Patrick Johnston, founder of the anti-abortion group Personhood Ohio, sent out an email this past weekend encouraging recipients to help his cause by “buying an assault rifle” and “some high capacity magazines and a ton of ammo.”
He wasn’t suggesting they buy just any assault rifles, mind you, but assault rifles from Johnston’s personal collection including two Chinese SKS rifles and a MAK 90. All three weapons use the same ammunition the AK 47 (7.62×39mm). Two of the rifles come with high capacity magazines and one includes a drum holding 100 rounds. He is also auctioning off 2550 rounds of ammo.
Because…. [...]
Teen pregnancy in Ohio has seen a dramatic decline since 2006, as well as a drop in the abortion rate. Ridiculously, Ohio Medical Board member (and anti-abortion activist) Mike Gonidakis is crediting the War on Women for the decline in abortion even though the abortion rate fell faster under Strickland than under Kasich’s first year… which is the most recent data we have.
Gonidakis was probably thinking of the drop in teen pregnancy, though we yet don’t have any Kasich-era statistics for that. What we see is huge decreases in 2000 and 2001, then a plateau followed [...]
Full Story... →It’s either that or they’re going with “Unofficial Kasich campaign committee.”
Let’s remember that the entire idea of JobsOhio came from Mark Kvamme, a maxed out campaign donor to Kasich who just also happened to be one of the major funders of Kasich’s Recharge Ohio PAC and other PACs that Kasich used to keep his political staffers on the payroll during his time in the political wilderness between his failed 2000 presidential bid and his 2010 run for Governor. The day AFTER Kvamme left JobsOhio, he just happened to write $25,000 in campaign donations [...]
Full Story... →Ohio ranks 47th in private sector job creation over the past month when you measure by percentage increase in new jobs (which is a fairer way to measure as it accounts for differences in population). Today, the Pew Charitable Trusts put those numbers in this handy graphic form:
Not only is Ohio tied for 47th, but over the past twelve months, Ohio has barely shown any job growth at all. In fact, the only way Ohio could drop lower is if it were actually losing jobs.
But never fear, fellow citizen, JobsOhio is [...]
Full Story... →One thing we know for sure: the Republicans in the Ohio Legislature care more about ideology than the Constitution.
We aren’t surprised, therefore, that the Republicans are pushing forward with a blatantly unconstitutional anti-abortion bill.
The bill is likely designed to be unconstitutional under current law because it imposes an undue burden on women who seek abortions. Some in the anti-abortion community seem to believe that if they keep passing laws that are against the existing case law, the Supreme Court will one day take a case and overrule Roe v. Wade. To that we say: if you can count [...]
Full Story... →The House GOP wants Ohio to adopt the Irish law that led to the death of Savita Halappanavar.
HB 200, the Politicians Playing Doctor Act, is a chilling glimpse into the minds of Crisis Pregnancy Centers. These sorts of bill–waiting periods, ultrasound requirements, forcing doctors to lie–are based on the CPC practices that are most likely to coerce a woman into continuing a pregnancy.
And, as we’ve long suspected, CPCs don’t care at all about the woman.
I’ll let others delve into the implication of forcing transvaginal ultrasounds on rape survivors, as this bill [...]
Full Story... →Today, the conservative organization Opportunity Ohio began touting its report “Medicaid in Ohio: The Choice is Clear” a report that argues against Governor Kasich’s support for expanding Medicaid under the President’s Affordable Care Act. However, the report notes on its cover page that it was authored by Jonathan Ingram, Director of Research at the Foundation for Government Accountability, a Florida group with ties to ALEC and the Cato Institute that provided the research that Tea Party Governor Rick Scott unsuccessfully cited to justify his failed attempt to require welfare recipients to be subjected to suspicionless drug testing [...]
Full Story... →The Toledo Blade reports that the Center for Choice has closed in Toledo. The clinic was unable to get a transfer agreement from ProMedica, Mercy, or University of Toledo hospitals.
As I said earlier, transfer agreements are a requirement for ambulatory surgery centers. They’re redundant because of federal law, but the Ohio Department of Health is using them as a pretext to shut down abortion providers.
In Bowling Green, Kasich was asked by a UTMC medical student if he would veto the line item in the state budget that would close most of the [...]
Full Story... →California recently released the rates for Covered California, their insurance exchange. Everybody is pleasantly surprised at how low they are (except Republicans).
The unsubsidized Silver plan is $272 for a $2000 deductible. It’s shocking because everybody expected prices along the lines of employer plans–which is on average $437 a month in California*.
As I said earlier, that doesn’t make a huge difference for consumers; your premium is a percentage of your income, as is your deductible. Most people will be paying around $110 (or getting a $5000-deductible plan for free). Under 3% of the public will be [...]
Full Story... →The Ohio Republican Party drum-rolled its new “dynamic” website Monday with the sort of synthetic excitement one might find in a TV ad for industrial strength floor soap. It boasted that the party was ”creating a movement”- and we dare not take that thought much farther. ”A party united.” it exclaimed, hoping to create one of those ballpark waves for the home team. “A state of freedom,” it declared, which such groups as Planned Parenthood and altar-bound same-sex couples might want to contest.
OK, so it’s political fiction hoisted on the wings of the Right.
The party’s press release announcing the arrival [...]
Full Story... →Today, the Columbus Dispatch is reporting that Governor Kasich is going to issue an executive order “directing all state-run boards, commissions and departments issuing occupational licenses to take into account a veteran’s military education, skills training and service time when determining equivalency for licensing requirements.” Which sounds nice, until you realize that practically, it’s totally meaningless. It’s a typical “I love kittens and puppies” resolution that politicians do when they want to look like they’re doing something for veterans, without, you know, doing something to help veterans around election season. The executive order doesn’t even add veterans’ experience to what [...]
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