Last month we broke the story of Republicans trying to disenfranchise Ohio college students. The plan, buried in the Ohio House budget, would penalize Ohio universities that provide proof of residency documents to students who live on campus. Without such documentation, many students would not be able to comply with voter ID laws and would be forced to vote provisionally.
When asked about the plan, Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted’s office told Talking Points Memo that “he is not pushing for the universities to provide students with documentation to help them register to vote.”
“This is not [...]
By all accounts, State Representative Connie Pillich should not even be in the legislature right now. When Governor Strickland appointed then State Representative Jim Raussen to a post at the Ohio Department of Development shortly before the 2008 election (and Raussen accepted), it avoided the 2006 rematch in which Pillich, an Air Force veteran who served in support of both Operation Desert Storm and Desert Shield, narrowly lost. After the Republicans quickly unified around a replacement candidate, Pillich narrowly carried the district by a little over 5,000 votes.
In the 2010 election, Pillich was pitted against Mike Wilson, the head [...]
Full Story... →We have an uphill battle to get voters to blame Kasich for local government cuts. It’s a risky strategy because it cuts against a number of longstanding cultural biases that Republicans have exploited for a generation. The FitzGerald campaign (and progressives in general) will need radical tactics to create a facsimile of responsible party government in Ohio over the next 18 months.
Responsible party government is a government wherein voters know what elected officials are doing, and the results of those policies. For example, let’s say Party A wants to reform the state tax code without losing revenue. They pass [...]
Full Story... →For the first two years of his term as Attorney General, we didn’t hear much from Mike DeWine. But as the race heats up for the 2014 election cycle, you can’t seem to turn on the TV or open a paper lately without seeing him photobombing any story or event that might get his face or name in front of Ohioans.
The Steubenville rape trial, the Cincinnati IRS office scandal, the shootings at Sandy Hook, the Cleveland rape victims, the Cleveland police-involved shooting… DeWine’s press team has found a way for DeWine to capitalize on all of these [...]
Full Story... →On Wednesday, Speaker Batchelder told the media that if the Senate would add an emergency clause to HB 7, a bill that would effectively make Internet sweepstakes cafes an illegal form of gambling in Ohio, he had the votes in the House to sustain it. Which isn’t really that surprising given that when it passed the House last month, it passed with the 66 votes (two-thirds majority) it would take to sustain it as an emergency measure. This is significant because as an emergency measure, HB 7 would take effect immediately after receiving Governor Kasich’s signature, and emergency measures [...]
Full Story... →Lionel Hutz: I’m here defending you on the charges of . . . (looks at sheet) Murder One!? Wow. Even if I lose I’ll be famous!
What is going on with the Republican Prosecutors in Southwest Ohio?
Yesterday, we noted that Republican Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters was thinking about pursuing what can only be described as politically motivated prosecutions of voters who cast provisional ballots after submitting absentee ballots. (Key idea: none of the voters cast more than vote.)
Previously, we brought you the story of Republican Warren County prosecutor David Fornshell, who pursued a politically motivated [...]
Full Story... →Poor Rob Portman. It’s not enough that Mitt Romney ignored his faithful traveling companion in Ohio in choosing Paul Ryan as a running mate; it’s not enough that the GOP right-wing is flapping hysterically because of his seismic shift to support gay marriage; it’s not enough that the liberals have targeted him because of his opposition to background checks (and a lot of other things).
Portman, the junior senator from Ohio – more accurately, the right-leaning Cincinnati area – has now become a noun and a verb. As in : Portmanization. And Portmanize. These are not words that have been pattering [...]
Full Story... →Republican Prosecutor Wants to Charge Voters Who Did NOT Vote More Than Once
Republicans and their news operations continue to try to suggest that voter fraud was rampant in Ohio in 2012.
Before the 2012 Election, Secretary of State John Husted tried to appease the base by suggesting that voter fraud was a big problem – we noted that after the election, he quickly backed off that claim. Now, Husted has ordered all county Board of Elections to hold public hearings on voter fraud allegations. If the allegations are found to be credible, the Boards of Elections can [...]
Full Story... →The right wing has, for months, demanded that progressives talk about the Gosnell case. I’ve held off, because a) he hadn’t been convicted and b) before you can talk about Gosnell, you have to talk about absolutely everything else.
After all, unsafe illegal abortion is the raison d’être for the movement to legalize abortion.
Sometimes women get pregnant, and they don’t think they can have the baby.
Maybe it’s an ectopic pregnancy, and having the baby would kill both. Perhaps a complication (gestational diabetes, preeclampsia, infection, depression) will threaten the woman’s health. Sometimes women are raped and become pregnant, [...]
Full Story... →Last December, Adam Lanza killed 20 kids and 6 adults at a school in Sandy Hook, Connecticut. In response to the tragedy, many Republicans around the country suggested school employees should be carrying weapons to school in order to defend against a similar situation in the future.
Here in Ohio, Attorney General Mike DeWine was quoted in an article about Republicans who support more guns in schools:
“If I was on the school board … I would think about having someone in the school who is very well trained, who has a gun under [...]
Full Story... →Last month Attorney General Mike DeWine signed a letter urging the Obama Administration to allow employers to opt out of paying for contraceptive coverage, a move that would effectively restrict access to contraception for women in Ohio . It was one more on a growing list of occasions DeWine has used his public office to push his own religious agenda.
David Pepper called DeWine’s position “a dramatic step backward for women’s health and autonomy” that “shows utter disregard for the rights of women to make their own health decisions.”
Our own Leonidas questioned the legal logic [...]
Full Story... →
