Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Conspiracy Theory: Obama and Ohio
FoxNews showed the unemployment percentages in different regions of Ohio. The areas with the lowest unemployment (about 6.5%) are the Cleveland area and the Columbus area, the two best areas for Obama. Could Obama have steered stimulus dollars specifically to those areas at the expense of other areas to help his re-election chances?
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Highly unlikely, since it would have been generally unnecessary. Columbus and Cleveland already lean heavily Democratic and were relatively insulated from the recession to begin with. Columbus, in particular, was able to weather the economic storm better than the rest of Ohio due to a number of factors: Ohio State University, the State government, higher percentage of white-collar business.
ReplyDeleteIf the Administration wanted to strategically direct stimulus spending for political gain, it would have made more sense to direct it toward areas where (1) the stimulus spending would have a more significant and visible effect, and (2) where "swing" votes could be won over or areas of shaky support could be shored up (e.g. blue-collar manufacturing communities).