numero uno

You just can't call bologna a steak, and you can't put a tuxedo on the funky blues.

According to campaign finance information, Strickland has in-hand $1.8 million dollars, only a few weeks before the end of politician season. Blackwell, by contrast, has $174,102 dollars in cash to spend.

Now, before we get all excited about these figures (which are, admittedly, pretty exciting), we should recall that Blackwell has made substantial ad buys in the countdown to November 7th. Our ad project which seeks to catalogue ad buys in nearly real time, shows that Blackwell benefited greatly from Republican funding early in the race. He is now being nearly forgotten while they pour funds into races across the country that once seemed shoe-ins for the GOP. But this disparagy of funds gives major legitimacy to the idea that Strickland is pulling far, far ahead.

And despite the $15 million Blackwell has spent (versus Strickland's $16 million), he still trails his Democratic opponent by nearly 20 percentage points in many polls. No amount of money will convince Ohio voters that this joker is governor-material. Even Petro's lame attempt to intervene in the ID-requirement case now in Ohio Supreme Ct (while being the lawyer in the same case for Blackwell) won't save them now.

If my magic 8 ball is correct, Ohio will next month hire its first Democratic governor since 1986.

"Democrats for the first time are looking like they have a lot to celebrate in November," said University of Akron political scientist Stephen Brooks.

The old saying goes, "as goes Ohio, so goes the nation." So go Strickland, go. I'm hoping there's lots to celebrate November 8th.