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Politicians see enemies lurking in election year
By Dennis J. Willard
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Sunday, Aug 03, 2008
COLUMBUS: Are politicians paranoid or are their enemies really out to get them?
Let's put four seemingly unrelated recent incidents to the test.
Two freshman Democratic state representatives are campaigning door to door in their districts when suddenly they are attacked and bitten by dogs.
Yes, it sounds like the setup for a punch line.
Unfortunately for Steve Dyer from Green and Matt Lundy from Elyria, the stories are true.
Both men are fine, although Dyer spent a weekend in the hospital to ward off infection.
The attacks have spawned the obvious jokes.
Were the dogs given their rabies shots after they bit the candidates?
Did anyone check whether Rover is a registered Republican?
All humor must contain a grain of truth, but Republicans are not using canines to stop Democrats from going door to door.
So should Dyer and Lundy be paranoid? Of course. Your enemies are out to get you.
No. 2: Two Republican candidates for the Ohio House drop out of the campaign to take jobs in Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland's administration.
Strickland creates a position with a fancy title — director of Insurance and Financial Development — in his development department that will pay $115,000 annually to state Rep. Jim Raussen, R-Cincinnati.
The governor has also promised a job to state Sen. Robert Spada, R-North Royalton. Spada faced term limits in the Senate and was attempting to return to the Ohio House.
Democrats need to pick up four seats if they want to grab the majority in the lower chamber for the first time since 1995, and removing Raussen and Spada from the races will improve their chances.
Republicans are crying foul and criticizing Strickland for playing politics by baiting GOP candidates with lucrative positions.
Should Republicans be paranoid? Of course. Your enemies are out to get you.
No. 3: House Republicans bring back an attack dog of a different sort, Scott Borgemenke, to run their campaigns.
Borgemenke was chief of staff for the House Republicans until leaving this year to take a job as Magna Entertainment Corp.'s executive vice president. Magna owns Thistledown.
Upon returning, Borgemenke did not issue a statement outlining how he was going to help Republicans maintain their majority in the House to ensure taxes are low, families are safe, criminals are scared.
Instead, he told a joke.
''When they asked me to return, they had me at hello,'' Borgemenke said in a news release. ''Campaigns complete me.''
You know those really ugly, nasty, attack ads you see on television during campaigns? Well, Borgemenke is responsible for his fair share.
He was part of the Ohio House team in 2006 that ran a television commercial that blew up a photo of a black man to attack a Democrat for being soft on crime.
Two years earlier, Borgemenke worked for the Ohio Senate Republicans on a commercial that attacked Democrat Terry Anderson for being soft on terrorists. Borgemenke and his cohorts used footage of Anderson talking to kidnappers. The ad didn't point out that Anderson was kidnapped by Hezbollah in 1985 while working as an Associated Press correspondent
in the Middle East and was held hostage for six years and nine months.
Campaigns complete Borgemenke.
Should Democrats be paranoid? Of course. Your enemies are out to get you and they've hired an eerie amalgamation of Jerry Maguire and Dr. Evil to help.
Our final test.
On Monday, FBI agents swarm public and business offices in Cuyahoga County and remove hundreds of boxes filled with records and computer files.
County Commissioner Jimmy Dimora and County Auditor Frank Russo appear to be the targets of an investigation rumored in the works for more than 18 months.
Dimora and Russo have some explaining to do regarding thousands of dollars of improvements at their homes, deals with contractors, relatives' businesses and other allegations that could bring a myriad of charges against the two public officeholders, members of their families, friends, associates and business connections.
Some Democrats are blaming Karl Rove.
Huh?
The conspiracy goes something like this: Rove, Bush's brain, sicced the FBI on Dimora and Russo almost two years ago with a plan to launch the raid shortly before the 2008 presidential election.
Democratic voters, turned off by the negative news, will stay home on Election Day and the GOP nominee, John McCain, will win in Ohio because Barack Obama needs to carry Cuyahoga County by a wide margin to make up for downstate Republicans.
Is Rove capable of a plan as devious as this? Yes, but there is not an iota of evidence to prove this far-fetched scheme.
Democrats should spend more time thinking about Dimora and Russo, and ways to stop squandering any moral and ethical superiority they had over Republicans following the Tom Noe coingate scandal.
Still, should Democrats be paranoid?
Of course.
Your enemies are out to get you.
Dennis J. Willard can be reached at 614-224-1613 or dwillard@thebeaconjournal.com.
COLUMBUS: Are politicians paranoid or are their enemies really out to get them?
Get the full article here.
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