Happy Holidays!

The Lake County Democratic Party and Santa Claus (Kevin Malecek) would like to wish you and yours a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Lake County Dems Endorse Strickland

Mentor, Ohio -The Lake County Democratic Party announced today that they have endorsed Ohio gubernatorial candidate Congressman Ted Strickland.

"Ted Strickland is our choice for Governor because he's the best candidate to get Ohio headed in the right direction again," said Tom Tagliamonte, chair of the Lake County Democratic Party. "Ted will clean up the corruption in Columbus and shift the focus to creating jobs, revitalizing education and making healthcare available for all Ohioans."

"I am very honored to have received the Lake County Democratic Party's endorsement to be Ohio's next governor," Strickland said. "I pledge to work with the citizens of Lake County and all Ohio counties to get our state back on track. We need to create living wage jobs. We need to improve our educational system. And we need to make sure that health care is available to every citizen across our great state."

With 227,000 citizens, Lake County is Ohio's eleventh most populated county. The endorsement marks Strickland's 21st and his largest county Democratic Party organization endorsement received to date.

Listen to Thomas Tagliamonte, chair of the Lake County Democratic Party, endorse Ted.

Listen to Ted accept the Lake County Democratic Party endorsement.

Straight from LaTourette's Mouth

On the night of Thursday November 17th, Congressman Steve LaTourette flip-flopped on an important budget vote. He promised his constituents that he'd vote against the bill, and in fact vote against it before caving to Republican leadership and voting for it. The budget cuts important services for the poor right in time for Christmas.

What was LaTourette thinking?

WCPN, Cleveland's NPR affiliate, interviewed LaTourette on the night of the vote. WCPN explains:

"Around 1:15 am Friday, LaTourette voted against the legislation.
Correspondent Chad Pergram interviewed LaTourette shortly after his no
vote...

'I voted no because in my district people understand the need for tax relief because it's growing the economy, but they don't understand why when we achieve savings, it comes from programs that help people who are disadvantaged.'

But the GOP leadership desperately needed LaTourette's help to pass this
controversial measure at the last minute. So LaTourette caved. And at 1:55
am, Pergram again interviewed LaTourette to find out how Republican leaders
cajoled the Congressman to change his vote.

'The Speaker of the House and the leadership of the House came and indicated that we're a majority. We need to govern and that in order to govern you need to move a package out of the House. To do nothing and not get it over to the Senate I think would not be discharging my responsibility.' "

Later LaTourette admits:

"It's still not right for the district... It's not right..."

How did LaTourette think his district would react?

"Well, Chardon's under 12 inches of snow so they're really not worried what happened here tonight."

Hear the full interview here.

In the end, LaTourette felt that it would not be responsible to vote against this bill. LaTourette needs a wake up call. Our Congressman should be responsive to the needs of his constituents not to the needs of the Republican majority.

Kudos to local activist Susan Lambert who forwarded us the link. If you have information you'd like to share, please send us an email at Doug@LakeDems.com.

Who is Ted Strickland?

With Columbus Mayor Mike Coleman dropping out of the Governor's Race, Congressman Ted Strickland is now the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for Governor.

On Thursday Ted Strickland sat down with Meet The Bloggers, a group of area bloggers, for an in-depth interview. You can listen to the interview or read the transcript. Here are some segments:

Ted Strickland on Education:

"We need to move away from a local property tax. The funding for elementary and secondary education by Constitution is a state responsibility. And over a period of decades, that responsibility has gradually been shifted down to the local level, increasingly to the local level [...]

We're never going to be a healthy state if we don't address this issue. It's not something that we can choose to do or not to do. It's something that we must do in my judgment. [...]

If the legislature doesn't go along, I'll conduct a continuous campaign against them as governor."

Ted Strickland on LaTourette's CAFTA Flip-Flop:

"Steve Latourette spoke vehemently against that bill and how bad it was and how it would hurt his constituency. And then he went in and he voted yes. [...] I think Steve sold out."

Ted Strickland on Economic Development:

"There are certain regions of this state that are doing very well. There are other regions that aren't doing well at all. I think the effort should be directed toward the regions that are most in need of help. And that the economic development dollars should be directed and spent in those regions."

Ted Strickland on Wal-Mart:

"There's a bill before the Ohio Senate that I strongly support. And that's to require employers in this state that have employees that are on public assistance to be identified. Of course, Wal-Mart's going to be probably at the top of that list."

For the rest of the interview, check out Meet The Bloggers.

Photo by Tim Russo of BuckeyePolitics.net.