BY PATRICK CROWLEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
HIGHLAND HEIGHTS -- Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Scotty Baesler made a rare Northern Kentucky appearance Tuesday to hammer Republican Jim Bunning for not supporting state-funded projects in his native territory.
Speaking to about 30 supporters on the Northern Kentucky University campus, Mr. Baesler used a chart to show that Mr. Bunning voted against funding for three Campbell County projects while a member of the Kentucky Senate in the early 1980s. The projects were:
The AA Highway, which was built and runs from near Ashland to near Alexandria.
The Southern Campbell County Industrial Park on U.S. 27 near Claryville.
An arena at NKU. It has not been built, but university officials and some community leaders have recently begun talking about trying to build an on-campus convocation center.
"I'm going to be traveling all over the state in the next two weeks showing what the world would be like if Jim Bunning had his way," Mr. Baesler said of the Nov. 3 election.
"Jim talks like he supports the people of Kentucky, but his record doesn't show that. You've got to walk the talk, and Jim Bunning doesn't do that," he said.
Mr. Bunning, a Southgate native and resident who grew up and raised his family in Northern Kentucky, has represented the region for 12 years in the U.S. House as 4th District congressman.
According to his campaign, Mr. Bunning has secured millions of federal dollars for projects that include a new federal courthouse in Covington; ramps for the Taylor-Southgate and Clay Wade Bailey Ohio River bridges; repairs to Ky. 9 in Wilder; a proposed light-rail mass transit system; and flood prevention projects and warning systems for the Licking River at and around Falmouth, which was devastated in a flood last year.
Mr. Baesler, a U.S. House member from Lexington, said Mr. Bunning also failed to support projects for Louisville as a state senator. Kyle Simmons, Mr. Bunning's campaign spokesman, said Mr. Baesler should be concentrating on the congressional race and not living in the past.
"Scotty's attack demonstrates the sort of directionless desperation of a candidate who is two weeks away from an election for the U.S. Senate, and brings up votes a man cast when Mork and Mindy was a No. 1 show on TV 18 years ago . . . and Jimmy Carter was a recent bad memory," Mr. Simmons said.
"Scotty Baesler is fixated on Jim Bunning's state Senate career to deflect attention from that, unlike Jim Bunning, he's never passed a bill in Congress," he said.
Mr. Baesler, however, mentioned Mr. Bunning's more recent past, noting his votes against the Family and Medical Leave Act and against raising the federal minimum wage.
"How can you say you care about families and working Kentuckians when you won't vote to give them a working wage . . . or allow them to be away from work to spend time with a loved one?"
Mr. Baesler said. Mr. Simmons responded by pointing out some of Mr. Baesler's votes in Congress, among them votes against the balanced budget and against a plan to use most of the $1.6 trillion projected federal budget surplus for Social Security, along with an $80 billion tax cut.
The latter passed the House in this session, with Mr. Bunning in favor of it, but died in the Senate without a vote.
"In Scotty Baesler's world, we wouldn't have a balanced budget," Mr. Simmons said, "and we wouldn't have a Congress working toward tax cuts for married couples . . . and the self-employed."
Still, Tom Ratterman, 24, of Newport, the Young Democrats' president and a member of the Student Government Council at Northern Kentucky University, said Mr. Baesler is more dedicated to education funding.
Local labor leader Wayne Whalen of Dry Ridge, who also attended Mr. Baesler's speech, said labor unions will help get out the vote for Mr. Baesler.
"We're doing some mail that will encourage people to vote, and we'll point out the records of both candidates," said Mr. Whalen, president of the Northern Kentucky Labor Council.
Mr. Baesler has not spent a lot of time campaigning in Mr. Bunning's home base of Northern Kentucky. Many political observers think Mr. Bunning will run well here, while Mr. Baesler will carry his home base of Lexington.
That leaves the race to be won and lost in regions such as Louisville and far western Kentucky, where Mr. Bunning is campaigning late this week into the weekend.
