State News Shot

Republican DeWine making Political Comeback

Last Updated on Monday, 18 October 2010 12:27 Written by rslcpol Monday, 18 October 2010 12:27

From Dayton Daily News:

Republican Mike DeWine hitches up his khaki pants and jogs through the heart of his opponent’s hometown on a crisp fall morning, clutching a stack of cookbooks.

“G’morning. Mike De-Wine. Nice to see you,” he tells people lining the parade route in Grove City, south of Columbus. He flashes a gap-tooth smile and thrusts out a cookbook produced by his wife. “Did you get one of Fran’s recipe books?”

It didn’t seem to bother DeWine in the least that his opponent, Democratic incumbent Attorney General Richard Cordray, was in line ahead of him in the Grove City parade or that they were marching through Cordray’s hometown and past houses decked out in Cordray yard signs.

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OH: Secretary of State Candidates Focus on Business

Last Updated on Friday, 15 October 2010 03:55 Written by rslcpol Friday, 15 October 2010 01:45

From The-Daily-Record.com:

Republican Sen. Jon Husted has been a state lawmaker for a decade, including a stint as the leader of the Ohio House.

“As Speaker of the House, I couldn’t hide from making decisions,” he said. “I’ve had to make a lot of them in my life. I’m not afraid to make them. But I also know that there’s a way to make them in which you can minimize the fallout for whatever it is you do.”

Democrat Maryellen O’Shaughnessy is the clerk of common pleas court in Franklin County and a former Columbus City councilwoman.

“There’s no one else who sits before you as a candidate for Secretary of State who understands as fully as I do the obstacles, the challenges and the successes of local government,” O’Shaughnessy said.

Both believe their backgrounds in public office help to make them a better choice to be Ohio’s next Secretary of State, the individual responsible for administering the elections and the office where businesses make official their presence in the state.

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CA AG Race gets Heated

Last Updated on Friday, 15 October 2010 03:55 Written by rslcpol Friday, 15 October 2010 01:35

From LATimes:

The political attacks are sharpening in the race for California attorney general as election day nears and interest in the campaign rises among voters and free-spending outside interest groups.

Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, the San Francisco district attorney, on Thursday amped up her attacks on the environmental record of GOP rival Steve Cooley, Los Angeles County district attorney. She accused Cooley of being in the pocket of local developers and Texas oil companies, and continued to cast herself as the green candidate in the race.

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AG Candidate Doesn’t want to be more of the same

Last Updated on Friday, 15 October 2010 01:31 Written by rslcpol Friday, 15 October 2010 01:31

From muscatinejournal.com:

Brenna Findley’s campaign headquarters is the passenger seat in her 2002 Honda Accord. A volunteer drives Findley to campaign stops so she can answer e-mail and talk on her cell phone in between stops.

If she sits behind a desk in an office, she figures she’s not out meeting voters.

“The last place I should be,” said the GOP nominee for Iowa attorney general, “is in a campaign office.”

And, she added, if voters send her to Des Moines, she won’t stay there all the time. She’d still visit the people of Iowa.

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AG Candidates on Air

Last Updated on Friday, 15 October 2010 01:26 Written by rslcpol Friday, 15 October 2010 01:26

From the Bay Citizen:

For weeks, San Francisco District Attorney Kamala D. Harris, the Democratic candidate, has dictated the tenor of the attorney general’s race with negative ads on television and radio, as well as a barrage of accusations of ethical impropriety in newspaper articles against her Republican opponent, Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley.

The Cooley camp has finally responded.

This week, the Peace Officers Association of California rolled out a 30-second independent TV ad on Cooley’s behalf. The video includes a segment that mentions Harris’s refusal to pursue the death penalty for a man who killed a San Francisco police officer in 2004. But it is otherwise a straightforward endorsement for Cooley, who has picked up support from nearly every major law enforcement group in the state. Statewide law enforcement groups have dropped hundreds of thousands of dollars into committees that will air more ads, although the LA prosecutor, having accumulated a substantial war chest, has yet to go on the air with his own ads. His campaign said they will come soon.

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Florida AG Candidates are Opposites

Last Updated on Friday, 15 October 2010 03:55 Written by rslcpol Friday, 15 October 2010 01:07

From the St. Augustine Record:

TALLAHASSEE — The Democrat and Republican nominees for the office of attorney general couldn’t have more different plans for taking over the job from Bill McCollum.

Democrat Dan Gelber wants to withdraw Florida from the lawsuit McCollum filed against the federal health care overhaul. Republican Pam Bondi attended the arguments in the case, and is making pressing forward with it a top campaign issue.

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Hollywood has Democrat AG Defending her Record

Last Updated on Friday, 15 October 2010 03:56 Written by rslcpol Friday, 15 October 2010 01:05

From lowellsun.com:

The movie Conviction opens in several Boston area theaters this weekend and Coakley plays the movie’s villain — the district attorney portrayed as ignoring DNA evidence and stalling the release of an innocent man who was sentenced to life in prison for murder.

Two-time Academy Award winner Hilary Swank is already receiving Oscar buzz for her role in the true story of Betty Anne Waters, a working mother of two who earns her GED, college degree and law degree in her fight to free her brother from prison.

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Florida: Profile of AG Candidate Pam Bondi

Last Updated on Friday, 15 October 2010 03:57 Written by rslcpol Friday, 15 October 2010 01:04

From tbo.com:

This year’s attorney general race pits a telegenic career prosecutor from Tampa against a seasoned politician from South Florida.

Republican Pam Bondi was a Hillsborough County assistant state attorney for 18 years and spent a decade as spokeswoman for the office. She has also been a regular legal analyst for CNN, Fox News and MSNBC. An endorsement from Sarah Palin helped propel Bondi to a convincing win in a three-way Republican primary. She has become a darling of the Tea Party movement and has campaigned alongside Gubernatorial nominee Rick Scott. Democrat Dan Gelber, a former federal prosecutor and chief counsel to U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn, has served the Florida House and Senate for the last decade. The Miami Beach native spent his formative years in Tallahassee, and still has a bit of a Southern twang to prove it. Both were raised in political families. Bondi is the daughter for a former Temple Terrace mayor, while Gelber’s father served multiple terms as mayor of Miami Beach. Both were early stars in their legal careers. Bondi looks to Hillsborough County Judge Barbara Fleischer as a role model. “She started court at 7 a.m. and you had to be there on time and prepared,” she said.

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