The Clermont County Democratic Party today issued a press release (below the fold) accusing embattled Republican Jean Schmidt of being a tax scofflaw. Her "family business" pays only $95 per year in taxes on a property valued in the millions.
Schmidt, you may recall, was the woman in the Captain America suit who called Jack Murtha a "coward" on the floor of Congress. Showing the true courage of a legislator willing to condemn herself to the pen, she then sponsored legislation to make flag desecration a federal crime.
If some Ohioans continued to believe their Schmidt don't stink, our inestimable congressentity then backed a secret proposal to turn the Piketon, Ohio, federal energy reservation into the world's largest storage dump for commercial spent nuclear fuel -- a proposal that John McCain still appears to favor. Schmidt thus became the first Member of Congress in history to invite high-level nuclear waste into her own district -- albeit 67 air miles downwind of her home.
DKOS readers are now familiar with the Obama inevitability argument. If Obama carries the Kerry states plus Iowa and New Mexico, then he only needs one more battleground state to top 270. That can either be Colorado, Ohio, Virginia, Missouri, Indiana, or Florida. Therefore, Obama can't lose. Yada, yada, yada.
The problem with this line of thought is that it treats the election as a machine running by statistical dynamics. What are the compounded odds of Obama losing all those independent contests? Pretty damned slim.
But the election is not a machine, it's a chess game. Each side employs strategy, and that strategy includes elements of psychological warfare and tactical surprise. McCain is not going to just stand still while all the applesauce falls around him, if you can imagine that. No, he's going to make his moves, and he's already pulled dead even in the national tracking polls. So what is McCain's winning move?
Whole mythologies have sprung up about southern Ohio. Either we are racists, bumkins, or just plain dumb. Many argue that Obama should neglect the region and concentrate on more "fertile" ground in Montana or old Virginia. They overlook that southern Ohio boasts a heritage as the organizing center of the Underground Railroad movement, that the population in substantial measure descends from a mix that included fugitive slaves and recalcitrant Indians, and that the oldest interracial churches west of the Alleghanies are here, some still in operation.
How soon we forget such south Ohio bumkins as Branch Rickey (who integrated major league baseball by sheer force of will), Ambrose Bierce, and Harriet Beecher Stowe.
Ok so why has Barack Obama done so poorly in southern Ohio, in the primaries and in recent polls? Why the pandemic bad advice that he ditch the region for more tolerant terrain? And why is it so important that the Obama campaign ditch this advice and send the candidate to the south-central Ohio corridor?
Despite warnings from Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), and Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL), the Republican congressional leadership of 2005 and 2006 ignored the burgeoning national problems that we now live with every day (gas prices food prices, the housing meltdown, recession, etc.) in favor of wasting time and money on misguided attempts at legislating morality. These GOP leaders, who at one time claimed a belief in limited government principles, were exposed as frauds when they showed no reluctance in using big government to legislate social issues. In these cases, the sky was the limit! This was especially true with Internet poker.
The Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA) is typical of Republican leadership efforts to legislate morality. To pander to anti-poker extremists like Focus on the Family, the GOP leadership embraced the power of the federal government to tell Americans what to do in their own homes with their own money. The GOP leadership also embraced UIGEA’s deputizing of banks to enforce the law, as if America’s banks were an unpaid arm of the Department of Justice.
Watch the video. It is just amazing. I am not surprised that this happened in Lebanon, Ohio. I graduated from high school in Lebanon and even then the town was an armpit. It is just sad that a sitting Congressperson could act like such a vicious and disgusting person during an Independence Day parade.
Whomever the person was attempting to intimidate the Wulsin supporter should be tossed off the campaign. We should demand that Jean Schmidt issue an apology and a promise to not employ such mafia style campaign tactics in the future.
Representative Schmidt - You are a Congresswoman - start acting like it.
Sorry for the short diary, and many thanks for the "rescue" last night.
This race is a long shot, I know. And I don't expect this diary to make the Rec List, but it would be nice. Given the economic catastrophe that Ohio has experienced during the past 8 years, electing an honest working-class Democrat from this state shouldn't be too hard. Unfortunately Mike Carroll is facing an uphill battle against incumbent Jim Jordan.
A new poll commissioned by the campaign of challenger Dr. Victoria Wulsin (D) shows widespread dissatisfaction with incumbent Rep. "Mean Jean" Schmidt (R), with only 33% approving her job performance and 48% saying they would vote to replace her or would consider doing so. Although the incumbent leads in the head-to-head matchup, her lead is in the single digits:
The head-to-head includes leaners; among strong supporters Schmidt's lead is only 26% to 24%. The poll, taken by Momentum Analysis, LLC by telephone on June 24-26, included 500 likely voters and has a margin of error 0f +/- 4.4 points.
Jean Schmidt, she of the notorious foot in mouth disease is at it again. Like other Republicans she recently joined in with the flagrantly inflammatory falsehood that the Chinese are drilling for oil off the coast of Florida. But unlike others she did it on the floor of the House.
Consequently, she was called on by many including the Ohio Democratic Party, the Hamilton County Democratic Party the Cincinnati Enquirer and others to retract her statement. But oh no, not Jean. Dick Cheney did, George Will did, but not Mean Jean. Instead she goes on the attack. Poor Jean she’s the victim it seems.
Last Saturday this guest column (see it on the flip) published in the Cincinnati Enquirer wherein Jean blames the media for her own error and attacks the paper for singling her out and missing the "larger picture," that being the need to drill in coastal waters.
As a 17 year old, I often see my fellow High School students cringe at the thought of getting involved with political campaigns. Each and everyone of us has the opportunity to make a difference in this year's election, yet none seem to jump at the chance. However, I've decided to dedicate my three month hiatus away from school to volunteer for Dr. Victoria Wulsin's campaign for Congress.
I'm here to ask for your help though, with only a few weeks away from the end of this political quarter we need to send a clear message to Congresswoman Jean Schmidt, that we're tired of rubber stamp politicians who represent politics as usual. Actblue Page in the hopes of helping Wulsin maintain her fundraising advantage over Jean Schmidt. My goal is to raise $2000 today from small 5 dollar donations today. If you can't donate than please recommend this diary so that others can see this diary and help Wulsin's campaign.
It's been a fairly quiet couple months from Daredevil Jean Schmidt, which is notable for someone whose brief Congressional career has been noted for remarkably inappropriate missteps, exaggerations, and shameful allegations. Schmidt's career as a Congressional candidate and Member has been so completely pockmarked by disgrace that she has almost singlehandedly made one of Ohio's reddest districts competitive for Democrats.
She has somehow avoided stepping in her trademark political dogpiles of late, however. Rumors were rampant that after nearly losing her 2006 race to Dr. Victoria Wulsin, Republican leadership had sent Schmidt a message from on high:
Keep quiet.
I have to admit, the lack of controversy of late from Rep. Schmidt left me a bit concerned. She had been such a reliable repository of excess for so long...if she could tone down her rhetoric and stay on message, perhaps all Republicans could?
I shouldn't have worried so much.
Schmidt's latest: she has sent out a letter accusing Dr. Wulsin, her opponent again in 2008, of performing "grotesque medical experiments" on humans.
Wulsin's contempt for the culture of life has even led her to participate in grotesque medical experiments. Wulsin was paid for her work in medical "studies" where victims of AIDS in Africa and China were, without their consent, injected with the malaria virus, all in the name of "scientific inquiry."
Naturally, this bald accusation of such Mengele-like behavior was a dirty lie. Schmidt's people, of course, tried to weasel out of it:
Schmidt press secretary Barry Bennett said the letter wasn't suggesting Wulsin participated in the experiments.
Which I guess makes sense, except for the part where the letter said:
Wulsin's contempt for the culture of life has even led her to participate in grotesque medical experiments.
Ah, Daredevil Jean Schmidt, notorious purveyor of lies and pictures of also-lies, is back. Back with a vengeance.
Here comes another big one. On June 5th, the truth-challenged Schmidt took her misspeaking skills to the floor of the House, denouncing federal limitations on drilling for oil by declaring that China is currently drilling off the Florida coast.
She alleges, of course, that it's Cuba helping their Communist partners in crime Communism to steal our good American oil. Watch here:
Yet no one can prove that the Chinese are drilling anywhere off Cuba's shoreline. The China-Cuba connection is "akin to urban legend," said Sen. Mel Martinez, a Republican from Florida who opposes drilling off the coast of his state but who backs exploration in ANWR.
"China is not drilling in Cuba's Gulf of Mexico waters, period," said Jorge Pinon, an energy fellow with the Center for Hemispheric Policy at the University of Miami and an expert in oil exploration in the Gulf of Mexico. Martinez cited Pinon's research when he took to the Senate floor Wednesday to set the record straight.
Even so, the Chinese-drilling-in-Cuba legend has gained momentum and has been swept up in Republican arguments to open up more U.S. territory to domestic production.
But cheers for Schmidt. She's not alone:
Vice President Dick Cheney, in a speech Wednesday to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, picked up the refrain. Cheney quoted a column by George Will, who wrote last week that "drilling is under way 60 miles off Florida. The drilling is being done by China, in cooperation with Cuba, which is drilling closer to South Florida than U.S. companies are."
This is one of the neatest things I've seen so far this election season.
Politicos and news junkies have probably been following Jean Schmidt's crazy career for a while. This year she is rematched against Vic Wulsin and she's already started slinging mud. In a move that is outrageous even for her, she is accusing Dr. Wulsin of intentionally injecting people with malaria against their will.
It's already looking like a nasty, nasty race, so I had to smile when I came across this Act Blue page. A 17 year old in the OH-02 set up the page asking people to contribute $5to support Vic and register their disappointment with Jean Schmidt.
I think it's a positive and patriotic thing to do.
It's not even August yet and Jean Schmidt is already spewing out lies. With less than six months to go until the election she's now claiming, in a fundraising letter, that Democratic candidate Dr. Victoria Wulsin engaged in "grotesque experiments" as a doctor with the Heimlich Institute, injecting unwilling patients in China and Africa with the "Malaria virus." The truth is, Dr. Wulsin was fired from the Institute after she wrote literature opposing these experiments. According to The Daily Bellwether there's another problem with Schmidt's attacks... there is no Malaria virus.
How can we prove Schmidt doesn't know what she is talking about? For starters, Schmidt's claim that victims in China and Africa were injected with the "malaria virus" is freighted with intent to deceive because a "malaria virus" does not exist. Malaria is caused by a parasite of the Plasmodium genus. And Baratz, who filed the medical board complaint, says Wulsin didn't inject anyone in China or Africa:
Dr. Victoria Wulsin lost to Mean Jean Schmidt by less than 1% in 2006. This year the two will face off again. Though everything seems to be going Wulsin's way - she has more money, polls show her ahead and the political climate is very good for here - this will still be a tough, tough race.
I'm following this race closely because I live in the district and don't like Schmidt at all. What is everyone else thinking?
OH-02 is the red-leaning district in which Paul Hackett (D) did very well in the famous 2005 special election, and in which Dr. Victoria Wulsin (D-Indian Hill) very nearly ousted national embarrassment Rep. "Mean Jean" Schmidt (R-Loveland) in 2006, a race that went to a recount before it was decided by about 2,500 votes. Dr. Wulsin is a terrific candidate and she is back to take another shot at Schmidt this year.
I learned from the Wulsin campaign yesterday that a spurious ethics complaint, which adversaries had turned into a sleazy assault on her character during the 2006 congressional contest and again during the primary early this year, has been closed -- hopefully bringing to an end to the despicable and baseless attacks.
You may have seen videos or links about this smear campaign, portraying Dr. Wulsin as some kind of gruesome mad doctor involved in evil-sounding "malariotherapy." The dismissal of the ethics complaint ought to put that nonsense to rest, but those videos and blog posts are still out there so I'm hoping to get the word out via this diary.
Some of you may recall that, back in 2006 I wrote about inviting Zack Space (OH-18) to stay with my wife and me during a fund-raising trip to New York City, despite the fact that we’d never previously met, and I had no connections to his campaign other than providing financial support to a competitive race. This year, the phone started ringing again (actually, far more frequently), and we extended the same offer to the candidates who called us to chat about their races. Our first guest of the season was, coincidently, running one district over from Zack. Please welcome Dr. Victoria Wulsin
Republican congresswoman Jean Schmidt from Ohio praised secularism in Turkey today, hailing it as a tool of progress, but declined to extend that same praise to the United States as well.
Musfara Kemal Ataturk's vision became reality on May 19, said Republican congresswoman Jean Schmidt in a speech directed to congressional majority leader Democrat Nancy Pelosi on account of the May 19 Turkish Youth and Sports Day. A leader that can combine vision and decisiveness can lay the foundation for a great future, said Schmidt adding, Turkey's neighbors can learn a lesson from him. The statement, in the congressional record, also praised women being granted suffrage in 1934.
The Heart Mini Marathon 15K running race has been an annual tradition in Cincinnati for 31 years. In addition to supporting a good cause (American Heart Association), the tough hilly course is a traditional tune up race for those doing the Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon in early May.
Republican US Representative Jean Schmidt (OH-2) is an avid runner and a regular at local races. The Heart Mini is an out and back course so one has the chance to see nearly all the runners at some point coming the other way. A ways after the turn around I was focused, feeling ok but definitely feeling the effort. Someone next to me cheered someone coming the other way and I looked up to see it was Jean herself. She finished in 1:17, a very good time for a woman of her age.
Know how she could do even better? More time to train. If only she didn't have to spend so much time being an incompetent Republican House member.
That's where we can help. Congratulate Jean on her race by tossing a little spare change in to her great challenger Victoria Wulsin. Maybe next year, with all that extra free time Jean can do even better.
