Strickland (D) vs. Blackwell (R) for Governor. I think Blackwell is scummy, for all the reasons mentioned in prior posts. I will say that he seems to have done a good job raising his daughter. She seems like a lovely young lady, as portrayed in his ads. Unfortunately, she is not the one running for office.

Tiberi (R) vs. Shamansky (D) for Congress. The last mailing Tiberi sent out pointed out the fact that he was born to “legal immigrants.” Gee Whiz.  The one before that bore pictures of fetuses outlining a Shamansky vote. The vote was an amendment on the Bill establishing the National Institute of Health which would limit the research that that Department could perform.  So if he voted FOR the amendment, I can only imagine what the campaign flyer would have said.  Shamansky votes to destroy the authority of the Institute?  Sigh. To be honest with you I am disappointed that the Dems are running Shamansky, as opposed to an up and coming guy. To me, he is just more of the same ole. But I have more in common with him than I do with Tiberi, who is against all the social issues I hold dear.

Brown (D) vs. Dewine (R) for Senate. Ok ok, I guess you see a trend here. I am ready for a change and not a roll over house for W. This is a vote for change. Change in Iraq, change in stem cell research, change in social policy.

Montgomery (R) vs. Dann (D.) for Attorney General. Ok.. this one is still a toss up for me. I really like Betty Montgomery. She seems to be one of the most moderate republicans in the state. She was pushed out of the gubernatorial primary because she refused to get muddled in the mud of who was more God Fearing, Petro or Blackwell. If she had been in the primary, I would have voted for her. HOWEVER, her ads against Dann are DISGUSTING. As a public defender Dann DEFENDS criminals. That is his job. Gee whiz. Of course he is going to come up with sound bites that make him sound like the devil incarnate.

Kreider (D) vs. Goodman (R) State Senate Just because someone doesn’t know how to market her self, is no reason not to vote for her. On the other hand, she has not really fought back against Goodman’s ads attacking her voting record. I respect Goodman for his standing up for gay rights at the statehouse, but that is about it. I will probably vote for Kreider because she is from my hometown and people who know her say she is a good person. Ok… not the most informed vote, but at least I admit it.

Taylor (R) vs. Sykes (D) Auditor of State. Taylor is a CPA. Period. Also, I think that the Auditor position is a good place for checks and balances for the state government. Since I expect that we will have a Dem state gov for this next term, we should have a republican auditor.

Brunner (D) vs. not sure for Secretary of State. We need to get this office cleaned up once and for all. Can’t even imagine the crumbs that Blackwell has left on his side of the bed here. EWWW.

The only judge I will vote for is Cain, who I think is a Republican. Basically, I don’t have any clue who the good judges are and I refuse to vote on the basis of who gave out the best candy in the Westerville 4th of July parade. I am voting for Cain, because my legal practicing next door neighbor, whose opinion I respect is supporting his candidacy.

Fewer people read their news these days, and when they do it is in “soundbite” dribs from the internet.  Newspaper sales are at an all time low and tv news is so factionally divided, one can predict polling numbers from viewship stats. The proliferation of entertainment commentators such as Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly and large conservative talk radio empires, like Clear Channel take politicing to a new low level. 

One has to wonder what these changes are doing to the basics of democracy.  As Arizona lures uneducated voters with the possibility of winning the electoral $1,000,000 lottery, we can only expect our politicians to stoop to new lows to pull in electorate votes.

As a warning to all those politicians who think that they can lure me in by showing how their long established opponent hates children, the working poor, and thinks that our troops need neither reinforced tanks or body armor, know that we see through your guise.  All we have to do is look at the polls to see WHY you are sinking to these levels. 

As Alan K. Simpson, former republican Senator explained,  “If you have integrity, nothing else matters.  If you don’t have integrity, nothing else matters.”

I will vote for the ones who matter.

Dear Editor,

I was disappointed and surprised that Ken Blackwell would choose Millard Fillmore as the worst president in Sunday’s “Ken’n’Ted” Survey. Although Fillmore is not remembered as a shining president, he is credited with delaying the Civil War through his signing of the Compromise of 1850 and starting the White House library. In addition, he sent Commodore Perry to Japan with a letter declaring friendship with the emperor.

Better choices for worst president would have been Lyndon B. Johnson, for his active role in the Vietnam War and the loss of 58,000 Americans, Andrew Johnson who was impeached when he sided with the Confederacy after the Civil War, or even Ronald Reagan, who tripled the national debt during his presidency.

Before Mr. Blackwell condemns Millard Fillmore as the worst president, and compares his own economic policies to those of Ronald Reagan, as he did in the last gubernatorial debate, he should make sure he knows his American history.

Anna K.

11^th grade American History student, Westerville North High School

For as far left as the Dems are, he said that is more palatable than as far right as the Republicans have seemed to go. At least when the Dems go too far left, individual freedoms are respected and institutions, such as schools, stay in tact. As an elementary school teacher, he looks at the 65 cent “solution” that Blackwell has proposed as a mechanism to dismantle public education, not support it.

Conservative Westerville seems to be serving as testament to the red tide of disillusionment the current Republican administration has brought. Given that, I find it surprising that the party would want to further that disillusionment by running Blackwell, who personifies the worst the Taft Administration has offered Ohio: hypocracy, self righteousness and narrowmindedness.

As reported in the Orlando Sentinal by Jim Stratton U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris said this week that the separation of church and state is “a lie,” that God did not intend for the United States to be a “nation of secular laws” and that a failure to elect Christians to political office will allow lawmaking bodies to “legislate sin.”

……..(sic)

She warned that if voters do not send Christians to office, they risk creating a government that is doomed to fail.

“If you are not electing Christians, tried and true, under public scrutiny and pressure, if you’re not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin,” she told interviewers, citing abortion and gay marriage as two examples of that sin.

Doing so, she said, “will take western civilization, indeed other nations because people look to our country as one nation as under God and whenever we legislate sin and we say abortion is permissible and we say gay unions are permissible, then average citizens who are not Christians, because they don’t know better, we are leading them astray and it’s wrong…”

She says it all.

Ken Blackwell Supporters Invade a Strickland Rally

Complete with video!

THIS is how the campaign sells their candidate? How frat-minded can you get?

Stay tuned for next week’s headline to be:

Blackwell supporters TP Strickland Headquarters- complete with footage.

Answer to the issues, Kenny–

• Educating our youth and being accountable to what they are being taught,
• THEN keeping these kids IN Ohio!
• Building Ohio’s tax base through job growth
• Attracting business and population growth in order to build a strong tax base,
• Protecting Ohio’s neediest populations through affordable healthcare and basic services
• And Ethics in State Government. ( Since your programs as SoS were ineffective- what now?)

OH TO BE AN OHIOAN…..

…..

Why??? Because a bunch of suburban moms in the reddest of red suburbs would never vote for Blackwell.

I live in conservative Westerville, Ohio. We are a tree city; we have good schools, great parks and a nationally ranked public library. We have more churches than barber shops and the barbershops are welcoming places with names like John’s Barbershop and Dave’s. I have been in neither, then again the only times I have been in the churches have been for weddings and funerals.

Westerville votes red no matter what the election. Red yard signs outnumber blue yard signs, and W is my President decals rival My Child is an Honor Student at whatever school bumper stickers on resident’s cars.

We are an open door pull yourself up by your bootstraps kind of community.We are the kind of community whose PTAs start meeting in the summer. I hung around after our first meeting of the year last night. I figure that a group of PTA moms talking after a summer meeting is a pretty good barometer…

And guess what… these republican moms are voting for the democrat! Why? Blackwell’s talk of transparency and yet reluctance to share tax returns, lack of support for our schools and general holier than thou attitude through his reign as Secretary of State will lose this election in the suburbs. In discussing his brainchild “The Ohio Center for Civic Character.,” the secretary of state’s website says,

The (sic) project provides simple, epiphany-creating resources to help diverse Ohio government, faith, business, education and service leaders commonly articulate and practice the trust-building essentials of personal good character and collaborative enterprise, together..

So glad that Blackwell and the current dragged through their own mud administration feels it their charge to promote “Civic Character.”

On the site, the Secretary of State asks every office holder and candidate to affirm:

Therefore, as a leading citizen and model to others, I will continue to voluntarily and intentionally strive to practice and communicate character ethics (as defined by Character First, Character Counts, UncommonSense and similar non-partisan guides) and encourage my fellow citizens within my community to strive likewise.

I suppose that this does not include disclosing tax returns. It’s ok Kenny… we’ll just trust ya.

Sunday’s Columbus Dispatch reports that Blackwell, himself, continues to encroach on my job everytime he opens his mouth and alienates more citizens.

In a compare/ contrast the candidates on the issue of faith, Blackwell responds to the question,” Is homosexuality a sin, and can gays be cured?” Blackwell answers,

” I think homosexuality is a lifestyle, its a choice, and that lifestyle can be changed. I think it is a transgression against God’s law, God’s will. The reality is, again,… that I think we make choices all the time, And I think you make good choices and bad choices in terms of lifestyle. Out expectation is that one’s genetic makeup might make one more inclined to be an arsonist, or night make one more inclined to be a kleptomaniac. Do I think they can be changed? Yes.”

Blackwell has the unquestioned backing of the most conservative evangelical Christians in Ohio, led in part by Rod Parsley of the World Harvest Church, Reformation Ohio, Ohio Restoration Project and the Center for Moral Clarity. (see previous Blackwell post)

The Columbus Dispatch enlightens the rest of Ohio with some of the rhetoric shared at Parsley’s church:

The Rev. Tommy Bates, a Pentecostal preacher from Kentucky, described the beast rising out of the sea: a horned, multi-headed creature with the body of a leopard, paws of a bear and mouth of a lion — just like in the Book of Revelation. This, Bates said, was the political system of Babylon, the evil kingdom in the Bible that was opposed to God and his people.

But there to stop the beast was the Rev. Rod Parsley — the overseer of a worldwide ministry headquartered at World Harvest in southeastern Columbus, an outspoken critic of popular culture and a nationally known Republican ally. “The Lord spoke to me and said, ‘I chose Rod Parsley to push this beast back for a season,’ ” Bates said.

“He said it was Pastor Rod Parsley who I chose to alter the election, the presidential election. Not a Democrat, not a Republican situation, but the spirit of the Antichrist … that came walking in America.” Now, Bates said, that creature was returning, with “a great whore riding on the beast’s back. … She is identified with a city, a political city called Babylon which is going to usher in the Antichrist.”

Gag…..And Parsley’s goal, they report:

Parsley already has a network of 1,000 churches, a television ministry and a local congregation of 12,000, but he is driving to enlarge his fold even more. Over four years, he has set a goal of preaching the gospel to 1 million people, converting 100,000 of them to Christianity and registering 400,000 voters.

I suppose that’s because he already has his million dollar home complete with $1,000 playhouse Search Parsley ( re: Fairfield county tax records.)

This is NOT the pocket I would want ANY elected official to be in.

OH TO BE AN OHIOAN…..