From openers

Mike DeWine is holding a news conference tomorrow afternoon in Cleveland to talk about the military base realignment process that took place last year. The Ohio congressional delegation, led by Steve LaTourette, not only turned around the process and saved the Defense Finance and Accounting Service office in Cleveland but even got a promise to expand the Cleveland office.

You just know this will come up, so let's dispense with it here: Sherrod Brown voted against the plan -- by accident.

When he understood that he'd voted the wrong way on the House floor, it was too late. So he submitted paperwork for the Congressional Record to reflect how much he supported the new base plan.

Mistakes happen. Maybe DeWine won't mention this. Then again...

Openers: "Doing Spin Work for Dems even before the Dems do their own spin work"

From whiotv

BELLEFONTAINE, Ohio -- In the race to be Ohio's next governor, Ken Blackwell appears to be campaigning backward.

The Republican candidate for governor is concentrating on his base in the two weeks leading up to the Nov. 7 election.The move follows weeks of trying to cut into Democratic leads in Ohio's urban counties and comes amid reports that conservatives have grown weary of the GOP after scandals in Washington and Columbus.

Blackwell rallied the faithful Sunday in Logan County, where residents voted better than two-to-one for President Bush in 2004. Over the weekend, he visited other GOP strongholds, as well as a couple of Columbus churches.Recent polls have found Blackwell trailing Democrat Ted Strickland by double digits.

GOP Senator Say Iraq Is Near Chaos; Oct 23 5:36 PM US/Eastern; By DEB RIECHMANN; Associated Press

Just two weeks before the Nov. 7 elections that will determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress, the White House tried to calm political anxieties about deteriorating security in
Iraq. Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers are calling on President Bush to change his war plan.

"We're on the verge of chaos, and the current plan is not working," Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said in an Associated Press interview.
U.S. and Iraqi officials should be held accountable for the lack of progress, said Graham, a Republican who is a frequent critic of the administration's policies.

Asked who in particular should be held accountable _ Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, perhaps, or the generals leading the war _ Graham said: "All of them. It's their job to come up with a game plan" to end the violence.

One has to ask why this man would say something like the statement above two weeks before an off year election that has become very bitter and contentious. This however really tells much about the Republican Party. Two weeks before a major election we have jack-asses like Graham, Warner, and Hagel running around shooting their mouths, when they themselves are not up for election, says the Republican Party has major leadership issues. And Republican Party is worried about traditional conservatives not voting in this election; really? Well it looks like the rank and file is doing a pretty good job of shooting themselves in the foot.

Message for the GOP; Shut Graham, Warner and Hagel up for the next two weeks.

Cross posted at the MVCA Commentary and Journal.

Is made by Dave over at NixGuy.com:

Here’s a question I’ll leave for an exercise to the reader.

When does a clean campaign go “dirty”?

Is it when the Democrats go negative?

Is it when the Republicans go negative?

Or is it when the media starts whining about Republicans going negative?

This could be important because we crossed the first threshold back on August 23rd, from Ted Strickland’s own words:

And I think that there is no question in my mind that Ken Blackwell has used his Secretary of State’s position to take actions, to issue opinions that resulted in the vote being suppressed, the people being discouraged and, in some cases, intimidated to vote, and that’s a big issue.

This was never reported in the MSM so we still had a “clean campaign”. Oh and remember, this man is, in the words of the Enquirer, “a man of integrity”.

Ted Strickland is a race-baiter and an excuser of piddling the children? The media sure missed these stories ... or did they cover them up?

From the Akron Beacon Journal:

A state appeals court has halted a hearing set for today before the Columbiana County Board of Elections on a challenge to the voter registration of Democratic gubernatorial candidate U.S. Rep. Ted Strickland.

The 7th District Court of Appeals in Youngstown issued the order Monday, the same day Strickland filed a federal lawsuit against his opponent, Republican J. Kenneth Blackwell, in his capacity as Ohio secretary of state, as well as the Columbiana County Board of Elections and its four members.

The federal suit also seeks a court order to stop the elections board from holding a hearing on the challenge to Strickland's voter registration.

Strickland spokesman Keith Dailey said the federal suit was filed ``because he is not being treated like any other voter would be under the same circumstances.''

The suit contends that Strickland is being treated differently ``because his opponent is the current secretary of state,'' Ohio's top elections official. It alleges that Strickland's right to equal protection under the law is being violated.

Since Mr. Blackwell has stepped aside and has gotten no where near this investigation, I sense subterfuge. Mr. Strickland rushed to vote early the other day so he could tie this issue up in the courts until after the election.

Not only is he not man enough to step up to the plate and be honest, he is actually trying to use the government to hide the truth from the voters.

Mr. Strickland may appear boring, but I suspect that he has more skeletons in his closet than at first thought.

Press on!

After it had been revealed that Mr. Strickland had knowingly ignored the fact that one of his staff had a habit of showing his wee wee to little children, you'd think that the Ohio media would rush in to defend the children of Ohio and press Mr. Strickland for answers. If you thought thus you'd be wrong -- they have rushed in to defend Ted Strickland!!!!

From The Columbus Dispatch:

FELON ON PAYROLL
Blackwell also had problem worker

GOP gubernatorial nominee J. Kenneth Blackwell, who has questioned the judgment of Democrat Ted Strickland for employing an aide who committed a misdemeanor, once had a felon on his payroll.

It is the hope of THE DISPATCH that you read the title, believe that Blackwell did exactly what he has accused Mr. Strickland of, and then move on, believing that the issue has been resolved and Mr. Blackwell was just practicing "politics as usual" -- WRONG!

Read on:

As state treasurer, Blackwell unknowingly hired a man with a long record of arrests and kept him on the payroll even after his office discovered the man's record and brought it to Blackwell's attention.

Records obtained from the treasurer's office show that Toomer was hired Nov. 17, 1997, as a $10.32-per-hour mail clerk/ messenger. On his application, Toomer indicated no felony offenses, and a State Highway Patrol record check at that time turned up none.

But when the treasurer's office sought clearance for Toomer to have access to the Ohio Computer Center, a second check turned up numerous arrests. On Jan. 26, 1998, the Department of Public Safety denied access to Toomer, alias Glenn K. Williams.

On Feb. 3, 1998, a week after learning of Toomer's criminal record, Beth Gilger, then the treasurer's director of human resources, wrote on office stationery that "we have enough to terminate" Toomer. At the time, and for the following six weeks, Toomer could have been fired without cause because he wasn't yet a member of the state employees union.

Blackwell said he decided not to fire the man on the recommendation of Gilger and the treasurer's office legal counsel. Blackwell said the man was an admitted drug addict who, after completing a Florida treatment program and passing treasurer's office drug tests, showed no signs of drug usage.

"He had met the drug screening, he was willing to undergo a pattern of drug-screening tests and he had a local church community that vouched for his turning his life around," Blackwell said.

What did Mr. Strickland do once he found out that he had a guy CONVICTED of exposing his sexual organs to little children? He rewarded him with a trip for two to Italy (the other of the "two" who went on the trip was none other than Ted Strickland himself!)

While I question Mr. Blackwell's decision, there is absolutely no comparison between what he did: give a guy who messed around with drugs a second chance, and what Ted Strickland did: seemingly reward a lying sexual pervert with a paid vacation for two!

One of the criticisms of Ken Blackwell is that he is a hater who is judgmental and self-righteous. Well, this incident pretty much blows that lie out of the water. Mr. Blackwell has not lied about the incident nor did he reward bad behavior.

It is the Democrat Party you will remember who have taken up the defense of the criminal over the victim more often than not and it is the Democrat Party which endlessly decries the treatment of ex-cons (voting rights, hiring, etc...) Here we have a ultra-conservative Republican helping out a guy with some prior problems and the liberal media use his compassion to try and crucify him.

Typical.

The rest:

In May 2002, about three months after leaving the treasurer's office, Toomer was sentenced to four years in prison after pleading guilty to sexually abusing a girl, beginning in September 1994 when she was 7 and continuing until 2001.

Blackwell said he did not know Toomer was a child molester until yesterday. If he had had any indication that Toomer was abusing a child while an employee of the treasurer's office, Blackwell said, "He would have been history."

There is obviously no way that we can test Mr. Blackwell on his claim of what he'd do, but Ted Strickland has already failed the test. He has already chosen his political career over the safety of Ohio's children. Add this with Mr. Strickland's stated belief that us poor commoners shalt not question scientists and that sex between adults and children just might be cool and we have a pattern of poor judgment and beliefs that are far out of the mainstream of Ohio (and maybe even California!!!!)

The Ohio media has made it quite clear that they will protect their chosen candidate, even to the determent of your children. I suggest that subscribers let them know just how much that angers the good people of Ohio.

UPDATE 1: Dave over at NixGuy.com makes a couple of great points on this story. Joe Hallett's skirts were all ruffeled when the Strickland story was first explored and now he turns to this? I also suspect that black voters will notice that Mr. Hallett had no problem defending the white sex pervert but pilloring the black one!

UPDATE 2: Speaking of how elected officials have handled drug abuse in their offices, Democrat Sherrod Brown doesn't exactly have a stellar record himself (check out Weapons of Mass Discussion & BizzyBlog).

NOTE: Originally posted on the State of Ohio Blogger Alliance.

From cleveland.com

Akron – Employees and temporary hires might work around the clock at the Summit County Board of Elections to prepare and mail 27,000 absentee ballots.

The ballots were delayed while errors were corrected on one of the four pages. Board members said at a meeting Tuesday that ballots arrived at 9 p.m. Sunday.

Summit was the last county in the state to get its ballot order delivered, said Ohio Secretary of State spokesman James Lee.

“We look like we’re incompetent, while it is the company that is incompetent,” said member Wayne Jones, referring to Election Systems & Software, the Omaha, Neb., maker of the county’s optical scan voting machines. ES&S is responsible for contracting with a printer to provide ballots. It chose Miami Printing of Cincinnati.

From openers

First was Republican Mary Taylor, out with a television commercial painting her opponent, Democrat Barbara Sykes, as a tax-happy state representative who sided with Republican sponsored legislation that included the penny sales tax increase several years ago.

Sykes has responded with a commercial with a playful twist, promising to clean up government corruption with a snap of her fingers. The spot concludes with a darkened photo around Taylor under the banner "Pay to Play" and a quote scolding Taylor for "kowtowing to party bosses," attributed to the Akron Beacon Journal on May 16, 2004.

Taylor called a late afternoon press conference and read a carefully-worded statement in which she said she would file a complaint with the Ohio Elections Commission against Sykes for violating state law for making a false statement and attributing it to a false source. "This quote does not appear in the Akron Beacon Journal anywhere on that day," Taylor said.

Sykes sounds like a 6th grader in this ad. (Wiff Taft?) We're all going to be in REAL BIG SHAPE!

Sent in to me from a reader. If you win, you get your very own trip to Italy with a pervert! No thanks! Click below to see the new game.

So bad, that the Democrat running to take Strickland's place is bashing it.

Charlie Wilson is so dumb that he couldn't collect 50 signatures to get on the primary ballot- But even he knows that Ted Strickland has done nothing to "turn around" his district.

She will be with Ted Strickland and other Democrats.

VINDICATOR POLITICS WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — Television personality Star Jones is the featured guest at a rally Friday at a North Side church for Democratic statewide candidates.

Jones, best known for her work on ABC's "The View," will join Ted Strickland, the party's gubernatorial candidate; Jennifer Brunner of Columbus, its secretary of state candidate; and Barbara Sykes of Akron, the party's auditor candidate.

The rally is set for 9 a.m. at the S.P. Phillips Fellowship Hall of Tabernacle Baptist Church, 707 Arlington St.

Wait- Isn't there a rumor that Star Jones' husband is gay?

Oh, nevermind.