PARSLEY: Not a fan of Islam.

When we last caught up with the Rev. Rod Parsley, the rightwing evangelical who heads World Harvest Church outside Columbus, he was stumping the state spreading love for Secretary of State Ken Blackwell in his train-wreck run for the governor's office and spreading hate for, well, just about everyone else: gays, Muslims and anyone else he deemed insufficiently upstanding and moral.

After helping Blackwell launch his gubernatorial campaign in 2005, Parsley's profile dropped considerably the following year. When Blackwell launched a "pastors love me" drive a few months before the November 2006 election, Parsley was nowhere in sight. It wasn't clear if this was because the IRS was making noises about looking into churches violating their nonprofit status via partisan campaigning, or because it was becoming obvious that Blackwell was going to go down to epic defeat. Anyway, Parsley was busy growing his TV empire and selling 37-inch cross-inscribed replicas of King Arthur's sword (seriously).

But now Parsley is back, attempting to attach his star to yet another rising (he hopes) political figure. On Feb. 26, Parsley was spotted in Cincinnati beaming at the side of likely Republican presidential nominee John McCain, stumping with him during his appearances. In a mutual lovefest, Parsley was quoted in the Columbus Dispatch as calling McCain "a strong, true, consistent conservative," while McCain dubbed Parsley a "spiritual guide."

Those who've been following Parsley for a while will recall that among his choicer statements were vicious attacks on Islam, which he called in his 2005 book Silent No More a "false religion" inspired by "revelations from demons," and "an anti-Christian religion that intends, through violence, to conquer the world."

On the same day Parsley and McCain were campaigning side by side, Barack Obama, in the debate taking place in Cleveland, was hounded by moderator Tim Russert to repeatedly "denounce" and "reject" Louis Farrakhan, head of the Chicago-based Nation of Islam, due to his history of anti-Semitic remarks. Yet Obama's not in a position to "reject" Farrakhan because he never accepted him in the first place. Farrakhan has no connection to Obama; he merely praised the senator at an event not connected with his presidential campaign.

And for those who consider attacking Jews a thousand orders of magnitude worse than attacking Muslims, consider this: Parsley has called himself a "Christocrat" and urged the rejection of separation of church and state because he believes America was intended to be a "Christian nation."

Will John McCain be called upon to "denounce" and "reject" Parsley and his bigoted statements, or will the double standard for Democratic and Republican candidates remain firmly in place? - Anastasia Pantsios

THEY CALLED KENNY!

Remember Ken Blackwell? As Ohio's secretary of state, he was the state's elections honcho during the 2004 presidential election (and simultaneously was co-chair of the Bush-Cheney reelection campaign in Ohio). Anyway, he was all about the rules back then: He told us we couldn't cast provisional ballots even though our absentee ballots had never arrived. Forced us to turn in voter registration forms on a certain kind of paper, or get lost. So narrowly construed who could cast a provisional ballot and when that many of us couldn't cast a ballot at all.

Yeah, you remember. So does Rep. John Conyers, a Michigan Democrat and now chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Conyers just received authorization from a subcommittee to subpoena Blackwell and force him to testify on efforts to protect the vote rather than suppress it.

In 2005, as the committee's ranking minority member, Conyers doggedly investigated widespread irregularities in Ohio's 2004 presidential election. He and 11 fellow Democrats visited for hearings, and later issued a scathing report, "What Went Wrong in Ohio?" The inquiry concluded that there "were massive and unprecedented voter irregularities and anomalies in Ohio. In many cases these irregularities were caused by intentional misconduct and illegal behavior, much of it involving Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell."

Until now, Conyers' report, and subsequent recommendations for electoral reform, have languished. But now, a year after Democrats took control of Congress, he's bringing it up again. The occasion? The subcommittee on civil rights recently held hearings on voter suppression. Blackwell was invited to give voluntary testimony, twice. But he declined the first offer and never replied to the second.

Days before the scheduled hearing last week, committee staff called up Blackwell's office at the Buckeye Institute, a conservative policy group where he's the Ronald Reagan Distinguished Fellow for Public Policy. Buckeye staff told Conyers' staff that the former secretary of state would be in Denver. Sorry. In e-mail responses to the Cincinnati Enquirer, dated Feb. 2, Blackwell said that his "schedule will not permit me to attend."

If Conyers wanted to learn more about Ohio's elections in 2004, Blackwell told the Enquirer, "I recommend Chairmen Conyers review the US Census Bureau's 2004 post-election analysis."

The Census Bureau found record voter turnout among black voters. That, however, says nothing about what blacks encountered when they reached their polling places. Though by now most of the country knows what happened at Ohio's voting sites, if Conyers decides to in fact subpoena Blackwell, maybe we will all finally find out why. - Charu Gupta

YOUR CHAIRMAN IS SO FAT ...

Recently, Summit County Republican boss Alex Arshinkoff was tossed from the county elections board by Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner for being a douchebag (more or less). Days later, the Committee to Re-Elect Jonathan T. Pavloff (the Summit County chair of the Republican Central Committee) mailed flyers to Akron residents extolling the virtues of his buddy Arshinkoff. The front of the flyer reprinted President George H. W. Bush's Lincoln Day speech from Feb. 23:

"Congratulations, Alex, for your many years of leadership and for the role you've had in building one of the strongest, most successful urban Republican organizations in the nation. Under your leadership the Summit County Republican Party has flourished despite all the obstacles you've faced: union domination, a small Republican voting base and an unfavorable press. Thank you for that leadership and keep up the good work, Alex!"

OBAMA: Admired by Whites - like Mike!

Attached to the glowing quote from the former president was either the most unflattering photo of Arshinkoff we've ever seen or an ad for the new McDonald's Happy Meal campaign, "Grimace goes to Washington." (We'd love to show you the photo, but it was too dark and grainy to reproduce.)

Incidentally, Pavloff, Akron's second most powerful Republican, has not bothered to vote in a Republican primary in over a decade. Note to Pavloff: If you really want to kiss ass, dump the flyer campaign and treat your fella to some appletinis at the Interbelt. Their Fabulous Fridays lineup for March is truly fabulous! - James Renner

YOU WILL VOLUNTEER, AND YOU WILL LIKE IT

Deputy County Administrator Rick Werner may have broken the law - or at least overstepped his authority - when he recently informed county employees that they had to spend their spare time campaigning for Issue 15, a levy for Cuyahoga County Health and Human Services.

Last week the Free Times received a hard copy of an e-mail Werner sent to employees at the Office of Health and Human Services, the Department of Job and Family Services, and the Office of Homeless Services on Feb. 24.

"Let me be clear: everyone who is part of the Office of Health and Human Services MUST volunteer on the Issue 15 campaign," the e-mail states. "While my insistence may put my request beyond the definition of "volunteering,' we all have an obligation to the County's health and human service mission to be a part of the campaign."

The e-mail concludes, "Please let me know if you have any questions or if I have not been crystal clear in my request."

And it most certainly was a request, Werner tells Free Times. "They don't have to volunteer if they don't want to," he says, adding, "It's hard for me to think anyone could view [the e-mail] as a kind of threat, but I can't tell you how each individual would react to it. I feel like we as a staff have an obligation to volunteer on this levy."

So, to recap: HHS employees "MUST" volunteer, but they don't have to, but they have an obligation to, but only if they want to. But they better want to. Crystal clear!

- JR

DUDE, YOU'RE NOT HELPING

Mike White took a break from shoveling alpaca shit and sweeping his office for FBI bugs last week to endorse Barack Obama for president.

Apparently, he is suddenly inspired by Obama (surely it has nothing to do with Hillary's waning support in recent weeks). With no sense of irony, White writes, "In my almost 28 years of active politics, I sadly watched the political process slowly become a process, not of creating hope, but of sowing as much division as possible in order to garner status, power and control."

Obama, he says, can change all that. Just, hopefully, not here in Cleveland, where White's friend and occasional best man Nate Gray used White's influence to place minority front companies at the airport in exchange for kickbacks, earning status, power and control in the process. - JR

YOU ROCK

Jennifer Brunner: Regardless of the outcome of this week's primary, the real winner is our new secretary of state, who put her reputation on the line by forcing Cuyahoga County to drop its expensive, hackable Diebold voting machines in favor of optical-scan ballots which leave a verifiable paper trail. It's a welcome change to see an elected official take on some responsibility instead of passing the buck. And she finally got rid of Alex Arshinkoff, too? Well, now, we're just smitten.

YOU SUCK

Clear Channel billboard programmers: We love that you want to update us on breaking news during our daily commutes. Gossip simply can't wait 45 minutes. But sometimes you get a little carried away with your punctuation. For example, the jury's decision to send Bobby Cutts to prison for 57 years was no cause for gleeful celebration. Three exclamation points? That's just tacky. In the future, limit exclamation points to stories involving good weather and/or Michael Stanley.