One of the lesser reported themes in the 2010 gubernatorial races was how Governor Kasich told conservatives that a vote for him was actually a vote against President Obama’s re-election in 2012:

Of course, as the titular head of the State party, a Governor can have influence over national politics.  Normally, a Governor’s popularity can be used to transition to support his or her party’s presidential candidates.  Also, the Governor traditionally is well tied into the State party organization structure and other political statewide political operations that can be lent to the presidential effort.  It’s no surprise that in [...]

Today, the annual campaign finance reports were due for the State candidates.  And it’s kind of shocking frankly.  The report covers all campaign activity from July 1, 2011 until the end of the year.

According to the Secretary of State’s website, Mike DeWine’s campaign raised over $574,000 but spent nearly a million due to outstanding loans the committee owed DeWine personally for loans DeWine made in order to barely defeat Richard Cordray.  The report also shows over $10,000 in just legal fees.  According to the Secretary of State’s campaign finance website, DeWine’s campaign only has a little over $134,000 on [...]

I haven’t seen this directly pointed out in the press coverage yet, nor has anyone pointed it out in comments.

The same guy in the State Treasurer’s Office who wrote to ODP that Mandel’s virtually blank schedule book showed he was the “hardest working State Treasurer in America” is the same guy who has subbed for Josh Mandel at every single one  of the State Board of Deposits meetings Mandel is supposed to chair.  Meetings that every other State Treasurer except Mandel attended.

Here’s the signature on the “hardest working State Treasurer in America” letter:

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The Ohio Democratic Party makes a public records request to Josh Mandel for a copy of his official calendar to see how much time he’s spent on actual State business when he’s not busy running for his next political office.

Mandel’s office then scrambles to put together a laughable “Top to Bottom review” of the office that largely cites “accomplishments” either things that his predecessors did or other claims already discredited by the Ohio media.  For example, one of the things Mandel’ boasts is Ohio’s high credit rating for certain portfolios, but Mandel omits that it’s the same rating that [...]

In the midst of all the Issue 2 (SB 5) referendum, it got lost that at the same time that there was another referendum effort already underway to repeal HB 194, the Republican’s bill that gutted early voting, prohibited school districts from providing transportation to students to cast legal ballots, eliminates the requirement that poll workers direct voters to their correct precinct, permits the challenge of an early ballot if the identification envelope statement of voter is not entirely completed (except you cannot challenge if that ballot was cast overseas or alleged by a voter in [...]

This morning the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services released the Ohio jobs data for December.  Again, Ohio’s unemployment rate dropped significantly from 8.5% to 8.1%, but that’s not good news once you, again, look at why Ohio’s unemployment rate is dropping.  In fact, it suggests that Ohio’s recovery is stalling.

In November, the unemployment rate dropped .5% as Ohio made a modest gain of 6,000 new jobs, but the drop was largely due to the fact that 22,000 unemployed Ohioans dropped out of the labor market altogether.  In other words, they gave up even looking for [...]