Will Hillary Clinton be Obama’s VP pick after all? Ralph Nader says yes. So does Ben Keeler. (How often does that happen?) VP nominee Clinton wouldn’t surprise me at this point. As I wrote in Ben’s comments, her constituency is the one he needs the most and he’s been failing miserably at attracting those folks.
Rasmussen has McCain up by 5 in Ohio. That’s 48-43% and includes leaners. It’s 45-41 among likely voters. Previous polls had it:
PPP, Aug 18, tied 45-45
Quinnipiac, July 31, 46-44, Obama
It’s not smart to compare different polls and find a trend, but this definitely looks like a trend. Anyway, there’s still 76 days before the election- anything can happen. (Via PolitickerOH.)
CAPA’s new season is now on the web. Here’s a post about it.
An example of the difficulty of obtaining public records. Scanned PDFs? Near useless. Here’s a somewhat related post.
Lots of people buzzing about McCain’s apparent plan to name his VP in Dayton, Ohio on August 29. That’s the day after the Democratic Convention ends, which is when the CW had him announcing.
Regarding the interminable egg controversy surrounding the race for the OH 15th district, the state’s Fiscal Note & Local Impact Statement on the 2003 bill (H.B. 152) says:
The bill also makes other changes regarding regulation. The bill states that an owner or operator of a facility shall not be required by any political subdivision of the state, or any officer, employee, agency, board, commission, department, etc. of a political subdivision to obtain a license, permit, or other approval pertaining to manure, insects or rodents, odor, or siting requirements for installation of an animal feeding facility if the facility has any of the following:
*a permit to install
*a permit to operate
*a review compliance certificate
*a NPDES permit
*an operation and management plan that is approved by the Chief of the Division of Soil and Water Conservation in DNR or by *supervisors of the appropriate soil and water conservation district.This provision clarifies that CAFO regulation shall fall under the Department of Agriculture.
Hmm, a clarification. (Emphasis added.)
Republican Steve Stivers, says the 2003 bill, which he co-sponsored, did not remove local control- that happened earlier. His opponent, Democrat Mary Jo Kilroy, says the bill did limit local control. It might be a little more nuanced than all that.
More domestic drilling- in Ohio? I didn’t know Ohio currently has 63,000 active oil and natural gas wells, according to the story. It’s NPR audio. Canada’s been drinking our milkshake in Lake Erie for 40 years. Despite this, environmentalists still say that keeping the US from drilling there too is more important, and all together now, drilling there won’t have any impact on prices.
“This Little Wingnut Went to the Wrong Coffee Shop” What made it the wrong coffee shop? That reminds of the old ethnic turf battles: Friend, you just went to the wrong sockhop. I keel your broh-ther!
Maybe Nick D will post the car owner’s home phone number- after all, it’s a smear!
Is an egg farm the top issue in the race for Ohio’s 15th District? Seems like it, if you’re following the press.
“The Central Ohio Transit Authority experienced an 18 percent increase in bus ridership on its fixed routes for the month of July,” according to Columbus Local News. That’s over July 2007. Stay high, gas prices! Keep these people off the road. Disclaimer: I have never ridden on a COTA bus. (Via RetroMetro.)
A new poll shows Barack Obama and John McCain tied in Ohio at 45% each. It’s from Public Policy Polling, which I’m not too familiar with. The latest Quinnipiac, from July 31, had Obama ahead 46-44. OK, that’s the same thing.
Gov. Strickland on Barack Obama’s campaign, from the New York Times:
I particularly hope he strengthens his economic message - even Senator Obama can speak more clearly and specifically about the kitchen-table, bread-and-butter issues like high energy costs…It’s fine to tell people about hope and change, but you have to have plenty of concrete, pragmatic ideas that bring hope and change to life.
I don’t know. I think I prefer that most politicians have no concrete ideas. If they came in with no ideas, maybe they’d stop screwing things up. Hey, I can dream!
(Via PolitickerOH, and the Ohio GOP.)
Ohio unemployment is now at 7.2%, the highest figure in 16 years:
The figures released Friday show that the number of unemployed workers in July was 430,000, up from 394,000 in June. The number of unemployed people in the state has increased by 96,000 in the past 12 months.
Ohio’s 7.2 percent jobless rate tops national unemployment of 5.7 percent.
Buckblog: “Of course these facts will escape the proponents of the proposed mandatory sick leave law as well as those pushing for a mandated pregnancy leave.”
Good point.
Things to do this weekend. Most interesting to me is Art al Fresco in the Short North tomorrow. I’m not quite sure what that is.
