From Daytondailynews

Local school superintendents hope voters don't assume financial salvation lies with state government this year.

After years of struggling over school funding issues, superintendents with tax issues on the May 8 ballot are not keeping their fingers crossed that a new state funding proposal is going to resolve their problems.

So they're counting on voters to approve the 14 school tax issues, 11 of which are asking for additional money, that will be on the May ballot in Montgomery, Greene, Miami and Darke counties.

"Our need for this funding is immediate," said Northmont Schools Superintendent Gale Mabry. "Even if the governor helps us, it probably won't be coming next year."

�But he's a Democrat, so he'll get a free pass for two more years.

Every dollar you earned from January 1 until yesterday belongs to the government. But starting today, you get to actually keep the money you earn. Congratulations, Ohio!

Click here for more details.

From The Dispatch:

"[Ted Strickland] can couch it in whatever terms he wants," said Rep. Kevin DeWine of Fairborn, the deputy chairman of the Ohio Republican Party.

"What I know is he has essentially embraced the framework the legislature passed two years ago, modified the formula very (little), put additional money in that would have been about the same amount we would have put in anyway, and called it his."

Noting an unprecedented absence of opposition from education groups during hearings before a budget subcommittee, DeWine said, "Maybe all they needed was for a Democratic governor to introduce it. If that's all it took to be constitutional, then I'm for it."

No one excels at mediocrity better than Ted Strickland.

Hilarious! Between this and hosting meetings of 9/11 Truthies, Brian Rothenberg's shady 527 group will never be taken seriously.

You would think that such staunch supporters of the nanny state, who want to protect bar employees from being "forced" to work in a smoke-filled environment, would also support legislation to keep dancers far away from patrons who may have unscrupulous and criminal intentions.

The first debate between Republican presidential candidates is May 3 at 8pm on MSNBC, and it will also be streamed online at politico.com.

Is there any interest in having me activate Right Angle Blog's live chat feature during the debate? If so, please leave a comment here.

From the Dayton Daily News:

By taking the job, Rep. De-Wine certainly undermines any future charge that he is trying to skate to high office on his name. He even risks making some Republican enemies.

What, for example, happens in 2010 if Mike DeWine wants to be governor, but so does some other big-name Republican, say, Rob Portman, Jon Husted or John Kasich? It's not a far-fetched scenario.

Chairman Bennett has made perhaps his biggest mark by getting would-be candidates to step aside, so as to avoid divisive primaries (a trick he couldn't pull off in 2006). But a Chairman DeWine would not be in a great position to do that. He couldn't ask his uncle to step aside, and he couldn't ask anybody else to step aside for his kin.

Fine. Let the public have a choice. Avoiding primaries might be in a party's interest. (Chairmen always seem to think it is.) But the practice is not in the public interest.

Of course, in 2010 a lot of pragmatic Republicans will be worrying that primaries work to the advantage of Republican candidates who are too conservative to win a general election, given what happened to Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell last year. But that was one year, one set of circumstances.

First of all, I love that the Dayton Daily News can claim Ken Blackwell lost because he was "too conservative", even though Betty Montgomery, Mike DeWine and many other liberal-leaning Republicans lost, while Mary Taylor was one of the most principled and conservative members of the Ohio legislature. The DDN might have avoided those points just because it doesn't fit their agenda-driven template.

And can we please give Rep. DeWine a break? He was elected just a few days ago and doesn't deserve to be attacked.

As we saw in 2006, the establishment's choice for Governor doesn't always win the primary. And in 3 years, Republican primary voters' opinions of Mike DeWine will still be negative. The Dayton Daily News should be ashamed for trying to find controversy where there is none.

From the PD

Aurora - Gov. Ted Strickland told education leaders Friday that while he remains cool to a proposed constitutional amendment on school funding, he's less and less hopeful about getting a legislative fix.

"The current ballot initiative, I'll share with you candidly, I have some concerns about," Strickland. "That doesn't mean you should interpret that I'm opposed to it.

"It may be the only initiative available to the people of Ohio. I would hope to deal with it legislatively. That approach does not look particularly hopeful."

Strickland made his remarks at a leadership institute sponsored by the KnowledgeWorks Foundation, the state's largest philanthropic education organization.

The three-day event ends today. His comments came one day after House Republican leaders embraced the school-funding plan in the Democratic governor's $52.9 billion, two-year budget proposal.

That budget includes increases of 3 percent in both years and a 22 percent boost in aid to districts with high numbers of poor children. The GOP's proposed budget also includes an increase in state aid to higher education that exceeds Strickland's proposal by $33 million.

In a briefing document distributed Thursday, Republicans put those budget numbers under the heading "Implementing Governor Ted Strickland's School Funding Solution."

"The governor said he stakes his governorship on his education plan," House Finance Committee Chairman Matthew Dolan, a Russell Township Republican, told reporters Thursday. "We're going to send it out to the people and say, 'This is the governor's plan - what do you think?' "

But Strickland and public-school advocates say the budget - while a step in the right direction - is not a solution to the state's school funding woes and does not provide the dramatic overhaul of the system that the Ohio Supreme Court ordered in four rulings.

"I will personally consider myself a failed governor if we do not solve this issue," Strickland said.

Draw your own conclusions.

The 2004 and 2006 elections in Lorain County were a double-whammy for the GOP, as Democrats gobbled up all of the Congressional, statehouse legislative, county commissioner, and county executive branch seats available. The most prominent Republican left standing in Lorain County, Lorain Mayor Craig Foltin, announced that he would not be seeking re-election this year. Who now becomes the prominent GOP office-holder in the county?

Predictably, with conservatism apparently on the wane, the three Democrat county commissioners figured the timing was right to increase the county sales tax.

Perhaps conservatism in Lorain County isn't dead after all. Enter 26-year-old GOP Amherst City Council member Nick Brusky. Brusky launched a grassroots petition effort to put the proposed county tax increase on the November ballot. The petitions are in and the number of valid signatures is more than sufficient.

Is Nick Brusky now positioned as the most prominent GOP officeholder in Lorain County? I don't want to jinx Brusky by using the term "rising star," but that's the term used by the Elyria Chronicle-Telegram in this very upbeat story.

UPDATE 5/3/2007: The Lorain Morning Journal's editorial, written by John Cole, takes a jab at the three Democrat Lorain County Commissioners regarding the proposed tax hike. It's an entertaining read, and hits the nail on the head.

After reading this article in The Dispatch, two quick thoughts came to mind:

1) Between frivolous lawsuits against lead paint manufactures, threatening job-creating Ohio vacuum cleaner manufacturers with "anti-trust" legal action, and now with going after school bureaucrats who take perks from the lending industry Attorney General Marc Dann really likes to ham it up and encourage front-page stories about himself.

2) If students are considering student loans, why wouldn't they shop around and trust a list provided to them by the school? I think this is just another lesson in why it's a bad idea to trust a school bureaucrat….or any bureaucrat… for anything, ever. And any student who didn't shop around for a loan with the lowest interest rates and best terms is a fool.

What planet do the�Democrat presidential candidates live on? I live on Earth, . . . and on Earth, the United States of America is the clear leader among its nations.

Nedra Pickler of the Associated Press reports that New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, one of the Dem hopefuls for 2008, said:

"We are today internationally and domestically a nation that is no longer a leader."

Who is Richardson speaking to that would be gullible enough to believe that?� He must be speaking to someone who has rarely traveled beyond their hometown, let alone traveled internationally.� Even residents of foreign nations who feel resentful�towards the United States acknowledge America's world leader status, even if grudgingly.

Another Dem pres hopeful for 2008, Delaware's U.S. Senator Joe Biden said:

"The American people are looking for us as Democrats.� They're looking for someone literally, not figuratively, to restore America's place in the world."

If America's place in the world is in question, the MSM ought to acknowledge its role in portraying America negatively.� One South Korean once asked me, "How can you enjoy living in the United States with all those� car chases?� I would be afraid."� Hollywood created that impression.� Another South Korean, who was trying to study the media more in depth to get a glimpse of what the life of a typical American�must be�like, asked me, "Is Jerry Springer Show real life or made-up fiction?"� Jerry Springer, whose syndicated show has reruns still airing internationally, is a Democrat.� Thanks for polishing America's image, Jerry . . .NOT!

Yet another Dem hopeful for 2008, former U.S. Senator from North Carolina John Edwards, said that the world needs to see once again that:

"America can be a force for good."

America has been and continues to be a force for good.� Our constitutional liberties, if implemented by the other nations, might improve the quality of life for others around the world to the point that we would no longer be the premier migration destination of the world, and the immigration policy quandary we're in now might be ameliorated.

America has taken the lead in making government and business more open and transparent.� Other nations are behind the curve on that score.� Citizens of other nations, though, are picking up on America's cue and putting pressure on their governments for�greater transparency.� Foreign politicians increasingly find themselves red-faced with embarrassment as the push for transparency yields astonishing revelations of misconduct.� Deflecting domestic outrage over such revelations may�among the reasons why a foreign politician might engage in America-bashing.

If America isn't the current world leader, Gov. Richardson, then I dare you to�name the nation that is.

RedState's Pejman Yousefzadeh pointed me to this post on the CATO Institute's blog which uses a quote by overpaid Cleveland school bureaucrat Eugene Sanders to show how desperately Ohio school leaders want to force students to attend public schools because local competition is kicking their butt. I'm happy to see national attention being focused on Strickland's efforts to destroy school choice and do the bidding of his union masters.

But the PeeDee's Mark Naymik reports that the budget debates are basically over, and supposedly the threat of getting rid of school choice was some sort of a bargaining chip. Pro-choice advocates should still keep the heat on Gov. Strickland because he hates giving poor children a chance for a better education. But it appears that current voucher and charter schools will still receive funding for the time being.

From hotline on call

�Dennis Kucinich and his red-headed-amazon-wife were PDAing in the spin room, where she held his hand, affectionately pushed back his hair, and rubbed his back as he was answering questions

�Let's get it on…..

Answer: Yes.

Rep. Steve Chabot and Minority Leader John Boehner answered this question correctly. Great job, guys!

Rep. Jean Schmidt answered this question incorrectly. Boo, hiss.

I usually try to ignore the Toledo Blade's editorial column, but SOB Alliance Member Pro Ecclesia pointed out a column which is too awful to pass up. It is by the Toledo Blade's Dan Simpson, who ignores the 2nd Amendment and uses the Virginia Tech shootings to propose a tyrannical gun grab of every legally owned gun in America.:

… Now, how would one disarm the American population? First of all, federal or state laws would need to make it a crime punishable by a $1,000 fine and one year in prison per weapon to possess a firearm. The population would then be given three months to turn in their guns, without penalty.

Hunters would be able to deposit their hunting weapons in a centrally located arsenal, heavily guarded, from which they would be able to withdraw them each hunting season upon presentation of a valid hunting license. The weapons would be required to be redeposited at the end of the season on pain of arrest. When hunters submit a request for their weapons, federal, state, and local checks would be made to establish that they had not been convicted of a violent crime since the last time they withdrew their weapons. In the process, arsenal staff would take at least a quick look at each hunter to try to affirm that he was not obviously unhinged.

It would have to be the case that the term "hunting weapon" did not include anti-tank ordnance, assault weapons, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, or other weapons of war.

All antique or interesting non-hunting weapons would be required to be delivered to a local or regional museum, also to be under strict 24-hour-a-day guard. There they would be on display, if the owner desired, as part of an interesting exhibit of antique American weapons, as family heirlooms from proud wars past or as part of collections.

Gun dealers could continue their work, selling hunting and antique firearms. They would be required to maintain very tight inventories. Any gun sold would be delivered immediately by the dealer to the nearest arsenal or the museum, not to the buyer.

The disarmament process would begin after the initial three-month amnesty. Special squads of police would be formed and trained to carry out the work. Then, on a random basis to permit no advance warning, city blocks and stretches of suburban and rural areas would be cordoned off and searches carried out in every business, dwelling, and empty building. All firearms would be seized. The owners of weapons found in the searches would be prosecuted: $1,000 and one year in prison for each firearm.

Clearly, since such sweeps could not take place all across the country at the same time. But fairly quickly there would begin to be gun-swept, gun-free areas where there should be no firearms. If there were, those carrying them would be subject to quick confiscation and prosecution. On the streets it would be a question of stop-and-search of anyone, even grandma with her walker, with the same penalties for "carrying."

Newsbuster's Warner Todd Huston opines:

The author of this tyrannical proposal is Dan Simpson, who is described as "a retired Ambassador" and a "member of the editorial boards of The Blade and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. " He is a former US Ambassador to various African states… which can easily be read to mean one who thinks government knows best, darn the citizen's rights, apparently.

[..]All in all, Simpson has done nothing but reveal that he thinks he is smarter than everyone around him and that only HE should be allowed to make all the rules. He also imagines himself smarter than the Founders as well as more able than the Supreme Court to adjudicate what should be allowable under the US Constitution. Or maybe not on that last point as he doesn't even seem to recognize that there is a Constitution.

It is very important to limit the size of government, and support an arrangement where government fears its citizens. And this column is a great example of why the Ohio media should be kept far away from the private information of concealed carry permit holders.

All I have to say to Simpson is: From my cold, dead hands!

Mark at the Pain Dealer likes the Rush Limbaugh shows' parody of McCain's Beach Boys joke. Its a great parody, and Paul Shanklin is incredibly talented.

But a friend pointed out to me that Vince Vance and the Valiants also wrote a hilarious song in 1980 called "Bomb Iran." And here it is from Google video. Enjoy!