Medina County Dem News

(Medina County Democratic Action Committee)

MCDAC Newsletter
January 11, 2008
Joyce V. Kimbler,
Editor

Letters to the Editor

The MCDAC Newsletter would like to print letters from readers and post those letters to the MCDAC blog. To be considered letters have to be no more than 250 words and contain the writer's first and last name. Please send letters to joycekimbler@medinacountydemocraticactioncommittee.org and put "Letter to Editor" in the subject line. MCDAC reserves the right to reject any letter without a reason being given to the writer.

Medina County Democratic News

These are the Democrats who filed nominating petitions with the Medina County Board of Elections to be on the March 4th, 2008 primary, according to the Medina County Gazette:

State Central Committee – Man
Michael D. Todd
State Central Committee – Woman
Patricia Hanek

State senator
22nd District
James E. Riley

State representative
69th House District
Jack Schira

Cunty commissioner
(term commencing 1/2/09)
John J. Sharkey II

County commissioner
(term commencing 1/3/2009)
Brian T. Feron

County recorder
Larry J. Courtney

County treasurer
Mike Todd

County engineer
No Democratic candidate filed.

County coroner
Neil F. Grabenstetter

County prosecutor
Dean Holman

Judge – Court of Common Pleas
James L. Kimbler

Two Medina County Dems Chosen as Richardson Delegates

Two Medina County Democrats, Irene Adams of Wadsworth and Patricia Walker of Medina, were chosen as the number one and two female delegates respectively for the Bill Richardson campaign in Ohio's 16 Congressional District. Whether they will get the chance to go to the Democratic convention will depend on how well Richardson does in the Ohio primary on March 4, 2008. They were chosen as delegates at the 16th Congressional District caucus held on January 3, 2008 in Stark County.

Read more by clicking here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/two-medina-county-dems-chosen-as.html

Brunswick Hosts the 13th Congressional District Caucus

While southern Medina County Democrats were busy attending the 16Th Congressional District Caucus in Stark County, Medina County was hosting the 13Th Congressional District Caucus in Brunswick, Ohio. The event in Brunswick was held at the Brunswick High School and was co-ordinated by Pat McNamara, who is a Medina County Democrat and an at-large Brunswick City Council member. The Medina County Gazette ran a story on the caucus in its January 4, 2008 edition.

The caucus was held on January 3, 2008 and the Brunswick High School Performing ARts Center was chosen because of its central location in the 16Th Congressional District. This is believed to be the first time that such a caucus was held by the Democratic Party in Medina County. Congratulations to Pat McNamara for co-ordinating this event!

Ohio Democratic News

Sherrod Brown and Southeastern Ohio

When Sherrod Brown announced for the United States Senate, he pledged that he would campaign in all 88 counties in Ohio and he wouldn't concede any county to Mike DeWine. He kept his word and it paid off for him in the 20 counties that make up the southeastern quadrant of Ohio. For purposes of this entry, we are defining the southeastern part of Ohio as being formed by following IS 70 out of Columbus to the Ohio River and then drawing an imaginary line from Franklin County due south to the Ohio River, but not including Franklin county itself.

Read more by clicking here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/sherrod-brown-and-southeast-ohio.html

Sherrod Brown and the Five Largest Ohio Counties

Earlier we posted an entry on how Senator Sherrod Brown did in the 20 counties that make up southeastern Ohio, excluding Franklin. What we found was that Senator Brown got over 54% of the vote in those 20 counties, winning 18 of them. In this entry we look at how he did in the five counties in Ohio that have a population of 500,000 or over. Those counties are Cuyahoga, Franklin, Hamilton, Montgomery and Summit.

Read the rest of this entry by clicking here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/sherrod-brown-and-five-largest-ohio.html

2008 Race for the Democratic Nomination

So Why Did Hillary Take New Hampshire?

That is the question that the political chattering classes are asking, following one of the biggest examples of polling failure since Dewey beat Truman in 1948. Was it her tears? Was it Barack Obama's rather peevish line about her being likeable during the last debate? Was it the presence of Bill Clinton on the ground in New Hampshire? According to Joshua Holland of AlterNet, the answer to all of those is "No." He attributes it to far more mundane factors: turn-out, organization, and Biden's supporters going to Clinton.

Read the rest of this entry by clicking here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/so-why-did-hillary-take-new-hampshire.html

More Voters in Dem NH Primary than in Rep NH Primary

Although New Hampshire has a higher number of Republican voters than Democratic voters, more people voted in the 2008 New Hampshire Democratic Primary than in the 2008 Republican New Hampshire Primary. Using the figures on the CNN Election Central website, with 99% of the precincts reporting, the number of voters in the Democratic Primary exceeded the number of voters in the Republican Primary by 50,874. This is the second vote in a row where the number of Democrats voting exceeded the number of Republicans voting. It will be interesting to see how many times this happens this primary season.

Two Websites for Updated Delegate Counts

Both Time and CNN have put up websites that keep a running count of what the delegate count is for each presidential candidate in each party. CNN's is found at http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/results/scorecard/ and Time's is found at http://www.time.com/time/2008/primaries08/?xid=rss-topstories. . Of the two, we find the one at CNN a little easier to use because it uses numbers instead of a bar graph to show the delegate count.

After the New Hampshire primary the delegate count, according to CNN is 178 for Clinton, 78 for Obama, and 52 for Edwards. On the Republican side it is 30 for Romney, 21 for Huckabee, and 10 for McCain. The magic number for Democrats is 2026 delegates to win the nomination. The magic number for Republicans is 1191 to win the nomination.

California Mail Ballots Go Out This Week

The AP put out a story on January 6, 2008, pointing out that mail-in ballots go out this coming week in California. The article also points out that not all the candidates are poised to take advantage of that fact. This is from the article:

Read the rest of the entry by clicking here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/california-mail-ballots-go-out-this.html

Newsweek Article on Obama's Campaign Organization

When you come right down to it, a political campaign, especially one for the presidency of the United States, is a pretty egotistical act. What a candidate is saying is "that out of 300 million Americans, I am the one best able to lead this country." People who are willing to put themselves in that position are not shrinking violets, they are not wallflowers, and they have a very big ego. The real challenge for such candidates is to convince the American public that their campaigns are more than exercises in ego, that their election will bring about good things for their fellow Americans.

Read the rest of the entry here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/newsweek-article-on-obamas-campaign.html

Articles of General Interest

The Mind of the Undecided Voter

Christopher Hayes, who is the D.C. political editor of The Nation magazine, posted a blog entry on his experiences in Wisconsin in 2004 with undecided voters. It is a very fascinating article. Now obviously his experiences are with a non-scientific sampling of such voters. He was in Wisconsin to work for an environmental organization that was trying to help elect progressive candidates in Wisconsin. He wasn't there to conduct scientific surveys. His observations, though, are very interesting.

Read the rest of the entry here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/mind-of-undecided-voter.html

Economy Going into Recession While U.S. Spends Billions Helping Iraqis

With the unemployment rate edging up and housing starts going sharply down, it is dawning on the geniuses in the Bush Administration that the economy is heading into a recession. This is bad news for Republicans. One of the things that Republicans wanted to argue in the 2008 campaign is that Bubble-Boy's tax cuts helped the American economy. If unemployment starts going up, that argument goes out the window.

Read the rest of the entry here: http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2008/01/economy-going-into-recession-while-us.html

You can read these and other entries at http://www.mcdac.blogspot.com

Newsletter prepared by:
Medina County Democratic Action Committee
Joyce Kimbler, Treasurer
P.O. Box 1213
Medina, OH 44258
MCDAC Website