Comings and goings

Has Republican Jean Schmidt's win in Tuesday's special congressional election scared away all the liberals? Consider:

• Cincinnati Democratic Committee co-chairwoman Jenny O'Donnell (right) is leaving Cincinnati for France in November, likely ending her longtime ambition to someday become the chairwoman of the Hamilton County Democratic Party. (Her mother, Priscilla O'Donnell, was chairwoman of the Clermont County Party and still sits on the Board of Elections.)
  
  "The ambition is still there," said O'Donnell, a Linwood psychologist. "I have this extra Democratic gene. The thing about this, is I don't think I'll be able to be chair. This was my time. I don't think I'll have this opportunity again."
  
  Her husband, Patrick McDevitt, is taking a job in France. On Wednesday, Mayor Charlie Luken nominated Ginny Corsini to replace him on the Lunken Airport Oversight Advisory Board.

• Green Party candidate Andrew Warner has dropped out of the 2005 City Council race to join the staff of Charterite Nick Spencer.
  
  Warner, a University of Cincinnati senior majoring in English and political science, made the announcement on his campaign blog Tuesday. He will be the Spencer campaign's field director, helping to coordinate door-to-door and phone-banking operations. The move came after Spencer posted a comment on a local blog saying young candidates who haven't raised money should get out of the race and work on a major-party campaign for experience.
  
  "You have to have a big ego. You have to love people talking about you. You have to really truly believe everything you say, or at least fake it -- and I think a lot of politicians are faking it," Warner said. "That's what I like about Nick. He's not afraid of saying what he wants to say."
  
  
• Adam Michael Rosenberg, the former director of the Hamilton County Democratic Party, is leaving Cincinnati this month for his native Connecticut. He plans to join the Peace Corps next year.
  
  Rosenberg headed the local party during the 2004 presidential campaign, and said he got job offers in Columbus and Washington after the campaign. But he said he got burned out on politics and hopes to make a difference in Africa.
  
  
• J. Wes Flinn, a 2001 Green Party candidate for City Council, left for Massachusetts last week. "Got a job up here teaching at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts," he reported in an e-mail. "Though Schmidt getting elected would have driven me out anyway."
  
  Flinn, who referred to his 2001 campaign as the "Wes Flinn No Chance '01" Tour, was perhaps best known in town as the author of the progressive blog Walk in Brain.