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Dirty politics are easy winner
(by Dave Lange - March 21, 2012)
COUNTY LINE, BY DAVE LANGE
Dirty politics are easy winner
"Due to one of the most creative gerrymandering schemes found anywhere, three of the four congressional races in Greater Cleveland affect communities of the Chagrin Valley. It is that fourth race, however, that generates passions regionally and interest across the nation."
I like history. I wrote that lead paragraph for this column on Oct. 24, 1996.
In it, I said Dennis J. Kucinich was "back with a vengeance," campaigning against incumbent U.S. Rep. Martin R. Hoke, R-Lakewood, to represent Ohio's 10th Congressional District, which included Cleveland's west side and western suburbs. I noted that his political career had "been buried so many times by the big-city daily" and that he had "accumulated many enemies in high places."
But Mr. Kucinich went on to win that election and seven more since then. It's taken 16 years for those enemies in high places, including the editorial writers at the daily newspaper, to get their wish.
An even more creative gerrymandering scheme had everything to do with that. The enemies of fair elections conspired to put U.S. Rep. Kucinich, D-Cleveland, and U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Toledo, head to head in the convoluted new 9th Congressional District and then contorted it even further to her advantage. The predictable Cleveland newspaper endorsement of the liar from Toledo over the home-grown boy who just happened to tell the truth about the liars who dragged his country into the Iraq War had nothing to do with it.
I do not use the liar label lightly, but there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and there was plenty of evidence available for our nation's highest leaders to know that. No mission was accomplished, freedom remains elusive nine years later, and true democracy is a pipe dream there.
Mr. Kucinich voted against the war that sent the national debt soaring, continually sought to bring American troops home and was roundly ridiculed for doing so. Ms. Kaptur voted for that ill-advised misadventure and continues to throw taxpayers' money into the military-industrial cesspool that profits from it.
There was never any doubt that she would win the Democratic Party nomination to represent the serpentine 9th Congressional District. But that didn't stop her from pouring lie after lie into her disgraceful primary campaign against a fellow Democrat who supposedly was her friend.
Contrary to her false advertising, Mr. Kucinich did not reject prescription drug benefits for senior citizens, he did not oppose benefits for military veterans, and he was no pal of former Cuyahoga County Commissioner and current convicted criminal Jimmy Dimora.
But while Mr. Kucinich always has supported manufacturing jobs, he had the integrity to vote against a bill that included a $42 million trickle for job development amidst a gusher of $127 billion for the wars in the Mideast.
The truth is that Mr. Kucinich is loved by the majority of the voters in his district and hated by the majority of the people who live in other districts. The truth is that Ms. Kaptur didn't need the former and had plenty of the latter for her easy primary victory.
Mr. Kucinich can look back at his political career knowing that he pursued the truth. Ms. Kaptur can continue hers knowing that she did not.
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