Time Magazine says Ohio's Taft among worst governors

[cmd]

11/13/2005, 6:10 p.m. ET

(AP) — Time Magazine has called out Gov. Bob Taft for his failure to report golf outings and for not leaving office after being convicted of four misdemeanor ethics charges.

(snip)
"The Gov. was widely considered an inept, ineffective leader even before he ran afoul of the law," Wendy Cole wrote for the magazine, citing Taft's failure to address the state's lagging manufacturing industry.

(snip)
Taft, serving his second four-year term, pleaded no contest in August to the ethics charges and was fined $4,000. In October, a poll pegged his approval rating at 15 percent.

Also mentioned in the magazine were Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco, who has been criticized for her handling of the Hurricane Katrina disaster, and South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, whose frugality many say is to blame for rising unemployment and falling income levels.

http://www.cleveland.com/newsflash/cleveland/index.ssf?/base/news-20/113192394572730.xml&storylist=cleveland

[lovelaureng]

1. None too surprising about Taft. n/t

[ok_cpu]

2. Among? What's he have to do to be the worst?

Have an approval rating in the low teens?
Commit crimes?
Lose a few hundred million in taxpayer money?


I guess maybe if any of those would happen, he'd be the worst...

[yellowcanine]

19. To be fair, there is the gropinator so he may not be the worst.

[electropop]

26. He'd have to do something truly insane like invest state pension funds

in collectible coins. But of course, nobody is that crazy.

[northzax]

39. why bother with collectible coins

when there are so many fine wines out there to invest in?

[electropop]

41. Did they do wines too?

:silly:

[merwin]

3. And yet they vote down election reform.

[WCGreen]

6. The reforms were convoluted and not ready for prime time...

The backers didn't line up any political support...

They didn't have any money and....

The issues were placed on a ballot that had no draw except local elections... A recipe for disaster...

[mtnester]

13. PLUS - Arnold came out strong to support one issue...

and many Dems smelled a rat with that

[electropop]

27. No they didn't! Massive fraud (again) in Ohio.

Ohio voted for reform. Blackwell saw his power being revoked and overruled the voters again.

In the just-completed election in Ohio, there are huge discrepancies between the polls and the vote count, on every issue related to election reform. Please publicize this. It exemplifies the trouble we should expect in 2006. It will be our downfall if we don't make it the top priority of our party to fight it. Please look at Issues 2-5 below.

ISSUE 1 ($2 Billion State Bond initiative)
PRE-POLLING: 53% Yes, 27% No, 20% Undecided
FINAL RESULT: 54% Yes, 45% No

ISSUE 2 (Allow easier absentee balloting)
PRE-POLLING: 59% Yes, 33% No, 9% Undecided
FINAL RESULT: 36% Yes, 63% No

ISSUE 3 (Revise campaign contribution limits)
PRE-POLLING: 61% Yes, 25% No, 14% Undecided
FINAL RESULT: 33% Yes, 66% No

ISSUE 4 (Ind. Comm. to draw Congressional Districts)
PRE-POLLING: 31% Yes, 45% No, 25% Undecided
FINAL RESULT: 30% Yes, 69% No

ISSUE 5 (Ind. Board instead of Sec. of State to oversee elections)
PRE-POLLING: 41% Yes, 43% No, 16% Undecided
FINAL RESULT: 29% Yes, 70% No

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-friedman/the-staggeringly-impossib_b_10589.html

[OzarkDem]

31. Please stop

This has already been analyzed. The reason for the discrepancy in polling numbers (and they were pre-election public opinion polls, not exit polls - there's a big difference) is because many voters changed their minds once they got in the election booth and actually read the ballot initiatives. They were confusing and poorly worded.

Perhaps this would be a good time to launch a campaign to encourage liberal Dems to "Leave Ohio Alone".

While we know we have a screwed up state, all the amateur outsiders wasting precious funds and shooting themselves in the foot isn't helping.

[cmd]

38. You are wrong

RON lost this one. There was nothing fishy about this election.

[electropop]

42. Move along, nothing to see here.

Glad you're pleased with the outcome. Blackheart now gets to stay in power until the Feds frog-march him out of there.

[cmd]

43. You are wrong again

I'm not pleased with the outcome. I do understand what the problem is in this case. When you put on a bad campaign, you must accept bad results. I live in a county where we still use punch cards. I am a poll worker. I watched voters come to the polls, express displeasure at being expected to read page after page of details about the issues. They didn't bother, they just said no. After voting they gave us poll workers an earful about having to deal with fine print.

RON did very little to explain that the issues would remove redistricting from politics, that it would benefit the people, not the party .

They didn't explain how the campaign finance limits would work. Real estate agents certainly explained how it would affect them.

RON didn't explain the advantage of opening absentee balloting for everyone. They didn't explain how many people simply do not have time to get to the polls because of their work schedules, or transportation problems.

They didn't explain how one person controls the election process in our state. They didn't explain how he misused his powers.

Put the blame where it belongs. RON tried to do too much in too little time with too few human resources. This wasn't a Blackwell or Diebold problem. It was our fault. Until you open your eyes and look for a solution, you do great harm by yelling wolf when there is none.

[electropop]

44. Thanks for the detailed explanation.

This is the clearest exposition I've seen. Perhaps your insights can be helpful in attacking the problems again.

[OzarkDem]

30. It was a flawed campaign - liberals themselves screwed up

The people who put the election reform campaign together did a poor job of developing the policy and strategy. Then they wasted everyone's money by blowing a ton on an incompetent political consultant.

Dems were ripped off by their fellow Dems on this one. No one should be so arrogant as to assume they know everything about how to conduct election reform if they've never done it before and they should certainly think twice about doing it in a state where they don't even live.

[WCGreen]

4. That's news......

[cmd]

5. Not hardly news

but important to keep the story alive.

[struggle4progress]

7. Hey! Ain't that Guvna Bob an his ole pal W?

[WCGreen]

8. Yea, two inbread republican patricians....

[sandrakae]

9. Yea and those assholes in Ohio are going to just elect another Republican.

[jseankil]

10. They'll put some sort of gay issue on the ballet just to get the nuts

to go vote and while they're there they'll vote Ken Blackman for Gov.

Idiots.

[AX10]

11. This isn't new info TIme.

:eyes:

What took them so long to discover that Taft's a scumbag?

[Einstein99]

16. Time has always been slow

(no pun intended), but it took them 10 years to change their "Man of the Year" to "Person of the Year," and their choices have always been off kilter.

[mtnester]

12. This is news? We have known that in Ohio for YEARS..n/t

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. Baby Blunt in Missouri

is also really bad.

Lots of details here:
http://www.firedupmissouri.com/blog/2

[Terran]

22. Still hovering around a 30% approval rating, I assume?

I haven't checked in a while. Hopefully the next Governor of Missouri will be Jay Nixon.

[proud2BlibKansan]

37. It's still pretty low I believe n/t

[leesa]

15. Did Time have to hire investigators to figure that one out?

[Einstein99]

17. Was Haley Barbour on the list?

He should be.

[LookManLook]

24. The article mentions that

Blanco and Sanford were also on the list. But didn't say that was it.

[UTUSN]

18. Jeb, Can You Hear This? Genes Don't Cut It n/t

[The Backlash Cometh]

20. Is this what happens to families whose daddies made good in the

presidency? Do we have to live alongside of a group of self-entitled spoiled progeny who may even be quietly supporting a cronyistic network that we would never approve of?

[newscott]

28. It's been that way since before we were a country

Why change now?

[progressoid]

21. Time for Ohio to amend their constitution to allow for a recall.

Or maybe the Reupugs could do the honorable thing and encourage him to step down...

Well, I can dream can't I?

[Toots]

23. Serving his second four year term

Evidently Republicans don't care whether a person is competent or popular as long as they are Republican.

[LookManLook]

25. I find it interesting that Mark Sanford made this list

Many people have seen him as a good candidate for the Republicans to run.

[Ignacio Upton]

29. The Freepers are orgasmic over him

If you read their boards it's "Sanford '08." However, a year ago they were support Colorado Governor Bill Owen. However, since the Democrats took back the state legislature, his chances are dead.

[OzarkDem]

32. Taft is the scapegoat

There's nothing the RNC and Ohio Repub Party would like more than to blame all the scandals on Taft and run him out of office.

Taft is actually only a bit player in the machinery of Ohio GOP and RNC corruption. If R's get Taft out of office, they hope they'll be able to sweep the rest of the scandal under the rug.

Taft needs to stay in office as long as possible to keep the public focused on the ongoing corruption scandal.

[mtnester]

35. Taft will NOT resign his office

it would taint the Taft family legacy...which his family has made CLEAR they will not tolerate.

And agreed, we WANT this idiot sitting right where he is during the 06 midterms.

[0007]

33. Where does Captain Good Hair rate? (Rick Perry}

[gasperc]

34. yeah, Blanco would be wise not to run for re-election

I'm not blaming hurricane Katrina on her, but she is in a very weakened state in how she responded to FMEA lackluster response and probably will get stung by the state's poor preparedness for a predicted diaster scenario. It might have been effective for her and Landieu to stand together and show clips from Landreau's July town meeting going over THE VERY TOPIC OF THE POOR LEVEE SYSTEM. But Blanco seemed overwhelmed by the situation. As would even the most super human person.

So, I think she should open the door for another Democrat to build up their name recognition and give them a shot at the mansion. Otherwise, it will surely go to Jindel.

[OhioBlue]

36. Taft is horrible

and any of the Repugs running for Gov right now will be just as bad if not worse. IMHO - Taft would actually be preferable to his Lt. Gov, Bruce Johnson at this point.

[Eurobabe]

40. No shit sherlock!

I live here, and this state sucks! Thanks to the GOOPERS.