Quinnipiac Poll Coming Tomorrow

Just received a press release from Quinnipiac University saying that they are releasing a new poll on the Ohio Governor's race tomorrow morning at 10 AM. Stay tuned for results.

What We Should Have Been Blogging About Last Week, Part I

Last week while the whole mess was going down, State Sen. Kevin Coughlin, who deserves a "nick"name of some sort that I haven't determined yet, flew under the radar to propose apportionment board reform. (H/T WMD)

Coughlin Set to Propose Apportionment Board Reform

COLUMBUS-State Senator Kevin Coughlin (R-Cuyahoga Falls) will introduce legislation next week that seeks to bring more balance and fairness to the state's method for redrawing legislative districts.
The resolution, jointly sponsored by Senator Gary Cates (R-West Chester), would amend the Ohio Constitution to change the membership of the apportionment board to the Governor, the Auditor of State, the Secretary of State, the Speaker of the Ohio House of Representatives, the House Minority Leader, the Ohio Senate President and the Minority Leader of the Senate.
Currently, the membership on the board includes the Governor, Auditor, Secretary of State, a person chosen by the Speaker of the House and the Senate President, who is a member of the Speaker's political party, and a person chosen by legislative leaders in the minority party. The board meets every 10 years to redraw districts after U.S. Census figures are released.
Coughlin's resolution would increase membership on the apportionment board to seven and require that five or more members agree to the district lines.
"This is a practical solution to the ongoing debate about redistricting in Ohio," said Coughlin. "This critical decision should be made by those who were elected by the people as part of a fair and balanced process."
Sen. Coughlin will detail the proposal next week be available to answer questions.

Let’s review. The GOP controlled Ohio’s governor’s mansion from 1990 until 2006. The GOP completely controlled all facets of our state government from 1994 to 2006. And they did absolutely nothing during that time to reform redistricting. Why? Because they liked how the process gave them complete control to draw the lines. Now, however, faced with the prospect of Democratic control of the apportionment board, all of a sudden reforming the apportionment board is a priority.

I can’t believe we let these guys get off the hook last week.

Ron Silver Passes Away

Ron Silver, better known as Bruno Gianelli to those of us who are fans of the West Wing, has passed away tonight from cancer at the age of 62. Silver was a life long Democrat who became a hard-core GOPer after the September 11th terrorist attacks on his hometown, but seemed to swing back to Democratic side of the fence during the 2008 election cycle.

Here is one of his most memorable moments from the West Wing. RIP, Ron Silver

Nevermind Lee Fisher's Website, Where's Ted Strickland's?

So after all the hoopla about Lee Fisher's website from certain voices in the leftysphere, I'd like to ask this: has anyone visited Ted Strickland's website recently? Yeah. Try it out. You'll find a whole lot of nothing. 

Neither does anyone seem to be home at the Democratic Governor's Association.

The 2010 election cycle is underway everyone. Time get your websites up and running.

Here's Your Sign Folks

This is exactly the news that we need to signal the beginning of an economic recovery: rather than staying dependent on exports, Chinese manufacturers are beginning to push to sell to Chinese consumers rather than American.

For the last decade, the U.S. consumer has been the engine that drove not only the U.S. but the global economy. This recession has made plainly obvious that we can't do it alone any more. Once China increases domestic consumption and stops being so reliant on the U.S. market, then trade with China can become trade again, something it hasn't been for decades:

Liu Dequan says he has had to alter the ornamental lamps his firm had fashioned for the US market. He’s changed the plugs to fit Chinese sockets.

“Since the financial crisis happened I have had no foreign business at all,” Mr. Liu laments. “I decided that I have to work on the domestic market no matter how difficult it is.”

I Honestly Wasn't In the Tank for Fisher...

...but after yesterday's drama, I sure as hell am now. See the logo on the top right of this blog. I'll explain more about this later.

I'm Back

Well, as I said over in my farewell message over at BSB, I will be re-activiating this blog. For right now, I'm getting it set up for the Lefty Blogs feed, getting Analytics set up, and other housekeeping tasks. Probably will not go live til next Monday. 

In the meantime, feel free to check out my archive of posts which goes back to August of 2005.

I'm Not Here Anymore

I've moved on to be co-editor in chief of the Buckeye State Blog.

There's an RSS feed of BSB posts in the top left corner of this blog now.

interesting quote

This is a quote from a column written about the Gillian Gibbons fiasco in the Sudan, but for me it called to mind the Phil Burress "Christian Conservatives" in the U.S.:

Every faith has rigid doctrinaires who would sacrifice their very humanity for the fool's gold of theological purity. These people are so eager to live the literal law of their holy books that they miss the point of those holy books, shedding compassion, kindness and plain common sense along the way.

Worse, they are always literal about the wrong things, always literal about passages in holy writ that they feel empower them to punish, judge, ostracize and condemn. Never literal about the passages that require them to give, forgive, serve and stand humble.

Who's fearmongering now? McKinsey report says U.S. can halve CO2 emissions by 2030 with "minimal" cost

One of the favorite tactics of those on the right who are bought, sold, and paid for by the fossil-fuel industry is to label those who express concern over global warming as alarmists overreacting to the threat. Tom Blumer of Cincinnati's BizzyBlog has even developed a trademark phrase to describe global warming activists as "globalarmists."

But a new study done by the consulting firm McKinsey & Co. should go a long way towards turning the tables on Tom and other fossil-fuel industry apologists. This report, funded in part by Pacific Gas & Electric, Detroit Edison, and Royal Dutch Shell, concludes that the United States could halve its CO2 output by 2030 at minimal cost.

That's because 40% of the steps needed to make it happen would actually save money. And, according to their report, 80% of this reduction could be achieved using only existing technologies. The 20% remainder is from technologies that are well on their way to commercialization, such as the use of cellulostic ethanol, and plug-in hybrid vehicles.

This contrasts sharply with the alarmists on the right who warn that we can't stop global warming without crippling our economy. For example, when Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut and Sen. John Warner of Virginia proposed a bill creating a cap-and-trade scheme for CO2 emissions in the U.S., the U.S. Chamber of Commerce estimated that it would cost 3.4 million Americans their jobs, as well as force consumers to pay as much as $6 trillion more in higher prices for oil, gas, and other goods. All this begs the question: Who's fear mongering now?

Read the BusinessWeek article detailing the McKinsey report by clicking here.