Vote in OHIO

Q:  What’s black and white and red all over?
A:  A newspaper

At the 2012 White House Correspondent’s Dinner, Jimmy Kimmel posed the question in this elementary school riddle and then answered, “Nothing anymore,” in reference to the demise of newspapers. Kimmel’s joke was a sad reminder of bygone days, when everyone looked forward to “reading all about it” and catching up on the news each day in the morning paper.  Not so any more, especially in central Ohio.

The Columbus Dispatch prides itself on being an “unbiased” award-winning newspaper, but its Republican-leaning partisan reports on Ohio politics have contributed to an exodus of readers for several years. Stories that might flatter Democrats are either unreported or under-reported. Stories that favor Republicans are given added significance, especially those involving Governor John Kasich.

The newspaper is headed by John F. Wolfe, whose family has owned the Dispatch since 1905. Wolfe and his wife have contributed well over a hundred thousand dollars since 1997 to Republican political campaigns and candidates, while at the same time their newspaper editorialized and reported on those same public officials, according to a Media Matters search of the “Center for Responsive Politics and National Institute on Money in State Politics” databases.

The main recipient of those donations is Ohio’s Republican governor, John Kasich, who won the governor’s race in 2010 and now faces re-election. By mid-2013, the Wolfe family had donated at least $33,750 to support Kasich’s campaigns and political action committee.  For more information on the Wolfe media monopoly acting as the right arm of the Ohio GOP, check out this investigative report by Media Matters: http://mediamatters.org/mobile/blog/2013/07/08/major-gop-donor-gaining-monopoly-control-over-c/194753

The point is this: DO NOT BELIEVE COLUMBUS DISPATCH STORIES THAT TELL READERS THAT THE GUBERNATORIAL RACE IS ALREADY OVER BEFORE ELECTION DAY. That propaganda has been printed over and over as a tactic to discourage the turnout of progressive voters, in hopes of increasing the GOP candidates’ chances of winning.

DO NOT BELIEVE COLUMBUS DISPATCH STORIES THAT TELL READERS THAT VOTER TURNOUT IS LOW. The Early Voting Center at the Franklin County Board of Elections @ 1700 Morse Road in Columbus, Ohio, had a steady flow of early voters that increased daily as it headed into the final three days of early voting.

Here’s the schedule for Ohio Early Voting on Saturday- Monday:

*Saturday, November 1, from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
*Sunday, November 2, from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.
*Monday, November 3, from 8:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.

If you don’t vote early, make sure you vote on Election Day, Tuesday November 4th, between the hours of 6:30 am and 7:30 pm. Check out this site that has everything else you need to know: http://ohiodems.org/vote-on-election-day/

If you accept a sample ballot at your voting location, check to make sure it’s the party you support. Last weekend, a Republican judicial candidate hired some people to pass out sample GOP ballots in the parking lot of the Franklin County Early Vote Center. Unfortunately, the paid workers tried to trick voters by telling them the sample ballots listed Democratic candidates.

VOTE- you’ll be glad you did.

#VotingMatters

#VoteBlue2014

#RememberInNovember

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Vote Blue to Save OHIO from ALEC

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
~Randall Terry

Let’s not be fooled into giving Ohio’s ALEC/GOP governor, John Kasich, another four years. The GOP continues to spend large amounts of time and money to trick voters into believing that John’s a “compassionate conservative,” but Ohioans have seen the real governor in action for the last four years.

Remember what we’ve witnessed SO FAR with John Kasich and his ALEC accomplices:
*Favoring special interest groups, that fund campaigns, over citizens
*Drastically cutting budgets to Ohio’s local communities, causing added levy requests
*Shifting taxes to favor wealthy and calling the changes “tax cuts”
*Drastically cutting budgets to Ohio’s public schools, causing added levy requests
*Gerrymandering of State School Board districts for ALEC/GOP control
*Moving public school funds to for-profit charter schools with little accountability
*Causing undue stress to children through constant high-stakes testing
*Promoting privatization in schools, local governments, prisons, turnpike, and more
*Diminishing workers’ rights with Senate Bill 5 and Right-to-Work bills
*Replacing jobs lost during recession with lower-paying jobs with fewer benefits
*Extreme gerrymandering of Congressional districts to favor ALEC/GOP members who no longer represent their constituents

Not to mention the JobsOhio scandal, the Suarez campaign finance scandal, the fracking in state parks scandal, the Lake Erie toxic algae crisis, voter suppression bills, renewable energy “freeze,” and laws that remove women’s rights to make their own healthcare decisions. The list goes on and on…

Every initiative has come from the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, the corporate special interests that help write Ohio laws. Follow this link for more detailed information on ALEC in Ohio: http://site.pfaw.org/pdf/ALEC-in-Ohio.pdf

Let’s make sure Ohioans are not fooled again.

Remember in November.

Vote OUT John Kasich and the ALEC GOP.

#VoteBlue2014

#WinOH2014

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John Kasich’s Own Frankenstein Story

I have been the author of unalterable evils; and I live in daily fear, lest the monster whom I have created should perpetrate some new wickedness.
~Victor Frankenstein

In 1818, Mary Shelley’s frightening ghost story, “Frankenstein,” was published and became an immediate best seller. Shelley’s main character was Victor Frankenstein, a man who was consumed by the desire to discover the secret of life. Victor said, “A new species would bless me as its creator and source; many happy and excellent natures would owe their being to me,” assuming he’d be revered by the useful creature he would bring into being.

Victor spent months eagerly putting together his monster, and one night, in the secrecy of his apartment, he brought his creation to life. After seeing his creature spiral out of control, Victor Frankenstein was repulsed by the monster’s “ugliness” and thereafter shunned his creation.

One must assume that no assemblage of old body parts and chemicals was involved, but studies confirm that Charles and David Koch and other wealthy industrialists created the Tea Party more than ten years before it burst into U.S. politics. Americans have been led to believe that the Tea Party is a grass-roots movement, but it’s clear that the party is in fact a pawn created by billionaires and large corporations with little interest in fighting for the rights of the common person. Rather, Big Business developed the Tea Party to instigate the common person to fight for unrestricted profits for corporations.

After Tea Party legislators held the American economy hostage with a government shutdown last year, Tom Zawistowski, of the Portage County Tea Party, proved that the Ohio Tea Party had spiraled out of control when he said, “The Republicans aren’t setting the agenda, the Democrats aren’t setting the agenda, President Obama isn’t setting this agenda. This agenda is being set by the American people through the Tea Party movement. Everything that is going on is being driven by us.”

That must have sounded really scary to Ohio’s ALEC governor who micromanages every aspect of government in the state. Just as Victor Frankenstein was repulsed by his monster’s “ugliness” and shunned his creation, John Kasich knew that he needed to separate himself from this uncontrollable monster that he helped create.

Last week the president of the Cincinnati Tea Party was ejected from a Kasich event in West Chester Township even before she entered the door. In the past, this same Tea Party activist had been a GOP powerhouse who promoted Gov. Kasich and his initiatives at local benefits. Now that she was wearing an “Ohioans Against Common Core” T-shirt, she was refused admittance to his political rally.

The Tea Party leader wanted to ask the governor if he supported Common Core. “All the research that I’ve seen has shown that he has never really directly answered the question if he supports Common Core or not,” she said.

There are so many questions about so many other issues that Johnny has chosen not to directly answer until after the election, such as his stance on “Right to Work,” but this honest inquiry came from one of his own people.

It appears that John Kasich has shunned the Tea Party during his re-election campaign, because he is no longer revered by the useful creature he helped bring into being. Will this monster’s revenge ultimately lead to an American horror story for the governor?

Only time will tell if John Kasich’s own Frankenstein story has a happier ending than the seventeenth century version.

#VoteBlue2014

#WinOH2014

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John Kasich & ALEC GOP Have Delusional Disorder

We accept the reality of the world with which we are presented. It’s as simple as that.
~Christof, from The Truman Show

The Truman Show is a 1998 classic movie featuring Jim Carrey and Ed Harris. Carrey plays a man named Truman who lives in a constructed reality television show that’s broadcast to billions of people around the world. Every aspect of Truman’s life is manipulated by the show’s creator and producer Christof, played by Ed Harris, who puts Burbank in sometimes drastic staged situations to expose his raw emotions and behavior to the viewers. Truman finally becomes suspicious about his perceived reality and begins a journey to discover the real truth about his life.

Oddly enough, there’s a real delusional disorder called “The Truman Show Delusion,” coined in 2008 by a psychiatrist and a neuro-philosopher, Joel and Ian Gold, in which patients believe their lives are staged plays or television shows. Judging by the behavior of GOP legislators in Ohio and around the country, it seems that many of them could be suffering from some form of television-related delusion.  Here is the TOP TEN list of symptoms that support this diagnosis:

1. The GOP has been secretly Breaking Bad ever since it joined the Koch brothers’ American Legislative Exchange Council, commonly called ALEC, over 40 years ago.
2. Today’s GOP leaders act as if they belong on the set of Dallas, a show about wealthy people whose lives revolve around oil, money, and greed.
3. Republican representatives, starring in the real House of Cards, easily assume their roles as cunning politicians who use threats and manipulation to run the government.
4. Citing an array of myths about the Affordable Care Act, these Pretty Little Liars have voted to defund ObamaCare 54 times- talk about reruns!
5. The Tea Party Sons of Anarchy shutdown the federal government last year, which almost turned our country into the anarchy that they seem to crave.
6. Gov. John Kasich and Ohio GOP legislators often portray Mad Men who use false advertising and other gimmicks to trick their constituents into accepting ALEC legislation.
7. John Kasich has entertained Ohioans with after-the-fact cover-ups and pay-to-play finance scenes from Scandal, which include intimidation, threats, and promises of influence.
8. After signing a bill to ensure that his privatized development agency, JobsOhio, won’t have public oversight, ALEC alumnus John Kasich makes daily appearances on I’ve Got a Secret.
9. The GOP-led Ohio legislature has starred in its own version of 19 Kids and Counting by launching a proposed Heartbeat Bill at the Statehouse with their co-stars, the Duggars.
10. Passing anti-women legislation, and publishing a picture of Kasich signing it surrounded by a group of old white men, have shown viewers that Ohio Republican lawmakers live in the 1950’s world of Father Knows Best.

It’s time for John Kasich and the ALEC-controlled GOP to get some help with their TV Land delusions, and learn to accept the reality of the actual world with which we are presented.

It’s as simple as that.

Check here for candidates who have a better grip on reality:  http://ohiodems.org/electioncenter/

#VoteBlue2014

#WinOH2014

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Message to EVERY Ohio Voter- Tie a String Around Your Finger…

“Over three years ago, Governor Kasich began an assault on hardworking Ohioans. And while he lost that fight, it is clear that the Governor’s position on the right of workers to bargain for healthcare and a living wage remains unchanged. Ohio’s families can’t risk another four years of John Kasich.”
~Ed FitzGerald

Early in-person voting begins on Tuesday, October 7^th, and voters must remember the Republican assault on workers’ rights via Senate Bill 5, and VOTE OUT Governor Kasich. Keep in mind which Ohio legislators also supported SB5, the anti-collective bargaining bill: https://www.ohea.org/sb5vote

You may want to tie a string around your finger before you head to the polls, because there are other equally important things you should never forget.

*Think about the American Legislative Exchange Council’s (ALEC) powerful influence on most of Ohio’s Republican legislators:
http://site.pfaw.org/pdf/ALEC-in-Ohio.pdf

*Bear in mind that ALEC/GOP lawmakers continue to pass extreme laws that compromise the rights of Ohioans, including women:
http://innovationohio.org/issues/legislative-scorecards/io-womens-issues-scorecard-ohio-house-of-representatives-2013-2014/

*Consider the renewable energy standards that were virtually eliminated by John Kasich, the Ohio GOP, and ALEC oil companies, despite widespread public support for Ohio’s clean energy progress:
http://mediamatters.org/research/2014/05/15/unnoticed-fossil-fuel-influence-could-soon-dism/199337

*Remember which party has engaged in sleazy voter suppression tactics throughout our state and country:
http://www.pfaw.org/media-center/publications/new-face-jim-crow-voter-suppression-america

*After refreshing your memory with the above, remember to vote for the party that represents the interests of working families, fighting for equality and justice for all Americans:
http://ohiodems.org/

To simplify your voting experience, keep this handy tool in your FAVORITES:
http://ohiodems.org/electioncenter/

#VoteBlue2014  #WinOH2014

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