Attention Progressives
By Mitch Berg
Ahem.
At the risk of dispersing some of this blog’s usual decorum:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
(breathe)
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
I’m not usually one for end-zone happy-dancing. But after all the “you are teh racist/sexist/anti-worker/anti-middle-class/teabagger!/Koch-sucker/crap all of us conservatives have had to sit through since the last election, frankly, I think we’re entitled.
Last night’s victory in Wisconsin, like the “budget compromise” in DC and the Minnesota state budget, weren’t unalloyed victories – but in this case, it wasn’t even as close as it looked for the Wisconsin Democrats.
Think about it, “progressives”; you just spent $40,000,000 of your unions members’ dues – twice as much as the entire campaign for the entire Wisconsin State Senate cost in 2010.
Twice as much as the GOP spent.
You did it, you said, because you just knew Wisconsinites, deep down inside, were a bunch of liberals! Not without reason; Barack Obama won every single one of those districts in 2008.
You – every damn one of you – just knew that you’d flip three, four, maybe even all six seats! Because – you just knew this – Wisconsin just BLEEEEEEEDS “progressive”!
Or at least you had to hope so – because this, along with this autumn’s vote in Ohio on a slate of reforms similar to Walker’s – could mark the beginning of the end, not of public unions, but of public unions as a critical, game-ending force in national politics.
Because in a few years, with more stories like this floating around out there, even more voters will see what a crock of crap you “progressives” have been selling for so long.
Your platform – which, when you strip away all of the happy-talk, is “we will force private sector workers to work ’til they’re 72 so public union members can retire with full benefits at 55” – just isn’t working anymore.
And what did you get for your tens of millions?
You got two – one that everyone knew we were going to lose, and one squeaker against a guy with lots of personal electability issues, The rest of them – even the Darling-Pasch race, which started the evening’s returns with Pasch winning – weren’t even close.
And Shelly “MAKE NO MISTAKE, WE ARE IN A WAR” Moore? Yep, you were in a war. And you were Italy. And even with all that union money for those obnoxious, “A Better Minnesota”-style TV ads, and all those union people trawling the streets, and all those Twin Cities “progressives” coming across the river to help out? Not to gloat, but that was the sweetest victory of them all last night, at least for a Twin Cities conservative who got to watch that race close-up from across the Saint Croix.
Sixteen points.
And the Democrats’ Holperin seat is looking kinda squishy in next week’s round of recalls. Your two pickups could very easily turn into one by this time next week.
Scott Walker has been affirmed; Barack Obama has been refudiated.
You want to call this a war? You know how those end, right?
August 10th, 2011 at 6:59 am
Wait, Wisconsin Democrats spent millions of other people’s money and don’t have a lot to show for it?
Stop the presses!
August 10th, 2011 at 7:16 am
At some point, they have to wake up, don’t they?
August 10th, 2011 at 7:36 am
We can only hope, doc!
Shrill Shelly was still sqwauking even in defeat saying that this is what democracy is all about! That’ the first statement that she ever made that I agreed with! The people rejected her with a capital R! Now, it will be interesting to see what punitive action her school board metes out to her for using school time/resources to campaign and making a snide remark when she was caught. I won’t hold my breath, but, if anyone knows anyone in her school district, maybe a couple of complaint calls to the board would get something started.
August 10th, 2011 at 8:11 am
I enjoyed it immensely, too. Shelly Moore was a ghastly candidate and richly deserved her fate.
August 10th, 2011 at 8:19 am
‘We breathe fail’ is an understatement. The Weekly Standard article you linked to should be bookmarked and this quote spread far and wide: “Meals and moral support? The union’s got your back. A job? Not so much.”
Shelley Moore deserved to lose, but I feel bad for first year outstanding teacher Megan Sampson losing her job while Moore probably keeps hers.
August 10th, 2011 at 9:04 am
Shelly Moore lost? I’m doing the Happy Dance, and I don’t even live in Wisconsin. Can we change Wisco from purple to red now?
August 10th, 2011 at 9:26 am
“Barack Obama won every single one of those districts in 2008.”
“The fact of the matter remains that, fighting on Republican turf, we have begun the work of stopping the Scott Walker agenda,” said Democratic Party Chairman Mike Tate.
“Republican turf” that went for Obama in 2008. You know, there’s political spin, and then thenre’s “your head spinning on your shoulders like a cyclotron” spin.
August 10th, 2011 at 10:09 am
But Mitch-they didn’t actually care about winning the recall elections. The unions were simply distributing a 31 million dollar stimuless program to put WI workers back to work. It is so cynical of you to make this about winning and losing.
August 10th, 2011 at 10:58 am
NW, Tate did get that point right. Shelly’s attempt was pretty much doomed to failure since her district is pretty much a GOP district; even PPP didn’t give her much of a shot. There’s a very hard core of progressives in the district (witness how the cities of Hudson and River Falls voted), but the overall district is far more GOP friendly than Dem friendly.
That the district went to Obama tells you how weak a candidate McCain was (despite clownie and the NYT’s spin about him being electable) and how badly the GOP Congress had tarnished the GOP brand.
August 10th, 2011 at 11:06 am
Shelly Moore was a poor choice by the Democrats, but an understandable one. She had the motivation, the ideology, and the networking that the unionistas valued, but she had a slew of personal and policy issues on which she skewed against her district. And she had a very public history of non-centrist remarks.
I knew she was in trouble when I got one of her mailers that said that she supported hunters and hunters’ rights in a very forced, awkward pitch. You could tell she was desperately trying to peel off the squishies, but the whole tone was wrong for someone who actually was a hunter. It had to have been written by some copywriter in NYC or a partisan hack in DC it was so bad. Moore couldn’t have done more to motivate hunters to vote for Sheila than send that out.
August 10th, 2011 at 11:28 am
I’m sorry, but any potential candidate who has been filmed shaking their fist in the air is finished. Even Keith Ellison hasn’t been that stupid. Shelly Moore was repulsive, and she got repulsed. Good for Wisconsin.
August 10th, 2011 at 12:48 pm
” I mean, it’s all about winning, right!” – Flush
August 10th, 2011 at 2:35 pm
To repeat: If the 2 Democrat recall elections next Tuesday flip to Republicans, then they are right back where they started from and all their money was wasted. I couldn’t think of a more perfect use for DFL/Union cashola than to get it shoved right back up their ass and told “NO! Now sit the hell down and STFU!”
August 10th, 2011 at 2:47 pm
I’m confident that the bottom feeding Progressives/Liberals are going to lose 1 if not both of the Dem Sen recalls. Even if they eek out a victory in both that’s a net gain of no more than 2 seats (in real terms a zero gain), at the cost of something like $20M each. A page right out of Charlie Sheens book on “winning”.
Please Dems, run another Moore, I enjoy watching a commie/socialist commit ritual suicide.
August 10th, 2011 at 3:09 pm
Hello. I am a member of WEAC (Wisc teachers union). I have $10,000,000 to blow. Here are my choices:
A) Breakfasts for at-risk inner city youths
B) After school consuling and activities for at-risk inner city youths
C) A huge party at Noah’s Ark in Wisconsin Dells for unionists
D) Buying air time on Twin Cities radio and TV stations for a socialist candidate who doesn’t have a chance of getting elected.
Our members vote C, but we decided to go with D.
August 10th, 2011 at 3:10 pm
Badger Blogger has a very nice chart of union spending in the recalls. Very eye opening. Soooo teachers. Tell me about your union. Are you happy with the millions of dollars thrown away? This is what democracy looks like.
August 10th, 2011 at 3:20 pm
Expect a new ad blitz from Tom Dooher and Education Minnesota. This horrible defeat will only cement the need to pour more union money into the DFL.
August 10th, 2011 at 3:32 pm
My retired public school teacher aunt is bitching about the new law. Hmmm, she retired at age 55. She just spent $22,000 on a new kitchen (those cupboards are expensive). Ummm times is tough.
August 10th, 2011 at 4:32 pm
Damn Governor Walker. Chuck’s aunt has to put off the new bathroom.
August 11th, 2011 at 11:34 am
This picture was taken from a news article, I think I saw it in the strib, so it might have been modified without authorization. However, it is BEAUTIFUL:
http://bit.ly/qZNu0K (SFW)
August 11th, 2011 at 2:00 pm
Nice use of “refudiated.” Sarah Palin would be proud! A new word is created at just the right time!