Liberal Reforms in Ohio: Trick or Treat? (Part II)

The amendment package being sold to Ohio Voters as “Reform Ohio Now” has the potential to tarnish and trash the election procedures in Ohio which have been fair, open, fraud-free, and managed with integrity for most of Ohio’s history. Rush Limbaugh and other articulate conservative voices keep repeating the phrase that “elections have consequences.” Liberals all over the nation are attempting to nullify the incontestable results of several elections by scheming to manipulate the judicial branch of state and local governments, and thereby advancing their agenda without the necessary ratification of the voters. And now in Ohio, the liberals are pursuing a thinly disguised endeavor of using the ballot initiative to further reject the will of the electorate, and create a synthetic environment in which voters and votes are created to advance causes which have been repetitively rejected by voters. The goals and movtives of the liberal partnership are clear: expand the base of likely voters by relaxing all of the measures that keep the elections fraud-free, increase voter turn-out, and overwhelm the conservative voting base in Ohio. It must be noted that the democrats tried this strategy in the 2004 Presidential race, and despite an extremely high voter turn out across the state, George W. Bush still won the state by over 118,000 votes. The best course of action for the voters of Ohio is to reject the benevolent sounding rhetoric of the liberals and vote no on state issues 2, 3, 4, and 5.

One of the sponsoring organizations, The Ohio Education Association, has told its’ members that the issues are “non-partisan, good-government issues.” Nothing could be further from the truth. Firstly, let us examine the “non-partisan” nature of “Reform Ohio Now.” The efforts of the RON organization are at bedrock some of the most prominent leftist organizations in Ohio and across the nation. The list of liberal organizations includes moveon.org, The People for The American Way, Americans For Democratic Action, The Ohio Education Association, The Ohio Federation of Teachers, Common Cause, the Sierra Club of Ohio, and Howard Dean’s Democracy for America. Among RON’s largest financial donors are George Soros and Peter Lewis. Even the New York Times has called the alliance supporting the amendments “A coalition dominated by democrats, unions, and watch dog groups” (The New York Times 9-9-05). At The People for the American Way web site their idea of “non-partisan” includes a “right-wing watch,” links blasting President Bush, Senator Bill Frist, and Chief Justice of the United States John Roberts, and voluminous attacks on every imaginable conservative cause. You can read more detail of liberal democrat involvement at this web address. You will be shocked by the depth of the liberal bench amassed to try to "reform Ohio!"

Perhaps the most blatant example of partisanship on the part of RON and their supporters can be found on the web site of Representative John Conyers, democrat of Michigan. Conyers speaks out on “Reform Ohio Now” as if he were a voting resident of our state. As one of the most partisan, liberal representatives on the national scene, Mr. Conyers stands as proof of the partisanship of these amendments. He states on his own web site, “the Republican Party in Ohio, which holds all state-wide elected offices, is in serious trouble with the voting public. Ohioans are tired of the corruption that is rampant throughout Ohio The closeness of the OH-2 special election, in which Iraq War veteran Paul Hackett came within a whisker of winning in a district that Rob Portman carried with 72% of the vote, was due as much to the widespread disgust with the Republican Party in Ohio as it was to the growing opposition to the war.”

Since The Ohio Education Association has put forward these amendments as “good-government issues,” let us examine the text of the ballot initiatives for a test of good government. The idea of double voting has become infamous in places like Chicago, Detroit, Miami and Philadelphia, and the RON movement appears to want to bring it to Ohio. Issue 2 would permit voters to cast two ballots in each election: one absentee, and one provisional. According to the language in issue 2:

"An elector to whom a ballot has been mailed, but which has not been received by the issuing county board of elections prior to the election, may cast a provisional ballot on election day. If the elector’s first ballot is received by the tenth day following the election, the provisional ballot shall not be counted."

In other words, a voter can cast two ballots, and the system will become subject to layers of big government red tape to avoid fraudulent elections. County Boards of Election would have to be responsible for sorting out all of the double voting. Can anyone spell F-R-A-U-D? Are fraud and double-voting part of the “good government” to which OEA President Gary Allen is referring?

Issue 5 will end local control over elections and replace it with a statewide board of political appointees who serve nine-year terms and are unaccountable to the voters of Ohio at any time. Currently, local bi-partisan boards manage the elections in the counties of Ohio. Local citizens man the polling places and insure the veracity and authenticity of each voter. The newly created board would replace the elected and accountable Secretary of State and have unlimited spending authority. “Good Government” as described by the supporters of RON must mean using nine political appointees to replace one elected official, and issuing the board members a blank check to operate the statewide elections.

The proposals of the Reform Ohio Now show the typical liberal excesses and overreaching. Issues 4 and 5 are designed to solve the problem of conflicts of interest on the part of the secretary of state. In 2004, Ken Blackwell was President Bush’s Ohio campaign manager at the same time he was running the election, which certainly appeared to be negative. While it may be true that a law is needed-not an amendment- a law that prohibits the secretary of state from running any political campaign (other than his or her own) during an election, amending the constitution to include a nine member board of cronyism simply creates more of an overindulgence of government to remedy a non-existent dilemma. As with several of the issues, there is no need to create another layer of bureaucracy or another unaccountable board.

In addition, Issues 4 and 5 both mandate blank-check budgets for the two new boards that the amendments would create. Whatever they deem "necessary," they receive in terms of tax payer dollars.

Ohio voters should reject all issues 2-5. The issues are either outright harmful changes, or they would be better handled as laws instead of constitutional amendments -- or both.

There are several compelling reasons to reject issues 2-5, however none of the reasons can trump the fact that the immense, defective, and meticulously slanted amendments have unintended consequences and do not belong in the Ohio constitution. Former President of the Ohio Senate Richard Finan has stated it best, “These matters do not belong in the Ohio Constitution, precisely because it is difficult and expensive to change the constitution. When the public feels the problems with these amendments, the public cannot correct them without more campaigns for constitutional amendments costing millions of dollars.

The argument, then, is not that the state political systems do not need improvement. The argument is that Issues 2 through 5 are not improvements in either substance or place. They are, at worst, special-interest schemes or, at best, well-intentioned attempts to build a bridge too far.”