Into My Own Asks This Question: What is John Boehner Doing About Rural Poor?

The blog "Into My Own" has a very interesting entry up about rural poverty and the lack of Republican response to such poverty. The entry is based on a report about rural poverty that the Dayton Daily News published. The DDN article used a town in Ohio that suffered a tragic fire. It examined what is happening to that town, Greenville, in terms of job loss, family breakup, and crime. The author of the entry believes that Boehner is doing nothing because people who live in such towns don't give campaign contributions.

That may be one reason, but here is another possibility. The problem of rural poverty doesn't lend itself to market solutions which, since the 1980s, have been the preferred solutions to any social or economic problem. A declining work force, inadequate funding base for schools, and a migration out of such places by young people, means that such areas are not attractive places for private investment. Since they aren't attractive for private investment, it is difficult to attract new businesses to such areas or help the ones that are already there.

It doesn't have to be that way. Here are some ideas: (1) put Ohio's school funding on a equal basis so that quality of education is not so dependent on where a person lives; (2) invest in school buildings and other public infrastructure; (3) put up a system of cheap broadband communication so that all areas of Ohio are accessible to the Internet; and (4) put more money into law enforcement in these areas so that the crime rate is driven down. Come to think of it, those solutions would work well for urban areas too.

Such solutions, however, are dependent on having an activist government. Such a government is not compatible with the philosophy of the Republican Party and its elected officials.

Jill Miller Zimon Raises Good Point: Why Didn't PD Do Story on Ohio Trending Blue?

Jill Miller Zimon, who is the author and owner of Writes Like She Talks a blog that covers writing, education, children, and politics raised a really interesting point in a posting that appeared on www.cleveland.com on Tuesday, September 25, 2007 She asked the question why was the Dayton Daily News and not the Plain Dealer doing a story on exurban counties trending Democratic. One of the counties that was profiled by the Dayton Daily News is Medina County which, as Jill noted, is much closer to Cleveland than it is to Dayton. (She was also kind enough to mention our own MCDAC Blog, which was certainly nice of her and appreciated.)

Of course, part of the problem may be that Medina County is much better known to the Cleveland Plain Dealer than to the Dayton Daily News. As a result they may not have been as impressed by Senator Sherrod Brown carrying Medina County since PD reporters would know that Sherrod represented all or part of Medina County from 1992 to 2006 before being elected to the Senate. Consequently, they may not have thought that it represented a political trend.

All that is true, but it doesn't totally explain why every state-wide Democrat running for a partisan office carried Medina County except for Barbara Sykes, who ran for State Auditor. You can explain away Brown and Strickland by pointing out that Brown's connection to Medina County and Strickland having a wing-nut for an opponent. Explaining away the Cordray and Dann victories, however, is much harder.

All this is not to say that MCDAC expects Medina County to go Democrat in the presidential campaign next year. It is to say that we expect that Medina County will be competitive and could be carried by the right Democratic candidate.

Medina County Swung More Than 25% for Dems from 2000-2006

A reader sent us a very interesting Dayton Daily News article link that shows that in Medina County between 2000 and 2006, the Democratic vote as measured by the vote for Gore in 2000 compared to the vote for Sherrod Brown increased by more than 25%. The link takes you to an interactive map which you can click on to get the vote totals from all three elections for every county in Ohio. What's interesting is that the Daily News used the U.S. Senate race as a comparison. If you used the 2006 Governor's race, the swing would be even more pronounced.

One thing that really helped both Brown and Strickland was that they campaigned everywhere in Ohio and didn't "write" off counties based on their previous voting history. Both men made more than one visit into Medina County. Strickland, for example, made three trips into Medina County between August of 2005 and November of 2006. Such efforts paid off on election day.

Another thing that helped was that in both 2004 and 2006 Medina County saw a tremendous grassroots effort led by David Brown, who co-ordinated the Kerry for President campaign in 2004 and then both the Brown and Strickland campaigns in 2006. Although Kerry didn't carry the county, the experience that volunteers gained was invaluable and really helped in the 2006 election.

Ohio's Non-Insured Prescription Drug Plan to Merge With Golden Buckeye Card

If you know any senior citizens who do not have prescription drug coverage, they might want to check out this story in the Dayton Daily News. Seniors enrolled in Ohio's Best RX plan, which covers eligible Ohio citizens who don't have prescription health insurance coverage, is merging with the Golden Buckeye Card. This will mean that Ohio seniors can use the Golden Buckeye Card for prescription medicine if they are otherwise eligible.

This quote from the article explains the coverage:

For adults younger than 60 to be eligible, they also must have annual incomes below 300 percent of the federal poverty level — $30,636 for singles, $41,076 for families of two and $10,440 more per additional person.

The article also points out that:

The program can complement other drug discount cards and Medicare Part D. Only one can be used per prescription.

The Daily News article notes that participants in the Best RX program save approximately 34% on their prescription drugs. If you click on the above link to the Daily News article you can read a telephone number and an Internet address where you can get more information.