Thursday, May 8, 2014

Stunning defeat


Dear fellow tax hikers, we are devastated by the unexpected loss of our Tax Hikin' Rick Bryan to that Jonathan Dever guy.  We are so distraught by this defeat that if any of us had jobs, we would have had to stay home today. 

How did we lose this race?  We were up in the polls.  We raised more money.  Ricky Baby raised the taxes, jacked up the spending, and took his share of German junkets at taxpayer expense that entitled him to this seat.  We even tricked our enemies at COAST to send a last-minute mailer advertising some of the best tax hikes from our 2011 Tax Hiker of the Year.

We were assured by our expert commentators that Ricky had this in the bag.  They told us Dever had no support, except for his inner campaign team, who were all idiots.  Some even said Dever had quit the race.  We lost to that?

This represents another failure of our movement.  It represents a failure to properly communicate our tax-and-spend message.  It represents a failure of the voters to learn who the great tax hikers are and support their campaign. 

And perhaps worst of all, this defeat represents a failure of Mustache Power when we needed it the most.

We now turn this discussion over to our loyal readers.  Tell us, why did Tax Hikin' Rick Bryan blow his lead to lose the race? 

19 comments:

Campaign Expert Matheny said...

Voters are stupid. They picked a carpet-bagger who runs negative campaigns over my good friend Rick Bryan. Alex and the rest of the idiots are even stupider for letting this happen. I am the Campaign Expert and my good friends the Rabes agree with me and so should you.

Let's Face It said...

Democrat Micah Kamrass has the party unified behind him.

Democrat Micah Kamrass has nearly $100,000 in the bank.

Tea Party Republican Jonathan Dever just ran a nasty campaign that greatly offended much of the Republican organization in Blue Ash, Sharonville and Reading, three communities which Republicans need to win big in order to have a chance.

Tea Party Republican Jonathan Dever has almost no cash left.

So, instead of a Republican tax-hiker winning this seat, it will once again stay in the Democrats' column with their own tax-hiker.

Once again, Republicans' bitter infighting and complete political ineptitude hands the Democrats a seat on a golden platter and will give Democrats yet another launching pad for an ambitious politician.

Mustache Meltdown said...

Why did Tax Hikin' Rick Bryan lose? Let us count the ways:

1. Wasting countless tax dollars on Junkets to Germany. Your job is to serve Blue Ash taxpayers, not serve yourself by taking vacations with our tax dollars.

2. Raised Blue Ash Earnings Tax 25%

3. The Chef, The Mac, The Cook, and Team Robocall spent 9 months on the campaign and failed to shave off Rick’s mustache

4. Building a $75 million park. Hey Ricky Baby, we all like parks. But there are parks, and then there are $75 million parks.

5. Helped Cincinnati build their streetcar. Remind me again why on God’s green Earth Blue Ash Council would step into this landmine of a shit bomb.

6. Rick is a douchebag. No further explanation is needed on this point.

7. Stood with Democratic Commissioners to promote a Sales Tax increase that few people wanted. And the people did indeed vote it down.

8. Tried to banish Blue Ash’s honorable Veterans’ Memorial to the middle of nowhere so a developer could pave over the current spot.

9. Disrespectful and dismissive to Blue Ash residents who address Council

10. Paid a band to perform at the Taste of Blue Ash, and then paid them more to not perform.

11. Took away a service animal from a disabled child. You got real heart Ricky Baby.

12. Thinks Bob Bedinghaus is an example of how to manage a large project. Perhaps that’s why Blue Ash’s park has spiraled out of control to a $75 million monster.

13. Tried to add more apartments to a city that already has more of them than its residents want.

14. He had the support of Campaign Expert Matheny and her parents, negative karma for sure.

15. People don’t like candidates who talk one way and govern another.

16. Over the years has lost touch with the people he’s supposed to serve. Ricky thinks his shit don’t stink, and refuses to consider any level of constructive criticism or ideas that could improve the city. FYI: Ricky isn’t the only Blue Ash Councilman affected by this disease.

17. The GOP needs to diversity. And an angry, bitter, old white man isn’t it.

Have I missed anything?

Blue Ash Resident Who Used to Support Him said...

He blew off a Blue Ash City Council meeting to attend a political candidate event.

Why God Why said...

The political landscape is littered with the corpses of Julie Matheny's clients. Jim Raussen, Virgil Lovitt, Tom Weidman, and now Rick Bryan for state rep, Jean Schmidt for Congress and Pete Beck for Warren County Commissioner. Several of these candidates only lost once in their careers... the sole occasion they had Julie Matheny on their side. Maxing that she still has a career in politics but quite frankly anyone who seeks her support is a poor excuse for a candidate.

Jumping Jim said...

Rick Bryan lost because too many Republicans are blinded by their hatred of President Obama and all that hate radio, hate blogs and hate TV that they consume all day and every day that they will only vote for extremist, angry, unstable nutjob candidates. But because most people don't share their angry, bigoted, greedy, hate-filled view of the world, the candidates that they nominate in the primary will never win in a general election. Stupid Republican voters.

Republican Leaders in ORP and RNC said...

We thought that Rick Bryan was the perfect candidate to help us get the votes of more women, more minorities, more Hispanics, more Asians, more young voters and more gay voters.

Yeah, we know he is a middle aged white guy and we say we don't want more middle-aged white guys in office. However, Rick's tax-hiking credentials are what minorities, women, and gays are really after when they vote for Democrats. Rick was our perfect foil but those stupid conservatives got in the way again.

So while we usually talk about party unity and rallying behind Republican nominee duly chosen by the voters, we only mean when our chosen candidate wins. When guys like Dever win, we just write the district off.


Angel Clark, you know the other one said...

Top 5 reasons it is okay I did not win:
5. I get shopping therapy. I have to replace two pairs of jeans from going door to door.

4.My mother sent me flowers.

3. I met Chris Monzel's Mom and now have 3 new Monzel pins.

2. The Blue Ash Republican Club does not have to hear me give anymore speeches.

And the number one reason it is ok I lost:
1. I still have more twitter followers than my opponents.

Thank you everyone! See you soon!

Crystal Ball is hazy in OH28 said...

Hilarity - the same people who spent the last 4 months telling us Jonathan Dever has NO chance of winning the primary now telling us he has no chance of winning the general. Please keep dropping by here with your expert opinions.

History Teacher said...

Hey Crystal Ball- does the name Mike Wilson ring a bell? Dude lost this district TWICE while Kasich and Romney carried it. He was an extremist nutjob Tea Partier, you may remember him.

Can you name a single point in history where an extreme right-wing carpet-bagging Republican who ran nasty campaigns won a tossup district like the 28th? Doubt it. However, we've seen dozens of cases where the Tea Party nutjob candidate costs our party a seat with their own hatred.

County Commissioner Jim Sumner said...

I have warned you people before that you are not to ever criticize a Blue Ash Councilman. You have disobeyed me for the last time.

I am taking names. There will be consequences for those who have challenged my authority.

History Professor said...

Actually Ted Strickland won the 28th District by 458 votes, about the same that Pillich won it that year.

It sounds like History Teacher thinks we should nominate a candidate like Virgil Lovitt and Rick Bryan. Let's see - we did nominate tax-and-spender Virgil Lovitt in 2008, and he got clobbered by 10 points! Wilson never lost by that much.

As for Tax Hikin' Rick Bryan, Kasich carried his Ward by 20 points. Rick only carried it by 5 points and 4 points in 2009 and 2011 against a neophyte Democratic opponent.

If you want to underperform in a general election, nominate tax-and-spend RINO's like Lovitt and Bryan.

Ashwin said...

I love me some Republican in-fighting. It reminds me of my days as a New York City operative for liberal Democrats.

What is Wrong with these People? said...

I still can get over how Tom Brinkman won in the 27th. Sure there was low turnout but do those Andersen Tea Partiers understand that this guys is a grade A moron? Common core, as bad as it is, has zero chance of going away because it would have to get through the house, senate and governor. The house has never even voted on it. Do they think Tom is going to somehow magically make that happen? Congrats on making the rest of us folks in Anderson Township look stupid in the eyes of pretty much everybody with hald a brain. Geez.

In the know said...

Dever started out down a little, and heading into the stretch he was down a moderate amount or a lot, depending on who you ask. He had an impressive surge in the last week to pull out the narrow win.

I would love to see the look on the faces of Rick Bryan and the rest of Blue Ash Council when they find out the extent to which Tom Weidman and Jeff Capell were responsible for the projects that generated much of the surge. Poor Rick, it couldn't have happened to a more deserving politician.

Mensa said...

If Tom Brinkman is a "grade A moron", then what does it say about Peter Stautberg who lost to him 54-46 despite having incumbency and lots more money to spend?

It's good to know that Tom Brinkman and Jonathan Dever are such morons. It must suck for the brilliant Peter Stautberg and Ricky Bryan to have lost to their intellectual inferiors.

Yost is Toast said...

What? You mean my big endorsements for Rick Bryan and Mary Jo Kubicki didn't work out as I planned?

Say, maybe I should get back to worrying about my own race and quit interfering in local Southwest Ohio races.

Conservative Voter said...

Hey Mensa, I am not lumping Dever or Rick Bryan for that matter into Brinkman's level of stupid. Dever and Brinkman are completely different in terms of aptitude and capability. The reason Tom won is because his son, and also the "Women for Liberty," were working their rears off for him, most of which were going door-to-door for their own state central committee races. He also benefited from an incredibly low voter turnout. You are correct, it doesn't say much about Peter that he lost. However, I am correct when I say that if you look at Brinkman's record the guy is a wacko who needs this job for his income. I feel bad for some of the naive people who voted for him. Remember when Brinkman was the ONLY STATE REPRESENTATIVE that voted for Ohio NOT to ratify the U.S. 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal protection under the law for all U.S. citizens??? And then he tried to make it out to be because of Roe V. Wade??? I am ashamed at how stupid my legislator is... I know high school students that could serve us better.

AD Watch said...

Don't worry, with Tea Party extremist Dever on the ballot, we will be keeping an eye out for any signs of bigotry or homophobia in the Republican advertising, and will be working with our friends in the media to paint all Republicans as racists. Any criticism of Michael Kamrass will automatically be considered anti-Semitic, neo-Nazi hate speech. Remember, David a Duke was a Republican.