Schmidt ekes out a win

In my Sunday post, I predicted that the race for Ohio's 2nd Congressional seat would be closer than it should be in a supposedly "safe" Republican area. My reasons were two fold. First off Schmidt came out of a bruising and negative primary while Hackett won his primary easily. Secondly, I believe Schmidt assumed she had it in the bag as soon as the primary was over. Nobody told Hackett that he was supposed to lose big. Hackett ran a lot of advertising emphasizing his military service in Iraq and that plays well in this area which gave 66% of their votes to President Bush in the last election. Hackett also wisely ensured none of his advertisements or signs identified him as a Democrat.

Yesterday, Schmidt did win but it was the smallest margin of victory in this district since 1974. As I went to sleep I was thinking about doing a long post analyzing this race and what could be learned from the near upset. Well, Bizzyblog has beat me to it and done it a lot better than I was planning. In the middle of his list of reasons that the race was close, he addressed the sorry state of the Republican leadership in Columbus.

The sorry state of Ohio:
5. Ohio'’s governor has a 17% popularity rating.
6. Most of the Republican Party leadership in Columbus is scandal-plagued, corrupt, and a disgrace.
7. Ohio's Republican Party is fiscally governing the state like the Democratic party would.
8. Ohio'’s economy therefore significantly lags that of the rest of the nation, with higher taxes, higher unemployment, and slower growth.

While if Hackett had won Democrats would have crowed that it was a referendum on President Bush, Republican problems in Ohio start in Columbus not D.C.