Some Implications of Election Results in Ohio (5:34 AM, the day after the election)

Ohioans were interestingly targeted and nuanced in their voting yesterday. They appear to have known exactly what they wanted to say when they completed their ballots.

Their wrath against Republicans was mostly directed at those running for statewide office. Until last night, Ohio had no statewide Republican officeholders except for a majority of those sitting on the State Supreme Court, an ostensibly nonpartisan body and hadn't had any Dems in such positions since 1990. Among newly elected state executive officers, only one--the new state auditor--is a Republican.

But losing GOP gubernatorial candidate Ken Blackwell was wrong to say in his concession speech last night that he and other Republican candidates for statewide offices were swept along by a tide that had died since 1994--the year Republicans took control of the US House of Representatives, ushering in what many in the GOP thought would be a permanent majority in Washington. Washington trends had little to do with Ohio's election yesterday.

Except for the successful Democratic candidate for the US Senate, Sherrod Brown, Dem candidates for statewide office won because voters were sick of the corruption that appeared to have taken hold within the executive branch offices held by Republicans. (Brown's win was driven by two other--national--issues: the economy and the war in Iraq. And Blackwell probably would have lost even without the State House scandals. It should be said that neither Blackwell or Betty Montgomery, the state auditor running for attorney general who supplied most of the evidence in the Coingate scandal, were either implicated in any wrongdoing. But the scandals no doubt played a part in their losses yesterday.)

But, the national trend toward Democratic officeholders does not explain the drubbing Ohio voters administered to Republicans yesterday.

Proof of that can be seen in that while electing a new Democratic governor and other Democrats to executive positions in Columbus, voters returned Republican majorities to both houses of the General Assembly, our state legislature. And, except for indicted Bob Ney's old congressional district, where the Republican nominee lost, Ohio's congressional delegation will remain unchanged--and mostly Republican--despite several hotly contested and ultimately close races.

The implications of yesterday's elections for Governor-Elect Ted Strickland, an ordained Methodist minister and a graduate of one of the finest evangelical institutions in the country, are similar to those for President Bush. (That's Strickland pictured above.) Mr. Strickland, like Mr. Bush, will be dealing with a legislative branch in the hands of the opposition party. As in Washington, to get anything done in Columbus, the chief executive and legislative leaders will have to work together.

In both Columbus and Washington, I expect there to be decided moves toward bipartisan cooperation in 2007. (It will be harder to pull off in Washington than in Columbus, I think. That's because in Congress, there are many Dem members itching for payback. Nancy Pelosi's first task as the new Speaker will be to rein in senior Democrats who will want to do this rather than establishing a positive legislative agenda. Pelosi has shown a decided capacity for imposing discipline and I think that she will work mightily to push a positive agenda and not political revenge.) By early 2008 though, I expect the Washington bipartisan impulses to give way to presidential politics, while having a longer life in Columbus. (In Washington, Mr. Bush by early 2008, will feel increasingly compelled to give way to what is deemed most politic and least intrusive on the campaigns of his would-be Republican successors.)

Ohioans cast interesting votes on statewide ballot issues.

They said NO to expanded gambling--more casinos in the state, as well as slot machines at race tracks. The Ohio Republican Party had pushed the NO position and our senior US Senator, former Governor George Voinovich, actively worked against the proposal.

They said YES to a smoke-free initiative backed by many in the health community and NO to a deceptively worded smoke-less proposal backed by the tobacco industry. The smoke-less initiative would have actually expanded the numbers of public places where people could smoke.

They voted YES for an increase in the minimum wage, something that Democratic members of Congress are bound to pursue at the federal level once the 110th. Congress takes over in January.

All in all, the elections in Ohio and nationally went pretty much as I expected. Ohio voters, like those in much of the rest of the country, have voted in favor of mixed government, opting to put checks on both parties.

One caveat: It's pretty clear to me that races for the US Senate and US House yesterday were nationalized and were by and large, a referendum on the policies of the President. People were voting on Iraq, for the most part. In states like Ohio and Michigan whose economies have lagged behind the national economy, jobs also were a big factor. Yesterday, folks voted against President George Bush, even taking down officeholders who had not always walked in lockstep with him.

Both the President and his key adviser, Karl Rove, are savvy enough to understand these facts and I fully expect Mr. Bush to move quickly to reach across the aisle to ensure that at least some of his two remaining years in the White House are marked by enough comity to get some things done. As I mentioned last night, this is what he did with a Democratic legislature in Texas when he became governor. He's likely to want to do it now.

In Ohio, Governor-Elect Ted Strickland, a Democrat who has always won with Republican support, will, I think, be temperamentally well-suited to a similar reaching across the aisle to get things done. Unlike Mr. Bush, though, he won't be doing so with six years of a history of bad feelings to overcome.

Okay, that's enough politics for now.

[This has been cross-posted at RedBlueChristian.com.]