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.

GOP issues: abortion, photo ID, unions, But jobs?

IT'S A PITY that men can't get pregnant.

Considering the proclivity of some politicians and their stablemates to get into trouble over sexual mischief, it might slow the lawmakers' pace to rule over women in such matters as abortion (among other things).

You are reminded of the biological injustice of unisex pregnancy when the Republican majority in the Ohio House of Representatives preoccupies itself with Draconian anti-abortion legislation that is said to be the most restrictive in the nation. Some supporters would even sacrifice the mother rather than permit an abortion. Nice work, guys! How did the Buckeye state survive for so many years without the benefit of your medieval wisdom?

It should be clear to all of us by now that this GOP group of intellectual stragglers, fattening up on God knows whose money, is moving in for record legislative insanity in hopes of completing their mission before the fat lady sings. Or at least until the public becomes fully aware of the highly inflammable perils of the merging of poisonous ideological lunacy with politics.

There is, for further example, the Photo ID bill passed by the Republican gang in the House (action is pending in the Senate). It would cost the state many millions to administer (at least the abhorrent poll tax of yore produced a bit of revenue.) And it supposedly addresses a fraud menace that the bill's promoters are unable to show exists. Rather, it is the Republicans' fast track solution for their longstanding commitment to blocking you-know-who Democrats from reaching for a ballot.

Sen. Tom Niehaus, the Republican who serves as Senate president, wants to hush such slandering of his party, having been quoted as insisting:

"I do not believe this is any way a voter suppression issue. This is about maintaining the integrity of the voting process."

Having followed the evolution of such blather for many years, I would be happy to lay up a dime that it has everything to do with voter suppression, senator. I would only hope that these integrity-minded folks would stop lying about their motives. Besides, what does any of this have to do with Kasich's daily avowal to create, eh... jobs?

For all of this wickedness however, there is another report out of Columbus that may have kept more than a few members of Team Kasich up a little later on this day. We Are Ohio, the group that heads the effort to repeal the anti-union meaures so eagerly enacted by those Republicans in the legislature and signed into law by the governor, declared overwhelming success Wednesday as it delivered nearly 1.3 million signatures on their petitions to cap its drive to place the repeal on the November 8 ballot.

For Team Kasich, it is cost of doing overreaching business. There isn't a politician alive in Ohio who wouldn't like to ignite a campaign with those petition numbers. It's time for Gov. Kasich and his soul brother, Wisconsin's Gov. Scott Walker, to get on their cell phones to figure out what went wrong in their feral assault on public unions. And if they don't know, there are more than a million folks in Ohio who can tell them.

But aren't Kasich and Walker only trying to create jobs in their states?