Mayor from Ohio. (Getty image file photo.)
Each morning in the Ohio Capital Journal’s free newsletter, The Eye-Opener, we round up the news and commentary from across Ohio, the country and the world that catches our attention. We call this feature Catching Our Eye and have published it here.
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Catching our eyes
Ranked voting. Avery Kreemer of the Dayton Daily News reports: “DeWine signs Ohio’s ranked choice voting ban“
Ranked-choice voting will be officially banned at the state and local level in Ohio after Gov. Mike DeWine signed Senate Bill 63 on Tuesday.
SB 63 is scheduled to go into effect in 90 days. The bill requires the state to withhold payments from the Local Government Fund – a pool of money equal to 1.7% of all Ohio tax revenues and distributed to municipalities – for any municipality that chooses to adopt a ranked-choice voting system.
Investigation? Laura A. Bischoff of the Columbus Dispatch reports: “Ohio AG candidate calls for investigation of JobsOhio, former OSU president“
A Democrat running for Ohio attorney general is asking the state inspector general to investigate former Ohio State University president Ted Carter and JobsOhio, who paid $60,000 for a podcast produced at WOSU Public Media studios.
Inspector General Randall Meyer has the authority to investigate JobsOhio employees if he receives a complaint.
Attorney John Kulewicz sent a complaint on March 17 asking for an investigation into Carter, JobsOhio President JP Nauseef and his designees, and podcast host Krisanthe Vlachos.
– I don’t remember. The Toledo Blade editorial board writes: “Prosecuted under oath“
U.S. Senator Jon Husted has a impoverished memory for a relatively youthful man of 58.
We learned this primarily from Mr. Husted’s testimony as a defense witness in the criminal trial of FirstEnergy executives accused of orchestrating the bribery scandal that was the basis of the $1.3 billion rescue package for Toledo Edison’s parent company.
Retreating democracy. Slate reports: “They have been measuring the state of democracy for years. Guess what their up-to-date report says about America“
Donald Trump and the Republican Party are dismantling American democracy at a record pace, according to the latest edition of a long-running project monitoring the state of democracy around the world.
How to lose friends and alienate people. Adam Serwer from Atlantic writes: “Destroying America’s Allies Proves Harmful to National Security: How “America First” Became “America Alone.”“
After a decade of denigrating American allies as freeloaders, President Trump is begging them to aid open the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway adjacent to Iran that is sometimes called the “jugular” of the world economy.
These allies are reluctant to jump at the chance to join Trump’s war with Iran – none of them have accepted the offer. This leaves the president trapped in an unnecessary war of choice that he started and cannot end. Iran’s influence on the world economy grows as oil prices rise and the strait remains closed to the United States and its allies.
Virtually anyone could have told Trump that spending the last few years antagonizing allies with aggressive tariffs, bellicose arm-twisting, and imperial disregard would hurt him when it came time to ask those same allies for aid. But this is not a basic strategic miscalculation or even typical Trump incompetence – it is the result of a particular ideological fantasy of American independence from foreign alliances that is unaware of how these alliances have long served American interests. Americans are learning the demanding way that the economic costs of Trump’s autarky are much greater than the costs of the “globalism” he opposes.
Russia. The Wall Street Journal reports: “Russia shares satellite imagery and drone technology with Iran“
People familiar with the matter say Russia is expanding intelligence exchanges and military cooperation with Iran, providing satellite imagery and improved drone technology to aid Tehran target U.S. forces in the region.
Production. The Associated Press reports: “Instead of benefiting American manufacturers, Trump’s tariffs are hurting them“
Trump’s main justification for the tariffs was that they would force more U.S. factories to open and generate enough revenue to close the federal budget deficit. But it didn’t materialize.
Factories continue to lay off workers, and in Trump’s first full 12 months in the White House, 98,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost. U.S. companies that foot the bill for tariffs are now suing the Trump administration for refunds of more than $130 billion in tariffs. Meanwhile, the federal deficit is expected to grow over the next decade.
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