Can Kerry take Ohio in November?

No candidate has ever been elected or re-elected without taking the Buckeye state.

As you probably already know, Ohio has a myriad of problems albeit economic and political. Ohio has a right-wing Governor and right-wing dominated legislature. The state is also riddled with unemployment.

Could Kerry take Ohio and what should Kerry do it ensure that it happens?


John

I was just reading the other day about 1960..and fyi, Nixon took Ohio but Kennedy won. Anyway, I'm sure you are right about all the elections since then.

What are the latest polls showing in Ohio? I'm sure the plant closings isn't going to help Bush.

If you are still worried about the "no campaign office in Ohio" I'm sure it will be done with plenty of time.

Kerry can and should pick it up, thereby winning the election! :-)

His campaign offices opened last week and more resources are arriving. Ohio will be a blue state in November.

Dems have won without Ohio in the past, but never a Republican. All polls indicate that we're heavily leaning towards Kerry.

Get out the vote in the large cities (Cleveland, Columbus, Cinncinati and Toledo).

Michigan went for Clinton in 92, 96 and Gore in 2000. At the time, we had a GOPig governor and a GOPig dominated legistlature(we're still stuck with that one). In 2000, the pre-election polls had the race pretty even going into election day. Detroit turned up huge on election day, for the first time since the early 70s, and Gore carried the state. The same thing happened in 2002, and put Jennifer Granholm in the governor's office.

The freepers say that voter fraud in Detroit is why this happened. In 2000, I still lived in the city and voted at my neighborhood precinct. I had been voting there, early in the morning, for over a decade, and there was never more than a handful of people present. I never saw the turnout that I did in 2000-there was a long line at 7:30 am to vote.

First, the good news. Bush is unpopular enough in Ohio that Voinovich is running away from him in his fight for reelection. That is very good. Also Kerry is finally opening headquarters so that should help. Between that and the indy groups he should be OK on the ground. The state is a mess and it is the Republicans fault. All of those are positives.

Now for the bad news. The Ohio Democratic party is comatose. There are no surrogates for Kerry in the majority of Congressional districts. Our current delegation is split about 12 to 6. We have no statewide elected officials at all. Kerry is going to have to fend for himself due to that. We are 3 and 19 in state wide races since 1992. Our wins are Clinton (92,96) and Glenn (92). That defines pathetic.

Kerry needs to really work the state though. The southeast part of the state should be a gold mine in that Bush got close to 70% and unemployment is at 25% in some of those counties. He needs high turnout in the cities.

The big x factor is a possible same sex marriage amendment. If it is on the ballot most fundies will make it to the polls and vote for him. If it isn't then they may stay home giving us a leg up.

I believe it is no Republican has been elected without winning OH.

That said, I do think Kerry can pick it up.

You kidding?