“Inside every progressive is a totalitarian screaming to get out.”
— David Horowitz.

More attention must be paid to the enemy of democracy in our midst — that being The Capital Times here in Madison WI.

Not long ago, its editor emeritus advocated using the machinery of government to defund the opposition — that being the Republican Party itself! (Read & weep!) “Dane County’s progressive voice,” as the publication bills itself, now wants unelected state bureaucrats to preemptively strike candidates from the ballot:

“It is entirely reasonable for the Wisconsin Election Commission to explore prospects for barring Trump and others who encouraged the insurrectionists from the state ballot.” (Read & shriek!) The Castros of Cuba could not have said it better. (Only in Spanish, presumably.)

---

The greatest jury is the American voter

Progressives demand that the “science” (as it is understood at the moment) of global warming and pandemic mitigation take top-down control of individual decisions. Peter Berkowitz explains that Woodrow Wilson argued in a 1912 essay that government should be “an instrument of civilization and of humanity” managed by a new professional class of highly trained and scientifically adept technocrats. 

“By virtue of their education and impartiality, they would rise above the mere consent of the governed in which the nation’s founders grounded the legitimate exercise of political power. They would discern “genuine public opinion” — that is, not the preferences people expressed through voting and the choices they made in all the other areas of their lives but the policies that the experts determined would promote the people’s better selves and best interests. 

“Through efficient, rational, central administration, the experts would implement public policy that was unlimited by any consideration — including citizens’ expressed preferences — other than the experts’ authoritative reconstruction of ‘the purpose of the people of the country.’”

---

Six commissioners would pre-empt voters

The governor appoints two of the six WI Elections Commissioners; the Republican and Democrat(ic) leaders of the Assembly and of the Senate appoint each of the other four. That’s potentially four Democrats and two Republicans, although the current make-up is three Dems and three GOPs due to staggered five-year terms. And no, you would not know these people. 

Currently, any citizen not restricted by felony criminal conviction may seek office after submitting sufficient nominating signatures and disclosing their finances. Their political affiliations, past votes or public statements are matters for voters to decide; not appointed commissioners.

But The Capital Times would allow nameless partisans to determine what constitutes insurrection, disloyalty, deviant thinking, and so on down the slippery slope.

More partisanship disguised as good gummint

Donald Trump is not the only name the progressive publication would strike from the ballot. Ted Cruz, Kevin McCarthy, and Jim Jordan — and, presumably, Ron Johnson — are just some of those it names. Pretty much anyone who voted to examine the results of the 2020 presidential election. Never mind that Jeremy Raskin, Sheila Jackson Lee and other Democrats voted the same way in 2016! It could be argued that Democrats’ relentless efforts to delegitimize Trump’s presidency helped fuel the January 6 riot.

The Capital Times was inspired to launch its shocking assault on democracy from an organization with the Orwellian name of “Free Speech for People.”

Of course, their scheme would do exactly the opposite. They would strip free speech away from the people because they do not trust the people to make the right decision. They might vote Trump again! Blaska Policy Werkes hopes they do not — but then, we are not totalitarian. 

Blaska’s Bottom Line: American citizens have the right to make the wrong choice, as they did on November 3, 2020.

How are YOU fighting progressivism?