2010 Election
Click here to read letters of endorsement for Gov. Ted Strickland and former Congressman John Kasich.
Gov. Ted Strickland has presided over the state in the worst possible times. Yet, he has pulled the state through a certified crisis as well as anyone could.
Hard as it is to imagine, other states’ economies and their governments are worse off than Ohio. In some cases, much worse.
That Ohio isn’t in a more desperate position is a credit to both the governor and the Republican legislative leadership that, for two of Mr. Strickland’s four years in office, worked to find some common ground.
John Kasich, the Republican challenger, is running on promises he can’t possibly keep, relying on rhetoric from a generic Republican playbook. He sees little good happening in Ohio, and his prescription for making things better is to cut taxes and loosen regulations on businesses.
If only governing were so simple.
The Strickland record
Ted Strickland got his job by handily defeating J. Kenneth Blackwell, another Republican who argued that high taxes are at the heart of Ohio’s problems. Though Mr. Kasich lamely claims otherwise, taxes have gone down — not up — on Gov. Strickland’s watch. (Mr. Kasich claims a delay in the final installment of five years of personal income tax cuts is a tax increase.)
Mr. Strickland does not get credit for that series of tax cuts (Republican Gov. Bob Taft set them in motion). But he has not tried to undo the significant tax reforms. He’s taken this position even as the changes are failing to bring in the revenue that was predicted.
In truth, he had no choice but to make do with the money he had, because raising taxes when the economy was tanking was politically impossible. But cutting spending for the mentally ill, for example, has not come easy to a Methodist minister and former prison psychologist.
Four years ago, Gov. Strickland said that if he did not find a way to ensure adequate funding for schools, he should be counted a failure. He has not found the answer; witness the myriad school levies that voters are still being asked to pass on the grounds that the state is raising standards and cutting their funding.
Gov. Strickland is right that all-day kindergarten, a longer school year and a more rigorous tenure process are good policies. However, the best that can be said about his plan to pay for the expensive changes he’s mandated is that he’s forcing school districts to make a choice:
They can either ask for more money from voters or confront the fact that they can’t keep funding generous and extensive step increases for their employees, pick up administrators’ share of their pension contributions, offer generous retirement and health-care packages and resist efforts to consolidate.
The governor has been right about big decisions that are important to the future of the state. He has supported building a train system linking Cleveland, Columbus, Dayton and Cincinnati, using $400 million in federal money. Connecting Ohio’s urban corridors is something a modern state needs to do.
Gov. Strickland is not an ideologue. He’s steady and mature, not given to political or personal impetuousness. He’s also not charismatic or brilliant, but he has made hard choices smartly.
John Kasich’s pitch
Former Congressman John Kasich started out his campaign talking about eliminating Ohio’s income tax. Then he said it should be phased out over 10 years. Now he’s more vague.
He has, however, signed a “no new taxes” pledge. He’s just wrong to think he can manage a deficit that represents potentially a 15-percent shortfall without raising taxes on somebody. Even some Republicans say that would be impossible.
You could say that in a short span Mr. Kasich has grown, that not that long ago he was proposing to eliminate 40 percent of the state’s revenue. If backing off that shtick is progress, it’s not reassuring progress.
In other important areas, Mr. Kasich is proceeding as if he doesn’t know a lot about state government, as if its nuts and bolts are beneath him. Pressed for details about one of his proposals in a meeting with the Dayton Daily News editorial board, he said he doesn’t “trip over ant hills on the way to the pyramids.”
He’s critical of the worker’s compensation system, though he doesn’t say what’s wrong with it except rates are unpredictable.
He doesn’t want utilities to be forced to increase their use of alternative energy if doing so raises costs. But energy policy has to move in this direction, and not to insist on that is to ensure Ohio remains dependent on polluting fossil fuels.
Mr. Kasich, once a presidential aspirant, was during his time in Congress a leading figure in national budget negotiations. He says that experience will serve him well as governor.
But even allowing for the fact that this is a pitched campaign, he’s doing nothing to suggest that he would give Democrats the time of day, especially if the Ohio House and Senate both are controlled by Republicans.
Ted Strickland is not the perfect governor. But history will judge him as having been dealt a miserable hand and having been better than competent. He should be re-elected.
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