Will Ohio Democrats gain from the GOP Scandals

[liberal N proud]

On to Ohio
Christopher Hayes

It's hard to think of a state outside the Deep South where the Democratic Party has been more thoroughly whupped than Ohio. For over a decade, Republicans have controlled the governor's mansion and all statewide constitutional offices and had near two-thirds majorities in both state legislative chambers. Both US senators are Republican, as are twelve of eighteen Representatives. The sad fact is that the GOP has encountered precious little resistance on its path to hegemony; Democrats have been out-fundraised more than 2-to-1 and fight each other harder than they fight their Republican opponents. Lucas County, around Toledo, has two tribes of Democrats--the local press refers to them as Team A and Team B--whose members regularly battle each other for local office. "The Ohio Democratic Party is so terrible and ineffectual," a friend who worked on the campaign in Ohio last year recently told me, "it ought to be taken into receivership."

But things might be about to change. Thanks to the arrogance and corruption of the state GOP and the tireless investigative journalism of the Toledo Blade, every day Ohio voters are learning more about "coingate," a scandal at once farcical and outrageous, that touches nearly every prominent elected Republican in the state and could finally pave the way for a Democratic resurgence.

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050711&s=hayes

[AX10]

1. kick

[orion9941]

2. Ohio Dummocrats

Democrats in Ohio will never have a shot of taking anything back at a state level until there is some serious house cleaning within the Ohio Democratic Party. The ODP has helped screw over democratic campaigns better than any republican spin. Take the last Governors race in Ohio. The democratic candidate vertually got no funding from or help from the ODP.

[Botany]

3. Not if the Ohio Dem party has anything to do with it ......

..... they are the tits on a boar hog
..... they are the screen door on sub
..... they are to getting things done what a bicycle is to a fish.

Denny White :puke:

[formerrepuke]

4. One certaily hopes so. Dems have lost influence due to both

inertia and complacency (and some degree of disgust- consider the recently concluded political career of Democratic Congressman James Traficant)..all in the face of increasing Republican efforts- who do well in most small towns and many suburbs. I hope the Ohio Democratic party is planning on milking the "coingate" scandal for all it's worth.. and it IS a genuine scandal; unfortunately, there's no sex involved- so it will require a lot of hard work to convince people that it's a 'morality' issue.

[Kolesar]

5. Term limits drove a lot of good Dems out of Ohio government

Term limits were engineered by the gop to destroy effective politicians who knew how to get reelected.

[zbdent]

6. The media spin is that the dems are trying to make political capital

mountains out of molehills. (Capitalizing on Repub errors).

Even the editorial page of the somewhat moderate Akron Beacon Journal is using that spin . . .

[rexcat]

7. The repukes here in Ohio will keep control as long as...

the Democrats keeping putting up candidates who are lightweights. The ODC is in complete disarray in the state, and especially here in SW Ohio.

[norml]

8. Jeb Bush...Shocking 'Coin Gate' Crimes and Murder

Jeb Bush...Shocking 'Coin Gate' Crimes and Murder
Published on 02 July 2005 | Source: TNC Staff Reporter FL

Florida Investigator Who Got Too Close to Florida "Coin Gate" Silenced by Jeb Bush's Gangsters

Story Unfolding

Room 132 at the Knight's Inn in Valdosta, Georgia. Florida Department of Transportation Investigator Ray Lemme had the goods on the Bushes. He paid with his life.

Lemme was anxious to meet his contact, driving a beeline direct route from Tallahassee using I-10, Rt. 221, and US 85, to Exit 16 intersection of I-75 and US 85 (Knights Inn, 2110 West Hill Ave., Valdosta, Georgia). The Knights Inn is fairly remote from I-75, surrounded by empty lots and woods with few potential witnesses in the vicinity.

Wayne Madsen

FLORIDA PANHANDLE, June 10, 2005 -- Experienced federal investigators, acting independently, have discovered a covert funding channel used by the 2000 and 2004 Bush-Cheney campaigns and the administrations of Jeb Bush in Florida and Bob Taft in Ohio to illegally funnel foreign and other questionable money into Republican coffers.

Ever since the brutal death of Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) investigator Ray Lemme in July 2003, the focus of investigators in Florida and Georgia has been on the political scandal Lemme was uncovering. After his official investigation of contract fraud, money laundering, illegal immigration, and election fraud was shut down on orders of Jeb Bush, Lemme continued to investigate the use of FDOT to launder cash for the Bush Brothers and their allies. Lemme's focus was on the use of the Florida turnpike system to launder cash for the Jeb and George W. Bush campaigns. It was an investigation that would ultimately lead to Lemme's body being discovered in a motel room bathtub in Valdosta, Georgia. A two-state police cover up of Lemme's death, threats directed at Florida and Georgia investigators, and a virtual media blackout indicates that the GOP administrations of Jeb Bush and Georgia's Sonny Perdue wanted the Lemme story to go away -- and fast.


snip


http://www.newcriminologist.co.uk/news.asp?id=1185989364

[ElTexican]

9. Probably

n/t

[WLKjr]

10. I was told by a lady the other day

from Alabama that was passing through and stopped at the store I work in to buy a replacement portable DVD player for her kids on their way back home. Conversation went like something like this:

Thanks for telling me the truth about those other DVD players, I am glad your honest!

-me
Well ma'am, I hate to lie to people and always try to tell the truth, even if the better product is more you can take my word for it that it will last longer and you will have better luck with it in the long run.

-her
Thanks again.

-me
Will that be all for you today?

-her
Yes

-me
Okay then, your total is $145.46

-her
WOW, what is your tax rate up here?

-me
7% ma'am, used to be less than that till our dear gov. bob tax, cough, taft came into office.

-her
OH REALLY???? (now I know I am talking to a lefty at this point, but I don't point that out to her)

-me
Yah, he is the worst gov. Ohio has EVER HAD, he raises taxes, cuts schools funding, and is an all around lying idiot with a 19% approval rating, the lowest in the country!

-her
A republican huh?

-me
Yep! (smile on my face)

-her
Don't worry, I think they are in for a big hurt in 2006 with all these scandals, I am from Alabama and down there we have a 10% flat tax, I live in a military town and people get by alright there,.....

-me
And to top it off, he is involved in this coin-gate scandal, and cost ohio taxpayers millions of dollars and acts like it's nothing and Ken BLackwell, well he's a different story all together....

-her
Oh, I will have to read up about that, sounds interesting.

-me
Oh it is,


-Her
Well , things are going to get better for you here in Ohio, I can feel it, it's going to turn blue in 2006 because people are sick of republicans here, your not the only one I have heard say those exact same things......

-me
Have a safe trip home!


-her
Bye!




(this made my day)