Installment number 171 of the Carnival of Ohio Politics is up, thanks to the author of The Boring Made Dull.  As dismal as Ohio’s political trends may be, TBMD’s deft compilations of the Carnivals often make me laugh.  He warns us that for the next Carnival that he writes after this one, he might “go off the reservation.”  Well, if his Carnivals, heretofore, have been “on” the “reservation,” my sides might ache from too much laughter the next time around.  Go ahead and click the link.  You know you want to.

Politics serves us flip-flops and broken campaign promises on a frequent basis.  In the midst of petty political bickering, we have a fully stocked arsenal of such flip-flops and broken promises to go tit-for-tat with our opponents, no matter which candidate one champions.  Such is the human condition.

But some political reversals are so shattering that using the word “flip-flop” in those instances would be trying to trivialize the seriousness of the offense.  An example of what I’m talking about would be George Bush the elder, who served one term as president on the heels of Reagan.  Bush said, “Read my lips!  No new taxes!”  That was an outright lie.  He didn’t get re-elected.

Ted Strickland’s abandonment of his stance against slots shows that he is a liar.  Whatever he said in opposition to gambling to get co-endorsed (with Ken Blackwell) by the Ohio Roundtable in the 2006 gubernatorial race was an outright lie.

If I were a Democrat (OK, I’m not), this, to me, would signal the beginning of a gubernatorial primary challenge.  There’s no way I would try to defend Strickland when he’s been caught in such a bold-faced lie.  All the ammunition needed for the GOP to, not just go tit-for-tat with Strickland, but to outright defeat him at the ballot box has already been hand-delivered by Strickland himself with his outrageous lying.  Clear the primary for Ted to run for a 2nd term?  No way.  That’s not giving the Democrat Party a chance to win in 2010.  Time to find an alternative candidate that’s not as tragic a figure as Strickland.

The ODP, though, by way of Chris Redfern, is joined at the hip with Ted Strickland’s political ambitions.  Rather than try to defend Ted’s outright lying, though, because that would strain credulity too much, the ODP is going to try to lull voters into paying no attention to the betrayal that seeks to bring slots to Ohio without the vote of the people.  Along that vein, Chris Redfern has tried to overshadow Ted’s dastardly betrayal with his public request for Jimmy Dimora to resign as chair of the Democrat Party in Cuyahoga County.

Though there was initial hesitation on Redfern’s part, Redfern did the right thing by taking steps to purge state government of former Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann.  By doing so, Redfern kept the ODP in the good graces of the voters of Ohio, when there was so much potential for political damage to the whole party had they just tried to let the matter slide.

Allegations of corruption continue to bubble to the surface in Cuyahoga County Democrat Party circles, with Jimmy Dimora at the epicenter of those allegations.  If Redfern can give the ODP a boost in the eyes of Ohio voters by taking a tough tone with Dimora like he did with Dann, then full steam ahead.

However, excuse me for being a bit cynical, but no shocking new Dimora revelation hit the news headlines in the last few days, despite Cuyahoga County GOP chair Robert Frost’s continued drum beat against Dimora, and despite the announcement of Dimora’s temporary hiatus as the Dem party chair in his county, so the timing of Redfern’s public request for Dimora’s resignation leads me to believe that he was waiting to go public with this until such time as he needed to distract attention away from something else that was going horribly wrong.  That something else is the revelation of Ted Strickland’s outright lying.

While Redfern and the ODP came out smelling like a rose during the outrage against Dann, the current scenario doesn’t have such a rosy outlook.  If Dimora were concerned about the well-being of the Ohio Democrat Party, he’d have stepped aside long ago.  Dimora doesn’t care about the well-being of the Ohio Democrat Party.  Dimora cares about maintaining the status quo within his own fiefdom, and he’s got a political machine that is built to do just that.  He’s not dismantling it.  Dimora’s milking it for all it’s worth, and he’s counting on the P.T. Barnum maxim that, “A sucker is born every minute,” to allow him to maintain the status quo even amidst the negative portrayals of himself in the media.  Even if Dimora is finally forced out of Cuyahoga County government, the machine will make it all to easy for Dimora to influence which of his cronies get to succeed him in office, so this isn’t going to end so well for Redfern.  As I mentioned in a prior blog entry, to mitigate against such county-level corruption, it would be advisable to move county commissioner elections to odd-numbered years.

This also isn’t going to end well for Redfern because the Strickland betrayal of Ohio’s voters won’t go unnoticed, despite the distraction.  In fact the distraction will only compound the problem.  Whether the media chooses to focus on a Strickland administration that lies, and that only looks for short-term quick fixes for the state budget, or whether the media’s attention is diverted to the corruption of Democrat officials in Cuyahoga County government, the public will be made much more aware of how the Rust Belt economy came into being within Democrat strongholds.

So that brings us to the GOP response to Strickland’s lying.  Enter GOP rivals for the 2010 gubernatorial nomination, John Kasich and Kevin Coughlin.

The GOP frontrunner, John Kasich, has failed to capitalize.  Silence from the Kasich camp.  Perhaps knowing that Kasich would utterly fail to capitalize was one reason why Strickland felt emboldened to carry out his act of betrayal.

Kevin Coughlin is an embattled politician, himself.  There are rumors of a personal scandal swirling about Coughlin.  I’m vague about it because the rumors are vague.  While Coughlin vehemently denies the existence of any scandal, he needs to be vetted.  If Coughlin is being truthful, then the sooner he’s vetted, the better for his fledgeling campaign.  Right now, it appears as though Coughlin is stalling his own vetting process by quashing inquiries, which makes observers wonder whether there’s something there.  If nothing’s there, then Coughlin should welcome the inquiries, have done with them, and move on to the issues.

Because he’s not been vetted, the MSM doesn’t seem to be taking Coughlin seriously, and his views on the issues aren’t receiving much coverage.  So, to get Coughlin’s take on current issues, I looked to Weapons of Mass Discussion (bloggers, yet again, doing the job of MSM journalists), which posted a Coughlin statement, and Coughlin appears ready to pounce on both Kasich and Strickland.

Coughlin pouncing on Ted:

“The General Assembly should reject Governor Ted Strickland’s proposal to allow over 15,000 video slot machines in Ohio. Ohio’s voters have spoken loudly in four statewide elections to reject the expansion of gambling.

“I have no objection to allowing Ohio’s voters to decide the fate issues via ballot initiative. But Governor Strickland’s proposal is an end run around voters. The General Assembly is being asked to rush through a massive expansion of gambling without public testimony, proper hearings, substantive debate or a vote of the people. That’s downright sneaky and Ohioans should be outraged.”

Previously, Coughlin had assailed John Kasich for not being as protective of the 2nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution as Strickland has been, while Coughlin firmly framed his own stance as a protector of the 2nd Amendment.  Coughlin also had something to say about John Kasich in light of Strickland’s betrayal:

“Equally troubling is the deafening silence from John Kasich. Ohio voters who oppose casino-type gambling have a right to know where John Kasich stands on this important issue.

“The fact is that John Kasich’s top two campaign advisors are registered lobbyists for the gambling industry. Douglas Preisse and his partner Robert Klaffky are not only coordinators of the Kasich campaign, they are paid lobbyists for the Ohio Legacy Fund, a racetrack/gaming coalition that has spent millions to promote slot machines in our state.”

Ouch, Mr. Kasich.  That definitely dampens my enthusiasm for the Kasich candidacy.  Then Coughlin continues with his statement, targeting both Kasich and Strickland, collectively:

“So it’s clear that when it comes to standing for principles and against casino-type gambling, Ted Strickland and John Kasich are two of a kind.

“Ohioans are already paying too much for everything. The last thing they need is the government rummaging through their pockets for more money. Slot machines are just another means of sucking cash from the people who can least afford it. I will oppose the conference committee report on the state budget if this reckless plan is included and I urge my colleagues to do the same.”

That’s a message that resonates with me.  But Mr. Coughlin, you have got to clear your name from those that would besmirch it, even if Alex Arshinkoff is the author of those pesky rumors.

And Mr. Kasich, Mr. Coughlin has uncovered two of your glaring deficiencies that you ought to do something about.  A third deficiency in your campaign message, that I intend to blog more about in the future, is your stance on education, which needs much more meat on its bones.

At this point, the GOP should be a lock for the governor’s office in 2010.  As a Republican, I find it rather sobering that neither of the announced GOP candidates is currently positioned well enough to claim a stranglehold on the seat despite Strickland’s virtual forfeit of the job, and despite the continued damage to the Democrat brand dealt by the Dimora political machine in Cuyahoga County.

“Along the rust belt that hugs Lake Erie’s shores, Democrats have long enjoyed a near monopoly on municipal and county governments.”

I began another Buckeye RINO post with those words, titled “Democrats control everything.”

If you are a Cuyahoga County voter, you probably think that’s a pretty cool thing that Democrats control everything.  Nirvana has been achieved, right?

Oh.  Except for the corruption.  Funny thing, about that Cuyahoga County corruption . . . as I said before the last election, when I endorsed Annette Butler for Bill Mason’s County Prosecutor seat . . . “It has everything to do with the Democrat Party.”

Oh.  Except for the economic woes of Ohio’s Rust Belt.  But that has much to do with the corruption.  Let Plain Dealer columnist Phillip Morris connect the dots for you, as he did in a column last Monday:

“When will we begin to aspire and agitate for honest and efficient government?

“When will we stop accepting the oversight of party hacks, interested more in preserving power and patronage than in advancing prosperity?

“When will we start to understand that our futures are being compromised by too many uninspired and uninspiring public officials who routinely exploit their offices for self-enrichment?

“When will we realize that we can never become a business incubator as long as we tolerate inefficient city and county government?

“When will we demand better for our children — and our industry — which continue to flee the area in droves?”

I know that everybody in Cleveland likes to blame George W. Bush for the tanking Rust Belt economy, but the former U.S. President has not been implicated in any of the corruption probes of Cuyahoga County officials.  Let me just note that the “party hacks” referenced in the 2nd paragraph of that Phillip Morris column excerpt happen to be Democrat party hacks, since the Democrats are the ones who control all the legislative and executive branch offices of Cuyahoga County government.

Talk of a Cuyahoga County government reform package by way of home rule charter has died down.

Phillip Morris asks for voters to start pressuring Dennis Kucinich, Marcia Fudge, and Frank Jackson to present a new plan to reform the county.  I think that’s looking to the wrong direction for reform.

The right direction for reforming county government is for voters looking in the mirror and putting pressure on themselves to learn more about election candidates than whether they are Democrat or not.  They have to start voting for the person, and stop voting for the party.  Jimmy Dimora does not fear any wrath from Cuyahoga County voters.  He knows that they will always vote Democrat.  Even if Dimora has to step down, he knows that he can always get a crony to replace him, since Democrats will surely always win.  Unless Cuyahoga County voters demonstrate that they are capable of voting for a Republican instead of rubberstamping even the most corrupt of Democrats, reform will continue to be elusive.

How is it that even the most corrupt Democrats win county elections time after time after time?  I think it’s mostly that they hide in the coattails of the top of the ticket.  In presidential and gubernatorial years, the ODP looks to maximize voter turnout in Cuyahoga County to help the top of the ticket carry the state.  A lot of the voters that come out of the woodwork for those elections only know about the presidential or gubernatorial candidates at the top of the ticket, but they vote in all the races, using the Democrat party affiliation as their guide in the races they know nothing about.  It happens in more than just Cuyahoga County (an example from Lorain County here), and that’s how voters enable entrenched cronyism and corruption.  The counties with the least government corruption are those with swing voters, where politicians fear that if they screw up, they’ll be voted out in very short order.

I do have a proposal, though, for cleaning up county governments, not just in the rust belt, but throughout Ohio, and it doesn’t require any home rule charters be implemented for restructuring governments:

Just move the election dates.  Elect county commissioners in odd-numbered years.

If we are going to look to a Cleveland-area Democrat elected official to put pressure on to reform county government, let’s not start with Kucinich, Fudge, and Jackson, as Phillip Morris suggests.  Let’s start with Ohio House Speaker Armond “I’m for sale!” Budish.  Let’s see if Budish is willing to distance himself from the Dimoras, and Russos, et al, of Cuyahoga County.  Let’s get action from the Ohio General Assembly to begin the process to amend our state constitution, to change the law, whatever it takes, to move the elections for county commissioners throughout Ohio to odd-numbered years.

Odd-numbered years, like this one, are low turnout years, because we vote for obscure offices like city government, village government, school boards, and township trustees.  We ought to encourage more turnout for these local offices.  We can do so by bringing a higher profile race to odd-numbered election years.  So let’s hold elections for county commissioners in odd-numbered years.

County Commissioners wouldn’t be able to hide in the coattails of the top of the ticket.  Instead, they’d be the top of the ticket.  They wouldn’t be able to hide.  They’d have to withstand more scrutiny.  If Cuyahoga County commissioner candidates want to turn out Democrats who will vote straight tickets, they, themselves, will have to be the draw, not the presidential or the gubernatorial candidates.

We’ll make it easier for county commissioners all over Ohio to fear the wrath of voters.

How would we make the transition?  In 2010, we elect commissioners to a three-year term.  They’d be up for re-election to a four-year term starting in 2013.  Likewise, in 2012, we elect commissioners to a three-year term, and they’d be up for re-election to a four-year term in 2015.  That would complete the transition.

More than just Cuyahoga County would benefit from this change.  86 other counties (Summit County has home rule charter) would benefit as well.  This is a county government reform measure that can be put into place that Jimmy Dimora can’t block from being enacted, as the State of Ohio will be the entity that undertakes the reform, not Cuyahoga County.

For those who love the Carnival of Ohio Politics, Jill Miller Zimon, of Writes Like She Talks, has composed a double-post.  Therefore, as you peruse the contents and see that some blogs appear in two separate paragraphs, bear in mind that they aren’t duplications of the same thing, they are, instead, twice as much stuff as usual (lots of reading).

It must have been quite a chore to put all that material together, so I’ll not try to make too big a deal out of the way my post about a “released time” proposal in Willard was incorrectly characterized in the Carnival as a fusion of church and state.  But I do have to make something of a deal out of it, because the released time proposal preserves a separation of church and state, and, if pursued along the same veins revealed in my post about School Enterprise Zones, released time can be a benefit for students and parents that can be applied to any supplemental educational pursuit, and need not have any connection at all whatsoever to religion.

I don’t know what the Board of Education of Willard City Schools will decide pertaining to a “released time” proposal put forward by the Willard Ministerial Association, but I certainly favor the idea.  The Norwalk Reflector recently published an article outlining the proposal.

Under the proposal, students at Willard’s Central Elementary School would be allowed to cross the street to Grace United Methodist Church during their recess period after lunch and receive religious instruction.  The volunteers that would act on the WMA’s behalf in escorting the school children across the street and providing the religious instruction would be subject to background checks.

The separation of church and state would be maintained, as the religious instruction would not request any resources whatsoever from the public schools.  The only request is that students be permitted, if they and their parents desire, to be excused for recess for a few minutes of Bible study off school grounds, yet adjacent to school grounds.

But even if the Willard School Board decides against “released time,” I would encourage the Willard Ministerial Association to make weekday religious instruction more accessible to schoolkids, perhaps as a before-school activity, and/or as an after-school activity, or perhaps on a “released time” basis to junior high and high school students at locations adjacent to those schools.

Of course, if released time is permitted for those of Central Elementary’s students who want to spend recess on Bible study, released time should also be granted to students who wish to devote their recess to alternative pursuits.  In this sense, even parents who wish their children’s education would steer clear of all religious instruction can still benefit from approval of WMA’s proposal, as they can design programs according to their own preferences to be utilized during “released time.”  All of this is encapsulated within the concept of “School Enterprise Zones” that I’ve written about here at Buckeye RINO and also here, here, and here at Word of Mouth.

If these proposals are followed, any popular demand for charter schools will be diminished, as parents are able to incorporate public school instruction into a larger educational design for their children.  It is the role of the public schools to be a tool in the hands of parents so that the parents can fulfill their responsibilities to educate their children.  The public schools should not usurp those parental responsibilities for education.  The public schools had better not show themselves to be inflexible and unwieldy tools, as I foresee continued vigorous debate over the future of education in Ohio, and schools had better ally themselves with parents in that debate than make enemies of them.