Ohio wants a bailout.

Nation: They are going to get it as well considering Obama's spend our way into a better economy plan which is basically create a bunch of welfare jobs to give the illusion of prosperity. It would be cheaper to cut everyone a check.

As the economy sputters and tax revenue plummets, governors and mayors across the United States are lining up to ask President-elect Barack Obama and the new Congress for hundreds of billions of dollars to plug holes in their budgets, arguing that services will suffer and joblessness will rise if Washington does not come to the rescue. In Ohio, which has shed 100,000 jobs in the past year, Gov. Ted Strickland (D) and his budget team spend a lot of time delivering bad news to constituents and plotting ways to wring money from the federal government. He announced $640 million in cuts for the budget year ending June 30, for a total of $1.9 billion since the economic crisis began. "We're not crying wolf. This is real," Strickland said in an interview in his statehouse office, pointing to charts that project the most serious erosion of state income in 40 years and a two-year budget deficit of $7.3 billion. Revenue shortfalls in the upcoming two-year budget could amount to about 25 percent of the state's discretionary spending. Strickland recently picked up the telephone and called Rahm Emanuel, the incoming White House chief of staff. When he heard the recorded voice of his former congressional colleague, he left a message: "Rahm, it's Ted. You've never failed me and I need $5 billion." ....Hamler-Fugitt worries that the federal stimulus will have only limited benefits: "It's one-time money. We have a structural deficit." Habat said something similar, pointing out that tax cuts passed by the state legislature in 2005 will save taxpayers and cost the government roughly $4.4 billion during the next two years, more than half the projected deficit. "With the magnitude of the problem, there's no way Ohio can expect the federal government to give it that kind of money," said Habat, whose organization calculates that the recession will cost the state another $4 billion in revenue during the next two years. "Ohio always lags in recovering from recessions," Habat said. State policymakers are united in saying that any recovery will require federal tax dollars, and lots of them. As for the telephone call Strickland made to Emanuel, asking for billions: The governor said Emanuel called back and said "something to the effect of, 'I hear you. You may not get everything you want, but you'll get help.' "