On Nov. 8, unions and Democrats aim to rebuke Republican Gov. John Kasich like no governor's been rebuked before.

That, at least, is what Ohio's union-Democrat alliance has to aim for. Unless Ohioans repeal Senate Bill 5 at the ballot box -- and unlock the Vise-Grips Kasich is clamping on public employee unions -- the union-Democrat alliance could be to Ohio what the dodo is to birds. That's because SB 5, whatever else it may do, would make it harder for public employee unions to collect political contributions from members.

It's as if Democrats, when they sometimes ran both Ohio's House and Senate in the '70s and '80s, wrote laws making it tougher for fat cats to pool campaign donations and elect . . . let's see . . . anti-union Republicans.

Democrats, unfortunately for them, didn't think of the first thing. Republicans did think of the second.

So now, legally speaking, 70 of the General Assembly's 82 Republicans, plus fellow Republican Kasich, have Ohio's public employee unions (and their Democratic pals) in a corner. And cornered prey has two options: fight or die.

In a plus for the union-Democrat alliance, of those (few) laws that "go to referendum" -- land on the statewide ballot via petition -- voters more often reverse Ohio legislators than agree with them.

Previous Plain Dealer coverage

SB 5 is a start worth fighting for: Kevin O'Brien

Ohio Gov. John Kasich is breaking unions, pledges, hearts: Connie Schultz

Unions, collective bargaining have been hot topics in 2011

So: Slam-dunk for the union-Democrat alliance, humiliation for conservative Ohio Republicans, right? No. Anyone who would place a bet now -- or make a prediction -- either loves risk or enjoys embarrassment.

Besides, ballot campaigns aren't often about facts. They're about psychology. Example: Envy isn't just one of the Seven Deadly Sins. It's also a political technique.

It could be that at November's ballot box -- if SB 5 lands there -- the real fight will be between those Ohioans who envy public employees' (supposedly easy) lives and those Ohioans who envy Republicans' (supposedly bulging) bank accounts.

The question is whose ads light more fires. Surely, already scripted in some campaign consultants' minds are anti-SB 5 ads featuring police officers and firefighters who've been injured protecting other Ohioans -- and pro-SB 5 ads featuring Ohio homeowners, preferably of the everyone's-Grandma persuasion, teary-eyed over staggering property tax bills on the old home place.

That assumes fancy GOP lawyering doesn't somehow abort a Senate Bill 5 referendum or that some cute Republican budget-writing doesn't push an SB 5 referendum into 2012. (Hard to imagine why Republicans would want the referendum in a presidential-election year, but then a lot of what happens at the Statehouse these days is about abnormal psychology, not politics.)

Either way, Assumption 1 seems to be that Kasich faces an uphill battle protecting SB 5 at the ballot box or trying to impose SB 5-like union limits in other ways.

Assumption 2 seems to be that the union-Democrat alliance will beat SB 5 in a walk because there are a lot more paycheck-to-paycheck Ohioans than there are rich Ohio Republicans.

Trouble is, behind both assumptions is a third one: Ohio is just another state, except that it's between Lake Erie and the Ohio River.

Consider this from a recent New York Times story: "It is perhaps surprising that Ohio faced more limited public demonstrations [than in Madison, Wis.] considering that [Ohio's SB 5] . . . goes further than Wisconsin's [anti-union Assembly Bill 11] in several important ways."

It's not surprising.

After all, it's Ohio that, amid Watergate, returned Republican wheeler-dealer James A. Rhodes to the governorship; that, like only California among big states, backed Richard M. Nixon all five times he ran nationally; and that, in 1992, imposed term limits on the legislature because, hey, that would guarantee good government in Columbus.