The strategy behind "bait and switch" is to show something appealing to people, and when they're successfully lured, to switch the bait to something else.  One often thinks of the practice as a sleazy sales pitch by an unscrupulous marketer, but here in Ohio and around the nation, it's being used more and more in politics.

John Kasich and other Republican governors, senators, and congressmen were elected to office in 2010 by baiting the voters with promises of more jobs.  Rather than spending much time in 2011 on job creation, most of those lawmakers were focused on quickly passing a laundry list of radical legislation aimed at diminishing the strength of the Democratic Party.

"Bait and switch" has also been used to elect well-known politicians to office and then to replace them by appointing pawns who are less likely to question extreme party initiatives.  According to Jim Siegel of The Columbus Dispatch, "nearly a quarter of the Ohio House will have initially made it by appointment, and 19 of Ohio’s 33 current senators were either appointed to their current Senate seat or their previous seat in the House." 

When legislators have been appointed by their political party, rather than elected by their constituents, to whom will they owe their allegiance?

Think.