Results Are In
Nov 8th, 2006 by Brian A. Thomas
The election results are in. Let’s explore:
State Issues:
Issue 2: Passed overwhelmingly. Unfortunately too many people thought this would raise the minimum wage and that is all. If that is all it did they wouldn’t need a public vote on an amendment. What the issue was about was making all your employment information publicly available to anyone who wants it. Want to know what Sue in sales is making? Well, now you can find not only her salary, but her address and phone number and everything else that is part of her employment record. This is a stalkers dream come true. All employers and homeowners must now maintain several decades worth of paperwork, which raises the cost of business substantially. The raising the cost of business would be one thing since the bill was made by anti-business, anti-capitalist people, but the odd thing is the full loss of privacy to anyone who wants your information. Surely they knew that stalkers will take full advantage of it… Since it is an amendment, the only way to get rid of it will be another amendment. So the question becomes, how many people will be stalked and raped before they repeal it, and repealing a minimum wage increase will be hard to get past the voters and cost tons of money. Odds are they will let the problems in the workplace that this causes and the stalking to go unchecked. Thank God we bear arms. Women, get armed and ready, your stalker is coming thanks to the voters of Ohio.
Issue 3: Failed. Thankfully the people of Ohio saw through this one. Even if a large percentage of the nos were because they oppose gambling, enough people who support casino gambling also voted no on this since they knew this was just a bad amendment all the way around.
Issue 4: Failed. Issue 4 would ban public smoking in all places but bars, race tracks. Restaurants would have to have a walled off (no half-wall junk, but a full walled off area) for their smoking zone. Motels and the like would have to create a separate smoking area away from the rest of the motel. This bill was sponsored by the tobacco industry and the bar owner’s trade group. I voted yes only because I think the tobacco limits are getting out of control, but at the same time I didn’t really care how this went.
Issue 5: Passed. This takes a smoking ban to all new levels. It takes things to such an extreme that it is easier to list where you can smoke now: Your car. Outside. Your hotel room or other lodging room. You home… IF you don’t run a business there and have non-smoking employees who are not family members or live there. I voted a big no on this one since the marketplace already has a system more or less moving to this in place already. We didn’t need an amendment to do that.
US House, Ohio 16th District: Ralph Regula (R). This is what I voted, and I am sure this is the expected outcome. However, I am thinking Regula has been there long enough, time to move somebody else in. Anyhow, the loss of the House to the Democrats means that Regula looses his chairman seats, meaning Ohio lost a bit of representation in the House.
US Senate, Ohio: Sherrod Brown (D). Well, I puked in my mouth and voted for Mike DeWine. Both were horrible choices. Both were very strong anti-gun people. Both are far left socialist. Brown admits as much, DeWine somehow runs as a Republican. However, DeWine at least votes for Republican leadership and that would have been the key there.
Ohio Governor: Ted Strickland (D). Obviously I voted for Bill Pierce, who finished a rather distant third as expected. I rather have had Brown over Strickland, but what can we do. I’ll comment more on the swing to the Democrats later.
Attorney General: Marc Dunn (D). This is one where I did vote Democrat. I also voted for the Democrat candidate for the state house. This was more a vote your gun issue. Odd when the Democrat candidate gets a better endorsement than the Republican…
State Auditor: Mary Taylor (R). I voted that way as well. Also endorsed by the pro-gun groups.
Secretary of State: Jennifer L. Brunner (D). Well, I voted for Greg Hartmann (R) for a variety of reasons, mostly as a pro-gun move. However, while Hartmann had the endorsement of Vote Your Guns.com, the NRA doesn’t seem to have a report card for either.
Ohio State House District 52: William J. Healy, II (D). This is another case where I voted Democrat (as noted above) and once again was more a vote your gun thing. Trumped the Republican dude nearly 3 times over.
State Treasurer: Richard Cordray (D). I voted for Sandra O’Brien (R).
Both Supreme Court spots went to Republicans. The only one I voted for was Robert R. Cupp (R). Actually, I thought there was only one seat open. If there is only one open, then Terrence O’Donnell (R) got it. If there are indeed 2 as the results seem to indicate, then Cupp got one as well.
Locally, Richard Regula (R) lost re-election to the Democrat Todd D. Bosley, and Kim R. Perez (D) run the Auditor spot.
Nationally the Democrats run control of the House, by 30 or so people. The Senate probably will be evenly split. While I agree it is never a good idea to have one party in control of both the House, Senate and the Presidency I have to worry about how Republicans will interpret the loss. Will they see that many of their former supporters stayed away or voted Democrat because they are unhappy with the way the party has been moving away from the smaller government stance they used to stand for? Will they see it as a vote only against the war? Will they see it as people want more taxes and bigger more intrusive government the way the Democrats want? Let’s hope it isn’t the latter. Of the Republican’s that I know who were voting Democrat, it was more to punish them for their recent big government moves in the hope that they will return to what they used to stand for, some were voting against the war as well. I suggest all who did as such write their Republican leadership in their state and nationally and tell them why. Get them to move the party back to the smaller, less intrusive government they used to stand for. Having voted only will probably send the wrong message.
