Are Democrats Trying To Lose Ohio?

[Stubborn]

[liberal N proud]

1. Strickland should never have been the candidate for this race

He has way too much baggage and the Kochs, NRA and a few other organizations have attacked him right and left.

Ted Strickland was a victim of the Bush Recession, his term as governor was in the middle of it and the states deficit and job losses mounted. Those have all been used against him in non-stop adds none of which mention that this all took place while the bush economy was destroying the country.

I will vote for Ted Strickland and campaign for him, but the right has made it a priority to make sure Portman can keep working for his corporate overlords.

[ROCK2]

3. You're right...

The R superpac ran anti-Strickland commercials in Ohio for months with no response. Now that Strickland is finally running commercials, he hasn't once said anything about the Republicans destroying the economy. He's a very weak candidate.

[CincyDem]

6. Exactly - Same strategy they took choosing Fisher to run against Kasich.

Ohio Dems are out of touch and I'm not sure why. There were better choices.

Jennifer Brunner, the former Secretary of State who cleaned up a lot of Ohio's voting rights issues going into the 2008 and 20012 elections (and has now been replaced by a R asshat who is rolling ALL of them back). No question she was the best choice vs. Kasich but Lee Fisher, then Lt Gov most known for falling asleep during afternoon meetings, was picked because...wait for it...he was "next in line". That decision gave us Kasich (since Fisher didn't campaign during siesta time...lol), poising him for national visibility. He's already polishing his message for 2020 as the "last electable republican" willing to stand up to Donald Trump.

PG Sittenfeld ran in the primary vs. Strickland. Young, smart guy who, in the words of many local dem officials, was trying to "jump the line" going from a Cincinnati city council to the senate in one election. His baggage: 1) he's got degrees from Princeton and London School of Economics, although it's hard to make that a negative vs. Portman's Dartmouth degree; and his age (31) that would make him the youngest member of the current congress, stealing that title from the forward thinking Tom Cotton who we could be dealing with for 40 years if Arkansas gets its way.

David Pepper runs the Ohio Dem party. He's a good guy with a multi-generational family tradition of active participation in democratic causes in SW Ohio. His baggage - he's never won an election. He was a city council member here in Cincinnati who got elected in 2001 who came in first in a "top 7 get the job" election but he's never won anything head to head.

In the end, it seems to me that Ohio Dems are overly committed to process and orderly lines of succession vs. actually winning. I love me some Ted Strickland personally but for most voters in Ohio, it's going to like voting for chunky old dad or grampa vs. Portman who still looks like he's out running marathons. (Doesn't hurt that Portman had full grey hair in his 30s so he looks like he's never aging). This was a year to move young and Ohio Dems missed the boat (again).

Also - watch Portman for 2020. I don't think it's a coincidence that the first ads nationwide that the Kochs ran were in Ohio support him. Kasich will have the baggage of "failing" in 2016 and my money, Rob Portman will be in the sweetspot for 2020...assuming he's running from a Senate seat.

[bulloney]

2. That's exactly what I've been saying.

Pro-Portman ads have relentlessly been attacking Strickland's term as governor. There have been multiple versions of the same message - Ohio lost 350,000 jobs while Strickland was governor and the state's "rainy day" fund was depleted. I've been arguing with several people that most states went through similar experiences due to the nationwide recession.

And of course, you'll get attacked by the NRA unless you demonstrate that you will support unlimited access to all firearms to anybody, any time.

And what has the Democratic party and the Strickland campaign done to counter these disingenuous and dishonest ads? NOTHING! They've just let the Portman campaign and their supporting PACs smack Strickland around like a punching bag.

There's plenty to attack Portman on. He was W's budget director and U.S. Trade Rep. We had record deficits under his direction in both departments. He was also anti-gay rights until his son came out and announced he was gay, and Portman has since done a 180-degree turn on that issue. Otherwise, he's been a lackluster representative who tows the party line on all of the rhetorical issues like repealing Obamacare, attacking Hillary on the emails, Benghazi, and on and on.

The Ohio Democratic Party has been a joke for the past several elections. Their slate of statewide candidates have been horribly weak and the party does little or nothing to promote them. That's why the Republicans have controlled the governor's seat, Ohio House & Senate, all elected cabinet positions and the state supreme court virtually every year since the early 1990s.

[Fast Walker 52]

4. WTF? Very disturbing. So weird coming from a state with Sherrod Brown too.

[turbinetree]

5. Hey Strickland, maybe you should ask Mr. Portmann what he thinks about the below article

since he Portmann is going to vote for Donald j. Trump is he not?


Dear Kellyannne Conway and Steve Bannon

can you and Mr. Bannon have an answer to this report, I think the public has a right to know, since your "guy" and "everyone", in the "republican party, from Paul Ryan, every republican Congressman and woman, Mitch McConnell, and every republican U.S Senate men and woman on down:

says that what he is saying is wrong, but will still "vote" for him because he is better than the democratic candidate-----------really:

What say the republican party..........................he owns you and you own him, lets not forget this point, and this article should be asked in every campaign debate, in the MSM when confronted in this country, do you still endorse and will vote for Donald J. Trump?

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/08/donald-trump-model-management-illegal-immigration