Specifically, he wants to know why only 100,000 votes were cast when usually OH-02 puts up 300,000. Furthermore, he wants to know if the 200,000 that didn't vote were Republicans.
Let's answer he second question first: not all of them were Republicans, but a significant portion of them were. Remember, we're talking about a district that re-elected the President at 62% and Rob Portman at 74%. The primary featured Republicans coming out to the tune of three to one compared to Democrats. Paul Hackett energized the Democratic base, so I'd have to think he got about as many votes as he was going to get.
The interesting question: Why did these folks stay home?
First and foremost, it was a special election held in August. There weren't any state-wide issues or offices on the ballot and very few local issues.
Secondly, the Republican primary seriously divided the GOP in the district. Republicans in this area are staunch supporters of their candidate and they are tired of nonsense from Columbus and "establishment" candidates like Jean Schmidt. Tom Brinkman's organization, COAST set up a "Stay Home" campaign. Bob McEwen did little to support Jean Schmidt and so the "values" vote weren't all that interested in the race. Pat DeWine, God love him, stayed away too. The only guy from the primaries who really jumped in to help Jean Schmidt, was (no offense Eric) a guy I hadn't heard of until Jean was already the candidate.
Thirdly, the Ohio GOP has got some serious work to do in reinvigorating the base. CoinGate (and the much bigger Democrat scandal of the BWC investment losses which are being framed generically as "CoinGate" too) is dragging the whole state party down. Gov. Taft has a 17% approval rating, the worst in the entire country. The statehouse seems to be run by Republicans who are only interested in staying in power using backroom deals and other shady skills. Ken Blackwell is the only breath of fresh air in Columbus, so naturally the "establishment" hates his guts.
Somehwere out there in the blogosphere, I saw numbers from the last six or so election cycles. I can't find them now, but if I do, I'll update. What the numbers will show is that a significant number of people stayed home for this election, for whatever reason, and because the race was so close (and Hackett so energized his base while Schmidt didn't), one can only come to the conclusion that those were Republican votes...
Mark's Remarks
Firstly, Jean Schimdt was not a good candidate. She won the primaries by being positive, while the other three high contenders sniped at each other. I am ashamed and disgusted by Tom Brinkman's campaign. Brinkman is a joke. He is against everything. While he is a fiscal conservative, which is laudable, he has no clue when it comes to national security. He tried to run as an outsider, and I initially fell for the gag. However, the more I saw of him, the more I saw John McCain, and we do not need another "maverick" in Washington.
