President Obama’s “2012 Election Playlist” was posted recently on Spotify (credited to Obama and his young campaign staffers). There are songs by James Taylor and Springsteen, plus his new karaoke jam “Let’s Stay Together,” but there is a suspiciously large number of Country songs (Dierks Bentley, Darius Rucker, Sugarland, Zac Brown Band).  

Atlanta publisher Andrew B. Adler’s “kill Obama” column challenges my “fight-words-with-words” standard response to vicious publications and speech. It never should have been published. No, he’s not a racist, anti-Semitic crank or advocate of sex among boys, clerics and coaches. Sick as they are, I wouldn’t muzzle them so long as they are willing to accept the consequences.    

Don’t believe the tall tales spouted by Newt Gingrich, Steve Chabot or Dusty Rhodes. Despite what some overly excitable white, middle-aged men will tell you, recent federal rule changes that mean women will be able to get free birth control don’t infringe on religious liberty.  

People usually ask for autographs from people they are huge fans of, or people whose signatures they can sell for some quick cash. That’s why Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Miami Twp.) asking President Barack Obama for an autograph seems kind of weird. After all, Schmidt supports the assertion that Obama was born inside some foreign terrorist camp.  

Cincinnati’s new police chief, James Craig, who began his job in August, already is making some welcome and long overdue changes. Ten supervisors and 40 officers are being transferred from the department’s numerous specialized units and put on street patrol.  

Those of us who regularly witness these scenes were not surprised that it took only two weeks for Ohio to arrest its first legally armed bar patron for threatening to kill someone. Supporters of the new guns-in-bars law say it worked as intended and that once the gun-wielding public hears one of its brothers is in jail for five years the rest will learn to control themselves when someone plays Dave Matthews Band on the jukebox five times in a row.   

After months of speculation about when Apple would announce the launch of the iPhone 5, the company today finally scheduled the press conference that would change all of our lives forever ... and announced that there would be no iPhone 5. Tech geeks across the land responded with rage to the offer of an improved iPhone 4S, promising to switch to the Samsung Galaxy 2 and then weeping because they know it’s not true.  

After spending several weeks in the nation’s capital waiting for a chance to vote on a deal to raise the federal debt ceiling, U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown is glad to be back in Ohio. Brown, the Democrat from Avon, a Cleveland suburb on Lake Erie, was in Cincinnati this week to visit with constituents in this part of the state and meet with the media.