Tax and spend, tax and spend!

Voted for Brunner, the third frontier thing, the casino relocation, and my school tax levy. I’m giving the last last registered Democrat a real run for his money tonight. Tax and spend! Tax and spend!

And the Ohio Dems ran a Kasich-Lehman ad. Let the general election begin!

[That is, we’ll all pay attention for a week now while the dust settles, realize that the weather is nice, vow to really read up on the candidates before the general election, get busy in the fall, and walk into the polling place only to remember that we can’t remember which Ohio Supreme Court candidate belongs to which party. Such is life.]

Read Full Post »

The ties that bind

On a day that President Obama and Vice President Biden (hat tip: Fox News, geez) will be in Ohio drumming up support for the current health care reform iteration (and the VP will be fundraising for Gov. Strickland this evening), it’s worth speculating about which ties will be more significant in the governor’s race: Strickland’s ties to Obama and national policy, especially health care, jobs, and overall economic performance; or Kasich’s ties to his time as a managing director at Lehman Brothers, the heavyweight financial firm that went under in the fall of 2008.

In many ways, of course, it’s unfair to link both candidates to these larger happenings. As Governor of a swing state, Strickland’s interests do lie with a successful Obama presidency–rising tides and all that. As a managing director in the investment banking division, Kasich’s former title sounds impressive, but it’s more likely that he was in his position because of his political influence, not his investment savvy. But which connection will be more sticky, if you will?

If Obama’s approval tanks and national Dems are on the run this November, then Strickland’s chances of winning re-election go down, though it isn’t an automatic win for Kasich. After all, Strickland can still pivot away from national Dems, tout statewide initiatives, and return to his more comfortable, folksy campaigning style, a strategy that he has proven to be master of. The thing to look out for, I think, is any connection that can be made between Kasich and Lehman’s failure. Even a seemingly insignificant connection could tank his chances, especially since he is running, in part, on his ability to be a better state fiscal manager. If Strickland’s camp can paste some line connecting Kasich to this huge failure into a fall ad, it would be more than enough to keep independents away from Kasich. Remember, Lehman was the biggest corporate bankruptcy in history (see Wikipedia’s quick summary). Kasich is lucky, in a sense, that Lehman wasn’t a household name in Ohio. In New York and other financial circles, Lehman’s collapse was end-of-days type drama. I, like most people, can’t fathom $600 billion in debt, but I know it’s a massive figure, one that can’t easily be explained away.

Read Full Post »

It’s just that easy to balance a budget. Really.

I don’t agree with Third Base Politics’ take on Sunday’s Dispatch piece on John Kasich. My take away from this brief history of Clinton-era budget intrigue is that Kasich was a member of the US Congress in the 90s, and that he wants to take a lot of credit for the national budget surplus–and by implication the tech fueled economic boom of the late 1990s. It seems like a Republican would be more interested in advancing the rewards of a freer market economy and less what the government did or didn’t do (or in this case what one Republican individual did).

Kasich disagreed [with a suggestion that the surplus was a product of bipartisan efforts], contending that Clinton’s budgets in 1994 and 1995 projected “$200 billion deficits as far as the eye could see.” It was only after Republicans insisted upon curtailing spending and the size of government, and reducing the capital gains tax, that “we began to see the revenues really flow,” Kasich said.

A similar formula, he said, can be used to solve Ohio’s budget problems: “I’ve seen this movie before, and it can have a happy ending.”

I think Kasich is still running up hill, and I’m not sure that communicating his congressional experience 15 years ago, whatever that experience was, is any consolation to Ohioans who are in this mess right now. In short, Strickland’s response to this should be less “The national budget surplus of the late 90s was not Kasich’s doing” and more “If he has a plan, then why keep it secret? Help Ohioans now.”

Federal level campaigns can be partisan. After all, these campaigns are about one side having more votes in Congress. But running for statewide office needs to champion keeping the state going. It’s about Ohio v. 49 other states. In short, it is about cooperation. In 2006 Strickland showed that he is a master of this type of campaign.

Kasich still has a ways to go. His campaign organization needs to adjust to running for statewide office in Ohio. Until then, all the stories about his time in Congress will appeal to his base and not a broader audience of Independents and irritated Dems. And they are out there.

Read Full Post »