Welcome Back! Eric J. Brewer reflects on the transition...

I'm not dead. Been unexpectedly busy as hell over the past couple of months. Just a few quick thoughts.

We kicked Judge John O'Donnell's ass for Supreme Court of Ohio at the polls and he knows we did it. The closeness of the campaign sent a strong message. I've learned some shocking information about him that I'll be releasing soon. It will come with a demand for a criminal investigation.

Looks like Rev. Darrell Scott backed a winner. Congratulations. From his cabinet choices I get President-elect Donald Trump's thinking. He's bringing WASPs back to the forefront to re-affirm an American "national identity" over the USA. It's gotten too multi-cultural. We're an English speaking and Christian nation and that's what his choices are affirming. His cabinet consists mainly of WASP's. Even the two immigrants, Elaine Chao and Nikki Haley, are married to WASP's. Haley's husband is a WASP from Cleveland. Two Catholics and one Greek Orthodox who's dad was WASP are on it. The only Jew in the cabinet, Steven Mnuchin, is handling the money. It fits the stereotype that's been associated with Trump. If he selects Dr. Ben Carson as Secretary of HUD he'll be the sole Descendant of U.S. Slaves in the cabinet. President Barack Obama didn't have any U.S. slave descendants in his first term cabinet and his only "black" cabinet member was Eric Holder as U.S. Attorney General. Holder, wasn't the Descendant of U.S. Slaves with his parents being born in Barbados. Trump's cabinet choices, with the exception of Chao and Haley, are deep rooted Americans. I served in the U.S. Air Force. The generals don't scare me. Their presence creates an interesting display of strength.

I've reviewed U.S. Senator Jeffrey Beauregard Session's sponsored and co-sponsored bills. He's Trump's choice for U.S. Attorney General. I took particular note of those he's sponsored or co-sponsored that benefit the Descendants of U.S. Slaves. The bills include his eliminating federal sentencing disparities for users of crack and powdered cocaine because it disproportionately hurt black people. He wants the racist Davis Bacon Act repealed. That 1931 law was specifically passed by Congress to stop black southern construction workers from moving north and taking jobs from white men. Sessions is anti-abortion knowing that two-thirds of aborted fetuses are black. He's sponsored or co-sponsored legislation that recognizes historically black universities and historic figures. Cleveland's Jesse Owens, Rosa Parks, Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and Nelson Mandela are among those he's introduced legislation to recognize.

And if folk are worried about Alabama and the KKK, consider these thoughts. Ohio had the largest number of KKK members in the USA during the 1920's. Over 400,000. Michigan, Pennsylvania and California were with Ohio in the top 4 KKK states. Alabama, where Sessions is from, wasn't even close. Consider this as well. Alabama desegregated its schools in 1963. We didn't even start in Ohio until 1977, and that was after Jim Hardiman and the NAACP sued the state in Reed v. Rhodes 1974. The racists we deal with here are far worse than those in Alabama. I'm cautiously optimistic about Sessions if we get the right U.S. Attorneys for the Northern and Southern Districts of Ohio.

East Cleveland voters should have already "early voted" Gary Norton out of the mayors job, and Thomas Wheeler out of the Ward 3 council seat. This may sound self-serving and I don't care. The last smart East Cleveland vote was my 85 percent victory in 2005. I kept the city out of fiscal emergency for 4 years. I built up the police department and cut crime by 40 to 75 percent. We had the lowest homicide record in years with 5 in one year. We striped streets, built playgrounds. I cut your fucking water and sewer rates by 40 percent.

There was absolutely no discussion about Cleveland Clinic closing Huron Hospital with me. Dr. Gus Kious and I had met to discuss ORC 749.01 that would have created a "municipal hospital" and provided free or low cost medical care for the city's residents. It would have been funded by property taxes. I wrote the $2.2 million NSP grant that was supposed to demolish 150 properties and renovate 15. I wrote a vacant property registration ordinance that was already generating money before I left. We estimated $625,000 the first year. Vacant property owners even now are required to register the property with the city and post a bond. Their name, address and real contact information are supposed to be posted on the front of the property. It can only be left vacant if they are actively trying to prepare it for rent or sell, otherwise they must tear it down. Violations are first degree misdemeanors.

We'd been successful in winning cost saving concessions from the unions. Ken Adams and I were working on a police complaint process that would have guaranteed investigations of misconduct. Frances Paster, my HR director, and I were stripping the police of disciplinary authority over police, and were moving towards disciplining them exclusively in accordance with more restrictive civil service rules. Cops who committed crimes were being prosecuted. My second term would have resulted in more police reforms.

And for the record, y'all know gotdamned well I wouldn't have handled the Cleveland cops who invaded East Cleveland and murdered Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams the way that bitch assed Norton did. Ralph Spotts will tell you that I instructed the city's cops to arrest any cop from another jurisdiction who pursued a person into East Cleveland without a warrant. I had already told Independence Excavating that I wouldn't let them turn the property into a dump where Norton and Wheeler supported the dump on Noble Road. We were working with the Port Authority to develop the area into a duty free zone. One of the DeGeronimo sons will confirm the meeting we had in my office. No fucking way would I have supported a Noble Road dump behind residential homes. That shit is insane and only fools think it's not.

Norton and Wheeler have fucked up East Cleveland beyond anything that could have been imagined. They also lack the skills, intellect and ethics to fix what they've fucked up.

We always had road salt when I was mayor. WEWS TV5 rated our streets the best cleaned in the region. We had the best EMS and fire response times of any community. Even if the service trucks and fire trucks were old, we maintained them. We checked employee drivers licenses twice a year to learn if their licenses were suspended. I fired cop Todd Carroscia for driving a police car into another person with his suspended license. We were also working on prosecuting his ass. Norton brought him back. He also returned Scott Gardner to work after he pled guilty to misdemeanors that had been reduced to felonies in Medina County. And where the fuck is the asphalt warmer and roller I bought to repair streets? Service Director Samuel Lockhart and I were working on a plan to buy garbage trucks to pick up our own trash, and equipment to do our own street paving.

Yes. You fucked up in 2009 East Cleveland. You fucked up again in 2013. It's 2016 and your two previous fucked up votes for Norton have led to your current level of misery. You can continue down the same reckless path you've proceeded down since 2009 or you can change. Whoever you elect will have to face you again next November, so it really doesn't matter. What you've got to do now is stop Norton and Wheeler from making any additional reckless decisions on your behalf. Tuesday, December 6, is the last day of voting. Do yourselves a favor and recall Norton and Wheeler.

Final thought. The Trump campaign victory fucked me up. It fucked Trump up, too. I've never seen Americans take to the streets and protest a winning presidential candidate in my life. Not like this.

Trump had no clue of what he'd be getting into by serving in an office that is as tightly-regulated as the presidency. People think presidents and other elected officials have power when all they have are duties and limits. The power of the presidency is extremely limited to exercising very narrow and specific legal authority.

The budget Trump inherits for 2017 is one which sets forth the priorities of the Obama administration. So I'm sure when Trump met with Obama, the president told him to forget all that shit he'd promised on the campaign trail, it ain't in the budget. No wall. No extra immigration enforcement officers. None of that bullshit. That's why he started backtracking. Reality hit him. Here's a link to Obama's budget priorities.https://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget [2]

So for me Trump is the president, like it or not. The election is not likely to be overturned and we're going to deal with him whether we like it or not. I've lived through Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, the two George Bush's, Bill Clinton and Obama. The presidents don't matter. It's the locals who fuck you, so I'm not really worried about Trump unless this pathological liar wants to convince me that we need a war. His challenges with the truth remind me of Norton in East Cleveland. I'd never believe him.

It's been a minute since we connected. Hope all is well in your world.