On this week's Reporters Roundtable on WCPN panelists discussed two of the big topics here in Akron -- the University's purchase of Quaker Square and the fight for chairmanship of the Summit County Republican Party.
Let's get this out of the way first. During the Quaker Square discussion, moderator Dan Moulthrop quoted Your Humble Blogger. The quote showed admirably current prep as he quoted last night's post. Thanks to Dan and panelist Kymberli Hagelberg for the nice mention.
Normally a namecheck would warrant nothing more than a one-liner in a "Random" post. But when they turned to the Coughlin/Arshinkoff tilt, things really got interesting. Hagelberg noted that neither she nor the ABJ reporters covering the story could find a single R elected official -- current or past -- who would speak against A2.
Second, freelance writer Chris Maag runs through a number of Alex's more troubling facets including a reset of the entire Scene Magazine piece from 2002 and noted the real concern that Arshinkoff may compromise the party's interests to remain in the closet.
Someone noted a Debbie Owens Fink letter in today's ABJ in which she defends Arshinkoff (who supported her in the last election against Tom Sawyer, whose campaign I worked for.) Among other things, she notes:
- It is no secret that Coughlin was upset that Mary Taylor, former state representative, was supported by the local Republican Party to run for statewide office, while he was not.
- Coughlin's letter rant also claimed that Summit County demographics are more favorable than ever for Republicans. Where are his figures coming from? Recent statistics show that for ''likely voters'' (those who actually vote) in Summit County, 43 percent are Democrats, 37 percent are independents most of whom vote for either the Democrat or the best-known candidate (likely to be a ''D'') and only 20 percent vote Republican. Democrats have better than a 2-to-1 advantage over Republicans.
The whole show is worth listening to, but this segment is nothing but fun.
4 comments:
I have a question regarding the timing of Coughlin's coup attempt. It came within the same week Rove resigned. It has long been rumored that AA had ties to the White House. Was Rove his last link?
Maag is really bad, there is a lot of stuff they can bring up on Coughlin, but he didn't do that. The other two were awesome, especially Kym saying no one in this race is innocent. That is so true!
You know this Pho!!!!
I worked on the Kerry campaign with former Republican precinct committee-persons who were so mad at AA that they had left the GOP altogether. They wouldn't work for an extremely progressive or pro-labor Democrat, but they were happily working (and working hard) for anyone who opposed the more whacko fringe of the Republican party.
I believe Kevin will sail thru this matter with ease and I have been watching this closely. He has his feces in one sack so to speak and as far as skeletons in the closet it is either hardly any or none of any signifigance or abosolutly none period. In this venture I know we will not see a last minute "Godfather in the Closet" with him. Also most if not all the rumors we have been hearing about him have been started by none other than Alex.
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