Author: Jared Kamrass

Donald Trump’s victory in 2016 showed Democrats that their ‘Blue Wall’ in PA, MI, and WI wasn’t so fortified after all. For the first time since 1988, a Republican presidential candidate carried the Midwestern states that had been the bulwark to what Dems had thought was a structural advantage in the Electoral College.

Since that night, Jared Kamrass of Cincinnati, OH notes that Dems have worked to find new paths to victory in these high white-working class states. Keeping all three governor’s mansions and flipping legislative chambers in MI and PA in 2022 exceeded expectations for even the most optimistic Dem. But it was last night in Wisconsin where a state Supreme Court race was the culmination of nearly 8 years of work to rebuild.

Left-leaning local judge Janet Protasiewicz decisively beat former high court judge Dan Kelly to give Dems a 4-3 majority on the Court. With gerrymandered maps, abortion restrictions, and threats to executive power all expected to be argued in front of the court, Wisconsin is poised to join MI and PA as having fair maps, access to abortion, and a reigned in legislature.

The common denominator has been the inroads Dems have made with white college educated voters, particularly in the suburbs. These trends had begun during the Trump presidency but have accelerated with the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.

As the 2024 Presidential Election begins in earnest, Jared Kamrass believes these trends are likely to continue, especially if the now-indicted Trump is the GOP nominee. While fast-growing Sun Belt states such as Arizona and Georgia are now critical to the Dems electoral path moving forward, and party strategists are salivating over demographic trends in North Carolina and Texas, the party has now demonstrated successful alternate paths to victory in the Blue Wall states that, if sustainable, will make Republican’s options in the Electoral College exceedingly slim.

The last decade has seen many technologies make their way into the domain. But there’s no denying that blockchain and artificial intelligence are the most innovative — and their fusion will form the technology of tomorrow.

Jared Kamrass of Cincinnati, OH explains that AI allows machines to help people make decisions. Blockchain allows for transparent, secure, and tamper-proof applications. The crossroads between both have the potential to revolutionize a myriad of industries by improving their efficiency and clarity.

ChatGPT Is an Evolutionary Creation for Technology’s Future

ChatGPT, crafted by OpenAI, is a fantastic example of how artificial intelligence has evolved in recent years, creating intelligent “robots” that can learn from input data and provide outputs similar to humans.

Experts dub ChatGPT a breakthrough in the world of natural language processing thanks to its vast language model that enables human-esque replies to queries. Though, its not perfect.

The application has a plethora of uses for businesses looking to automate certain tasks and enhance their customer experience — adding blockchain to this just increases its power.

How AI and Blockchain Can Work Together to Craft the Future

One significant application of both technologies working together is in cybersecurity.

Digital threats are becoming alarmingly commonplace, and the traditional system-securing methods aren’t cutting the cake. Luckily, AI and blockchain should create a more positive outlook for the industry.

Artificial intelligence can be used to identify and respond to threats. Blockchain tech can maintain security and data integrity. Combining the two ensures a more secure and efficient cybersecurity system for people, companies, and even governments.

But the Future Has Much More in Store for Blockchain and AI

The technological combination is making its way into the supply chain management field.

Blockchain technology can be utilized to craft a secure, transparent supply chain, while artificial intelligence analyzes data to optimize proceedings. This tandem working helps businesses decrease costs, enhance efficiency, and ensure deadlines are met with precision without compromising quality.

It Doesn’t End There

The seemingly unbeatable duo is also making headway in the financial services sector to create efficient, secure payment systems.

AI quickly detects fraudulent patterns and activities, with blockchain bolstering transaction security and integrity. By working together, the technologies reduce the time and cost necessary for overseas transfers, increasing the financial system’s accessibility.

And, Of Course, They Have a Roll in Decentralization

Naturally, artificial intelligence and blockchain are helping to realize decentralized marketplaces. Such marketplaces allow buyers and sellers to deal with each other directly without third parties.

Similar to other fields, blockchain ensures authenticity, while AI optimizes and analyzes. The latter also has the ability to make personalized recommendations to buyers based on their shopping habits or recently purchased goods.

The AI/Blockchain Collision is Undeniably the Future of Technology

The artificial intelligence and blockchain crossover has the power to reinvigorate all sorts of industries, including others unmentioned here.

As companies continue looking for ways to automate and improve experiences, such technologies will continue appearing in abundance. And experts are saying they’ll evolve with even more vigor as time goes on.

From art museums to botanical gardens to stadiums to parks, the city of Cincinnati in Ohio has it all. Ranked one of the best places to live in the United States of America, it boasts a diverse economy, low-cost living, excellent family-friendly streets, and a boatload of jobs.

But, Jared Kamrass of Cincinnati, OH states that as the latest real estate news shows, there’s more coming to the area for Cincinnatians to look forward to. 

Downtown Cincinnati Building to Be Sold for $3 Million to The City

Last Wednesday, the city council voted to purchase 101 W. Fifth St. from Saks, the luxury retailer, for $3 million, giving them complete control over the coveted downtown site. 

According to officials, the lump sum will come from the TIF (tax-increment financing district) that funds developments in the southern downtown area of the city.

Saks occupied the property from 1984 until December 2022, when the city unanimously decided to buy the site. Mayor Aftab Pureval reportedly stated that the future of the building is bright — it will be instrumental in reinvigorating Cincinnati’s convention center district. 

While it’s unclear precisely what the Council will do with the former Saks building, councilmember Jeff Cramerding assures residents that it will increase vitality and bring more energy to the block. 

Cincinnati Leads the Nation with Fastest-Selling Homes

Other US cities may be experiencing a housing market cooldown, but the Cincinnati metro area remains piping hot. According to Zillow, a countrywide online listing service, homes in the vicinity are achieving a pending offer in just 12 days.

The city’s housing market is still energized despite key changes, like inflation and rising mortgage rates. So much so that the area pocketed the “fastest-selling US home market” title.

Montgomery Quarter to Complete in 2023

Montgomery Quarter, a transformational development on the Montgomery Road and Ronald Reagan Cross-County Highway intersection, is set to complete construction this year. 

The mixed-use development contains an array of features anticipated to revitalize the area, including:

• Over 130 luxury apartment units and condos
• A luxury hotel
• Plenty of street and structured parking
• Flexible-use outdoor green space
• 100,000 square feet of Class A offices
• More than 30,000 square feet of restaurant and retail space

The $150 million development is currently under construction By Brandicorp. Upon its completion, Cincinnatians will benefit greatly from diverse dining, shopping, and living opportunities. 

Cincinnati Children’s Hospital’s New Behavioral Health Facility to Finalize in The Fourth Quarter

The new behavioral health facility has been in the pipeline for years, but the building is set to be completed in the final quarter of 2023. 

The $99 million state-of-the-art inpatient mental health development will encompass 160,000 square feet, boasting 68% more room than the current facility.

Throughout its five stories, the building is replacing the current inpatient suite on the College Hill campus. All inpatients at the new facility will get a private room, allowing families to visit and stay more easily than before. 

Such transformational improvements will ensure the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital can better foster an engaging, therapeutic, and patient-centric environment. 

Formerly known as the Western Intercollegiate Conference, Big Ten Conference is the oldest Division I collegiate athletic conference in the country. Formed in 1896 by the Universities of Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and many more, it hosts a wide range of events across a myriad of sports.

With such a fast-paced environment, Jared Kamrass reports that there’s always a lot for fans to catch up on. Here are the latest hottest topics.

UCLA’s Move to Big Ten Is Set to Be Fantastic for Supporting Student Athletes

UCLA and USC plan to switch from the Pac-12 conference to the Big Ten, which may have unbelievably positive effects on the schools’ athletes.

Traditionalists reportedly don’t appreciate that the move will eradicate age-old rivalries between geographically close and convenient teams. However, most believe this rationale hasn’t been the case for years. Now, it’s about money, and the revenue the schools stand to acquire in moving to the Big Ten proves essential for their athletic departments.

While USC’s private school status simplifies decision-making, things are more complicated for UCLA — it’s a public institution tied to the University of California system.

That said, USC, UCLA, and other Pac-12 members aren’t impressed with media and TV revenue from the conference in recent times. So, moving to Big Ten could see media contracts give them almost $1 billion per annum.

Furthermore, the switch will ensure UCLA can offer enhanced resources to players who need them to compete at elite levels, such as specialists, tutors, support staff, virtual tutoring, and so much more.

Next Commissioner to Have Direct Experience in College Athletics

With the Big Ten Conference searching for its next commissioner, Gary Barta, the Iowa athletics director, stated he wants to see them employ somebody with direct experience in college athletics.

Barta’s comment comes after non-traditional commissioner hires by Pac-12 and the Big 12 in the past 24 months. The Big 12 hired a former entertainment agency executive, and the Pac-12 chose an MGM Resorts mogul.

While Barta isn’t the Iowa representative who will be casting the vote, he’s certainly providing feedback in the hopes they’ll make a solid decision.

Two Ohio State Women Earn Big Ten Weekly Honors

Lena Hentschel received Big Ten’s Women’s Diver of the Week, and Katherine Zenick achieved the conference’s Women’s Swimmer of the Week after a meet victory over Michigan a few weeks ago.

Ohio State obliterated the Wolverines, earning its first win against Michigan in Ann Arbor. In fact, it was also the first time they won against Michigan in two consecutive dual meets.

Zenick won the 100 fly, reaching the wall in a cut time of 53.36 and finishing third in the 40 free with a time score of 22.59. The formidable swimmer was also on the winning 400 free relay and 200 medley relay teams, proving an integral component of both.

As for Hentschel, she won the one-meter and three-meter dives, earning a total score of 353.48 and 302.40, respectively. Both of her scores ensure she qualifies for NCAA Zones.

Ohio State sports teams have had a busy time of late. From a women’s hockey duo organizing a charitable clothing drive to the Buckeye’s loss against Georgia, a lot has happened in the last few weeks — and there’s even more to come!

Jared Kamrass of Cincinnati, OH states that since many fans find it hard to keep up with all the occurrences in Ohio State’s athletic world, the roundup below boasts the recent highlights in one easy-to-consume place.

Ohio State’s Kicker Takes Responsibility for Miss Against Georgia

Noah Ruggles, the kicker for Ohio State, missed a 50-yard field goal that allowed Georgia to secure their spot in the national championship. While the blow was tough to take for the team and fans, Ruggles is bearing full responsibility for missing the shot.

Jackie Ruggles, the kicker’s mom, spoke on behalf of her son on Tuesday morning, thanking Buckeye fans for their support and reaffirming that “Noah takes full responsibility for the miss.”

She went on to say that he is grateful for his teammates and coaches who always gave him a chance to succeed.

Former Syracuse Safety to Transfer to Ohio State

On Tuesday evening, Ja’Had Carter, the former safety for Syracuse, announced he will be heading to Ohio State.

As a three-star player from Richmond, Carter has a record of 12 pass break ups, 138 tackles, two fumble recoveries, and 3.5 tackles for loss.

The 198-pound six-foot-two player was an All-American freshman in 2020, regarded by many as the best safety in the transfer portal.

Carter is the third member to join the Buckeyes since the standard season ended, with John Ferlmann from Arizona State and Casey Magyar from Kent State joining him.

Ohio State Is Working Tirelessly to Fill the Arena for the Men’s Basketball

Ohio State is trying to fill the Value City Arena as the men’s basketball team will host Purdue on the night of January 5, 2023. Starting at seven in the evening, the game will be televised across the country on Fox Sports 1.

Early in the season, Ohio State played for some pretty sparse crowds, averaging 10,786 fans inside their 19,049-seat arena across seven matches.

However, they are looking for a near-full stadium this time. And it appears they will achieve it. Seven hundred students have opted in with discounted tickets, and over 15,000 tickets have been sold.

Ohio State has worked tirelessly to fill the arena, conducting a range of email pushes over the last 30 days, and running ticket giveaways on its social media.

Ohio State Women’s Hockey Duo Organized Clothing Drive

Quinn Kuntz and Emma Maltais from Ohio State’s women’s hockey team organized a clothing drive last month in support of Star House, a center that helps youth experiencing homelessness in Central Ohio.

The pair gathered more than 600 garments from student-athletes, staff, and coaches to donate to Star House ahead of the festive season.

On the ice, the two are well-respected players, and the team is starting its final half of the 2022-23 campaign next week.

Growing up, it was generally accepted that Michigan was in decline and that the state would always be inferior to my home of Ohio. Detroit was bankrupt, the auto companies needed a government bailout, and the state was rife with political corruption. On top of that, save a few decent years from the Pistons and Red Wings, sports in Michigan were floundering. The Lions were a perpetual laughingstock, University of Michigan football was bogged down by two horrendous football coaching hires while Michigan State was mired in mediocrity. Michigan was an easy target, even for places that seemed to have been dealt just as bad a hand in other states.

Meanwhile in Ohio, Jared Kamrass notes that Columbus and Cincinnati marked their place as two of the few Midwest cities to be on the upswing after the Great Recession, job growth was strong, and even the woeful sports franchises in Cincinnati and Cleveland experience success in ways that had been rare in decades prior. Cincinnati and Columbus received expansion professional sports franchises (NHL’s Blue Jackets and MLS’ FC Cincinnati) while Ohio State and University of Cincinnati experienced new heights of athletic success that was coupled with historic academic and research achievements.

As a Democrat in Ohio, Jared Kamrass reveled in our status as the premiere swing state in the nation. Sure, Michigan was more reliably Democratic, but the nation turned its eyes every four years to ‘Ohio, Ohio, Ohio’.

But as the Trump years and societal change from the COVID pandemic began to reshape our collective reality, something unexpected happened: Michigan lapped Ohio in nearly every measurable way. And November 2022 put this into stark relief in the span of only a couple weeks.

After Michigan voters enacted non-partisan gerrymandering reform, legalized adult-use cannabis, and enshrining abortion rights, they quickly became a model to the Midwest of how a functioning state-level democracy should look. At the same time, Ohio’s leaders ignited a constitutional crisis by ignoring the state Supreme Court not once or twice, but seven times, all in the pursuit of maximizing their own power through egregious gerrymandering. They ignored the will of their own voters by pushing a billion-dollar bailout of coal plants (later to result in several corruption indictments, including against the Speaker of the House), rolled back the state’s environmental standards, passed egregious abortion bans, and restricted access to voting.

It should come as no surprise that Michigan elected state level leaders resembling the will of voters while Ohio continues to restrict 45% of its voters to super-minority status while continuing to strip away the remaining pillars of functional democracy. Nowhere are the stark differences in the states’ trajectories more visually clear than in the Governors who won re-election in each in 2022. In Ohio, Gov. Mike DeWine is milquetoast, plodding, and barely a caretaker as he lets the extreme flank of his party in the legislature run roughshod over him on issues such as guns and education. North of the border, Governor Gretchen Whitmer is a young and exciting leader who has clearly articulated a vision for the future of her state.

Jared Kamrass of Cincinnati, Ohio notes that the whole country saw the reversal of fortune on the Saturday following Thanksgiving as 20 million Americans tuned into watch the University of Michigan’s 3rd ranked football program demolish Ohio State’s 2nd ranked squad on their home field. After dominating the first 20 years of the century, Ohio State seems to have fallen behind Michigan’s program when it counts, removing the last pillar of Ohio’s perceived dominance against ‘The State Up North’. Michigan even hired a university president who helped shape success at the University of Cincinnati while OSU is amid a campus-wide leadership crisis.

For all once-proud Ohioans, the solutions aren’t simple, and certainly will require differing approaches. But Michigan clearly showed that the path forward needs to include returning power to voters and shedding the ‘failed state’ distinction that comes with a non-functioning Democracy. Ohio has long been a microcosm of the nation, yet our politics and policies resemble that of states like Mississippi. Access to abortion, cannabis, voting rights, fair districts, and functioning social services are all core to Michigan’s success, and have only come with voters being empowered to use their voice.

At the ballot box and on the football field, Michiganders have found their voice, their identity. Meanwhile, Ohio has strayed from its. Michigan has embraced popularism and empowerment, with a streak of midwestern toughness. Meanwhile, in the Statehouse and the Horseshoe, Ohio has become something it’s not: one sided, weak, and unbalanced.

Almost everyone not involved in politics has the same reaction when they find out most states elect their judges: “why?”

Jared Kamrass of Cincinnati OH notes that this is a perfectly reasonable question, and one that doesn’t really have a good answer yet remains the case.

In the aftermath of the Dobbs decision from the Supreme Court, including comments from Justice Alito about similar cases such as Marriage Equality, access to birth control, along with future Court decisions around redistricting, Jared Kamrass notes that it’s clear Conservative activists are aggressively pursuing a strategy of allowing states to make decisions about rights and civil liberties.

At the same time, these same activists have pumped hundreds of millions into judicial races across the country. And when things don’t go their way, they change the rules. In 2020, Ohio elected two Democrats to the Supreme Court while Donald Trump was carrying the state handily. In 2021, the Republicans in the legislature changed the ballot to show party label next to Supreme Court candidates, in the hopes that voters would revert to their partisan tribalism and Republicans would carry all future races.

In 2022, state after state will be electing Supreme Court judges who will hear cases about legislative gerrymandering, overturning election results, and whether or not women can safely get an abortion.

Democrats are typically good at mobilizing their voters for big races at the federal level, but struggle to do so for down ballot races. Starting in 2022, and for years to come, Jared Kamrass mentions that leaders in the party will have to do a better job funding these races and motivating voters to care about them. The rights that had been deemed secure and permanent are all now in question. And they won’t be decided by well-vetted federal judges confirmed by the Senate, but by partisan elected officials.

Two of Jared Kamrass of Cincinnati, OH’s great passions are political campaigns and football, so it shouldn’t shock you that is his favorite season.

Depending where you live, you may be used to ominous political ads during injury timeouts or the two-minute warning. In Jared Kamrass’s hometown (Cincinnati), even-numbered years have always guaranteed a steady diet of candidates in his living room during breaks in OSU and Bengals games.

But Amazon’s announcement that Prime won’t be airing political ads during their ballyhooed productions of Thursday Night Football may be the beginning of the end for one of the last, best ways to guarantee political advertisers reach an audience: live sports.

Over the last decade, as viewers/voters shift away from ‘appointment’ television and switch to watching content through streaming and cut the cord, live sports has been the one holdout. No one wants to DVR a football game or watch the World Series on YouTube the next day.

Political advertisers and their media buyers have been willing to pay a premium to guarantee such a high market share for a cable or broadcast placement. Three days after TNF on Prime launched with a big Chiefs/Chargers matchup, the Bengals opened their season against the hated Pittsburgh Steelers. That 1:00pm CBS slot garnered a 39.0 rating and a whopping 76.3 share in the Cincinnati DMA.

But Amazon’s entering into live sports may finally be closing off that last captive audience for advertisers. It has been rumored for years that Amazon, Apple, or Google may snatch up portions of College Football conference media rights, and Amazon’s strong start with TNF on Prime isn’t likely to dampen that speculation.

While the advertising capabilities of the tech companies certainly allow for better targeting and more creative ad placement, political advertisers will be out of luck if other platforms follow the lead of Amazon and ban such ads from their platforms.

Tech platforms aren’t under the same obligation as FCC-licensed broadcast stations and cable providers to show political ads at ‘lowest unit rates’. So, while tech platforms might consider allowing political ads (though not legally required to do so) media buyers might want to brace themselves for sticker shock.

Jared mentions that we shouldn’t expect to see NFL, College Football, Playoff Baseball, or the NBA fall off over-the-air providers anytime soon, however, we can expect Amazon’s foray into the NFL to accelerate the trend that media buyers and political advertisers have been dreading for years.