The Columbus Delta House

One of the most compelling story lines of politics (and life in general) comes when chickens roost; in the sad case of Marc Dann's rise to power and today's fall from grace comes lessons which ought to be required courses for those communications and poli-sci majors who are grooming themselves to become the next James Carville or Karl Rove.

In another of the industry's ironic moments Dann, who campaigned on a wave of ethics reform and high-minded judgment good enough to unseat the formerly-unbeatable Betty Montgomery, is now causing Democrats to mull over musical chairs a year and a half post-taking power in one of the state's most important offices. It is the lead on tonight's NewsNight Akron program on PBS 45/49 (shameless plug) with almost all the elements needed to move from current events to HBO drama.

Dann, in an Eliot Spitzer-like moment, looks into the camera and begs the forgiveness of his family, friends, supporters, co-workers and most of all fellow citizens for the lapses in thinking that led him to an affair with a woman who worked for him. Two faithful lieutenants (one of them, Leo Jennings III, is well-known in Akron circles for his political media work) fall on their swords for trying to keep everything hush-hush; another gets the outright boot for his behavior in a tale that includes drunken driving and debauchery in Ohio's very own Capitol Animal House.



It has been ten years since the nation watched the President of the most powerful nation on earth explain what "is" meant and how sex really wasn't sex; in the past decade we've seen a U.S. Senator face charges for toe-tapping in a men's room, a U.S. Congressman fall from grace for pursuing pages, another U.S. Senator wrapped up in a D.C. call girl scandal that led to suicide, and most recently New York's Governor skip out of office for high-priced call girls. What, don't these guys read newspapers, watch TV or listen to the radio?


We can't say what Dann was thinking when he used campaign funds to set up that hip bachelor pad for swingers; we can't imagine what went through his mind when underlings messed up again and again and again without retribution from the man who rode the surf of outrage over counting coins and insider dealing to become Ohio's top lawyer; we can't explain why he stepped over those boundary lines every husband -- every husband -- knows is the marriage line of death. The list of public figures who haven't made the connection to destruction because of private failings grows by one more, adding another line to the laugh riot that is American and Ohio politics.


This is tragic because Dann's wife and children deserve far better than the sympathy going their way while the public ridicule envelopes him. It's sad for the Strickland Administration which has been trying to prove government can handle it's business the way voters expect their business to be done. We don't vote for our leaders because they are like us; we vote for our leaders because we want to believe they will represent what's best about us, and this isn't the best.


The Republicans predictably are calling for Dann to step down, but that's like Democrats in 2005 calling for Bob Taft to step down: the GOP's best interests are for Dann to tough it out, fight for his job and make as many public appearances as he can to apologize and promise he'll do better. The wishlist for Republican party leaders is for the opposite, giving them what Tom Noe gave Dann and the Democrat party what it wanted most in 2006: a face, a poster boy, a target to use to convince voters weary of scandal that neither side has clean hands. That would take the high ground held since January 2007 by the Ted Administration in Columbus and give the GOP what they know doesn't exist in 2008 following the economy, gas prices and war: a door back in.