#policyissues

SB5 passed by the narrowest of margins - 1 vote: 17yea / 16nay - last night and already my inbox is pinging to life with emails from the Ohio Democratic Party begging for support to repeal this gutting of collective bargaining rights.  I do think the bill (law once Gov. Kasich signs it) is an even bigger abomination than the one initially presented a few short weeks ago, and I do not want to see it in effect.  Apparently, the only way to get rid of it once Mr. Kasich signs it is to put it to a referendum, and herein lies my issue. 

I've long been opposed to putting issues to the voters.  This nation is a representative democracy for a number of reasons --- one reason that I often give for that is because the average voter is ignorant on many issues and does not have the time to properly research or understand them; hence the reason we select professional lawmakers to do so on our behalf.  Ballot issues circumvent this process and give us disasters like allowing casinos in Ohio and taking away the choices of a municipality to not have one in its borders thanks to a constitutional amendment.