NYTimes.com: Ohio Labor Unions vs. Super PACS

Kaitlyn Crist
kc800208@ohio.edu
@Kaitlyn_Crist

Seeing Ohio in political headlines is nothing new. There is a famous phrase used a lot this time of the year: "so goes Ohio, so goes the naton."
Ohio is all over the news, and we are visited regularly by the candidates and their entourage, trying to swing the state in their favor for those precious eighteen electoral votes.
Laborers Celebrating the repeal of SB5 this past November
Photo via Amy Sancetta, Associated press

Despite this coverage, I can't help but click on any stories featuring my home state.This one in particular caught my eye because it involved the words "labor unions." This caught my eye because not a year ago labor unions were battling for their rights by successfully shooting down SB5, a union suppression law.  I was interested where the unions stood now and what they are doing for this particular election.

It seems many Ohio unions are standing with President Barak Obama in the upcoming election, and have started a grassroots campaign to keep him in office. Thanks in part to the "Citizens United" ruling  cooperations are now able to funnel millions of dollars into super PACS that are creating political ads. In this particular case, there are several PACS dedicated to cast the President Obama in a bad light. These Ohio labor unions are knocking on hundreds of doors and making thousands of phone calls to combat these heavily funded attack ads, and and show people that Obama is more than these flashy ads portray him to be.


This advertisement speaks out against President Obama's values, and is funded by the super PAC "Campaign for American Values"  which is not associated with the Mitt Romney campaign. 

These types of grassroots efforts are what truly inspire me about elections and politics. When you have lost all hope, and think that cooperations with billions of dollars have all the political say, stories like this come along, and it's inspiring. It is nice to see that social groups haven't given up on politics and the "American Dream" of democracy. It's nice to see NYT covering these grassroots efforts. It puts a little more faith in the classic belief in American voters and for having a voice in making a change in our government (or in this case, not).

And it's even cooler to see it in my own state.


A phone banker makes calls in Columbus, Ohio. 
Photo via Andrew Spear for the New York Times