Sunday, November 02, 2008

Falling Back

I'm out of state tonight, watching McCain on SNL in between attack ads that make Ohio look warm and fuzzy. Of course, the worst of the slime always drops in the last 72 hours, so maybe it's that bad back home tonight, as well.

More negative mailers. Ho hum. Tiberi is getting more personal in his attacks on Robinson. You know what I want to know? After two years of closely watching Tiberi and listening to him speak, it never occurred to me that his "I was a realtor, so I..." line doesn't make a lot of sense. He graduated OSU in 1985, worked for Kasich for eight years, was in the Ohio General Assembly from 1992-2000, when he went to the U.S. House. According to the Almanac of American Politics, he was an assistant on Kasich's staff from '84-'92, and a realtor from 1995-2000. It doesn't mention his tenure in the State House. His Wikipedia entry says that he worked as a realtor upon graduation from college in 1985, but doesn't mention his work on Kasich's staff. That may have been a misunderstanding on the entry-writer's part, as the Fox News candidate biography for Tiberi lists his real estate experience first, before his legislative work. His biography on his official house page lists his real estate experience last, saying "He also worked as a realtor with ReMax Achievers in Westerville." Tiberi has had a day job in legislative politics for the last 24 years, dating back to before college graduation. It would appear to me that he moonlighted from his taxpayer-paid job as a legislator because his legislator's salary (today's State Reps make $59k per year) wasn't sufficient for his needs and/or desires, or because somebody advised him that he needed a "real job" on his resume if he wanted to pursue his political ambition. Does anyone know where I can find out how many clients Tiberi actually had during his tenure as a real estate agent?

You know what? Forget it. I'm not going to spend the next 72 hours looking, and if all goes well it will never again be relevant. Forget I asked.

Anyway.

Does anybody else think John Boehner is about to totally explode? It's understandable that a man who has gone from majority leader to leader of a potentially very small minority (who in all likelihood will oust him as leader), who got left hanging naked on the first financial rescue package, and is stumping for a candidate nobody much likes anymore would be on edge. But this has simply been crazy. He called Obama's actions in the Illinois senate "chickenshit," demanded that the U.S. Department of Justice dispatch prosecutors to Ohio polling places, and proclaimed the DOJ's refusal to do so the result of Obama supporters "infiltrating" key positions in the Republican-run Department. This is his actual behavior. It leads me to imagine him having dreams where he tries to arrest Jennifer Brunner because of a Cuyahoga registration in the name of "Mickey Mouse," but Mickey actually shows up at the polls with ID and loudly proclaims his intent to vote for Obama. Boehner tells the two State Patrolmen he's brought along to now arrest Mickey for voter fraud. When the patrolmen say there's no evidence of a crime, Boehner screams that that they have his eyewitness testimony, goddammit, and what more do they need? At this point both patrolmen peel of their latex masks and reveal themselves to be Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, who say "we're on your staff, we're in your caucus, we're running your ground game in the swing states. We're at Hoover and Heritage. Think you know your family, John? Don't be too sure..." He awakens from his dream in a cold sweat, with voice-mail, and that's how we get this week's behavior. Either that or he's always been a raving lunatic hiding behind the partisan hack facade.

Everyone's coming up with their predictions for the presidential map. I'm interested, but honestly, I think Obama will get between 270 and 300 EVs. As long as that's the case, my main interests are: 1) The two local races- Garland/McGregor & Robinson/Tiberi, 2) Control of the Ohio State House 3) Obama winning Ohio. As a matter of fact, I'd like to see one of those interactive mapping tools for Ohio's 88 counties. Anybody can predict that Cuyahoga and Summit will go for Obama, and Butler and Warren will go for McCain, but what about Wood and Erie? Athens and Jefferson? Hamilton? Beyond that, I'm interested in differences between Presidential margins and downticket margins by county and precinct. For instance, in which counties will McCain do better in his race than any downticket non-incumbent R does in theirs? In which counties will Obama do better in his race than any non-incumbent downticket Dems? In other words, where does Cordray beat Obama?

It's late. Before I start firing off letters demanding that the FBI investigate the Blue Jackets' horrible record in shoot-outs and raving about Gary Bettman's supporters driving the Zambonis, I'll sign off. Y'all should get some rest, too. Those three points of interest listed above? I'm predicting one of them won't be answered by the time the clock strikes midnight on Tuesday.



1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Quite engaging for a post about a bunch of random stuff. :)

Regarding Boehner, you gotta figure it's been tough for him spending his whole life trying to convince people he name is pronounced bay-ner when everyone knows it is pronounced boner.