Ohio is a failed state: Michael M. Lederman
State Rep. Nino Vitale, an Urbana Republican, seen on the Ohio House floor in a 2016 photo. Vitale has criticized coronavirus restrictions, refused to wear a mask and sought unsuccessfully to impeach Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine over his COVID-19 health orders. Vitale's actions may be on the extreme end, yet many state lawmakers apparently agree with him on DeWine's health orders; Senate Bill 22, which takes effect June 23, will give the Ohio legislature the power to overrule future state-declared health emergencies and to veto health restrictions and other executive actions. Citing SB 22 and other indicators, Dr. Michael M. Lederman calls Ohio a "failed state" in a guest column today. (Ohio House)
CLEVELAND -- I’ve lived in Ohio for more than 40 years and I love it here. So it pains me to say it, but I live in a failed state. A failed state is a state where the government doesn’t serve the needs of the people. A failed state is a state where honesty is unimportant. A failed state is a state where the populace tolerates or supports corrupt and dysfunctional leadership. A failed state is a state where violence is used to achieve political objectives. A failed state is a state where working people can’t get work and the work they get is insufficient to allow them to live a decent life. A failed state is a state where people die of preventable or treatable disease.
Despite rich resources, a great tradition of contribution to our nation’s history, agriculture, industry, science and culture, Ohio has become a failed state. The U.S, Census Bureau says 13% of Ohioans live in poverty. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more than 4,000 Ohioans die of drug overdoses every year. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reports Ohioans’ life expectancy is 77 years, seven years less than that of Italy, three years less than that of Taiwan and two years less than in Albania and Lebanon, as recorded by Worldometers.
We’re in the midst of a killer pandemic. Ohio’s governor, Mike DeWine, has done his best to try to deal with the epidemic by following the advice of physicians and scientists in the Ohio Department of Health. But the department’s respected director had to quit her job after her family was threatened by armed protesters who thought they knew better how to deal with epidemics than she did.
In the meantime, the brilliant minds in both houses of our state legislature passed legislation (Senate Bill 311) that would have forbidden the Ohio Department of Health from having any authority for prevention of disease! They failed to override the governor’s veto, as several lawmakers could not attend after they or family members contracted COVID-19.
But they haven’t given up. Revised legislation to limit the authority of the Ohio Department of Health (Senate Bill 22) will go into effect in June. In the middle of this pandemic that has already claimed nearly 20,000 lives in our state, many Ohioans and many of our elected officials reject the recommendations of experts to mask. Freedom in the failed state of Ohio seems to be conflated with aggressive indifference to one’s neighbors and disregard of science.
The Ohio legislature that wrote both SB 311 and SB 22 includes an accused criminal. Last year, the Speaker of the Ohio House, Republican Larry Householder; the former Ohio Republican Party chairman Matthew Borges; and three other politically connected Ohioans were arrested for participation in an alleged $60 million bribery scam to bail out some nuclear energy plants. Yet this past November, Mr. Householder still won re-election to his House seat. Failed states are often led by characters like these, and citizens in failed states vote for characters like these.
We shouldn’t be surprised, then, that this past November, more than half of Ohio’s voters cast their ballots in favor of a president whose catastrophic failure to address the COVID pandemic contributed to the more than 500,000 American deaths and more than one million COVID cases in Ohio. Our state favored a narcissist who lies as easily as he breathes, who boasted to Billy Bush of assaulting women and who, after he lost a fair election, encouraged citizens to disrupt the workings of Congress. Citizens in states that are failing seem to admire blustering blunderers like that.
I don’t know what it will take for Ohio to stop failing, but to start, we must learn to value truth and science over fantasy and wishful thinking, and we’ve got to do a much better job electing our representatives and leaders.
Dr. Michael M. Lederman is a professor of medicine at Case Western Reserve University. The views expressed are his own.
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Ohio is a failed state: Michael M. Lederman
State Rep. Nino Vitale, an Urbana Republican, seen on the Ohio House floor in a 2016 photo. Vitale has criticized coronavirus restrictions, refused to wear a mask and sought unsuccessfully to impeach Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine over his COVID-19 health orders. Vitale's actions may be on the extreme end, yet many state lawmakers apparently agree with him on DeWine's health orders; Senate Bill 22, which takes effect June 23, will give the Ohio legislature the power to overrule future state-declared health emergencies and to veto health restrictions and other executive actions. Citing SB 22 and other indicators, Dr. Michael M. Lederman calls Ohio a "failed state" in a guest column today. (Ohio House)
CLEVELAND -- I’ve lived in Ohio for more than 40 years and I love it here. So it pains me to say it, but I live in a failed state. A failed state is a state where the government doesn’t serve the needs of the people. A failed state is a state where honesty is unimportant. A failed state is a state where the populace tolerates or supports corrupt and dysfunctional leadership. A failed state is a state where violence is used to achieve political objectives. A failed state is a state where working people can’t get work and the work they get is insufficient to allow them to live a decent life. A failed state is a state where people die of preventable or treatable disease.
Despite rich resources, a great tradition of contribution to our nation’s history, agriculture, industry, science and culture, Ohio has become a failed state. The U.S, Census Bureau says 13% of Ohioans live in poverty. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more than 4,000 Ohioans die of drug overdoses every year. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reports Ohioans’ life expectancy is 77 years, seven years less than that of Italy, three years less than that of Taiwan and two years less than in Albania and Lebanon, as recorded by Worldometers.
We’re in the midst of a killer pandemic. Ohio’s governor, Mike DeWine, has done his best to try to deal with the epidemic by following the advice of physicians and scientists in the Ohio Department of Health. But the department’s respected director had to quit her job after her family was threatened by armed protesters who thought they knew better how to deal with epidemics than she did.
In the meantime, the brilliant minds in both houses of our state legislature passed legislation (Senate Bill 311) that would have forbidden the Ohio Department of Health from having any authority for prevention of disease! They failed to override the governor’s veto, as several lawmakers could not attend after they or family members contracted COVID-19.
But they haven’t given up. Revised legislation to limit the authority of the Ohio Department of Health (Senate Bill 22) will go into effect in June. In the middle of this pandemic that has already claimed nearly 20,000 lives in our state, many Ohioans and many of our elected officials reject the recommendations of experts to mask. Freedom in the failed state of Ohio seems to be conflated with aggressive indifference to one’s neighbors and disregard of science.
The Ohio legislature that wrote both SB 311 and SB 22 includes an accused criminal. Last year, the Speaker of the Ohio House, Republican Larry Householder; the former Ohio Republican Party chairman Matthew Borges; and three other politically connected Ohioans were arrested for participation in an alleged $60 million bribery scam to bail out some nuclear energy plants. Yet this past November, Mr. Householder still won re-election to his House seat. Failed states are often led by characters like these, and citizens in failed states vote for characters like these.
We shouldn’t be surprised, then, that this past November, more than half of Ohio’s voters cast their ballots in favor of a president whose catastrophic failure to address the COVID pandemic contributed to the more than 500,000 American deaths and more than one million COVID cases in Ohio. Our state favored a narcissist who lies as easily as he breathes, who boasted to Billy Bush of assaulting women and who, after he lost a fair election, encouraged citizens to disrupt the workings of Congress. Citizens in states that are failing seem to admire blustering blunderers like that.
I don’t know what it will take for Ohio to stop failing, but to start, we must learn to value truth and science over fantasy and wishful thinking, and we’ve got to do a much better job electing our representatives and leaders.
Dr. Michael M. Lederman is a professor of medicine at Case Western Reserve University. The views expressed are his own.
Have something to say about this topic?
* Send a letter to the editor, which will be considered for print publication.
* Email general questions about our editorial board or comments or corrections on this opinion column to Elizabeth Sullivan, director of opinion, at esullivan@cleveland.com.
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