From The Politico:

Sarah Palin’s political action committee has been selective and strategic in its donations to candidates over the past six months, but if money is any indication of where her heart lies, her political loyalties can be traced to Ohio.

While SarahPAC has devoted just 5 percent of its total expenditures over that period to fellow GOP colleagues, four of the 17 candidates Palin contributed to hail from Ohio — the state where she held by far the most presidential campaign events in 2008, according to The Washington Post’s candidate tracker.

The former Alaska governor and 2008 vice presidential nominee gave $5,000 to former GOP Rep. John Kasich, who’s running for Ohio governor; $3,500 to former Rep. Rob Portman, who’s running for the state’s open Senate seat; $1,000 to Rep. Jean Schmidt; and $1,000 to state auditor Mary Taylor, whom Kasich recently tapped to be his running mate.

A GOP source familiar with Palin’s thinking said most of these candidates solicited Palin’s support. “She feels there is a real chance to turn the tide in Ohio,” said the source.

“It makes sense to me that she may be looking to a future where Ohio matters to her, and if she’s building support, I think it’s great,” said Alex Triantafilou, the GOP chairman in Cincinnati’s Hamilton County.

“We’ve got an incumbent governor in Ted Strickland who is very vulnerable, so perhaps she sees where her dollars can make a difference,” he added.

Palin’s largest monetary donation went to Kasich, the former House Budget Committee chairman and Fox News talk show host, who has edged ahead of Strickland in recent polls.

The article also mentions that she will be speaking March 5th at an Ohio Right to Life event. Tickets can be purchased here. She is tough to book and won’t even be speaking at CPAC, so this is a huge deal for the pro-life movement in Ohio. Conservative friends at the Strategy Group helped make the event possible.

Sarah’s book was fun from a gossipy perspective.  I wanted to read more about accomplishments and policy debates in Alaska, but instead found myself slogging through a bunch of stories about how the media and the McCain campaign mistreated her. Almost any book by a politician is ghostwritten, but  this one came no where close to, for example, what L. Brent Bozell Jr. did for Barry Goldwater. And I couldn’t imagine Ronald Reagan writing a book to bitch about the press or pesky Ford operatives.

Regardless, Sarah is right on the issues, knows how to give a good speech, and is the only conservative rockstar who might run for President. She is more qualified for the job than President Barry, and is our worst potential candidate… except for all the others.

It is fantastic news that she is focusing so much on the state. Ohio’s misogynist Democrat Party Chairman has no idea how truly popular she is.

The Plain Dealer editorial board is supporting Minority Leader Batchelder’s campaign contribution legislation:

Federal employees have the Hatch Act prohibiting most from using their offices for political purposes. State employees in Ohio are subject to Gov. Ted Strickland’s executive order clamping limits on gifts.

It’s about time clear ethical standards were set for those who work for Ohio’s 88 county governments as well. The need is acute, given the degree of cronyism among certain Cuyahoga County officeholders.

House Minority leader William Batchelder plans to introduce a bill as early as this week that would plug the loophole in campaign finance law in Ohio that allows county officials to solicit political contributions from their own subordinates. The bill also would put the clamps on employees eager to curry favor with political bosses by filling their campaign coffers. Those are hardly onerous restrictions.

I need to learn more about this legislation, but I’m always skeptical about government limiting campaign contributions, as money should be treated like speech. The US Supreme Court did uphold the Hatch Act as constitutional in 1973, but was since watered down by the Federal Employees Political Activities Act of 1993, which allowed those employees to run in nonpartisan elections, participate in voter-registration drives, donate to political organizations, and campaign for candidates in partisan elections.

I would contend that, in today’s world of McCain-Feingold and 527s/501c4s, since Federal employees are only prohibited from donating directly to candidates, all that was eliminated was transparency.

Democrats in Cuyahoga County were corrupt long before the money showed up. And The Plain Dealer knows this, but the newspaper has long shown itself to tolerate a certain level of corruption, as a vast majority of their subscribers do not care.