Springer for Ohio governor? Really?
For a 44-year period starting in 1971, Pennsylvania reliably handed the governor’s office to one party for eight years, then handed it to the other party for eight years. This all came to an end in 2014, with Democrat Tom Wolf’s defeat of Republican incumbent Tom Corbett, and it’s a dice throw whether Wolf will get his ticket punched for a second term next year.
Our neighbors to the west in Ohio have not followed what has been, for the most part, our rigorously predictable pattern. Since the end of World War II, there have only been two Democratic governors who have won re-election – Frank Lausche in the 1950s, and Richard Celeste in the 1980s. The three remaining Democratic governors – Michael DiSalle, John Gilligan and, more recently, Ted Strickland – all went down in defeat. Meanwhile, Ohio’s legislature is also dominated by the GOP.
Though Ohio has a reputation as a purple state in presidential elections, its hue is somewhat more red than blue, and the Democratic “bench,” to use the well-worn term, has been seriously depleted. With the popular Republican Gov. John Kasich prohibited from seeking a third term in 2018, the campaign to replace him has begun in earnest. Few of the Democrats who have announced their bids, or are expected to, have raised pulses among the party faithful.
How bad is it? Some Ohio Democrats are urging someone who last held elected office in 1978 and last appeared on a ballot in 1982 to step into the race.
His name?
Jerry Springer.
Yes, that Jerry Springer.
Business Insider reported last week that some Buckeye State Democrats are urging Springer to jump in, believing he “could be a good fit for the current political climate.”
The report continued, “Springer’s proponents have highlighted his ability in the era of President Donald Trump to provide his own funding for a campaign and to connect with working-class voters familiar with his television show and history in Ohio politics.”
Oh, yes, his television show. It’s been on the air since 1991, and has become notorious for its exploitation of human dysfunction and depravity. Recent episodes have been titled “Happy Trampy Mother’s Day,” “I’m Not Gay Anymore” and “Thou Shall Not Cheat.” If viewers tune in, they can, for example, enlighten themselves about a woman who takes up with her beauty school classmate’s boyfriend “in retaliation for a stolen client.” In another episode, “a woman wants a man who is already in a relationship to take her virginity.”
And through it all, Springer has been an eager ringmaster.
In theory, a candidate who would be 74 on Election Day, last held office when Jimmy Carter was president and who possesses such a, um, colorful résumé, should stand about as much a chance of becoming governor as the 1-15 Cleveland Browns do at winning the next three Super Bowls. But John Green, a political science professor at University of Akron, told Business Insider that, given the ascension of Donald Trump to the presidency, “a candidate like Springer might be successful.”
It’s not out of the question that an entertainer can successfully transition to politics. Arnold Schwarzenegger took the job seriously when he was governor of California and got reasonably decent grades when his term was up. Of course, a certain other governor of California had a movie career before moving to Sacramento. In 1981, he moved into the White House.
But Jerry Springer?
Voters in Ohio might well conclude by the end of 2018 there’s enough of a circus in Washington, D.C., and they don’t need a competing one in Columbus.