In general:
- Democratic Big Labor cronies are submitting recall petitions today to force a recall election of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and Lt. Governor Rebecca Kleefisch. They claim to have enough to weather the inevitable challenges.
- This latest exercise in partisan petulance is scheduled to cost the state of Wisconsin 9 million dollars’ worth of taxpayer money, once you factor in all the state- and municipal-level Democratic temper tantrums. And here we thought that getting Democrats out of office would stop them from wasting productive people’s money.
- Governor Walker has already amassed a $5.1 million dollar war chest for this nonsense, and he can raise as much as he darn well pleases. There’s going to be a lot of money poured into these recall elections, by the way; money that the Democrats in particular are going to miss.
- The Democrats don’t have a clue who to run against Walker. (via @VickiMcKenna)
I don’t want to sound too dismissive of this situation, but Wisconsin Democrats spent a ridiculous amount of money last year to buy one, and rent one, state Senate seat. That does not mean that complacency is justified, but it does mean that I can point and laugh with a clear conscience. It’s good for morale to remember that these people talk a bigger game than they can actually play.
Moe Lane (crosspost)
PS: Scott Walker’s site. Because, as I said: no complacency.
That last point will ensure that Gov. Walker beats this recall effort.
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I don’t like the idea of recall elections. We don’t have them in Florida and I think it is a good thing we don’t have them.
Anyone worried Feingold will ride in White Knight style? And what impact that might have? I’ll admit to having very little knowledge of insider Wisconsin politics, but this seems a distinct possibility.
If Feingold wanted in, I think he’d be in.
Already. He’d be in already.
@BG5: Where in FL are you? I’m in the NE.
(South) Lake County. I’m running for county wide office this year.
Good luck! I work in Duval County and live in Nassau (because I refuse to subject my kids to duval county public schools).
My sister lives and works in Duval.
Eh, I’m with Althouse on Fiengold. If it looks like the other candidates are terrible, a good possibility, he’ll “reluctantly” run to “save the State”.
The Dem campaign will probably be “A return to normalcy and civilty” with the Unions doing the heavy lifting on savaging Walker. The idea is to make the populace sick of turmoil and argument with the promise of everything becoming quiet and calm once again if they win. They need a candidate who can pull that off. Fiengold fits the bill, he was lefty to the core, but pleasant.
The advantage Walker has is that he’s got a record of success with his reforms to campaign on and he’s a calm and pleasant man. Kasich in Ohio had neither as he was irritable and Ohio’s “people’s veto” prevented his Union reform law from ever going into effect.
That said, it’s going to be a rough Summer in WI.
The only good thing to come out of any of this may be the draining of resources Dems will need in other pursuits. Aruges–agreed–Althouse is who I am listening to on this. Like a bashful beauty queen, Feingold will step in “Me? awww, you guys–ooohhkay . . .” I’m just not sure if any of it will work at this stage in the game. And Mr. Gator, good luck with your campaign. I’m the product of Volusia county public schools; aunt and cousins live in Jax.
Back in the early 60s I went to 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade in Jacksonville. When my family moved to California and I entered 5th grade I was effectively a year behind the local kids and had to work like a son of a gun to catch up. Sounds like the Duval county schools haven’t gotten any better over the years.
Re: #4: (h/t the Jay Weber Show out of Milwaukee for pointing this story out)
Strike out Democrat and replace with Unions as the organization that doesn’t know who to run. It’s shocking the one special interest group’s control over the party. The Democrat party has completely abdicated control to a bunch of unelected power brokers. Imagine the alternate universe were the Koch family meeting with 20 other major business leaders in the state to hand-pick a Republican candidate for office.