DeWine ministry: Faithful to the AG's mission!

Re-posted from Plunderbund (Updated) 



When I think of Mike DeWine, I think of God-given goodness.

(Bear with me, folks.)

When I think of Mike DeWine, the over-achieving Republican attorney general of Ohio, I think of random acts of kindness, of rainbows, of the morning dew glistening in the break of day, of the yellow brick road of Oz, of....

At least , that's what Mike DeWine wants me to think. But he's been around long enough for me to have second thoughts, that his political career invokes something much less warmly engaging than his current public mythiness despite friendly editorial embraces from  Ohio's  mainstream media that levitate him. (See update below)

A few days ago, for example, the papers reported another DeWine foray into the private lives of same-sex married couples.  He wants to disrupt their bonds, challenging (with a 41-page brief) the  ruling by a federal judge that Ohio's law banning such marriages is unconstitutional.

So much, then, for random acts of kindness.

For DeWine, his further quest for  Biblical  correctness was hardly terra incognita.  His insistence on installing his own ministry in the AG's office has been widely reported.  He has joined a group of like-minded attorneys general in challenging employer-covered contraceptive insurance  under the Affordable Care Act.  Not a day passes that Mike isn't  out in the middle of the trench warfare that has been consistent with his pledge since he ran for the office to rid satanic  Obamacare  from the vanishing soul of America.

Consistent?

So consistently wrong  has his political intuition  been that he blindsided Mitt Romney by flip-flopping his endorsement of Mitt to his theocratic pew mate and perennial presidential candidate, Rick Santorum. (Some power couple!)  DeWine's  betrayal of Romney was obviously driven by his erring conclusion that Santorum would win the Ohio primary.  He didn't. No sharing the winner's circle  for DeWine, who was thought to have dreams of a promotion  to U.S. attorney general.

So much for rainbows.

You should also note that DeWine's ministerial life  includes a stint of teaching  a government course at Cedarville University, an evangelical Baptist  school in southwestern Ohio that, among other things, allows only women to teach Bible classes to  female students,  as Biblically inspired. It also has had a number of skirmishes with faculty over faith-based issues.   .

 You have to put some of his odd behavior in the context of his landslide defeat by a liberal  Democratic congressman, Sherrod Brown, who evicted Mike from the U.S. Senate with nearly 56 pct. of the vote in 2006. The AG must still feel the pain.

Meanwhile, DeWine  is now being accused by his Democratic opponent this year,  David Pepper, of  pay-to-play tactics by awarding lucrative state legal business to law firms that just happen to channel money into his campaign  treasury.

DeWine's apologists insist that there's no connection.  But the practice is and has been quite common by AGs over the years, so why deny it?.

So much for the yellow brick road.

So much for goodness.

So much for  the wholesome commitment to public service by our attorney general.


UPDATE:  In Dr.Phil tones, the Beacon Journal on Sunday editorially offered DeWine some feathery-friendly advice to "help himself from further questioning"  about his management of campaign contributions from law firms that are awarded business by his office.  The paper displayed some concern that a lingering issue  - of which the AG says he knows nothing - could be an "important opportunity" for him to "show the leadership" that he has so often displayed on other issues. (Leadership?  Vigorous opposition to same-sex marriages?  Demonic opposition from Day One to Obamacare?  Both of these occupy much of his time these days.)

The BJ editorial page has often had a soft spot for DeWine and just recently bedeviled DeWine's Democratic opponent, David Pepper, for complaining about the AG's backlog of rape kit tests.

The paper recommended a better paper trail on special counsel work for the AG, a sort of how-to on preserving his otherwise goodly career.  No further questioning here.