Kasich Speech Balances Ohio Recovery, Obama Criticism
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Gov. John Kasich offered his full-throated endorsement of the Republican presidential ticket Tuesday night at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, citing GOP nominee Mitt Romney’s experience in business, as governor of Massachusetts and running the 2002 Winter Olympics.
Kasich’s remarks, streamed online and delivered on an evening that included a personal speech by Ann Romney, the GOP nominee’s wife, and the keynote address by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, presented a challenge for the Republicans: touting the economic success Ohio has achieved since he took office as governor in 2011 without undermining their central argument against President Barack Obama, that the economy hasn’t recovered as much is it should have.
“We’ve made real progress in Ohio in restoring confidence,” Kasich declared. “But we need a new partner in Washington. This relationship just is not working. It is holding us back.”
Kasich pointed to Ohio’s success in eliminating an $8 billion deficit when he took office without raising taxes, taking the state’s rainy day fund from 89 cents to $500 million, and going from being ranked 48th in terms of job creation to fourth, and first in the Midwest.
“We could not cut taxes because we were not competitive,” he said. “So you know how we did it? We did it the way that a family does it. We sat down and set priorities. We eliminated those programs that we no longer needed” but “prioritized those things that we really did need.” Ohio “killed” the estate tax – the “death tax” as opponents refer to it – “because no person should have to visit the undertaker and the tax man on the same day,” he remarked.
Ohio also restored “common sense” to regulations, protecting the environment and Ohio families without killing the state’s “job creators,” he continued. “In fact, we want to honor the job creators in our state and work with them because they help our families,” he said. He also touted Ohio’s improved credit rating.
“But you know what? The wind is in our face. The president has given us headwinds,” he said, advancing the argument that Ohio’s economic recovery is in spite of Obama’s policies, not encouraged by them.
Also, as Romney will face, the actions Ohio took “were not always easy” nor always popular, Kasich continued. “When you get yourself in public service you must lead and you must do what is necessary,” he remarked.
Obama’s solution lies in taking money out of the pockets of American taxpayers and sending it to Washington, D.C., and his regulations have had a “smothering effect” that has “paralyzed the job creators,” he said.
“This is the wrong philosophy, these are the wrong policies and we need a new leader,” he stressed. “If there’s anything we need in government today, it’s people who understand how to create jobs, plain and simple, and the people that criticize folks in business just simply don’t get it. They’ve put us in this hole, and Mitt Romney has a history of being a great job creator.”
In addition to Romney’s private-sector experience, Kasich touted Romney’s success as governor of Massachusetts – or “Tax-achusetts,” as he put it – and reversing a trend of losing tens of thousands of jobs when he took office to the creation of 40,000 new jobs when he left office. He also pointed to Romney’s stewardship of the troubled Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, where he “made every American proud of what he did.”
“[Vice President] Joe Biden disputes a lot of those facts,” Kasich said. “But Joe Biden told me that he was a good golfer. And I've played golf with Joe Biden. I can tell you that is not true, as well as all the other things he says.”
Reaction from the Obama campaign and Ohio Democrats quickly followed Kasich’s remarks.
The governor’s speech “was just more of what we have seen” from the Republican ticket during the campaign, “empty rhetoric and false attacks,” said Jessica Kershaw, Ohio spokeswoman for the Obama campaign. Kasich and Romney “have been uniquely bad” for Ohio and its workers, “from trying to strap the budget crisis on the backs of our state's firefighters, teachers, police and other public servants” -- a reference to Kasich’s effort to curtain the power of public-sector unions last year, overwhelmingly overturned last November -- “to opposing the president’s rescue of the auto industry,” she said, echoing another frequent line of attack in Ohio.
Within minutes of Kasich’s speech, the Ohio Democratic Party issued no fewer than four separate statements. One, attacking the governor for telling a “fairytale” about balancing Ohio’s budget without raising taxes, pointed out that the state cut more than $1.3 billion in funding for schools and communities, “forcing layoffs, school levies and tax increases across the state.”
Another statement said in telling the story of Ohio’s recovery, which began a year before he took office, Kasich “conveniently ignor[ed] the significance” of the auto rescue supported by Obama and U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.
“The American auto industry is helping to spur growth across Ohio because President Obama and Sen. Sherrod Brown ignored the pundits and politicians like Mitt Romney and John Kasich and invested in American workers,” said Chris Redfern, state Democratic Party chairman, referencing remarks by Kasich that “we shouldn’t throw good money after bad” and “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt,” Romney’s infamously headlined 2008 New York Times op-ed piece.
“As we continue to hear more and more announcements from General Motors and Chrysler about the thousands of jobs being and created and retained by the auto supply chain in 80 of 88 Ohio counties, it’s clear that our state is on a path to recovery, despite Gov. Kasich and Mitt Romney’s failure to support the most significant economic investment we’ve had,” he continued.
Those announcements include GM’s recent decision to award production of the next generation of the Chevrolet Cruze to its Lordstown plant, where the car is being made, which is expected to be the centerpiece of Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to the United Auto Workers Local 1112 union hall Friday.
Copyright 2012 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.