Mullane's to Reopen

I'm sorry to interrupt election blogging, but this news seemed too good not to pass along. (It's actually relatively old news, but I'm just learning of it, and haven't seen any of the usual suspects mention it yet, either.)

It appears that Mullane's is going to reopen. Mullane's was a small, eclectic spot on Race Street near Garfield that closed in 2002. It'll be in a different space, but will still be called Mullane's Parkside Cafe.

You can check out the "Friends of Mullane's" website here, and become a Facebook friend of Mullane's here.

Mullane's was such a great place. I remember ending a date there with dessert. (Given that I'm still single, the relationship clearly didn't take off, but I'm not blaming Mullane's.) I think a lot of downtown and OTR residents are excited about the restaurant's return.

Who's Voting - Some Analysis

Plum Street Studios has an analysis of some of the general trends of absentee voting, which includes early voting. The Conventional Wisdom is that absentee voters tend to be more likely white, older, and more Republican. With the increase of early voting, I think those numbers are less true on the age element, so I believe Democratic absentee voters have increased in recent years, but I think they are still likely to be white voters.

The Enquirer's Greg Korte gives his analysis of the numbers and believes voting trends will hold true from the 2007 election, discounting the younger demographic that turned for the 2008 presidential election. It think it will be clear that the 2008 numbers will not hold up this year and the average age will rise significantly, but I believe it will be lower than in 2007, which I think puts the vote up in the air on a few points. I believe revolves around who the younger African-Americans will vote for, which logic would dictate helps African-American candidates, but I don't see it shaking up the big picture. Maybe 1,000 votes would be in play, something on that scale. 1,000 more votes may swing one candidate up a spot, but unless thats 10th to 9th, it will not make a big difference. It may be the difference between Winburn and Watson getting the open spot.

All of this could be totally wrong and 2008 voter registration movement may carry the voter turnout in the City up from 2007. It goes back to GOTV and in local elections there tends to not be much of that type of effort, so the CW of past elections wins out. We'll have an idea in the morning.

The Polls Are Open

The Polls opened up in Ohio this morning and will remain open until 7:30 PM tonight. Be sure to check that your polling station as not changed via the BOE website's poll search.

If you have an absentee ballot, you can still return it, but it must be received by the Board of Elections before 7:30 PM tonight. You best bet is to hand deliver it. The Hamilton County Board of Elections is located at 824 Broadway, Cincinnati, OH 45202.

Seven

That's the number of messages from robo-calls that were on my answering machine today. Wow.

Interestingly, two of these were about Jeff Berding. One was from David Crowley, reminding me that "Jeff Berding is not a Democrat." The other was from Eric Kearney (a Democrat), supporting Jeff Berding.

I'll be glad when tomorrow is over.

Queen City Survey Signs Off

Dan from Queen City Survey posted yesterday that his blog is ending. He may spin off some of his featured content in other forms, but the blog will end, at least for now. Good Luck Dan and I hope to keep reading your interesting take on Cincinnati in other forms.

TV's Here to Keep You Ignorant

I guess I should thank John Kiesewetter for reporting on TV's continued indifference to society, but I'm not sure John has a problem with that. It is an injustice to the community that local TV stations will provide close to no coverage of important local elections. It is sad that the stations will still get more complaints about interrupting "So You Think You Can Dance?" for two minutes than calls wondering why they are not covering the fate of State Issues #2 and #3. What's ironic is that he mentions "V" the remade TV show that includes a totalitarian take over of the news media. That part of the fictional TV show is much closer to reality than not.

Monzel Lies in Campaign Ad

So, I disagree with Chris Monzel on most things, but I respected him for being a person of personal principle. Well, now he's lying in his campaign TV spot about the streetcar, so that respect has gone out the window. Where does he lie:

1. The streetcar does not just go a "few blocks" as he put it. No matter how you want to define blocks, saying that from the Riverfront to Clifton is a few blocks is like saying the Ohio River is a tiny creek.
2. Building the Streetcar will benefit the entire city and region. The jobs created to build it will come from across the city. The property value increases with result in more tax revenue for the city, which benefits the entire city. Monzel knows that a strong central core of a city is critical to being prosperous
3. The projected cost is 185 million, not 200 million. I guess he could claim a rounding error there, but seriously, come on...
4. Monzel clearly implies the city would be funding the full 185 million, which Monzel knows to be false. The Streetcar plan calls for Federal and State funding that will make up the bulk of the project. That money will not come for anything else, so there is no money to divert to a pet project he wants to use to buy off votes.

If you are against the Streetcars, fine, I can agree to disagree with you, but those I've talked with who are either unsure about it or just against it, don't lie about the plan or about the goals. Here Monzel knowingly makes false statements about elements of the plan and overwhelmingly misleads on everything else. That's a lie where I come from. Spinning details in politics is a gray line, but Monzel knows better and has held a higher standard in the past. This is a new low for him. I guess he's worried about his re-election chances and wants to get every ignorant voter to the polls he can. This type of ad is not worthy of a candidate. If you've heard this type of tactic in the past, most of the time its from a 3rd party group, who tend to do the dirty work in place of the candidate. Monzel gets dirty all on his own.