You want a rant, I'll give you a rant

I voted today and here are my issues:

1) I voted in a church today: I'm offended first as a Jew, second as an American. How can I be expected to vote in a place of worship with a picture of Jesus sitting next to me and not be appauled? It's inappopriate and called the separation of church and state.

2) The voter ID law: I see a multitude of issues with this law. At face value it makes sense, but there are some serious issues with it especially since there is more evidence of fraud with absentee balloting. My wife and I do not have driver licenses with our current address on it. We have utilities in our names, but we had a hard time finding one in my wife's name. Luckily she had a pay stub. But what about families where the wife doesn't work? Or the poor who don't have jobs, or a house with utilities in their name? This sets up for voter disenfranchisement. I admit there is a concern here, but when there are no reports of widespread voter fraud due to indentification purposes, then I don't see the benefits outweighing the costs of some voters being disenfranchised. And when a voter does have to identify themself with a utility bill or a pay stub, does this cross the privacy line? Yes. The one saving grace is that voters cannot be denied the right to vote, only the right to count their vote, as it hangs in limbo until their identity is verified with a provisional ballot.

3) The issues and candidates: Well, the Republicans have been in charge of Ohio's government for more than a decade and have nothing to show for it. Except, of course, a weak economy, higher costs of education and high foreclosure rates among other things. So, I took it upon myself to vote a straight party line with the Democrats and vote all the Reps out, except for governor and state auditor. In those instances I voted for Fitrakis, the Green party candidate for governor. His beliefs are more in line with mine and he is not part of the two-party system. After the 2004 election I vowed to myself I would not vote for someone who I did not whole-heartedly agree with just because I had no choice. We have a choice and it is not just Blackwell or Strickland. For the state auditor I, surprisingly, voted for the Republican candidate Mary Taylor. If elected she would be the first CPA to run the State's Auditors office, which I find shocking. Bottom line she is more qualified than her challenger.

Today we were also tasked to vote for two of Ohio's Supreme Court Justices, which in my opinion should be appointed and confirmed by the state's legislature. A NY Times investigation illustrates why. In their investigation it was found that, in some instances, the Justices ruled in favor of their campaign donors 70% of the time. Needless to say this is a conflict of interest. Judges should not be elected and subject to raising money for a campaign. They are supposed to interpret the law as it is written, not in the way their campaign donors want them to.

As to the issues, I voted for a higher minimum wage, against slot machines, against the backed smoking industry smoking issue, and for the state-wide smoking ban. In my opinion gambling should be legal in Ohio, but this issue is a sham to promote gambling while supposedly funding higher education. Isn't this what the state lottery was supposed to do? The ballot issue should be: Should or should not gambling be permitted in Ohio? Then the State Legislature deals with the semantics. Lastly, smoking should be banned in public places. Bottom-line, it is a public health issue and if I were to write the law, I would allow smoking in certain places (i.e., restaurants, bars, etc.), but would force them to meet an air-quality level.

That's all.

sbz