Ohio Attorney General Jim Petro is running for the Republican nomination for governor against Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell.

Petro's campaign has been running a TV ad criticizing Blackwell's support of an Ohio Tax and Expenditures Limitation (TEL) amendment.

The ad compares a TEL with a little boy's toys being taken away. Whatever merits Petro's attack on the TEL idea may have (full disclosure: I've written in favor of TELs here), it is a noxious metaphor to use. We citizens are not children receiving toys from the all powerful parental government. We are adults who contract for and pay for services from government. If Jim Petro's view of the relationship between a government and the citizenry is that of a parent-child then he's not fit to govern.