Tax hiker by proxy.

Without question, Ted Strickland has been deathly afraid of raising taxes on Ohioans.

By shunning his past rhetoric, he flipped on gambling in order to help pay for the state's massive budget shortfall. Strickland preferred to sacrifice his principles rather than give Republicans any ammo come next Fall.

But with one article in the Sunday 'Spatch, all that was for naught.

And the two-year, $50.5 billion state budget signed July 17 includes at least $1.5 billion in revenue from higher fees that take effect in the coming months, the Legislative Services Commission said.

Some critics of the fees point out that, two years ago, Gov. Ted Strickland told The Dispatch, "I think higher fees are higher taxes."

Who wants to bet Strickland's communications director buried his head in his hands when he heard that comment?

This article is a sign. Despite all his efforts to avoid it, the Ohio mainstream media is already defining Strickland as a Governor yanking cash from taxpayer pockets.

And it doesn't stop there.

Facing a massive budget shortfall for next year, the Putnam County District Library is forming a plan to ask commissioners to place a levy on the November ballot.

[...]

So we were trying to figure out how to reach 20 percent and now with Governor (Ted) Strickland’s proposed plan and what the General Assembly did (referring to the state budget), they added another 11 percent on top of that, so now we’re looking at a 33-percent total cut, potentially, for the year,” she said.

Strickland's 'hide under my desk and hope it goes away' strategy of the first two years of his Administration helped put the Ohio in the spot it's in. Now, because of his library cuts, townships, villages and cities will be putting levies on their ballots begging for tax increases.

None of which needed to happen.

Jello Stricktaft, Tax Hiker by Proxy.