Ohio Megathread

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

...So it's good to know Ed will fight through this peer pressure for him to drop out!

He shouldn't have to drop out if he doesn't want to...

I certainly hope you weren't one the people calling Schweitzer a selfish traitor for choosing not to run for Senate

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Kasich is ludicrously lucky.  This is Obama 2004 Senate race lucky.  First he runs for governor in 2010, the most GOP year in two decades, winning a state that had gone to s**t in the economic turndown under a Democratic governor by the skin of his teeth in a race that he would have lost any other year.  Then he runs against Tartuffe in 2014 and will likely run up the score in a dramatic fashion.  He'll have a record of winning the top swing state in the nation twice going forward now, making him the most attractive resume/paper candidate in the GOP field in 2020 to run, likely, against a President Clinton seeking reelection, or, should the GOP win in 2016, to wait until 2024 and make a bid then.

Why would he wait? What's stopping him from running in 2016?

For one thing, he would do about as well as Bill Richardson...

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

I think we're to the point now that Wendy Davis will probably outperform Fitzgerald.

What counties can he win at this point?

Athens and Cuyahoga are the only certainties.  Maybe Lucas and Summit (I'd guess he barely wins the former and loses the latter).  That's probably it.  I imagine he'll do even worse than Lee Fisher.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

I think we're to the point now that Wendy Davis will probably outperform Fitzgerald.

What counties can he win at this point?

Athens and Cuyahoga are the only certainties.  Maybe Lucas and Summit (I'd guess he barely wins the former and loses the latter).  That's probably it.  I imagine he'll do even worse than Lee Fisher.

Mahoning?

Forgot about Youngstown   It could go either way, but I suspect FitzGerald narrowly carries it b/c of the unions.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

This race is just freakin painful to watch now.

At least its outcome doesn't affect your state

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Where's Adam?

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

The only alternative was running Strickland again and he declined already.

Strickland was never a reasonable alternative nor would any A-list candidate be someone to have replaced FitzGerald with.  No one would've expected a replacement to win, the idea would've been to dig up some termed out State Rep/State Senator and run him/her instead to try to stop the bleeding regarding base turnout.  Anyone who met basic standards of credibility would do as long as they can play the part of generic D.  It'd be a good way for a B or C list candidate to boost statewide name recognition and have a number of folks in the Ohio Democratic Party owe them a favor.  FitzGerald has negative name ID, whereas Sutton or a generic termed-out State Rep/State Senator would simply have no name ID.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

I will be writting in Joffrey Baratheon/The Brave Little Toaster for Gov/LG

I am mad at FitzGerald for more reasons than I can begin to count, but Kasich is...well...yeah, that's not happening either   I considered Rios, but she's too out there (making any form of cooperation with the NSA a felony is insane and she spelled "fracking" as "fracturing").  Plus, she seems to be the bad kind of left-wing protest candidate

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

TL;DR version of that: democrats may now lose the Cuyahoga County Executive race.

LoL.

No we won't, Adam's more or less right about the big picture with the Cuyahoga County Executive race; these are just sore losers and Smith was never held in particularly high regard despite being a State Senator.  Even FitzGerald will win Cuyahoga and Armond Budish (our nominee) is a strong candidate (he's got statewide potential, although I think he'd do much better running for state-level office than for Senate; he's not the right type to run against Portman). 

@ Adam: Told you not to back Smith in primary (although in fairness, I believe you later came around and switched to Budish, IIRC).

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Adam, do you think FitzGerald will end his political career after this election, or will he try to run for something else in the future?

It doesn't matter if he runs for anything, he has less chance of winning another primary than Alan Keyes has of becoming President.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Adam, do you think FitzGerald will end his political career after this election, or will he try to run for something else in the future?

It doesn't matter if he runs for anything, he has less chance of winning another primary than Alan Keyes has of becoming President.

Haha, of course he'd never actually win the nomination (much less the general). My question was if he might be delusional enough to try.

Yes, if it'd keep him in the headlines.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Two things: First, why did typing " ; ) " withour the space make an R-OH avatar pop up in my post?  Second, Fitz isn't getting nominated for anything.  Unlike Boyce, everyone hates FitzGerald.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Turnout will be depressing, is my main prediction.

You've changed your initial stance I take it?

*snip*

We're not given the right to know the party ID of our judicial candidates on the ballot, and that ultimately helps Kasich's Republican judges.

Not this year it doesn't, overall the lack of party ID for judges helps incumbents and candidates with Irish last names more than anything else.  In fact, it's probably the only reason O'Donnell will likely win (plenty of Republicans think he's a Republican ).

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

You folks think Democrats still have a chance of knocking off that pimply faced nerd Josh Mandel?

Thankfully Mandel will almost certainly still be around for another four years. I'm hopeful looking forward to a more successful Senate campaign in 2018.

Vosem, why do you support a someone (Josh Mandel) who falsely accused his opponent (Sherrod Brown) of being a wife-beater?

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Ugh, even that turd Mandel won by double digits. Thanks for dragging everyone down, FitzGerald. He lost Cuyahoga County!

FitzGerald didn't just lose Cuyahoga, he lost it by double-digits.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Chris Redfern also lost. I suppose blind partisan hackishness eventually catches up to a man.

The person who beat him is under investigation for burglary, if I'm not mistaken.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Huh. Would've pegged you as a Neuhardt guy.

I've never really been a fan of Neuhardt. If you ever hear her speak, she doesn't exactly excite the Democratic base and around the media and even around voters and volunteers, to be honest she can be just...intolerable, to say the least.

Pepper sealed the deal for me when he promised to provide Cleveland representation in the new ODP leadership. Not only that, but with being ODP Chair comes the responsibility to bring success for us. Sharen as previously mentioned is a perennial loser, but Pepper has managed to get elected countywide in Hamilton County before, and his impressive record this year (outraising DeWine, running high quality ads, tons of donors and volunteering on his behalf, union endorsements, aggressive campaigning etc.) is definitely encouraging.

We need someone young and confident like Pepper to step up and say enough is enough. Restore order in the party in keeping the Redfern establishment at the head of the party and get the ball rolling again going into 2015-2016.

What we need is someone who can raise a sh!t load of money and isn't aligned with the whacktivist crowd.  It'd be better if Pepper could win without Turner (who is basically a bone to the whacktivists and the Cleveland African-American political machine), but if that's the only way to beat Neuhardt, so be it.