Ted Strickland, Early Education, and quicksand.

Wow.

Politically speaking, the question after reading that headline from yesterday afternoon is this: how many points will it cost Ted Strickland come November of next year?

Here are the gruesome details:

Ohio slashed preschool programs more than any other state in the nation, according to a new report.

The state-by-state analysis found Ohio cut the largest percentage of funding from preschool education and, as a result, will deny services to the largest number of children.

Awful enough on its own, eh?

Now consider this...

The below picture is a screen capture of the google cache of Ted Strickland's now defunct campaign website from 2006.


In it, Ted Strickland highlights his primary message for his campaign: Turnaround Ohio.

Turnaround Ohio is the Strickland/Fisher strategy to make sure we start that cycle of success here in Ohio, and here are its key components:

1. Provide every child a fair start through access to high-quality early care and education.

In addition, among the headlines Ted Strickland enjoyed during the 2006 campaign are the following...

Helping kids early will help Ohio later, candidate Strickland says (Cols. Dispatch)

Getting a campaign - and kids - started right (Cleveland Plain Dealer)

Strickland's first plank resonates (Cleveland Plain Dealer)

And in 2006, Ted Strickland was quoted as saying, "[Early education is] the most effective use of economic dollars."

Without question, if Turnaround Ohio was Ted Strickland's campaign theme, early education clearly served as its bedrock.

And with Candisky's headline as stated above, that bedrock has been reduced to the very quicksand that may sink the Governor's re-election effort.