Is Kasich Cooling On Mary Taylor?

Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, I present to you today the very loosest of cases, based solely of circumstantial evidence and my own unprofessional read of the situation at hand. Nothing I say here should be  taken as fact, unless verified by an outside source

Translation: This is nothing but a theory, and not a very  solid one at that. I’m just throwing it out here in the interest of sparking discussion, not reporting it as fact.

Okay. Now that we have an understanding, I’ll proceed with my case.

Exhibit A: Kasich Calls On Taylor To Testify About Healthcare Exchange

As has been mentioned several times here already, Mary Taylor has been refusing to testify to the House Health and Aging committee about the progress towards setting up a state healthcare exchange.

So if Taylor is unwilling to testify, why did Kasich lead the Columbus Dispatch to believe that he was willing to testify but would prefer for Taylor to do so?

Here’s an excerpt from a December 12th Dispatch article:

Gov. John Kasich hinted that he was willing to share information with Carney and the Ohio House’s Health and Aging Committee. The catch is, the governor said, he’d rather Taylor or his health-care adviser, Greg Moody, go testify instead of him.

“ That’s their issue,” Kasich said, adding later: “I’ve got to think these things through. I’d like to get somebody there that’s working on it all the time.”

Just days later on the 15th, Taylor called the request to testify a “political stunt”.

Exhibit B: Kasich Brings Up Taylor’s Plane Use

In yesterday’s end of the year review, Kasich brought up Taylor’s improper use of state planes. Until I saw a tweet about this remark, I hadn’t heard a thing about this story. Now, because of his mention, the story is getting press coverage.

So why did he bring it up during such a heavily publicized speech?

One could argue that Kasich was trying to head off a potential scandal by announcing a resolution before a story broke through into the public consciousness. The trouble with that theory is that that isn’t how Kasich operates. We have many examples of Kasich’s M.O. dating back to the opening moments of his term, where he attempted to be sworn in during a private midnight ceremony. In this and other cases, Kasich tried to steamroll over opposition until he was finally stopped by bad press and the possibility of a legal challenge. He did the same with his unconstitutional appointment of Mark Kvamme, and his attempts to impose strict limits on press coverage.

Exhibit C: Taylor Did Not Attend Yesterday’s Speech

This one is pretty self-explanatory. Mary Taylor did not attend Kasich’s year end speech. It was claimed that she was off working on CPE training so that she could remain a certified public accountant.

Exhibit D: John Kasich, Control Freak and All-Around Unpleasant Person

And finally, we have the emergence of a pattern. Kasich has finally came out directly and asked for Kevin DeWine to step down as the State Chairman of the Republican Party. This is a fight that has been brewing for a long time, with DeWine now saying Kasich asked him to resign shortly after he was elected.

Kasich tried to do this first through that backchannel ask. When that failed, he used his supporters to try and undermine DeWine’s position. And now he has his supporters out working to state a coup in the central committee.

As much as I hate to say it, the Republicans gave us an ass kicking in the last election. Regardless of the reasons for their success, you wouldn’t expect them to be trying to throw out their chairman. But Kasich is so dead-set of appointing his own man, that he’s willing to risk a major intra-party civil war in a key swing state before a presidential election. Kasich must know that every Democratic strategist in America dreams about stuff like this, and he’s willing to do it anyway.

And now we have Mary Taylor. If Kasich isn’t actively trying to undermine her, he still managing to do a fair job of it.

I don’t know why Kasich would have a reason to turn on Taylor after picking her as a running mate, but there has been speculation that Taylor has her eye on even bigger things. The same has been said about Kasich.

And we all know how Kasich feels about people he perceives as standing in his way…