This is pretty big news on the national level, as many GP governors have resisted the Medicaid funds. John Kasich will be running for re-election soon, so it’s not too surprising that he went in this direction.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich announced Monday that he will accept the Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act, becoming the fifth Republican governor to embrace the provision of the health care reform law that the Supreme Court made optional.

The governor unveiled the decision as part of his budget proposal.

“We are going to extend Medicaid for the working poor and for those who are jobless trying to find work,” Kasich said at a press conference in Columbus. “It makes great sense for the state of Ohio because it will allow us to provide greater care with our own dollars.”

This makes sense, and only those politicians who are obsessed with partisan politics are resisting these dollars.

Many of us supported the casinos in Ohio, but it’s important to acknowledge that all of the revenue projections used to sell the casino measure to Ohio voters are not being met. Basically, around $1.9 billion per year was projected, while the governor’s new budget has revenues at just around $1.0 billion.

One factor is that the Cleveland casino, which is doing very well, was projected to be much bigger. There will be a phase II, however, so that could definitely help the numbers.

Brent Larkin asks the tough questions in the wake of Josh Mandel’s loss to Sherrod Brown despite million of outside campaign money spent on his behalf.

In 40 years of paying attention to these things, I have never seen a candidate as universally vilified in the mainstream media. By constantly running afoul of campaign fact-checkers, Mandel did immeasurable harm to his image.

Mandel inability to answer simple questions was epic.

The Mitt Romney campaign is arguing that they will win Ohio despite the polls, but it’s hard to believe them given the desperate Jeep ads Romney has been running. The Toledo Blade is one of many news organizations slamming the ads, and they offered up a scathing editorial.

In the fi­nal few days of the pres­i­den­tial con­test, Mitt Rom­ney ev­i­dently rec­og­nizes that his op­po­si­tion to the fed­eral res­cue of Gen­eral Mo­tors and Chrysler is costing him voter sup­port he needs in Ohio and Mich­i­gan. So the Re­pub­li­can nom­i­nee is con­duct­ing an ex­er­cise in de­cep­tion about auto-in­dus­try is­sues that is re­mark­able even by the stan­dards of his cam­paign.

At an ap­pear­ance last week in De­fi­ance, Mr. Rom­ney an­nounced that “Jeep, now owned by the Ital­ians, is think­ing of mov­ing all pro­duc­tion to China.” That as­ser­tion was based on an am­big­u­ously worded news re­port.

Chrysler, which owns Jeep and in which the Ital­ian auto­maker Fiat has a ma­jor­ity stake, quickly de­nied the re­port. A com­pany spokes­man said Mr. Rom­ney’s rhe­tor­i­cal leap “would be dif­fi­cult even for pro­fes­sional cir­cus ac­ro­bats.” But the Rom­ney cam­paign launched an ad in Ohio that claimed that Pres­i­dent Obama, who pre­sided over the auto bail­out, “sold Chrysler to Ital­ians who are go­ing to build Jeeps in China.”

Chrysler CEO Ser­gio Mar­chionne re­moved all doubt about his com­pany’s in­ten­tions this week in an email to em­ploy­ees: “Jeep pro­duc­tion will not be moved from the United States to China,” he said. “Jeep as­sem­bly lines will re­main in op­er­a­tion in the United States and will con­sti­tute the back­bone of the brand. It is in­ac­cu­rate to sug­gest any­thing dif­fer­ent.”

The ads seem to be backfiring. Voters in Ohio aren’t stupid. They follow the auto industry and they know a lie when they hear one.

The presidential race is super close. Mitt Romney was gaining, but then President Obama had two very good debates performances. The clip above from the foreign policy debate got a ton of play as Obama hit Romney hard for his silly comments about the size of the Navy.

Of course, Ohio is the ultimate swing state again, and Obama is holding on to a small but stable lead. If that happens, there’s almost no way Romney can win.

The economy is doing much better in Ohio as compared to the rest of the nation, as unemployment is substantially lower at 7%. This is the result of many factors, but the success of the auto bailout is definitely one of the reasons, and that is helping President Obama’s campaign in this important state. But another important factor has to do with fracking, as natural gas drilling is booming in Ohio, and that’s driving a ton of economic activity in industries like steel.

This economic activity and the resurgence of manufacturing is also creating opportunities for entrepreneurs, as more jobs lead to a great need for more services. So all sorts of small businesses can thrive if the manufacturing and fracking boom continues. Bars, restaurants, suppliers, drycleaners – the possibilities are endless. There are many factors, however, to consider. Think about location, as not every part of the state is thriving. There are opportunities in older areas of course, but the approach is much different in those areas. In thriving areas you’ll pay more for rent, but in a growing community this is worth it if you have the startup capital. Also, make sure you have an intelligent marketing strategy. Should you be using social media? Should you be printing your marketing materials, and should you be browsing options like brochure printing to save money? Are TV and radio an option? Many entrepreneurs don’t think through their marketing budgets in advance, so don’t make that mistake.

The key is that these are exciting times in Ohio. Hopefully the trends continue.

There’s no way Mitt Romney can win the presidential election without winning Ohio, and the auto bailout is making it very difficult for him in Ohio.

Democratic strategists and independent political observers credit Obama’s advantage to his support for the auto bailout and strategy of appealing to blue-collar workers. They also note that Ohio’s 7.2 percent unemployment rate is a full percentage point lower than the national average.

“Romney is going to have to do something very unusual to take Ohio away from the president,” said Jim Friedman, a Cleveland lawyer whose involvement with the state’s Democratic Party has spanned several decades.

Obama “is not doing great in Ohio, but he’s doing well enough,” said Peter Brown, the assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, who helped conduct the latest poll. “Obviously these numbers are good for him, and if the president wins this state, he’s going to get reelected.”

The auto bailout is perhaps Obama’s trump card in Ohio.

Friedman argued Obama’s support and Romney’s opposition to the bailout are resonating in Ohio, where the car industry “is both historically and psychologically important.”

Romney is trying to fight back, as he just launched a new ad showing a dealer who lost his dealership as a result of the bailout. But this is pure desperation, as that dealership would have gone under with Romney as president as well, since Romney opposed the auto bailout or any help for the industry in the middle of the financial crisis.

The new Horseshoe Casino in Cleveland has gotten off to a very successful start, as local players are flocking to the casino. There are many reports of tables being full most hours during the day as people have to wait to play. In the poker room, they aren’t hosting tournaments as the room is so full with players wanting to play the cash games. There aren’t many novices when it comes to poker rules and casino etiquette as many of these players have played in the regional casinos.

Apparently it’s not just locals jamming into the new casino. One of the selling points to Ohio residents when they finally approved the casino was that so much money was leaving the state to the region’s casinos in Detroit and Pittsburgh. Now that may be reversing, as reports are out that regional casinos are seeing a drop in business after the opening of the Cleveland casino. The numbers for June during the first full month after Ohio casinos opened in Cleveland and Toledo are down 9.4% from April for the eight casinos in Detroit, western Pennsylvania and along the Ohio River in northern West Virginia.

The Cleveland casino is beautiful and located in downtown Cleveland near other attractions like Progressive Field, so it’s no surprise that they are winning some business. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the long run.

Gerrymandering is one of the biggest problems we have in modern politics, and in Ohio, the past round produced some truly ridiculous outcomes.

Thus, a group called Voters First has gotten enough signatures for a ballot initiative in Ohio to reform the process. The group is backed by Democrats but the notion of redistricting reform also has support from some Republicans, even if they don’t back this effort.

The proposed process is interesting:

The Voters First proposal would create a 12-member bipartisan citizens commission to draw the congressional and legislative maps every 10 years using criteria such as keeping communities whole, promoting competitiveness and compactness and having the districts lean toward how voters in that area actually vote.

If approved, the commission’s newly drawn maps would become effective in 2014.
Republican lawmakers were heavily criticized for drawing some unusually shaped and meandering districts intended to favor GOP candidates.

***
Under the Voters First amendment, most citizens — aside from politicians, their family members or donors — would be allowed to apply for the commission. A panel of appeals court judges would whittle that list down to 42 commission candidates.

The House speaker and House minority leader then would each eliminate nine more names. Of the remaining 24 names, nine would be randomly selected for the commission. Those nine selected would then pick the remaining three.

Personally, I think the idea of open primaries, one primary for Democrats, Republicans, Independents, etc. with the top two in a runoff, is also a great idea. But this one is also intriguing.

Take a look at this ad for the Obama campaign in Ohio and you’ll see how tough both sides are going to battle for this state. It’s still the ultimate battleground state:

The last time Ohio voters didn’t pick the winner in a presidential election was 1960. Republican Richard Nixon won the Buckeye State, but Democrat John F. Kennedy won the nation.

Since 1964, no other state has had such an unbroken string of siding with the winner.

No one can know until Nov. 6 whether 2012 will uphold Ohio’s record as the pre-eminent swing state or end its reign, but neither the Obama nor Romney campaign is taking a chance.

“The tipping-point states appear to be Virginia and Ohio,” said Chris Redfern, the Ohio Democratic Party chairman. He said the state party will run the biggest state campaign organization in the country.

“What we look at is building an infrastructure that can turn out as many votes for the President as possible in all of Ohio’s 88 counties,” Mr. Redfern said.

Right now I think Obama has the edge with the success of the Auto bailout and the fact that Romney backed Issue 2.