DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Surging into top-tier contention, Republican Rick Santorum came under sharp criticism from rivals hoping to slow his momentum two days before Iowa’s kickoff caucuses. The former Pennsylvania senator defended his record in Washington and cast himself as the most electable conservative alternative to front-runner Mitt Romney.
COLUMBUS — The Ohio House of Representatives passed a compromise bill to reunite the state’s primary in March and approve a new congressional map, ending months of political wrangling in that chamber. The 77–17 House vote came at the eleventh-hour during the chamber’s last scheduled voting day this year. It’s aimed at ending a dispute over new GOP-drawn congressional lines.
COLUMBUS — With time running out to move the state’s presidential and U.S. House primaries back to March, an Ohio congressman is asking a judge to put contested GOP-drawn congressional lines into place immediately.
COLUMBUS — Visitors to the Ohio treasurer’s new search engine for public worker salaries have complained the site is riddled with errors and omissions, leading the office to repair existing data and change the way it presents wage information.
Even as the Nov. 8 election still approaches, the Delaware County Republican Party is looking ahead.
Last week in a procedural vote to move along a piece of legislation, the U.S. Senate voted by an overwhelming margin of 79 to 19 to establish a mechanism to retaliate against countries that consistently and intentionally undervalue their currencies. While the legislation may seem evenhanded in its treatment of every currency manipulator, it is squarely directed against the Chinese government which is, to the surprise of nobody, keeping the yuan undervalued so as to encourage both production and employment in their domestic export sector. Needless to say, if the yuan is undervalued, then the U.S. dollar is overvalued, and if the Chinese artificially expand their export activity, then the U.S. will see its export sector unfairly restrained.
COLUMBUS — Republican hopes to unseat liberal Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown in Ohio next year are riding on Josh Mandel, a boyish-looking, 33-year-old Marine veteran whose fledgling campaign has been shaken by allegations of questionable campaign cash and ethical lapses — and a broken promise.
In a speech laying out Republican economic proposals for tax reform, U.S. Rep. Pat Tiberi (R-Genoa Township) said a “dysfunctional” Democratic-controlled U.S. Senate holds the blame for a lack of action coming out of Washington. Tiberi, appearing Thursday at an event arranged by the Delaware Area Chamber of Commerce, spoke over the backdrop of a slideshow that concluded with a photo of former U.S. President and conservative icon Ronald Reagan.