Why Did An Unpopular Turd Like Mike DeWine Win Ohio?

This disgusting turd named Mike DeWine won the Ohio governor's race. He and Republicans rigged the districts to favor Republicans. So it doesn't matter whether they failed at winning popular vote. They have control of the districts. They win.

Ohio governor-elect is Mike DeWine. He is the current inept Attorney General of the state. For eight years, DeWine sided with the cops when it came to the deaths of people of color. He was a prime enabler of the opioid crisis in the state. He takes dark money from corporations. He is a millionaire. He owns a minor league baseball team in North Carolina. DeWine is a tiny guy with a huge presence in the Dayton region. He lives in Columbus but owns a farm in Cedarville.

Clearly, a seasoned politician, Ohio elected this turd as the governor despite Republicans losing the popular vote.

Even in my own community, Theresa Gasper, outraised and tied with Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH) in the Midterms but lost the election.

Turner is a worthless lawmaker who was not popular in the Dayton region. However, he managed to win the votes despite the fact he barely visits the region.

Matter of fact, of all the 16 U.S. Congressional districts, 12 remained Republican and 4 remained Democratic.

The only Democrat to win a national race here was Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH), one of the few progressive lawmakers who wears it like a badge of honor. He said that most of the elections in states like Ohio, Florida and Georgia were stolen by Republicans because of shady tactics.

Richard Cordray outraised and outspent DeWine. He either was tied or trailed DeWine by a few points. Yet, the state continued to stay in Republican control in the statehouse.

Just recently, Ohio passed "Stand Your Ground" and "Heartbeat" laws. Instead of working on infrastructure and the trying to save closing hospitals, they want to give reckless Americans more chances to kill people of color. They want to meddle in the business of women by limiting choice clinics and defunding Planned Parenthood.

Then I saw on Twitter a story from Rich Exner of Cleveland.com. He found that the Democrats matched the Republicans on polling, voter registration and popularity.

The Democrats ran much more competitive in total votes for the 116 Ohio House and Senate elections across the state, cleveland.com found in tabulating the unofficial returns.

But the Republicans scored their wins for 63 percent of the seats while collecting just over 50 percent of the total vote.

This is a lot like what happened in Ohio's 16 congressional districts, where Republicans won 75 percent of the seats with just 52 percent of the overall vote.

These are two fresh examples of how skillfully gerrymandered legislative districts can sway the balance of power - especially when one party is in full control of drawing the maps as was the case for the current districts.

He said that the gerrymandering of the districts made it possible. Ohio has one of the worst Congressional District maps in the country. It was deliberately used to help Republicans win elections in Ohio.

Richard Cordray managed to win the popular vote but lose the state. He blames Republicans for rigging the map and making harder for Democrats to win.

Ohioans in 2015 voted to reform the way Statehouse districts will be drawn, beginning in 2021. Then, earlier this year, Ohio voters did the same for congressional districts going forward. The votes for change were not close, passing each time with more than 70 percent support.

The separate reforms carry their own set of rules, but the gist is the same - a new set of 10-year maps cannot be approved without buy-in from both major political parties.

"The problem with gerrymandering is so straight forward and clear cut if you just look at the numbers" from the election returns, said Catherine Turcer, one of the advocates for change as the executive director of Common Cause Ohio.

"I'm so pleased that the voters of Ohio have taken the step to rein in the problem. We deserve to be in control of the elections."

Exner added, the GOP's statewide domination is undisputed. The governor, auditor, secretary of state, treasurer and attorney general will all again be Republicans.

The lone Democratic win statewide was by Sen. Sherrod Brown, a veteran elected to a third term. The Democrats also did win two seats on the Ohio Supreme Court, but the ballot does not identify party affiliation in the Supreme Court races.

Despite the strong showing by the Ohio GOP, the Democrats actually did make significant gains over 2016, argues Richard Gunther, who worked on gerrymandering reform and is a professor emeritus of political science at Ohio State University.

He found the vote margin between Democrats and Republicans in Ohio's congressional races shifted the Democrats' way by an average of 10 percentage points. That was in line, he said, with national trends.

"Ohio did not miss out on the wave at all," Gunther said. "The difference is that gerrymandering was so effective that the Democrats picked up no additional seats."