Is Cincinnati A RW town?

[stopbush]

I'm interviewing for a job there. I understand it's a Big R city.

Anybody know?

[Kolesar]

1. They are still ranting about the Civil War in that town

...if that tells you anything. It is probably the most conservative of the large cities in America. We would love to have you , though! :hi:

[mod mom]

4. If you live in cinci-have you been to the Freedom Underground Railroad Museum?

the reason I ask is we just took the kids a couple of weeks ago. One of the exhibits is lifesize bronze statues of 2 slave traders near some Af Am men (slaves) in obvious anguish. My son made a instant comment about one of the slave traders. Have you seen this? We attempted to take a photo but had to rely on a disposable (forgot ours) and it didn't turn out. I am dying to find out the artist and see what others think of this exhibit.

[Kolesar]

5. Well, no, I live in the other corner of the state

i am just relating from political stories and my 8th grade Ohio history. Waving the bloody shirt, and all that. The museum sounds great. Hope I visit it some day.

[NEOBuckeye]

8. Which is ironic, given that Ohio and Kentucky were Union

It's disturbing, really, how far north the Confederate mentality has spread.

[rexcat]

9. Kentucky was a slave state.

[theHandpuppet]

12. A little more complicated than that

Slavery and confederate sympathies ran high in western Kentucky were large plantations flourished and agriculture was the only base for the economy. In the Appalachian region of Eastern KY -- as it was in Appalachian regions of many southern states -- the opposite was true. The Appalachians, where the people felt their state governments were controlled by wealthy lowland landowners with whom they had little in common (and where slaveowning was rare), served as the base for Southern Unionists. My father's family came from Pike County, Kentucky and all of them, to a man, served with the Union. Vestiges of this division are still being played out today in voting patterns, and Cincy became even more red when people from Western KY and other Southern states headed north to seek work.

I'm originally from SE Ohio but lived in Cincy for 10 years and yes, it is disgustingly RW. And it's religious makeup -- divided between conservative Catholicism and Protestant fundamentalism -- gives it that special "nutty", neofascist flavor.

[cmd]

13. Interesting story, Handpuppet

West Virginia, of course, became a state because of the civil war. I didn't realize that Eastern KY held the same beliefs. It certainly makes sense that they would. I need to do some more reading in that area.

[Kolesar]

14. That was a good read...eom

[rexcat]

16. I love your assessment of Cincinnati...

well stated! With your permission I will be using your description of the area.

Of note this is my second time in Ohio. My parents were from Washington which left me with a western flavor but I was born in the South and educated in the Midwest and the South. It makes me somewhat confused at times as to where my allegiance should be. We lived in the Dayton area where my dad was stationed at Wright-Patterson AFB. When I left Ohio many years ago because of a low draft number and a four year hitch in the Air Force to avoid the Army and/or Marines I thought I would never return, but to my surprise I married a Floridian and we ended up in the Cincinnati metro area because of her job. We live in the Mason area and between the conservative catholics and the fundy protestants there is not much left over! It has given me a distorted flavor of Ohio, especially of the northern half of the state as in I was pleasantly surprised in the Ohio '06 elections.

On edit: Thanks for the history lession. I was aware of West Virginia breaking away from Virginia at the time of the Civil War but did not realize the issues in KY were so stark, Eastern vs. Western KY.

[peace13]

2. Oh ya baby.

Headquarters for stolen election 2004. Good luck with the job though. Peace, Kim

[mod mom]

3. I went to grad school there and although it is a very beautiful city-

it was way too conservative for moi. It is definitely a more of a southern city than midwestern. Old republican $ rules the town. my 2 cents.

[MeDeMax]

6. it is a pretty decent city to live in...

Inside the 275 loop you will find a few dem leaning or evenly divided areas, outside the loop areas tend to be heavily R.

Warren county (home of King's Island, along 71 South) is also home of "closed door ballot counting".

Butler (was in the news for immigration raid) and Warren counties typically vote 75% R.

Having said that, we DO need a few good men (dem women & men) in this misguided part of the state. Good luck !

[Ninga]

7. Lived in Milford, just outside of Cincinnati for 5 years. The standing joke is....

"if the end of the world is comming, you want to be in Cincinnati, because they are 50 years behind everyone else!"

It is not strong enough to say they are ultra conservative.


Best of luck....you gotta go where the jobs are these days.

[rexcat]

10. The city of Cincinnati is a mix (great tennis area)...

but many of the Democrats are to the center or right of center. The suburbs contain a majority of extreme RW religious types. We have lived in Mason for the past 19 years(23 miles north of Cinci) which is in Warren County and is 75% republican. Not long ago the county was 88%+ RW republican so we are making some headway. The other two counties that surround Hamilton County are also RW havens (Butler and Claremont Counties). Despite Mason being RW the schools are really good (6th in the state academically) and that includes 500 new kids a year in the school system over the past 5 years, unlike the Cincinnati Public Schools which is one of the worst in state.

There were four counties in the state that overwhelmingly voted for Ken Blackwell for governor. The other 82 counties went for Ted Strickland (our current Democratic governor) and they are Hamilton, Warren, Butler and Claremont counties.

I have mixed feelings about the area. We are here because my wife works at P&G and we have made the best of it. We moved from Tucson, AZ and it was a shock, to say the least. There are better places to live and there are worse places to live in the country.

On edit: I see your play tennis. The area is a great place for tennis. In Mason we have the ATP Masters series (mandatory for the men) and up till now is the last big event until the US Open. Next year they are moving the dates to July instead of August. The professional women also have a tournament here but so far the big names have not really come in to play. Federer and Blake played for the singles title this year. I have seen some really great tennis here over the years. There are a variety of tennis clubs in the area and we play interclub league (3.5 to 4.5) during the fall, winter and spring. Summer play includes USTA leagues, local, regional and national. I have played competitive tennis here in the area for the past 19 years.

[MeDeMax]

11. I admire you rexcat...

for hanging in there in Mason / Warren county.

Ever consider hiring a budding young reporter to interview townspeople to find out how the county people feel about their BOE directors and city safety director colluding and carrying out "closed door ballot counting" ?

If you do, please post those videos to YouTube, they will attract a lot of views.

[rexcat]

15. I have made a pledge to piss off the RWers in Mason...

and so far I have been very successful! It has gotten to the point my neighbors just shake their heads at me without comment. I just smile back at them and explain that I could never vote republican because I couldn't lower my ethical or moral values low enough to vote republican.

On the ballot thing in '04, nothing really happened during the count and the results were audited by a bi-partisan group after the election. I know one of the Democratic auditors and he stated that the count was above board. I have no reason not to believe him. What happened that night was pure stupidity by the Director of Safety for the county. I have also talked to BOE employees who are Democrats concerning the count and they say nothing funny happened except the count was accurate. Of interest the county, at the time of the election, was about 88% repuke and Kerry got 75ish% of the vote in Warren County. I worked a polling station as a polling judge (D) and was in a extreme right wing leaning precinct and the rough count I did when reviewing the ballots was about 75-25% (Bush* vs. Kerry). Of course all but about 11 precincts are extreme right wing leaning in Warren County!

[liam_laddie]

17. Sorry this is a couple weeks outta sync, but...

don't confuse the City of Cincinnati with the surrounding suburbs. I worked as a committee head for the Hamilton County 2004 effort for Kerry-Edwards. We were able to chop the county margin from 11% rethug in 2000 to about 5-1/2% in 2004. In 2008, we plan to take it blue.

The City (about 40% of the county) voted 66% Kerry, 30% Boosh. City is fairly moderate-progressive, although more segregated than many. Much of county is third-gen RW, one-issue Catholic...abortion. Plus the suburbs do have generally much better public school systems, so the better-off, when family considerations enter the scene, leave the city for the "safe" 'burbs. There is a sizable Catholic school presence here - grade, high and college - of which may are outstanding. IIRC, St. Louis, maybe Milwaukee, are similar in this respect.

For a smallish market region...about 1.6 million across the OH-KY-IN metroplex...the cultural life is pretty good: music, theater, pro sports (not my cuppa...) and fairly good restaurant scene. Look, it isn't a big coastal city, or Chicago, but one can live an interesting life here. Summer humidity is oppressive, winters are more slush than snow. Spring and fall can be great.
Of course, YMMV; depends from where you're moving. HTH.

Stopbush, what happened with the interview?

[VolcanoJen]

20. Spot on description

The Catholic thing blows me away... and no, I'm not picking on Catholics, but the brand of German Catholicism that rules this city is particularly stifling and non-fun-loving. This past Lenten season, on a Friday in the employee lunchroom, I was eating a ham sandwich, and everyone was STARING AT ME. Seriously. I'm halfway through a bite, and someone finally says, "It's Friday, Jennifer!!"

"Oh. I'm not Catholic."

I swear, they gasped.

"Where did you go to school then???" one of them asked, shocked. Guess they never heard of public schools? "Oh, I'm from Dayton, actually. Went to public school there."

More shocked looks. It cracks me up to this day just thinking about it.

I do notice that a lot of the Dems that live in this city are ex-pats, in the sense that they're definitely not born and raised in The 'Nati. I bond with them quickly, and beg them to stay!

Thanks to the Chimp, though, things are changing around here. I do believe there's a real shot at taking Hamilton County blue in 2008. Clermont, Butler, Warren... fuggetaboutit, not going to happen. But progressives are "out" more and more inside I-275, and it's damned encouraging.

[Earl from Ohio]

18. They just had a GREAT Celtic Music festival

If you get the job stopbush, you are in for some real treats culturally. I had never been down to the waterfront area along the Serpentine Walk. WOW it was incredible. By far the coolest urbanscape in Ohio bar none. And a purple pedestrian bridge across the Ohio River... how cool is that? And in 2009, the Tall Stacks music and riverboat festival returns.

The music festival featured Liz Caroll and John Doyle and the Irish supergroup Lunasa. Liz is perhaps the best fiddle player on the planet.



I'm a devoted "Lunatic"



We'll be back next year for certain.



Kevin Crawford from Lunasa is so cool. He called my youngest up to wish him a happy birthday and to encourage him in his flute and whistle playing. (If you're Irish, that's like having Yo-Yo Mah call up your kid to encourage him at cello.)

[VolcanoJen]

19. Yes.

This has been another edition of simple answers to easy questions!

Longer version is this... it's an incredibly Republican town, almost hostile, really. It's very southern here. But, it's also ignorant here. The easiest form of entertainment in this town is taking down a Republican spewing Bill Cunningham and Rush Limbaugh talking points from his barstool perch. It's quite a hoot.

There are liberal pockets, though. Northside is really emerging as a vibrant liberal community, for example. They pack 'em in at Drinking Liberally in Cincinnati on Tuesday nights at the Comet. Friends and like-minded progressives are easily found; it's a bonding experience to run into an outspoken Dem in Cincinnati.

It has its ups and its downs. But the interesting thing is, especially in the work environment, liberalism is so rare, especially the kind of intelligent, well-thought-out, fact and reality-based liberalism that many DUers possess, that everyone seems to want to talk to you about why you're supporting, say, John Edwards, for example. And I know I've changed minds. And I know for a fact I've shut people right the F up. :-)

Let me know if you have anymore questions about surviving as a Dem in the last truly red pocket of this great state... ahhh, the Nati!!

[Kukesa]

21. So, did you get the job? nt