Nate's Tea Leaves

Nate is reading the GOP tea leaves and his emotional state is constantly in question, but he put out a game of musical chairs that is worth note:

• Lt. Gov. Jeanette Bradley will take control of the Treasurer's Office.
• Congressman Rob Portman will leave Congress and become the Lt. Governor.
• President Bush will quickly appoint Gov. Taft to some position in Washington and Portman becomes the Governor. (President Bush will tell Ken Blackwell, Betty Montgomery, and Jim Petro to be good boys and girls and do what's best for the party by supporting Gov. Portman and either staying in their current - elected I might add - job thus ending the almost-assuredly nasty, Republican - dividing fight for Governor.)
• State Rep. Tom Brinkman (who was at last night's citywide public safety summit and IS NOT a source for this blog entry) becomes the 2nd District's Congressman.
• Blue Chip Review's Steve Fritsch is asked to kill his plans to run for City Council and takes Brinkman's place in the General Assembly.
• There is no word on who becomes the Lt. Governor.
  

The first point Nate makes I think will come true. Portman, instead of Taft, I think will be plucked into BushCo. Brinkman will want the seat, but he will have to get elected to it. Phil Heimlich may want to challenge him. Hopefully some other more sane Republican will go for it or better yet a good Democrat takes on Brinkman. Who that would be I don't know. Brinkman is an extremist who does not have that many friends in the GOP. He would have to get money from outside the area. Hopefully the attention a special election would get would give the Democrat enough cash to show Brinkman's extreme positions. I just hope that Charles Sanders is not the only person the Dems can run.

Listing Steve Fritch is rather laughable. I wonder if Nate is trying to suck up to Steve for some unknown reason. Yes, strange bedfellows indeed.