Dr. Strickland Analyzes His State: Ohio Has The Blues

CINCINNATI (TDB) -- Gov. Ted Strickland is a psychologist by training -- he holds a Ph.D. And he thinks Ohioans are too down on the state where they live, which is a far better chunk of geography in the American landscape than many Buckeyes seem to recognize. He used a term that means melancholy in nature, or funk.

"We've got a case of the blues. I don't think we're as proud of ourselves as we need to be."

Strickland delivered his diagnosis while speaking at a fundraiser for Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory, a fellow Democrat whose reelection plans started to jell at the event Wednesday night at the Westin Hotel. Strickland was the top draw, and disclosed some state aid is going to be pumped into a redevelopment project on the Ohio River in downtown Cincinnati called "The Banks." The governor offered no details, and said the official announcement will be coming in a few days.

He spoke lively about fighting the blues. He said Ohio has "an infrastructure that most state's would relish to have" -- that means bridges, highways, transit hubs. It also means ballparks, museums, symphonies.

"Ohio has everything it needs to be a growing, thriving, prosperous state," and he said the location is "excellent."

He is right. The climate is temperate, the ground doesn't quake, the winds don't roar off the Gulf of Mexico. We don't have massive fires from drought. And we have water -- in our great lake that fashions the state's northern boundary and in the beautiful river that curls and flows on the southern end. The state has a rich history, and its soldiers and generals were most important in defeating the Confederacy and ending slavery. The colleges and universities are founts of knowledge.

Ohioans do need to shake off the "blues" as diagnosed by the governor.

Now: A proposal for the entire Ohiosphere, right, left or down the middle. Can you all post an item within the next 24 hours that brags about our home state? That sells it to the rest of the world, and to Ohioans themselves.

The temptation, of course, will be to make a joke or take a shot. (A Dem line: Why is Ohio a great place? Bob Taft is gone. A GOP line: Why is Ohio a great place? We hold the state Supreme Court and General Assembly.)

Please resist temptation. Sell our state, lift the blues. Bizzyblog's Tom Blumer consistently posts items he calls positivity, and they are always about something good, or happy, or a happy ending. Think positivity everybody. After all, we don't live in Michigan.