NEW WATERFORD, Ohio – If Ohio is the country’s political weathervane (and there’s a good case to be made that it is), then the two-election trend toward Democrats may be ending.
“All of Ohio’s problems come from Washington,” says Bill Watkins, owner of The Original Mario’s pizzeria on East Main Street. “Bailouts, stimulus money, cap and trade have only hurt our economy, not strengthened it.”
Earlier this month, President Obama and his policies took a hit in the Buckeye State. A Quinnipiac University poll found that the president’s job approval rating dropped from 62% to 49% and that Ohio’s unemployment rate reached 11.1%, higher than the national average of 9.5%.
According to Republican pollster Neil Newhouse, Ohio was undoubtedly popular with Democrats a few years ago. This was observable, he said, in the composition of the electorate in 2008 and in the polls completed earlier this year.
Everything has changed. Ohio’s recession now appears to be blamed on Gov. Ted Strickland, a Democrat whose management of the state’s budget has done little to instill confidence in voters that he has a plan to get the state back on track.
“Regardless of party, officials rarely become more popular when conditions worsen,” says political scientist Bert Rockman.
If the decline continues over the next two to three opinion polls, Democrats and the Obama administration have a lot to worry about.
Sometimes cross-sectional research produces smoke without fire, reflecting only the momentary state or opposition rhetoric, Rockman warns.
From the early 1990s through 2006, Ohio trended Republican; The GOP controlled the state’s legislative, executive and judicial branches, as well as both U.S. Senate seats and most of Ohio’s congressional delegation.
Things started to change after the 2002 election, said University of Miami (Ohio) political science professor Christopher Kelly: “In 2006, Democrats struck back, winning the governor’s seat and one chamber of the Legislature, as well as the (U.S.) Senate seat.” In 2008, they further strengthened their control, bringing further profits to the Chamber.
Until recently, things were looking great for Democrats, Kelly said. “Gub. Strickland, who was popular, has seen his poll numbers drop because he has failed to get a budget to cover the deficit Ohio is currently running.”
Strickland’s approval rating dropped 11 points last month in the wake of state budget deliberations. Recent polls show his 2010 Republican challenger, former U.S. Republican John Kasich, to be within the margin of error.
And it gets uglier: An ugly tone has been set in the Democratic primary race for an open U.S. Senate seat between Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher and Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner.
Former Bush budget director and GOP Senate candidate Rob Portman crushed Fisher and Brunner in fundraising totals last quarter.
Kelly isn’t sure Ohio voters are in the mood for a return to Republican control: “Although Strickland’s opinion numbers are down, I believe any improvement in the economic outlook should reverse (his) recent misfortune.”
Part of the problem for Democrats in Ohio is that Obama followed FDR’s example, not JFK’s: Strike while the iron is sizzling and while the magic brew of trouble is brewing in the nation’s cauldron.
Whether his administration did the right thing about the recession, whether it did too little or too much, is starting to hit this rust belt state.
Then we have cap-and-trade, a crappy bill for coal-producing Ohio, but Washington thought it was better than nothing.
This brings us to health care or death by a thousand cuts. It has moving parts everywhere. Everyone agrees that we need universal access, cost reduction, quality maintenance and, oh yes, taxes to pay for it.
The problem is that this is a pipe dream; something has to give. We have high-quality medical care for people with access to high-value insurance; we have constrained access to the system and we have a high cost system. How do we get from here to there?
“It’s too much, too soon, too fast,” pizza salesman Watkins said while ordering at his store.
Fully aware of his Buckeye problem, Obama spent the day last week after a news conference on health care in the affluent Cleveland suburb of Shaker Heights talking about health care.
We have it all here, says Rep. Charlie Wilson, D-Bridgeport: “Ohio represents a wonderful cross-section of the country that seems to be able to straddle the line between liberal and conservative.”
Wilson’s district split in 2008, favoring him and Republican presidential candidate John McCain – further evidence of a deeply divided state.
