Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Political Change and A Breath of Fresh Air
Voting yesterday in NKY was kind of depressing. While Ohio had all sorts of interesting races (Chabot v Cranley, Wulsin v Schmidt, Heimlich v Pepper, DeWine v Brown, Strickland v Blackwell) and a host of ballot initiatives (2 Smoking Bans, Gambling, Min Wage Increase), NKY had a whole lotta nothing. I got to vote on one interesting race (Lucas v Davis), a city commission race with a whole bunch of incumbents, a few judges and my school board.
Well, at least it was fun to watch the circus from the other side of the river. And I'm excited to see what happens now. The Democrats clearly took some control, now the question is - Can they do anything productive with it, or is it simply a situation of 'throw the bums out' mentality that the 'other' party happened to benefit from. The Dems have spent years complaining about nothing getting done in America, so now the pressure is on.
Locally, I think it's more interesting. What does a Pepper/Portune Commission look like? It's the first time in 40 years that the dems have had 2 of the 3 commission seats...not that Pepper is significantly more liberal than Heimlich. I think it will mean good things for the city/county. There has been very little cooperation between the city and county governments, and with Berding/Bortz on council and Portune/Pepper on county, there is some chance for real change, real progress and real cooperation. I would have liked to see that jail tax pass though.... that needs to be A1 priority for Pepper to figure out now. We can't continue to allow criminals to be released because we don't have a cell for them.
Now to my FAVORITE.... Smoking Ban... I almost created a separate post for it. I am one who is very 'free-market oriented' and I realize that a smoking ban goes 100% against a free-market mindset. However, in this case my personal desire trumps my political/economic mindset. I just selfishly want to be able to go to bars, restaurants, concerts and not have to come home and immediately fumigate my clothes. I can tell you that 30 days from now my consumption of burritos at the comet, my nights listing to local bands at Northside Tavern and my visits to the Ohio side of the river for a beer just went up about 75%! I'm giddy with the thought of it. Now how do I get SmokeFreeOhio to lend their expert advice to KY... let's get this on both sides of the river to snap off any notion that bar business will be doomed in Ohio, and go to KY.
Well, at least it was fun to watch the circus from the other side of the river. And I'm excited to see what happens now. The Democrats clearly took some control, now the question is - Can they do anything productive with it, or is it simply a situation of 'throw the bums out' mentality that the 'other' party happened to benefit from. The Dems have spent years complaining about nothing getting done in America, so now the pressure is on.
Locally, I think it's more interesting. What does a Pepper/Portune Commission look like? It's the first time in 40 years that the dems have had 2 of the 3 commission seats...not that Pepper is significantly more liberal than Heimlich. I think it will mean good things for the city/county. There has been very little cooperation between the city and county governments, and with Berding/Bortz on council and Portune/Pepper on county, there is some chance for real change, real progress and real cooperation. I would have liked to see that jail tax pass though.... that needs to be A1 priority for Pepper to figure out now. We can't continue to allow criminals to be released because we don't have a cell for them.
Now to my FAVORITE.... Smoking Ban... I almost created a separate post for it. I am one who is very 'free-market oriented' and I realize that a smoking ban goes 100% against a free-market mindset. However, in this case my personal desire trumps my political/economic mindset. I just selfishly want to be able to go to bars, restaurants, concerts and not have to come home and immediately fumigate my clothes. I can tell you that 30 days from now my consumption of burritos at the comet, my nights listing to local bands at Northside Tavern and my visits to the Ohio side of the river for a beer just went up about 75%! I'm giddy with the thought of it. Now how do I get SmokeFreeOhio to lend their expert advice to KY... let's get this on both sides of the river to snap off any notion that bar business will be doomed in Ohio, and go to KY.
