Richard Doran

I’ve never felt Larry Doby gets nearly enough credit for being the first Black player in the American League. This weekend while we’re honoring Jackie, let’s also take some time to remember Larry Doby and his huge contribution to the game.

Cleveland, Columbus, Cincy, Toledo - all are just suburbs of Youngstown now.

I have been holding my tongue about something that happened during the Ohio gubernatorial race. I refused to speak while the election was underway because I did not want my words mistaken for an attempt to influence anyone’s vote. But now that the election is over, I have something to say. For nearly twenty years, my ministry has taken me among the homeless, the abused, the exploited, and the forgotten. I have sat with victims of sexual violence and witnessed the lifelong wounds of childhood trauma. What Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign did to Amy Acton was among the most morally repulsive things I have witnessed in American politics. They took a woman whose stepfather was indicted for raping her when she was twelve years old and featured her mother, from whom she had been estranged for nearly fifty years, in a political advertisement attacking her credibility. The advertisement challenged Acton’s account of her childhood without mentioning the sexual abuse allegations or the circumstances of that estrangement. When people expressed their horror, the campaign defended it. Imagine examining another person’s childhood suffering and fractured family relationships, then deciding those wounds might help win an election. Anyone who has worked with survivors of childhood sexual abuse understands the painful realities of denial, betrayal, shame, and estrangement. A child growing into a successful adult does not erase what happened. Nor does a parent’s denial make that suffering disappear. I find it equally disturbing that an elderly mother, whom Acton herself described as unwell, was brought into this spectacle. Whatever her own struggles or responsibility for the past, exploiting that fractured relationship was grotesque. To everyone who defended this, consider the message you sent to survivors. To the young woman whose family refuses to believe her. To the man who has carried the shame of childhood abuse for forty years. To the frightened child who has yet to tell anyone. What did you teach them about the value of their suffering? I am a priest. I believe in repentance, forgiveness, and redemption. But none of those things requires me to pretend that deliberate cruelty is anything less than a grave moral failure. Your political allegiance does not absolve you of moral responsibility. You do not get to set aside your conscience during an election and retrieve it afterward. If your loyalty requires you to defend the exploitation of a childhood sexual abuse survivor, your loyalty has become an idol. And if your conscience cannot recognize the wrong here, examine what political tribalism has done to it. This is not about Republicans or Democrats. We have a choice as a people: continue excusing cruelty from our preferred political camp, or summon the courage to condemn it wherever it appears. Amy Acton deserved better. Every survivor who watched this unfold deserved better. And God help us if we have reached the point where winning an election matters more than protecting the dignity of a wounded human being.

My sincerest wish is that today is the last day I ever have to hear the names Ken Paxton or Vivek Ramaswamy.

Governor DeSantis BLASTS Kristi Noem for bungling mass deportations and turning it into a shit show for her own glory. DeSantis BLASTS Congressmen like Byron Donalds for making millions on the stock market. DeSantis BLASTS Alina Habba for getting a $10 million government contract and securing a presidential pardon for her boyfriend. “If the people in office don't display some civic virtue about public service as a sacrifice. It's not to use the public office for private gain. I declined the pension in Congress. I declined the health care. I didn't trade the stocks. And I believe in congressional term limits. I mean, imagine if you went to the American people and actually tried to get that done. That's not right or left. That's something that a lot of people realize.. These guys work for themselves. They should be working for you.”