Ohio Politics

[terrycloth]

In the car, my mom and I were talking a little about politics. Apparently, a big scandal in the state is how the governor has been implicated in a huge web of corruption -- taking bribes, failing to report gifts, and so on -- and more and more evidence is turning up that the Ohio presidential vote in 2004 was basically fixed in all the ways that people were alleging it was fixed back in 2004. She thought it was highly amusing, and laughed about it. Everyone's looking forwards to seeing the scandal unfold, but no one would dream of trying to actually achieve anything substantial as a result of it. "It's way too late to change the result of the election, of course."

There's also a mayoral election coming up. For the past few years, Ohio has had a sane mayor. "But Ford is so *boring*," my mom complained, "Everyone wishes Carty was back in office." And yet, no one can believe that Carty (who's running as a democrat this time, but doesn't really owe allegiance to any particular party or principle other than doing favors for his friends) has 48% support in the most recent poll, ahead of the next candidate who has 16%. Ford, the incumbent, is not the next candidate, despite no one being able to point to anything wrong he's done. He's just too boring, and everyone knows the primary purpose of politics is to entertain.

At least in Ohio.