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Here's a little catch-up history -cut- "Bob Fitrakis is at his best when he writes about George Voinovich at his worst. Catching Voinovich at his worst was not that hard when the former "frugal" Cleveland mayor and future "moderate" U.S. senator held statehouse ethics hostage as Ohio's governor in the 1990s. So it's not surprising that The Fitrakis Files: The Brothers Voinovich and the Ohiogate Scandal -- the fourth compilation of the Columbus State Community College professor, lawyer, activist, and talk-radio firebrand's writings -- is probably his best.
Mifsud apparently believed being a member of the Knights of Malta gave him prosecution-proof armor and the belief he could do no wrong. As Fitrakis, more than any other journalist, documented, Mifsud could actually do almost no right. It all caught up with the Mifsud when he struck a deal with T.G. Banks, who was to minority contracting what fellow Ohioan Don King was to boxing -- a flamboyant parasite -- for a low-cost home renovation job for Mifsud's future wife. Thanks greatly to the pressure Fitrakis kept on the scandal once it started unraveling, Mifsud and Banks went to jail. Voinovich, unfortunately, went to Washington, where he joined his former sycophant and lieutenant governor, Mike DeWine, in the Senate. DeWine earned his way into the world's most exclusive club for helping destroy Joe Gilyard, who had the audacity to complain about efforts to force him to steer jail-construction contracts to the Voinovich Companies owned by Pauly Voinovich."http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/17/2004/714-cut- "United States Representative; District 15
Deborah Pryce, Republican .......... 193,866 votes 61.61%
Mark P. Brown, Democratic .......... 120,789 votes 38.39%
United States Representative; District 16
Ralph Regula, Republican .......... 202,508 votes 66.55%
Jeff Seemann, Democratic .......... 101,807 votes 33.45%
United States Representative; District 17
Tim Ryan, Democratic .......... 212,800 votes 77.19%
Frank V. Cusimano, Republican .......... 62,871 votes 22.81%
Randy D. Walter (Write-in)
United States Representative; District 18
Bob Ney, Republican .......... 177,586 votes 66.17%
Brian R. Thomas, Democratic .......... 90,808 votes 33.83%
United States Senate
George V. Voinovich, Republican .......... 3,464,044 votes 63.85%
Eric D. Fingerhut, Democratic .......... 1,961,002 votes 36.15%
Helen Meyers (Write-In) .......... 296 votes 0.01%”"http://www.smartvoter.org/2004/11/02/oh/state/congress.html-cut- "calling for an investigation Voinovich could ill afford. Disappointed with losing but still strong, I had not planned what I would do if I won, I planned what I would do if I lost the election. Several months passed when I saw a curious help wanted ad in the paper. A statewide campaign was looking for media savvy staff. I answered the ad and found the best, yet weirdest job I ever had. The law firm of Frutig, Polito and Travis was functioning as the fund raising mechanism for the campaign of Thomas J. Moyer who was a candidate for Chief Justice of the Ohio Supreme Court. Thomas R. Frutig was the boss. He was tall, with a unruly shock of prematurely white hair. He walked fast, his limbs seemed to flail about in disparate directions. He talked fast, sometimes frothing at the mouth, he used really big words unneccessarily and left you with the impression he was a serviceble maniac. This impression, however, turned out to be on point. Frutig was simply a rich boy (his wife's money) playing lawyer and political king maker. The entire staff was intimidated of him, not to mention incompetent. To date, they had spent $50,000 to raise $5,000! Most days, they looked in books from the republican congressional office about campaigning to decide what to do, really.
I was given a very strange IQ or aptitude test of sorts; required of all potential candidates. Apparently, I passed for Frutig kept me out till 11 p.m. discussing "the matrix". The matrix was his favorite term. No one ever figured out what the hell it was, but he would often come storming into the office, like a big angry scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz, hair flying, eyes bulging and in a semi-comatose rage, draw huge, undecipherable hieroglyphics on the conference room walls; all the while lecturing us about the matrix! His trade mark saying, that we would later tongue-in-cheek adopt for the campaign slogan was "Keep your spinnaker full, blow sunshine up their asses and run up their backs with hobnail boots!" He probably stole it from some one else, but it was colorful and illustrative of Frutig's energy and delusion."-cut- http://tinyurl.com/7nkewThat should fill in a bunch of this man's biography. |
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