Mike DeWine wants to be Ohio's Attorney General. But is that what YOU want?

By Chad D. Baus

For the better part of the past year, Buckeye Firearms Association has been warning against the potential re-emergence of Mike DeWine into Ohio politics.

We've warned that this is the same Mike DeWine who was thrown out of his U.S. Senate seat by voters in 2006, after running around sporting a Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence (formerly Handgun Control Inc.) endorsement because "his record really wowed the group."

We've cautioned that this is the same Mike DeWine who Human Events Online named among the Top 10 anti-gun U.S. Senators, noting that he was "consistently the only Republican to speak in favor of anti-2nd Amendment legislation on the Senate floor."

We've reminded that this is the same Mike DeWine who, shortly before his defeat in 2006, took a position in opposition to legislation which barred gun manufacturers, distributors, dealers or importers from frivolous lawsuits designed to put them out of business.

We've observed that this is the same Mike DeWine who consistently cast his votes on the side of the most rabid anti-gun Democrats in the Senate.

We've written op-eds and distributed flyers. Our organization even made the largest donation we've ever made to a single candidate to his then-primary opponent, Dave Yost.

But the fact is, far too few people have even begun paying attention to the 2010 races. I have had conversations in the past few days with people who are general "up" on national politics, who had no idea that DeWine was even back on the scene, let alone emerging as the Ohio GOP's nominee for attorney general. (And trust me, they weren't pleased when they heard the news.)

The trouble is, by the time most people start paying attention to state politics in an election year, quality candidates have already dropped out - or been forced out by the state party - because they were unable to raise what they perceive are the funds necessary to compete in the ever-more expensive campaign process.

Ohio gun owners have already lost a quality, pro-gun candidate in the Republican primary for Attorney General (Yost), and in the Democrat primary for Secretary of State. But the vast majority of people don't even know it. They'll be the ones you hear complaining about the lack of good choices when they get to the polls in May, not realizing that they could have made a difference, had they only gotten involved sooner.

That is why it is incumbent upon you, the informed Ohio gun owner who regularly visits BuckeyeFirearms.org and stays current on the state political scene, to get in touch with as many gun owners and freedom-loving Ohioans as possible and warn them about the candidacy of Mike DeWine. You need to give them the facts - facts that they won't get from reading DeWine campaign literature, filled with claims of support for the Second Amendment that are every bit as baseless as those made by Barack Obama throughout 2008.

In the last reporting cycle, Mike DeWine raised one quarter of one million dollars more than his opponent, pro-gun incumbent Attorney General Richard Cordray. And the former Senator brags that he is sitting on over one million dollars in his campaign fund.

DeWine is now claiming to be a supporter of the Second Amendment, hoping we'll either forget all those years in Washington D.C., or somehow be convinced that he's had a change of heart. Like Barack Obama, Mike DeWine wants you to believe his words, and ignore his actions.

Putting his campaign rhetoric aside, the fact is that everything about Mike DeWine's long record indicates that he presents a clear and present danger to Ohio gun owners and concealed handgun license-holders. It is NOT too soon to begin to actively tell family, friends, neighbors and anyone else who will listen that if they cherish their Second Amendment freedoms, they will do everything in their power to ensure that Mike DeWine is permanently retired from politics in the Buckeye State.

Download this flyer. Forward this op-ed. Discuss it any time you're with a group of people. If Ohio gun owners don't stand up to this threat, they'll live to regret it.

Chad Baus is a Member of the Fulton County, OH, Republican Central Committee and Vice Chairman of Buckeye Firearms Association.