In a review of Miss Coulter's Godless: The Church of Liberalism, Richard Kirk gives conservatives good reason to embrace the blonde bombshell.

From The American Spectator:

What undercuts the liberals' case against Coulter on this score, however, is their own (not always tacit) endorsement of vile epithets that are regularly directed against President Bush and his supporters by the likes of Cindy Sheehan, Michael Moore, and a gaggle of celebrity politicos. Coulter employs the same linguistic standard against liberals (with a touch of humor) that they regularly use (with somber faces and dogmatic conviction) when they accuse conservatives of being racist homophobes who gladly send youngsters to war under false pretences to line the pockets of Halliburton executives. Hate-speech of this stripe is old-hat for leftists.

Until Air America, Helen Thomas, and most Democrat constituencies alter their rhetoric, I see no reason for conservatives to denounce Coulter for using, more truthfully, the same harsh language that leftists have employed, with no regard for accuracy, since the time of Lenin. When liberals denounce communist tyrants as fervently as they do real Nazis, then it will be time for Coulter to cool the rhetoric. Until that time her "verbal reprisals" serve a useful function within an intellectual marketplace that resembles a commodities pit more than a debating society.

While I would prefer a nice, calm, friendly exchange of ideas, there is a time for stinging satire and Ann Coulter proudly takes her place among the greats like H.L. Mencken and Mark Twain. For everything there is a season and I can think of no other American I would like better to represent me in the ring.

Give 'em hell, Ann!

Chuck Blasdel's campaign website has undergone a major makeover, and I've gotta say, it looks good.

This is one of the most important Congressional races in the country, not only because it's an opportunity for the GOP to pick up a seat they haven't had real control over for a decade. What really makes Blasdel's victory so important is the fact that he's opponent, Charlie Wilson, is completely incompetent.

Unless you want to see someone who can't handle collecting 50 signatures, was caught�dumping waste into the Ohio river, and voted against making English the official language,�it's in your interest to see Chuck Blasdel go to Washington.

So, if you can spare a dime, send it over to Chuck. And if you live in the 6th district, volunteer and/or request a yard sign.

From Openers

A poll released Thursday by the environmental group Oceana concluded that likely Ohio Republican voters are way happier with President Bush's performance than they are with Congress.

Sixty-seven percent of the 500 likely Republican voters in Ohio surveyed by the group rated President Bush's job performance as "excellent" or "good," but only 29 percent gave the same positive evaluation to Congress.

From Cafe Hayek blog

The market prices of most used-cars are too low for sellers of those cars to support their families. This fact is especially true for poor people, who, when they sell their old cars, almost always have only old, high-mileage, often dilapidated used-cars to sell. These people aren't selling two-year-old Lexuses or BMWs. They're selling 15-year-old Chevys and 20-year-old Hondas. So let's enact legislation mandating that no used-car can sell for less than, say, $25,000. That way, anyone who sells a used-car is assured that he or she will earn at least enough money to support a family for a year.

I doubt that many people would argue that government should legislate a minumum price for used-cars. But why not? If merely identifying a problem with a low price (such as "At the current minimum wage, even full-time workers can't support a family of four") is sufficient to justify legislative action to raise that price, why won't such action work for used-cars as well as it will work for labor hours?

Exactly!

From his press release

(Columbus) June 29, 2006 - Greg Hartmann, candidate for Secretary of State, today announced campaign chairs in each of Ohio's 88 counties.� The county campaign chairs are responsible for coordinating grassroots efforts and helping inform voters of Greg's background and plan for the Secretary of State's office.

"We're running an aggressive ground campaign," Hartmann said. "This will no doubt be an exciting and challenging campaign season, and I can guarantee you this team will not be outworked."

Hartmann's campaign chairs come from a wide variety of backgrounds including elected officials, farmers, attorneys, and other community leaders.

"Greg's got a great team in place and I'm glad to be a part of it," Hartmann's Hamilton County Campaign Chair Chip Gerhardt said. "Here in Hamilton County, we're developing a very aggressive grassroots effort to turn out the vote and I know that Greg's other county chairs are doing the same throughout the state."

Greg Hartmann represents the next generation of leadership in Ohio. As the Hamilton County Clerk of Courts, Greg has earned a national reputation for modernizing the office and making it more accountable to taxpayers. During the last three fiscal years, Greg has returned over $1.3 million to taxpayers. He's also been a leader in protecting Ohioans from identity theft….

From his press release

COLUMBUS - Gubernatorial candidate Ken Blackwell today named Wilberforce University President and former Congressman Rev. Dr. Floyd Flake a campaign co-chairman.

"I am honored and humbled by Rev. Flake's support of my gubernatorial campaign," said Blackwell. "Rev. Flake is an educator, a statesman and a national leader. He is providing our nation's oldest historically black college with principled, prudent and inspirational leadership. Rev. Flake will bring those same outstanding leadership qualities to my campaign."

"Ken Blackwell is the leader Ohio needs right now," said Rev. Flake. "He understands the challenges faced by institutions of higher education, he understands the importance of home ownership and he understands the power of economic opportunity."

"Ken Blackwell's solid, proven leadership will get Ohio's cities back on track," added Rev. Flake….

From The Columbus Dispatch:

Beginning today, Teresa Stevenson will devote her full attention to taking the job of the man who fired her.

The auditor’s office employee, a Democratic candidate for auditor, has been fired by Perry County Auditor Larry Householder, her Republican opponent in the fall election.

Householder dismissed Stevenson effective today at the recommendation of a neutral hearing officer who determined Tuesday that she was a classified civil-service employee.

Ohio civil-service laws generally prohibit classified employees from running for partisan elective office or working to elect candidates.

Householder suspended Stevenson with pay on May 5 to determine whether she participated in partisan politics while on the public payroll.

"I think the county has been very patient," Householder said.

Frankly, I'd like to fire a few of them myself.

A story that compares results from�Zogby and the Ohio Poll in a newspaper that isn't overly kind to Republicans. (Rasmussen is mentioned as an after-thought.)

The University of Cincinnati's Ohio Poll follows a tried-and-true technique, interviewers calling random numbers, making follow-up calls to reach registered voters. Over many years, the Ohio Poll has a solid track record.

Zogby Interactive departs from that approach, using Web solicitations to build a database of those who register for online polls. Just 20 to 50 telephone calls are made to help ensure proper representation of all demographic groups. The most recent Ohio Poll directly contacted almost 700 registered voters.

While both surveys have a similar range of statistical accuracy (plus or minus 3.3 percentage points for Zogby; plus or minus 3.7 percentage points for the Ohio Poll), that's misleading. The university's method has a greater likelihood of finding a representative sample, crucial to accuracy.

…Want to make things more complicated? The Rasmussen poll employs yet another approach (aided by autodialing).

To remind everyone, here's what the Ohio Poll said about the race:

Strickland leads Blackwell by six points, 50-44

DeWine leads Brown by ten points, 52-42

It's also worth noting that in the SurveyUSA poll, which shows Strickland with a 16-point lead, only just over half were likely voters.

(hat-tip to Lincoln Logs. more on the polling lunacy here.)

President Bush is coming to Ohio to rally Republicans to support DeWine, but there is a growing group that will protest the event, and these are the growing numbers of Conservatives and Republicans that want DeWine gone.

Across the Ohio liberty blogsphere the sides are clearly drawn among Republican voters; those that will hold their nose and vote for DeWine, and that that are so fed up with him that they will vote for a man of similar qualities but is a Democrat. So what should we do?

This leads me to consider that we are faced with two choices, making the hard decision and what might be the right decision, to vote for Brown; or the easy and definitely wrong decision to vote for DeWine.

I say, vote for Brown. And I say this with complete loathing, but only because DeWine has to be made an example.[1] Otherwise, how will we get rid of Voinovich and ensure our Senators start looking out for the State of Ohio rather than their own selfish interests or the big money lobby groups that finance their campaigns.� Furthermore, how do we get the RNC, ORP and county Republican Parties to realize who votes their candidates into office? I say vote them out!

What will be lost by voting for Brown over DeWine; nothing. The only thing lost is that there will be one less Republican Senator and from the Senate Republican voting record this isn’t such a bad thing.

In the end, six years is a long time in my life but when I look at causing normative changes in the State Republicans, it becomes a small slice. Accordingly Brown becomes an investment. Electing him will become the impetus for Ohio Republican leadership to change. Sad as it is to say, the only way to get Republicans to change is to make them the underdog.

Brian Duffy�

Also posted at the MVCA Commentary and Journal.

This one is also good…

"Ohio has too many impediments to job creation and business expansion. Our taxes are too high, our government is too big and we are not taking advantage of available resources. We must move beyond the status quo and become competitive with neighboring states by cutting taxes and streamlining government, or we will continue to lose jobs and talented young people."

"Ohio's next governor has to embrace bold initiatives. I have proposed such initiatives and I offer the experience and leadership needed to take our state on a path of job creation and economic prosperity."

Blackwell has advocated the following job creating initiatives:

• Create a $6 billion jobs creation and infrastructure improvement fund by leasing the Ohio Turnpike;
• Implement a single rate tax system over a four year period, with a target rate of 3.25 percent;
• Eliminate the stand alone estate tax and increase the definition of residency for tax purposes from the current 120 days to 180 days or more;
• Repeal the sales tax increase of 2003, returning the state sales tax to 5 percent; and
• Privatize the Bureau of Workers' Compensation.

But he makes specific proposals, which Strickland's does not.

Check it out at The Whistleblower…is there anything good going on we ask?

According to Rasmussen Blackwell is only getting 66% of the GOP vote and is down 2 to 1 in Indepdents.� These are the GOPers who disliked the TEL and who were close to Petro.� Therefore this needs to happen for Ken Blackwell to take the lead…

1.� Get up to 80%+ of the Republican vote…it'd shrink Ted's lead to 6-7 points

2.� Attract 40% of Independents, then the race becomes a toss up.

3.� Hit that 35% of black vote and then you are ahead.

Difficult to do, but not impossible.

We're serious too…

"Today we learned the disappointing news that Honda of America has decided to build its newest automotive production plant in Indiana rather than Ohio. However, we can be encouraged that this new plant will be right next door and will lead to job growth right here in Ohio. It is clear that we must work even harder as a state to create job-ready sites and to make sure that our people have access to the best educational opportunities possible. As governor, I will work to establish strong, meaningful relationships with Honda of America and to strengthen Ohio's relationships with the entire automotive industry. And, as governor, I will move aggressively to remove the bureaucratic and regulatory barriers to business growth in Ohio."

1.� He was still positive

2.� He will work with Hondy

3.� The last line sounds like it could have come from a Republican.

4.� He'll tick off the UAW and other Union groups by working with Honda�

Stop the presses!

From CNSNews.com:

America is about to revisit one of the most turbulent decades in its history, Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean told a religious conference in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday. "We're about to enter the '60s again," Dean said…

Later in his speech Tuesday, Dean appeared to backtrack. "I'm not asking to go back to the '60s; we made some mistakes in the '60s," he said. "If you look at how we did public housing, we essentially created ghettoes for poor people" instead of using today's method of mixed-income housing.

Another mistake Democrats made in the '60s, Dean acknowledged, was that "we did give things away for free, and that's a huge mistake because that does create a culture of dependence, and that's not good for anybody, either," he noted, a reference to the Great Society welfare programs created by Democratic President Lyndon Johnson in the mid-1960s.

Damn well you did, Mr. Dean. And the poor, mostly black "benefactors" of your mistakes are still paying for your shortsightedness.

From an email (I'm STILL laughing!)

From The Cleveland Plain Dealer (September 20, 1994):

"Gloria Steinem, who has devoted her life to advancing the cause of equal rights for women, commonly supports female candidates over male rivals in election campaigns. But not in the Ohio attorney general race.

Steinem was in Cleveland yesterday as the keynote speaker at a $65-per-person fund-raiser for Ohio Attorney General Lee Fisher, a Democrat, who is running for re-election against State Sen. Betty Montgomery, R-2 of Perrysburg.

About 400 people, almost all of them women, listened as Steinem praised Fisher's record on rights for women. The well-known feminist at one point referred to Fisher as an "honorary woman."…"

Ted Strickland picks interesting running mates!

BizzyBlog blames the new Commercial Activities Tax:

Here’s one theory:

• Indiana eliminated its gross receipts tax on businesses a few years ago.
• Ohio just established and is the process of fully phasing in a Commercial Activities Tax (CAT), which is in essence a gross receipts tax.
• If it had located the new plant in Ohio, shipments from the Honda plant to dealers would be CAT-taxable sales. The tax would have to be paid whether the plant or the company were profitable.
• Indiana does have a corporate income tax (which Ohio is phasing out), but it would only have to be paid if the plant is making money.
• Honda is probably already unhappy that shipments of cars from its existing Ohio plants to dealers are CAT-taxable, and didn’t want to add any more to what they will have to pay in the coming years on Ohio shipments.

Advantage: Indiana.

Message to Bob Tax: You screwed up again, thanks!

Message to Ken Blackwell: Rechange your mind and eliminate this job killer.

In this case, not my advice but that of candidate for state auditor Democrat Rep. Barbara Sykes.

From The Columbus Dispatch:

With more than four months still to go before the November election, a third Democratic Ohio House candidate has found himself in trouble with the law.

Vernon Sykes of Akron, a former state legislator trying to reclaim a seat he left because of term limits in 2000, was charged with drunken-driving early Sunday morning after he was stopped at a State Highway Patrol checkpoint.

Sykes admitted to drinking a couple glasses of wine at a political fundraiser, according to the Associated Press. He did an eye and walk test, before his wife, state Rep. Barbara Sykes, a Democratic candidate for state auditor, advised him not to submit to a breath test.

Since even Democrat Ohio Supreme Court Justice Alice Robie Resnick has refused the test and a Virginia judge has ruled them unconstitutional, I suppose that we should follow the leaders, lawyers and lawmakers who advise (some by their actions) the refusal of a breathalyzer test.

I also have constitutional questions and ask them here and here.

From WTOL.com

State Auditor Betty Montgomery says she feels very blessed. Her brush with a nerve disorder came and went quickly, sparing her the lingering effects of a disease that can hit more severely.

In the midst of her campaign for attorney general, Montgomery was stricken last month with Guillain-Barre Syndrome, whose symptoms include a tingling sensation in the limbs and paralysis.

In extreme cases, the disorder is life-threatening, though federal health experts say most patients recover from even the worst cases.

From the Intelligencer

Oversight of the elections process is more penetrating and relentless than ever before. A candidate using the public office he already holds for some nefarious plot to win election to another post would be spotted quickly €”? and would be more likely to find himself in court facing a judge than in the winner’s circle.

That’s why demands by some Ohio Democrats for Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell to, in effect, step down from his post are ridiculous.

Blackwell, a Republican who is the state’s chief elections officer, is running for governor against U.S. Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Ohio. Some Democrat leaders in Ohio have suggested that Blackwell should not supervise an election in which he is a candidate for governor.“The person who oversees the rules cannot in fundamental fairness also be the judge of the game,” commented Strickland’s running mate, Lee Fisher.