Pro-life Gonidakis soars in GOP circles

Akron native  Mike Gonidakis  is enjoying the greatest power surge of his career as president of Ohio Right to  Life. The greatest!

As the chummy lobbyist deeply inside Republican circles at the Statehouse, he won the hand of Gov. Kasich for an important appointment to the State Medical Board, which passes judgment on licenses and discipline of physicians -  a neat disconnect inasmuch as he's not a medical doctor while passing judgment on persons who are.

And he has is become a key figure  in  Atty. Gen. Mike DeWine's onslaught of anti-abortion initiatives.  As the recent  piece re-posted below from Plunderbund pointed out, Gonidakis has fared quite well since DeWine entered office four years ago, with his consulting business rising to 19 clients from a mere three.

We particularly were bemused by Gonidakis'  praise of DeWine after  the latter's arrival in 2010:  "Thank God for Mike DeWine and his leadership.   If it wasn't  for Mike DeWine, we would have taxpayer-funded abortions and mandatory funding of abortions in a public option."

In  appreciation of  DeWine's good behavior,  one can expect tens of thousands of campaign fliers to be sent out by ORL during the  AG's reelection campaign, just as the group did four years ago. (At that time, Gonidakis insisted to me that the group was "non-partisan".)

And so we get a strong clue of how cross-pollination works in politics.

But wait:  Gonidakis isn't finished.   Ohio Right to Life has now taken some steps that will not please his some folks in his Republican base.   His office has entered opponents in primaries  against  GOP officeholders:  Congressman David Joyce and State Sen Frank LaRose.

 He split hairs on whether right-to-life congressman  Joyce is pure enough. As for   LaRose, it was retribution for LaRose's proper opposition to Gonidakis' appointment to the medical board  based on his lack of qualifications.  Nothing was more political than Gonidakis' retaliation since it had nothing to do with abortion.

Kasich's hidden basketball trick

No one executes the hidden ball trick - no one - more often  than Gov. Kasich.  From his swift demolition  of former  Ohio GOP chief Kevin DeWine  to bring in  an eco-friendly  crony (Matt Borges)...to Jobs/Ohio...to his friendly appointments to state boards without fanfare, the governor has shown there's nothing too politically sticky that can't be explained by his K-squad.

The latest example arrived by way of Plunderbund, which noted that three of his appointments to the Ohio State Medical Board are avidly anti-abortion with some anti-genetic counseling tossed in.  We're not entirely clear on what Kasich would say, for example,  about the so-called heartbeat bill because he has yet to take a position.  He also was no more than a shadowy figure in the run-up to the anti-union vote on House Bill 5.  In that instance, however, he was said to be  exchanging strategy  with Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who left no doubt about his opposition to public unions. As we wrote earlier, the GOP high command  is urging sponsors of right-to-work  legislation to remain silent until after next year's election. Cool.

Did I mention genetic  counseling?  It is the purely neutral expert counseling to couples  about any genes in the couple's history that could lead to problems to a newborn. The pro-life people see such counseling as the gateway to abortions, expertise or no expertise. Ohio Right to Life chief Mike Gonidakis, a Kasich appointee,  even wondered during a board meeting whether such counselors could scare couples into making bad decisions.

Meantime, the neutral governor has presided quietly  as the legislature busily engaged in more abortion restrictions.

Kasich's problem is hidden ball tricks are rarely  used in baseball anymore and are not very successful.  His ball is an outsize baskteball that should be apparent anybody paying even casual attention these days.

Gonidakis wins the non-sequitur award for the Great Budget of 2013

The murky logic that attended  the governor's signing of the Great Budget of 2013 in Columbus Sunday night made it  somewhat of a challenge to isolate the best non-sequitur for posterity.  But we finally settled on this one from Ohio Right to Life's leader, Michael Gonidakis:

"It took great compassion and courage for our governor and pro-life  legislature to stand up to the abortion  industry that blatantly pressured them."

C'mon, Mike.   I would blatantly remind you that as a buddy of the governor who appointed you to the Ohio Medical Board,  you've been quoted  in  everything but the Major League box scores on your  aggressive support of the Draconian anti-abortion language  in the budget, even to the point of scary tactics about the cancerous illnesses  -not medically supported - that accompany abortion. Now that you've prevailed, don't you think it would be a greater act of compassion and courage for you  to recant  your self-serving  apocalyptic vision?

P.S. Your quote did manage to wind up on the Huffington Post, which cast more shame on Ohio at the national level by describing the approved anti-abortion  amendment in Ohio  as "among the most restrictive in the country."

Brennan and Gonidakis: Akron hometowners well rewarded in budget!

What a terrible coincidence!

 Two of the biggest winners in the state budget signed Sunday by Gov. Kasich are from  Akron:  businessman David Brennan, and  Ohio Right to Life president Michael Gonidakis. 

 Brennan, a longtime major patron  of the Republican Party,  is the pater familias/owner of White Hat Management, Ohio 's largest charter school system.  The budget handsomely favored his schools ($1,400 more for each school choice student in addition to the bountiful amounts - many more millions upon millions from the state at the expense of public schools. Just another day at Brennan's office, I'd say. )

Gonidakis, an aggressive legislative  anti-abortion activist, earlier appointed by Kasich  as a non-medical member of the Ohio Medical Board, parlayed a daily double: defunding of Planned Parenthood and opening the door to one of the nation's strictest  anti-abortion  measures, including the use of ultrasound in birth control exams.  It also prevents Planned Parenthood from sending critical abortion cases  to public hospitals  for emergency  care. "Stupidity," as Albert Camus once wrote in The Plague, "has a knack of getting its way."   The governor obviously decided that well-informed women will cast a meaningless vote in his re-election bid.

Frankly, the Akron area is far more progressive than what these two richly rewarded hometown guys  represent.

* * * * *

And while we're at it.  How odd as the Kasich Sound Track rolled out his boastful  budget signature Sunday: State Republican Chairman Matt Borges arrived on-line with exuberant praise of the governor's action well before it was even reported by the Ohio media. Is he scoop-conscious or what?   As for Kasich, he quickly announced his moment of grace for Ohioans  and departed without answering any questions. Call it the tunnel at the end of Borges' light.

(Right to) life of the party

I SEE THAT the father and daughter act of John and Sarah will appear at a hastily scheduled rally in Green Memorial Stadium Wednesday afternoon.  The place can seat about 6,000 but people who won't mind standing for a couple of hours will probably find a spot on the field.  McCain will doubtless skip serious talk on the economy and offer us instead further insights into the life and times of Joe the Plumber.  Sarah will settle for tweeting that Obama is a socialist who hates America.   In an instant, Green will become a pro-American town, as opposed to, say, nearby Akron, which has locked on to Democrats and unionists for many decades and, well, you know.   

The GOP has announced that everyone must have a ticket to enter the arena.  And just to make sure that the Republican base turns out,  Right to Life of Summit County, which qualifies as a pro-American group,  has set out to distribute 5,000 tickets.  The pro-lifers, the essence of the pro-American GOP base, have been quite active politically this year again, whipping up their supporters with the usual angry assaults on the anti-Amercan Pro-Choicers.   Who can forget the shouts from a line of surly loyalists waiting to get into a Palin rally in Johnstown, Pa. (Sadly, my birthplace!) as they faced a smaller group of Obama supporters across the street? You can look for this particular quote from a boiling  Palinite in Bartlett's someday: "Kill the babies, you bastards."

Which brings me to Mike Gonidakis, the executive director of Ohio Right to Life.  When I spoke to him recently, he dismissed thoughts that his group was driven by religious or political motives.  "Not so,"said Mike, a lawyer who once worked for former Ohio Attorney General Jim Petro and did quite well for himself before moving along in stages  to assume his present job. 

Mike was quick to remind me that Ohio Right to Life had, among other initiatives,  endorsed a Democrat in Parma and that it had no connection to any religion in particular, "Catholics, Protestants, Muslims" and so on.  I couldn't get much beyond that point even though I fidgeted with the knowledge that the group's PAC was  planning  thousands  of anti-Obama   radio and TV ads in Ohio and mailing a half-million ballot cards across the state. 

Gonidakis will tell you in his own words how  Ohio Right of Life, while non-political,  is deeply into the campaign mix:  "The PAC is going to pull out every effort it can to see McCain wins Ohio, certainly he needs to be president."

Needs to be?  Frankly, In all of  my years of chasing down politicians, I've never heard burning political ambition described quite that way.  As for Wednesday's rally, I'll wait for the movie.