For good reason!
“Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” — Samuel Johnson, 1775.
“The race card is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” — David Blaska, 2022.
The cover of Sunday’s New York Times Magazine features a young woman named Leah Spicer. She’s running as a Democrat for State Assembly in the rural district centered around Dodgeville (just west of Madison WI) against moderate (and gay!) Republican incumbent Todd Novak. Remember how Hillary Clinton treated Wisconsin as flyover country? The NY Times piece details how national Democrats ignored the grass roots — leading to the current 61-37 GOP advantage in state legislative chambers — by betting their money on high-priced, Washington-based consultants. Party chairmen like Wisconsin’s Ben Wikler are trying to recuperate.
Wikler seems miscast to engineer a 72-county Wisconsin strategy. The young man returned to the west side of progressive-blue Madison after making his bones on the D.C. Beltway at MoveOn.org. Regardless, the magazine piece should be required reading for political science majors. It’s all about recruiting candidates, raising dollars, and mobilizing voters.
By October, WisDems had pulled in more than $28 million in individual donations, about two-thirds of which came from outside the state. … By contrast, the equivalent figure for Arizona was about $8 million.
Good stuff, but the analysis steers clear of issues — and that is what is killing Democrats here and nationwide in 2022. You want issues? (You can’t handle the issues!) Let’s start with NY Times columnist and moderate conservative Ross Douthat:
The Democratic Party … has delivered the worst inflation since the 1980s, … the southern border’s highest-recorded rate of illegal crossings, [and] … a multi-year spike in homicide rates that has erased at least 20 years of gains.
— “In 2022, reality has a conservative bias”
Gov. Tony Evers and Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes could not defend the State Capitol during the riots of 2020! They and the city’s Democrats told police to stand down, allowing BLM crazies to smash windows, knock down statues of a slavery abolitionist who gave his life in the Civil War and that of a feminist icon on the opposite side of the Capitol. They sided with the criminal Jacob Blake and allowed Kenosha to burn.
And dysfunctional schools!
Not to mention (because we will), failing schools led for the past 14 years by Evers, first at the Department of Public Instruction and now as governor. (That Milwaukee high school where Barack Obama rallied for Barnes and Evers 10-29-22? Only three of every 10 students read at grade level; only 9.5% are proficient in math.) Public schools now teach hateful critical race theory and protect — if not promote — gender dysplasia.
Q. Which leaves Democrats with … what? … for issues. A. The race card! It’s Willie Horton all over again! The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel — all in for Tony Evers — prostituted itself by swallowing whole a tip from the far-Left SIEU union that the construction company owned by challenger Tim Michels has no black supervisors. Now THERE is a racist dog whistle! The newspaper had to run this correction:
“Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said that public documents showed Michels Corp. does not have black employees in management positions. … The company … says that across the corporation’s full slate of subsidiaries, 17.3% are either women or minorities.”
— Wisconsin Right Now reporting.
Not that the pool is deep. Nationally, only 5.1% of construction workers are black. (Source here.) John Nichols of the Defund-the-Police Capital Times also carries water for Mandela Barnes:
The Republican attack ads have been vicious this year — especially the ads that portray Barnes, the first black Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Wisconsin, as “dangerous” and “different.”
Like Pavlov’s dog, Nichols can’t resist the “dog whistle” cliché. In his Sunday WI State Journal Barnes puff piece, Nichols avoids the words “crime,” “police,” and “public safety.”
Blaska’s Bottom Line: Back to that NY Times Magazine article. We agree: “Yard signs … do vote because your neighbors see the signs, and the more signs they see, the more inclined they are to consider why you have the sign out there.”
Education
Blaska Policy Werkes 
Andrew Sullivan (no Righty, he!): Will DementiaJoKe And Despicable Lefty FINALLY_GET_IT…Their Far-Left Record Has Made The Far Right More Electable.
Money Quote: “It therefore doesn’t surprise me that in (DementiaJoKe’s) final pitch to voters this week, (DementiaJoKe) barely mentioned his record; HE_DIDN’T_TALK_ABOUT_INFLATION,_THE_LOOMING_RECESSION,_CRIME_, (illegal) IMMIGRATION,_COVID.”
Yard signs? The Gotch is ALL IN on them there!
When he sees those displayed by his neighbor (a [mercifully!] former Lefty County Board member), he knows, immediately and at once, who NOT to vote for!
The Gotch
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I thought the number of dems to repuks was 15-9. bawwww haaaa haaaa
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Regarding yard signs. An interesting test will occur here in Madison-lite East Lansing, MI. Our school board election includes exactly ONE non-woke candidate out of ten. In many East Lansing neighborhoods, almost ALL of the yard signs are for various liberal-left candidates. Virtually none of the signs are for this lone anti-woke candidate, who is running on a very reasonable program of simply enhancing school transparency so parents can know what the kids are doing. Every fifth or sixth house has these liberal-lefty yard signs. But what about all those other houses without any signs at all? I think the vote total for this one candidate standing alone will be some measure of how large a silenced minority we have in our midst. I will report the results next week.
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define “woke”
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Like Justice Potter Stewart said, “I know it when I see it.”
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Yes. This conservative had his car vandalized for bearing a bumper sticker with a conservative message. I am, indeed, afraid to put up a yard sign. I like my house the way it is….
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what was the “message”? some deserve a terrible response.
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61-37 due to gerrymandering and not Clinton.
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We no longer blame Clinton for Monica, I mean, Hillary??????
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No house fires in Madison from yard signs , they know better, you would think they would wonder why no righty signs. They know better, the house will be torched by the crazies lefties. Not many for the left either, you would think they would be afraid huh? Nah, they know the righties are really harmless unlike the left.
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I think that the main problem with the pitch that the dem’s are making this election cycle is that they are ignoring every major issue that most of us can easily point to.
IE: Inflation, crime, the fact that our savings that were making money under Trump are now loosing money under Biden, schools that don’t teach our children to read, write and do math at grade level; the very real threat of us running out of food and heat during this upcoming winter, the high cost of putting gas in your tank, the very real possibility of global war and so on.
The only issue that they seem to care about is abortion as seen by the constant drum beat by the liberal press, ( I mean, mouth pieces for the democrat party). This is witnessed by the article in Channel 3000 today.
https://www.channel3000.com/battleground-wisconsin-are-abortion-rights-still-a-primary-issue-for-voters/
The response by Kiara Kiki Jenkins that said how most of us think says it all when she said:
“It’s an important issue, but it definitely won’t flip any elections. Democrats are going all in on abortion, which is foolish. Unfortunately they won’t learn anything from it, though. It’s sad. People care more about their own livelihood and safety than an issue that only affects a small percentage of Americans.”
The problem with the abortion pitch is that I think most people regard abortion as a rather odious issue that they would rather not think about let alone come to terms with even if they had participated in one in some way or another.
The dem’s also promise a turn around of the economy, our schools, but they do so without a clear plan.
They don’t even mention the other issues that many people have said to me that they worry about.
That, in addition to the FACT that they have had two years under the democrat control over the Presidency, the U.S. House, the U.S. Senate and most major agencies in the federal government. The Wisconsin Governor, Lt. Governor, Attorney General, many mayoral positions in major cities in Wisconsin as well as many school board, county board seats and city council positions in Wisconsin but under their leadership we have only seen our world in every sense is going into the crapper.
We have all seen how cities and states run by the dem’s are also going into the crapper but red states that are run by more conservative politicians seem to be doing a lot better in all regards.
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It used to be “For the Children!” was the last refuge of the scoundrel but that became all abortion, all the time.
Now the Left wonders where everyone went.
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Abortion isn’t the left’s big issue – it’s DEMOCRACY.
This will also be the Republicans big issue after Trump announces.
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Democracy as in 250,000 absentee votes already sent out to unidentified, unverified voters in Pennsylvania. That Democracy?
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Democracy as in our completely objective mainstream and social media platforms.
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Maybe we just need a referendum on if we want democracy ( representative republic) or something else like socialism, communism, dictatorship, etc. Unfortunately you would have to have an explanation of all because they are not taught in schools anymore.
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Seems like Biden has real problems with the coal miners union. Biden stated that he wants to shut down all coal fired power plants thus putting many coal miners out of a job. The United Mine Workers of America has some 35,000 members. Around 20,000 are actual coal miners. Many towns in West Virginia, western Pennsylvania, southwest Virginia or eastern Kentucky and the lively hood of those living in them are dependent on the salaries paid to the coal miners.
https://umwa.org/news-media/press/biden-comments-about-shutting-down-all-coal-fired-power-disheartening-umwa-says/
Way to go Brandon!
Four days before the mid-term elections you announce that you are going to essentially put many more thousands of people out of work and further create economic distress for them and their families as well as those who live in the towns that they live, work and shop in.
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27 Of 30 Most Crime Ridden Cities RUN_BY_LEFTY
We’re shocked…SHOCKED…says no one!
The Gotch
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