RINO or not, DeWine got creamed by a liberal 'Rat with a voting record to the left of Dennis Kucinich (!). Again, we just can't write that off as bad campaigning or sharing the mud of a political scandal in an unrelated state office. The loss is just by too decisive a margin to ignore the shift in political trends.
I hope you are right about the pending gubernatorial contest in VA. It's just too important a state (like OH) to be in the 'Rat column for long. And yes, sometimes elections run in streaks. The 'Rats owned the governor's office for two elections in the '80s (Richard Celeste). Then the 'Pubs took over for four contests (Voinovich and Taft).
Since you seem to think running actual, non-RINO, Conservatives is a problem, why are you even on this website ?
As for Blackwell, you ignore the fact that he had already won statewide THREE times (1994, 1998 & 2002). You also ignore the RINO establishment HATED him and tried to ramrod their RINO standard-bearer, the ethically challenged Jim Petro. The establishment did NOTHING for him for the general election when he thumped Petro. Bob Taft the Turd crippled the GOP brand thanks to corruption, and sullied Blackwell with it, even though those two might as well have been from two different parties. You also forget that the Democrats hadn’t won the Governorship in TWENTY years at that point, and party fatigue inevitably sets in. And lastly, I believe RACISM played a part. You add up all those things, and you’ll see why Blackwell lost as he did. Of course, the media wouldn’t charge racism, because voting against a Black Republican — a CONSERVATIVE Black Republican — is perfectly fine. But vote against a Marxist Black rodent, and THAT is racism.