SEN. VOINOVICH OWES OBAMA AN APOLOGY

Tell Sen. George Voinovich that he must cooperate with President-elect Barack Obama come January.He also owes the President-elect an apology.

Republican Voinovich made an outrageous and disrespectful attack on Obama near the end of the recent presidential campaign. Voinovich apparently thought he could scare Ohioans into voting for his party’s candidate, Sen. John McCain.

“He is left of Teddy Kennedy. With all due respect, the man is a socialist,” Voinovich said of Obama, using neither his title nor name.

This language is McCarthyism in nature and despicable from Voinovich.

This was an attempt to label Obama unpatriotic and un-American.
The language is also disrespectful, calling a colleague and Senator “the man,” without use of his name and without use of his position as Senator.

Here’s what Voinovich wrote to those who complained to him about his charge:

“My comments regarding the policies of my colleague, Sen. Barack Obama (note now that Sen. Obama is a colleague and has a title), while visiting Meigs County were not based on anecdotal evidence but careful research of his voting record. A review of the National Journal’s 2007 rating, the most recent analysis available, confirms that Senator Obama’s voting record is more liberal than 93 percent of the Senate on economic issues. No other Senator had a voting record on economic policies. By comparison, Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont who describes himself as a ‘democratic socialist’ and hangs a portrait of former Socialist Party presidential candidate Eugene V. Debs in his office, is more liberal than only 90-percent of the Senate on economic issues.”

He goes on with this weak rationale: “In other words, even when compared to a colleague who openly describes himself as a socialist, Senator Obama’s economic voting record is more liberal.”

Talk about setting up a straw man to knock down. Talk about faulty logic. Where is the “careful research?”

There is no “Socialist” program or voting in the Senate and Sen. Voinovich knows that. There is no label on legislation as “liberal.” What determines such a concept, not anything legal.

If Voinovich votes with President George Bush can he be labeled a fascist and lover of corporate interests? Under his reasoning, I’d say he could.

It’s time Voinovich got out of the way and retired.

If you look at the city of Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio and the United States where Voinovich since 1980 has served as mayor, commissioner, governor and Senator, the city, county, state and country have declined and in some respects, declined precipitously during his service in those positions.

I think it is time to retire Voinovich if he doesn’t do that himself when his Senate term comes up in 2010.