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Cleveland
Plain Dealer...
Ted
Strickland blasts Ohio Gov. John
Kasich in Cleveland speech, says rematch possible
by Henry J. Gomez
September 30, 2011
As
Republican Gov. John Kasich
received slightly improved poll numbers Tuesday, the man he defeated
last year
and the man conventional wisdom pegs as a future candidate for his job
shared a
stage in Cleveland.
Former
Gov. Ted Strickland and
Cuyahoga County Executive Ed FitzGerald, both Democrats, unloaded on
Kasich at
the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy’s annual Northeast
Ohio
luncheon. The liberal organization is comprised largely of lawyers.
Strickland
in particular sounded like
he was angling for a rematch with Kasich in 2014. In a brief interview
after
the event, he acknowledged that he was considering another run.
“I’m
certainly not taking it off the
table,” said Strickland, a former congressman from southeastern Ohio
who served
one term as governor before losing to Kasich last fall.
ACS,
as the Washington-based group is
known, honored Strickland with its Stephanie Tubbs Jones Public Service
Award,
named in honor of the late Cleveland congresswoman. A crowd of about
100,
mostly judges and attorneys, turned out to hear two high-profile
Democrats
speak.
Strickland
blasted Kasich and other
Republicans in Columbus for supporting initiatives such as Senate Bill
5, which
if it survives a November voter referendum would severely restrict the
collective bargaining power of public-employee unions. Strickland also
took aim
at what he described as “voter suppression efforts” in House Bill 194,
an
overhaul of state election laws that will be contested if opponents
gather
enough signatures to trigger a voter referendum.
The
speech included a plea to “turn
back the onslaught” of the conservative Tea Party, “the greedy
corporate elite
and the anti-labor zealots.”
Democrats,
Strickland added, are
fighting for fairness “because the Kasich administration’s assault on
organized
labor and working middle-class folks is just simply unfair.
“It
is a political power grab, and
consequently it must be defeated.”
Kasich’s
spokesman, Rob Nichols,
dismissed Strickland’s criticism.
“I
would compare policy advice from
him to sailing lessons from the captain of the Titanic,” Nichols wrote
in an
email that attacked Strickland’s term. “Losing 400,000 jobs, raising
taxes by
$840 million, blowing an $8 billion hole in the budget, and then
planning to
raise taxes again to clean up the mess probably disqualifies someone
from being
a credible policy thinker.”
Strickland,
70, launched a business
and political consulting firm in July.
FitzGerald,
who introduced Strickland,
joked that he had prepared more controversial remarks but “put them
away for a
more private occasion” because a reporter was in the audience. He
talked mostly
about his first year as leader of a reorganized county government but
also said
that if anyone doubted the former governor’s performance, Kasich “has
eliminated those doubts.”
Because
he leads Ohio’s largest county
and represents a constituency second in size only to the governor’s,
the young
and ambitious FitzGerald is regarded widely as a future candidate for
state
office. Asked after his speech if he was considering a run for governor
in
2014, the year he would be up for re-election, FitzGerald said it was
“premature” to discuss the possibility.
Strickland
praised FitzGerald for
tussling with Republican Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted over
county’s
rights to mail absentee ballots to voters. The public battle resulted
in compromise;
FitzGerald agreed not to mail ballots his year and Husted, seeking
uniformity
in state laws, agreed to mail ballots to voters in all 88 counties for
the 2012
presidential election.
“I
want to say a word of thanks to
you, Ed, for standing up not just for Cuyahoga County but for voters
all across
the state of Ohio as you took on the fight,” Strickland said.
Read
it at the Cleveland Plain Dealer
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