Last night, the Montgomery County Democratic party held another zoom meeting. They blamed the ODP for giving them a different zoom account to use, which changed things up a bit. This time- you could see who was there. Not that many, when you realize there are about 360 precincts in Montgomery County- and they had maybe 40 people tops in attendance.
One of the first things they wanted to do was officially install Paul Bradley as Montgomery County Treasurer until Sept. 1, when the official start of the term begins. Voters clearly said they didn’t want Russ Joseph in office (for the 2nd time, he also couldn’t win as Montgomery County Clerk of Courts despite being the appointed incumbent) selecting John McManus as treasurer. Yes, the vote was close, but considering Joseph was the 2 year incumbent and had the advantage of sticking his name on tax bills and mailings for 2 years, he still couldn’t win.
Joseph got the seat when Carolyn Rice abandoned it when she ran for County Commission- and the party put him in charge. Joseph then quit a few weeks ago- to move on to supposedly greener pastures. His Linkedin says “Finance and Procurement Manager at United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio” [1] – but- he lists “Columbus Ohio” as his base of operations. Maybe we get lucky and he’s moving out of his Oregon District home- or maybe he’s telecommuting, or maybe, he’s carpooling with his neighbor, former Dayton Daily News editor Amelia Robinson who is now the community editor for the Columbus Dispatch. Either way- in an affront to voters, their choice of McManus is being ignored.
The Party had a vote to nominate Bradley, after their secret “Screening committee” chose him last night. I don’t recall seeing a call for people interested in the job either (and I’m on Central Committee- as an elected rep). Bradley said a few words, and then they had a first and second- and questions, where I asked why we couldn’t be a better party and hand it over to the rightfully elected candidate, McManus and show bi-partisanship and a respect for the voters will. I was told to take it up with state legislators. I suggested in comments after they shushed me off- that it’s too bad we don’t have very many Democratic state legislators in Columbus- and maybe this was part of the reason why.
They called a vote- announced they had more than 50% and started to move on. I asked to record my vote as no- and was told “that’s not how we’re doing it tonight.” Hmmm, I guess elections only matter when you choose them to. Very Trump like. Congratulations Your Majesty Mark Owens and friends and family of the Monarchy.
Elections still matter. So do the voices of the rightfully elected precinct captains of the party. You #FAIL democracy 101.
Tom Baker as Dr. Who quote comes to mind. “You know the very powerful and the very stupid have one thing in common. They don’t alter their views to fit the facts. They alter the facts to fit the views. Which can be uncomfortable if you happen to be one of the facts that needs altering.”