In this week's episode of Snollygoster, Ohio's politics podcast from WOSU, hosts Mike Thompson and Steve Brown discuss the hurdles faced by government during this pandemic year. Ohio Public Radio Statehouse correspondent Andy Chow joins the show.
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In this week's episode:
A Public Health Crisis Year
In Ohio, nearly 1 million residents have been diagnosed with COVID-19. Over 51,000 of those ended up in the hospital. And as of this week, 17,622 have died from the disease.
It has been an incredible year that none of us could have imagined 13 months ago.
Gov. Mike DeWine, who would usually be thought of as a small-government conservative, acted decisively in shutting down the state. Many of his Republican colleagues thought he went too far. Many Democrats criticized him for not going far enough.
DeWine's stance to follow the best medical advice available often put him at odds with then-President Trump, though the governor avoided ever openly criticizing the president.
The pandemic affected nearly every aspect of our lives, and while the vaccine and decreasing case numbers offer hope, the economic fallout may linger for a long time to come. Among other concerns, the state's unemployment system was put to the test and suffered from technological glitches, long wait times and rampant fraud.
Snollygoster Of The Week
When you think of talk show hosts running for high office in Ohio, some speculate – or even secretly wish – that Jerry Springer would run for governor or U.S. Senate. He was, after all, mayor of Cincinnati at one time.
Now another talk show host says he’s considering running for the Senate seat. He hosts the weekly one-hour radio show on WTAM in Cleveland called Geraldo in Cleveland. This week, Geraldo Rivera tweeted that he is "pondering" a run for Rob Portman's Senate seat.
Send questions and comments to snollygoster@wosu.org.
