Redstate

Not just the directors here at RedState think Taft should resign. Count me as one who thinks so as well.

Ohio's taxes are ineed outrageous. And the very worst are the local income taxes. Every burg with four corners and a stop sign can charge both its residents and anyone who works there up to 2%. Moreover they endeavor never to tell one get away. Three years after absconding like a thief in the night from Akron, I am still getting the occasional sternly worded letter demanding to know why I have not filed a return with the city tax collector lately. And of course my replies go unread, as must the St. Petersburg FL address the bureaucrats correctly have on file for me.

Get a clue guys: I obviously do not live in your fair city, and it's very unlikley that I commute 1800 miles to work there.

But I think the state party is in trouble too for the "Coingate" thing, maybe it's nothing, I've only heard about it in passing.  But if true, the whole system up there may need some housecleaning if the party wants people to trust them.  I don't think y'all can afford losing the trust of people in an important state like Ohio.  This is all aside from the fact that what he's doing up there isn't good for the people of Ohio, though.

the fact is that Taft basically acted like a typical Democrat in his last term.

He should go now so the Ohio Republican Party can get to work at destroying the remainder of Taft's legacy. He should know that if he doesn't resign, he risks something worse than his term, and that is the Democrats running Ohio.

may symbollically represent that Ohio is cracking down on the corruption but without real legal and ethical reform in the actual establishment, not just the Governor, it won't help either in government or in the polls.

How would you describe the GOP in Pennsylvania

that not only abetted "Fast Eddie" Rendell (Dem,Guv)

ramming gambling through the legislature -on the pretense they would then demand reductions in property taxes- turning around and in the same session, scrapping the tax reductions, and adding

an avg.26% increase to their own salaries , as well as the judges, in a legally questionable midnight vote!

The Judges of course blessed it.

So, nothing has been accomPlished except the default raising of taxes......... again.

Oh, they got caught trying to vote themselves a piece of the gambling action. But they promised to correct that.     WHAT TO DO?

Far be it from me to second guess the combined wisdom of the Redstate powers that be, but herewith a few points:

- Your wording of the misdemeanor charges is somewhat misleading.  Taft played golf with friends.  Sometimes he paid other times they paid.  He didn't properly report these social outings as gifts (it is only in the last four years that a round of golf was ruled as a significant gift).  Noe had business with the state (he was on the Board of Regents and was involved in the investment deal at BWC) and GOP fundraiser but he wasn't a "lobbyist" as such.  People honestly believed he was an honest and skilled businessman and assumed he had the best interest of the state at heart.  His wife was the Lucas County GOP chair.

- The comparisons with Illinois are not apt.  So far there has been no evidence of anything more than poor management and oversight.  Yes, it looks like Noe was a deceitful crook instead of loyal Republican.  But once it became known he was dropped like a hot potato.  Noe may have stolen millions of dollars but there is no indication anyone in the GOP let him do so or intended that he do so (obviously).  The BWC management and oversight structure was simply not set up to handle the type of decisions they were going to make.  The main investment decision maker was a Voinovich appointee and not connected to Taft.

- It might have been worth noting that Taft and the legislature just passed a tax restructuring plan that involves significant income tax reductions.  The plan is complex but significant.

- What is this great history of which you speak.  Are you talking about Mr. Conservative Robert A. Taft?  Who was governor before Taft?  Voinovich.  His Lt. Gov.?  DeWine.  Ohio is a state with a long history of moderation and squishiness, pretending otherwise won't help change it.

Here are a few questions I have:

- If Taft resigns Lt. Gov. Bruce Johnson becomes Governor.  How does Johnson differ from Taft?  How does he provide leadership and on what issues that Taft can't?  Why is this a good thing?  I the establishment is married to the status quo why is having another establishment person become governor good?

- What does a Taft resignation do to the other candidates for gov in 2006?   How does it help them?  Does Blackwell suddenly become more electable because Johnson is Governor?

- Why is Taft getting all the heat when the Democrats are exaggerating and hyping this "scandal" for all its worth?  Are moderate Republicans now the only enemy?  

Let me state categorically that I am not defending Taft policies in toto nor am I in favor of high taxes, etc.  But it seems to me that some conservatives are getting carried away in the media hype and are using this mistake as an excuse to punish Taft for policy disagreements.

We will have an election in 2006 and the voters can decide who they support to take the state forward.  I would prefer if that democratic process play itself out.

Except ban a troll who was banned once already, and returned from the grave.

See, some of us would rather not sit back and let things play out.  We'd rather be able to make a case for our side, and with a criminal in the statehouse, it's hard for Ohio Republicans to do that.

I concur with the call for resignation.

Why is Taft getting all the heat when the Democrats are exaggerating and hyping this "scandal" for all its worth?

Well, perhaps because he was just pleaded no contest to ethics violations?   You can't seriously blame Dems for calling attention to the fact that the GOP governor is now a convicted criminal.  Come on.  Even if Taft's transgressions were truly unintentional - and I'm not saying they aren't - that's not even particularly hard-hitting politics.

How does he provide leadership and on what issues that Taft can't?

It's hard enough to govern as a lame duck, but a lame duck with ethics problems?  Who's going to stick their neck out for Taft now?  Any politician in their right mind is going to have to disassociate themselves from Taft now, so how can he be expected to govern on any issue?

If nothing else, Taft's resignation leaves other GOP leaders free to denounce away.  That would be a very valuable thing to have, both out of political considerations, and normal governing concerns.

I think that the reference was more to "Mr. Republican" Robert A. Taft and his father and son, not to "The last Hapsburg," Robert A. Taft III.  This tradition also includes politicians like Jim Rhodes and Ambassador Portman.  Note that FDR never carried Cincinnati.  Ohio has often been referred to as a bellwether state in presidential elections, but it's always been more polarized than most swing states.  Sometimes the conservatives show up in force and Republicans win and other times they don't.  Unfortunately, recent officeholders seem to think that they have to run to the middle, mistaking the swings of the pendulum for evidence of a need for centrism.  Candidates for statewide office simply need to realize that they aren't running for Mayor of Cleveland, and if their campaign does a decent job, they won't need the Cleveland vote.

[Sam Wyche, to a crowd of rowdy football fans] You don't live in Cleveland, you live in Cincinnati!

[silence]

"Under Governor Taft, taxes have continued to increase along with state spending. That pattern of governance flies in the face of Republican principles"

Perhaps this is unfair, and I know nothing about Ohio but it was too tempting to pass this one up.

Is the part of his behavior that "flies against" (current at least) "Republican principles" that he raises taxes to pay for his increased spending?

I would think the conservative principle would be that if you are going to increase spending you should pay for it.  Isn't doing that more conservative than simply spending on the next generation's tab?

I am sympathetic if your concern is increased spending but if that's the issue, I would suggest that are probably more important, egregious targets.

Tom

didn't require too much discussion.

The man should resign, he doesn't help the party at all by staying in office, and hopefully those closest to him are putting pressure on him to resign, and he will take that advice.

I am not talking about just chastising Taft for this violation.  I am talking about their constant talk of a culture of corruption of a pay-to-play scheme for state contracts, etc.

I will admit that Taft made a mistake but the D's over-reaction is amazing.  One State Senator has proposed a state office of integrity or some such thing.  Another has talked of making ethics violations a felony.  There are ballot issues to lower campaign contribution limits and take away the election oversight powers of the Secretary of State.  Moderates are being chastised for high spending but the Democrats want even bigger and more expensive and intrusive government.

Bruce Johnson would be a lame duck as well.  And plenty of Republicans have denounced Taft's mistakes.  He isn't really a force in the party.  He has institutional power but not popularity - never really has.

What a pair.  Taft should come out here with the sleazy dems we have here.

Yep, Gov. Taft and all the other Republican establishment should resign!  The Ohio "grassroots", "conservatives" and others who really want change in the state of Ohio need to "rally in great numbers and stop being the silent majority"!  One would think the recent congressional election in the southern Ohio district with a "minimal victory" for the GOP would be a STRONG HINT THAT PEOPLE ARE NOT HAPPY!!!!!!  Ohio is an important and a great state! It is time the "true believers" stop drinking the GOP establishment "Kool Aid". Diet beverages on the diet menu and start using the "Splenda" why don't you?  Make yourselves really great "true believers in Ohio".

Bill Gainey

and the mess in Ohio has been a long time coming.  It has started back with Richard Celeste in 1983 when the state's top marginal income tax rate was 3.5%.  When he left office in 1991 it was 7.55% where it remains today.  Mr. Taft's reform would at least reduce it to just under 6%, but only over five long years and only with his off-setting tax increase.(Wall Street Journal)

We here in Ohio spent many dollars in the heyday of wonderful stock prices.  We overspent and then when the stocks fell so low in 2000-2001, we didn't have enough money to fund all the things we spent the money on.  Our biggest expenses are for Medicaid and Education.  No one really wants to reduce spending here.  So we're twisting ourselves into pretzels trying to move priorities around.  No one is happy with that.

I'm interested in Ken Blackwell.  He has some good ideas.  But will the powers-to-be back him?

Let the grassroots in Ohio rebuild their GOP.  Not the other way around.

If Blackwell is who the grassroots folks think will represent them the best, then back him fully.  Organize and get busy!

What would (former Youngstown Congressman) Jim Traficant do?

Stay in office till they slam the cell door shut.

That's part of the Ohio tradition too.

Get Taft out now, and his scandal will be old news by Nov. 06 and the GOP candidates will save face.


This method appears to be working in NJ with McGreedy and the Democrats.  The NJ Gov. race is this November and the Jon Moneybags Corzine is not being pulled down by McGreedy's scandals.  It's old news now.  If McGreedy had stayed around till Nov. 05 to finish his term, you can bet the GOP would be hammering away, even with a diff. Dem Gov. candidate.


Likewise, get Taft out now, and get the ammo out of the Ohio Dem. hands.

I agree with the directors. We should be the party that is willing to acknowledge our failures and correct them. We always have been (for the most part). No serious Republican has come out and defended the Nixon administration. And yet one Democrat after another will wax nostalgic about the Clintonian Camelot and how wonderful it was. They defend the years of feckless foreign policy (Arafat to the White House 35 times) and opportunistically surfing the teck-buble with no plan to handle it when it all came crashing down.

We did it with Trent Lott, we should do it with Taft

effort to police our own party - even tho it is imperfect.  would have called for Specter's resignation then Frist...Taft would have been lower on the list.

I agree that Taft should either resign or be removed from office.  It is a constant refrain on my own site that Republicans cannot hold Democrats to any ethical standards when they are guilty of the same practices.  House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, filed delinquent reports for three trips she accepted from outside sponsors that were worth $8,580 seven years after the fact.  And all this while she is attacking Tom Delay.  If Republicans had the moral high ground, and were free from special interest money and lobbyists, it would have been Pelosi on the defensive and her seat in jeopardy.  If we, as a party, were willing to clean our own house, we could use that ethical authority to remove many key Democrats equally guilty of the same corruption.  In fact, I believe America would demand that the Dems be held to those same standards. Setting such standards for ourselves creates better, stronger government.  A government we can trust.  It would also help remove a destructive partisan element from our government that is protected, and able to continue in its unproductive course, because its practices are endorsed on both sides.  The fight?  Well, that's just politics as usual.  It's time that changed.

Here, as elsewhere in RS, I agree with Kevin.

There are plenty of policy reasons to disagree with Taft, and other GOP establishment types, and there have been many places and times to express those disagreements.

There is also a place and time and method to deal with the "legal" problems of Gov. Taft.

BUT - so far, the policy and legal issues are almost wholly unrelated. Unless and until either the party as a whole rejects him (somewhat akin to what happened to Gov. Davis), it seems premature, if not dangerous, to demand resignation.

Meanwhile, I can only reiterate the enormous differences between the Ohio and Illinois GOP issues. There is massive systemic corruption in Illinois, in both parties, with long histories. It runs the gamut from sophisticated white-collar financial fraud, all the way to simple bribery in envelopes full of unmarked bills.

There is nothing of the sort at the state level in Ohio involving the GOP, and little amongst the democrats, for the past 20-30 years.

Finally, Kevin is correct in observing that replacing a lame duck with a lamer duck doesn't accomplish much. Unless the GOP could engineer a complete cleansing and dramatic (i.e. conservative) transition through a resignation, it may not serve any purpose, and may actually make it more difficult for the stronger following candidates to distance themselves from this administration.

Also, it will be interesting to see what else shakes out under the new Taft "standards" of a series of barely ethical violations - i.e. more cheaper rounds of golf would have been OK. Is anyone examining the records of other pols to see if someone is beating the rap by running a scam of serial solicitations just under the limits? How about others with similar "oversights".

I just caution against using a minute legal violation to accomplish a huge policy goal - that smacks of the Clinton impeachment, although this violation is comparatively minuter.

On the spending side, the policies of the Bush administration "fly against" conservative principles (even minus the military spending), but Bush holds the line against tax increases.  Is that sole characteristic what protects him from calls for his resignation from the Republican side?

As a visiting liberal here, I still see the RedState community as one where real dialog and discussion is valued, but precisely because real discussion IS allowed it does surprise me that there is not more open dissension to Bush's spending policies than there is, and frankly some outright disgust.

I can't help but noting that Taft has not had the luxury of raising spending AND cutting taxes, because states actually need to balance their budgets - or at least they can't just print more money.  That's not to say he shouldn't resign - I'm not close enough to Ohio politics to know the details of the ethics issues involved - but I agree with those here who have suggested that disagreement on policy is immaterial to that decision.

For some reasoned liberal opinion which recognizes the need to retain conservative voices as well, visit Choosing Hope

to Dignan's article before making my assertion.  There are plenty of you who are willing to complain about Republican spending, it seems. Also sorry about the double signature in the last post.  I created the signature after posting - didn't expect it to show up twice.