More ‘sky is falling’ hyperbole from inside the Madison bubble

One of these days, Paul Fanlund will encounter a real live conservative instead of getting his morning cup of joe filtered through some sociology panel at RadFest. 

Perhaps the Capital Times editor, hopelessly lost somewhere outside Dane County, will take a stool next to that over-the-road truck driver and get a load of what-fer with his mashed potatoes and gravy. Maybe he wonders into a Legion Hall or biker bar, mistaking it for a retro coffee house. Short of that, we’re looking at an intervention/deprogramming, Paul. A little exposure therapy for Madison’s inside-the-bubble boy.

In the meantime, Mr. Fanlund has discovered a book that reinforces Democrat(ic)-party dogma that Wisconsin has degenerated into a stygian hell hole in the eight years since the sainted Jim Doyle drained the state treasury of its last ruble. Because Republicans.

Mogadishu calling

Paul is giddy as a school girl over a book titled The Fall of Wisconsin: The conservative conquest of a Progressive bastion and the future of American politics.

We know that one thing has fallen in Wisconsin: the unemployment rate — to 2.8%, an all-time record low. 

• Property and income taxes have also fallen; they’re lower than in 2010.
• University tuition, frozen six straight years. 
• Health care ranks #1 in the nation.
• Everyone in poverty is covered under BadgerCare.
• The budget actually has a surplus.
• Pensions are fully funded.
• The state is spending more in actual dollars on education than ever.
• Wisconsin ranks in the Top 10 for employers.

Road could be better but Democrats want us to take the high-speed train to nowhere. Yeah, Wisconsin under Scott Walker is Somalia with snow.

The usual suspects

Fall of Wisconsin quotes people like UW-Madison political scientist Kathy Cramer; environmentalist Tia Nelson; and Democratic state Rep. Chris Taylor of Madison, “who courageously shone a light on the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and its mission to craft far-right legislation for statehouses nationwide.”

The Squire reminds our acquaintances that ALEC has a website, it’s not exactly secret. No courage required. (You want courage? Wear a MAGA cap on Monroe Street.) If states are the laboratories of democracy, as progressives like to say, then why not share what works and what does not among the 50 states? It’s up to the representatives elected by the people of each state to vote ideas up or down. In any event, Act 10 came not from ALEC but from the inspired imagination of Scott Walker.

“Fall of Wisconsin” (a beautiful time of year, BTW) does quote one Republican — at least, that is what Dale Schultz calls himself.

We lost so the game is rigged

Fanlund writes: 

The book also catalogs how Republicans have tried to rig the game with scads of untraceable dark money, outrageous gerrymandering, draconian voter identification laws to suppress voter turnout, and so on. The suppressed turnout was a particularly important factor in Trump’s 2016 presidential victory because it helped him win a razor-thin victory in Wisconsin — a pivotal swing state.

So gerrymandered that the 10th senate district, held by Republicans for decades and handily carried by Trump, went Democrat in a special election this spring. As for “suppressed turnout,” you might ask Hillary if she wishes she had not regarded our state as flyover country. 

Getting a free I.D. card is “draconian”?

As for dark money, ask One Scot Ross where One Wisconsin Now gets its loot to buy things like those Foxconn prophylactics. I have. He won’t.