Scott Walker’s hilarious screwup: He messed with University of Wisconsin — and infuriated his state

[DonViejo]

This guy is seriously the best the Republicans have? Here's why he's backtracking on a lame new education "reform"

HEATHER DIGBY PARTON

So the scuttlebut among the Villagers is that Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is the GOP’s Great Whitebread Hope, the man Jeb Bush has to beat. I’ve written before about the political establishment’s habit of picking out an upper midwestern Governor in the mold of Robert LaFollette to push as the GOP’s best chance to appeal to the proverbial “independents” who are desperate for a Republican reformer with results. In each election cycle you read endless arguments that start with this premise:

You could make a good argument for a Midwestern governor as the Republican presidential nominee,” said Larry Sabato, a political science professor and director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. “The Midwest has electoral votes Republicans need to reverse their fortunes in the Electoral College.”

One could say the same thing about the West and the Northeast. The GOP could use those electoral votes just as well, but but for some reason nobody makes the case that the Republicans will win if they nominate the Republican Governor of Maine for president. This seems to be more of a beltway fever dream than anything else. Polling shows that people really aren’t that “independent” and reforms are in the eye of the beholder. In any case, one need only look to past big winners Tim Pawlenty and Tommy Thompson to see how well it worked out.

Still, Walker seems to be thrilling the punditocracy even more than these bland Governors usually do. This undoubtedly has to do with the fact that he survived a recall effort and won re-election afterwards, which makes him in the eyes of the beltway some sort of giant slayer. But the fact is that he first won in the Democratic bloodbath of 2010 and then barely eked out a win in the next Democratic bloodbath of 2014. In the middle of those two off-year Republican landslides, he was recalled! No other Governor in the nation was recalled, but Scott Walker was and that somehow makes him a great moderate reformer who is a GOP national hero. By that logic, more Governors should want to be recalled so they can be admired for their political brilliance.

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http://www.salon.com/2015/02/06/scott_walkers_hilarious_screwup_how_he_messed_with_university_of_wisconsin_and_infuriated_his_state/

[2naSalit]

1. This is what happens

when an intellectually challenged individual steals an election and then tries to kill academia.

I love Wisconsin, have numerous ties there and have been saddened by what this ignorant, greed driven charlatan has done to it.

[deutsey]

2. I think one reason he's the rising golden boy

is the Kochs favor him, which means $$$$$$$$$$$$ and easy access to networks of very powerful interests for those who jump aboard his bandwagon.

I see him, also, as an eager and willing political stooge who will do everything the Kochs et al., want so long as he gets to play president.

[HereSince1628]

4. He and the ALEC fed legislature are surely golden boys for Koch...BUT

The VERY saddest thing that this has re- -demonstrated to me is that Wisconsin IS NOT REALLY PROGRESSIVE. It isn't even really a pale shade of blue.

Wisconsin is filled with pro-tea party racists. Anti American Indian/First Nations, Anti-Black, Anti-Hispanic and due to the geographic reality that creates...collectively Anti-Urban.

Wisconsin made BILLIONS making paper through VERY toxic technology. Advancing regulation and technology that advanced productivity put MANY people out of work.

That's resented. Greatly. It's blamed on environmental regulation, and while it's really more logical to suggest the losses are based on advances in productivity people upstate have their knickers in a knot. It PAINS them.

So who to blame? Unproductive people of color who've never done a hard days work...according to the Krafting paper pulpers and their mostly uneducated supporters.

This is WI reality and it has been so as the economy changed...so we've got a bunch of pissed off people who blame other people for problems that should rightly be blamed on at least a third bunch of people.

Wisconsin isn't blue. Don't kid yourself. Wisconsin is red, as in red-faced and pissed off that the good things that were happening around Stevens Point A.R.E.N.T. happening in the same way to the same sort of people.

It's blamed on non-whites, and democrats white and nonwhite, who support equality of non-whites.

It's the same story we read decades ago about Birmingham Alabama

[Scuba]

6. Sadly accurate.

[n2doc]

3. He's proven to be a loyal Koch ball-washer

That's why he is getting the push. They know that they can depend on him to do their bidding.

[Orsino]

5. So he's backpedaling on this wording...

...but not on $300 million in cuts? And he keeps getting reelected?

[Katashi_itto]

7. No sympathy. They keep electing Republicans.

[sendero]

8. Exactly....

.... and that goes for the whole country. "Be careful what you ask for, you just might get it"