The Wisconsin Recall Election

[_Brackite]

Romney now leads in WI:

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2012/election_2012_presidential_election/wisconsin/election_2012_wisconsin_president

While I am very happy about the big win that Governor Scott Walker got there last week, I still don't think that Mitt Romney will be able to win that state. President George W. Bush wasn't quite able to win the State of Wisconsin back in 2004.

[_EAllusion]

WI saved over a billion dollars and balanced the budget

We have a balanced budget amendment. We always balance the budget. The most recent balancing of the budget did clear up some structural problems that had been plaguing biannual budget balancing, but that was not due to collective bargaining. It was due to rather steep cuts in state allocation for education and health care. (Walker did find 500 million dollars extra to build more roads despite that not being a pressing need. The budget just reordered priorities away from certain domains and into others.)

Since school districts took massive cuts, it was helpful to exploit the lack of bargaining power the teachers now have and make unilateral cuts to their various forms of compensation. This led to mass quitting from teachers, which added to cost savings. This isn't going to be great for our reputation as one of the best public education systems in the nation, but turning Wisconsin into a poorly educated Wississippi probably aides the new Republican party, eh?

AND increased "free agency" by making membership in the union optional.

Completely false. Union membership was always optional. If you don't want to be part of a union, don't take a union job. If an employer doesn't want to hire union workers, then they can face a union strike. That's freedom. And this freedom was stripped away by law. You are no more coerced into joining a union than you are coerced into taking any job. Are people coerced into working for min wage at Wal*Mart BCSpace? Are they being forced to accept the terms of employment? Then why would they be coerced if an employer requires union membership as a term of employment? Remember, it's the employer who makes that call. And they make it because their labor force requests it as a term of having their labor. Free agency was decreased as people freely deciding to associate their demands in labor negotiations was made illegal. You hate this and therefore are not in favor of economic freedom. You're flat anti-liberty on this point. And rather than try to defend it in this case, you prefer your more typical tactic of just saying nuh uh to reality.

[_moksha]

When the economy is bad, people naturally turn to the leadership of multi-millionaires. Mitt could bring back jobs if he could work a leveraged buyout of Japan, Germany, China, Malaysia, Taiwan, Mexico, Canada and India. Shut them down and the world would turn to America for most of their imported products, and we wouldn't have unions so everyone would cling to the pant legs of industry for their trickle down.

[_bcspace]

While I am very happy about the big win that Governor Scott Walker got there last week, I still don't think that Mitt Romney will be able to win that state. President George W. Bush wasn't quite able to win the State of Wisconsin back in 2004.

I think Romney is a much stronger candidate than Bush. And while anything can change at any time, the current trend strongly favors Romney to take the lead in most, if not all, swing states. Plus, since he's now generating much more in campaign contributions, he can make several other nominally blue states competitive. Plus, if he's smart and the contributions can go further, he can campaign well in most states to help tilt more state governors and legislatures Republican. As we have learned from Florida and several other states, control of state government means control of elections which would enable us to put a stop to endless recount shenanigans.

Completely false.

Feel free to point out where the established facts are wrong. Like the King Follet sermon in the Terrestrial, this is going to be another Mission Impossible.

[_EAllusion]

Feel free to point out where the established facts are wrong. Like the King Follet sermon in the Terrestrial, this is going to be another Mission Impossible.

I already did. Feel free to show me how union membership was ever anything other than voluntary. An employer is presented with a choice by a union. Either the employer hires union only and the union works for them or the employer chooses not to and the union does not. That's it. For people who don't want to be a part of the union, this might suck, but it's as coercive as any other condition of employment a employer might have, such as having two years of experience in the field or having a requisite degree. Feel free to explain how making it illegal for people to get together and voluntary pool their labor resources in negotiations is anything other than a stripping of agency. Go ahead.

by the way, if if the threat of not having a job unless you play by the rules of employment is coercion, then it is fair to say that employers coerce their employees into everything they do, right? And if that is the case, there you have your justification for massive regulation of industry that you normally would claim to be opposed to when you are reflexively supporting whatever right-wing media supports.

Again, you're not in favor of economic freedom. You have no coherant political ideology beyond "Get the liberals!" and "Whatever rightwing media is saying is a-Ok with me!" And, because of your cheap semi-trollish hobby-horse comments on what it takes to be a faithful Mormon, you're not even that by your own criteria.

[_Brackite]

I think Romney is a much stronger candidate than Bush. And while anything can change at any time, the current trend strongly favors Romney to take the lead in most, if not all, swing states. Plus, since he's now generating much more in campaign contributions, he can make several other nominally blue states competitive. Plus, if he's smart and the contributions can go further, he can campaign well in most states to help tilt more state governors and legislatures Republican. As we have learned from Florida and several other states, control of state government means control of elections which would enable us to put a stop to endless recount shenanigans.

...

Thinking about it more, I do believe now that Mitt Romney has about a 50% chance of winning the State of Wisconsin. I think that the chances of winning the State of Wisconsin would go up for him if he picks Tim Pawlenty or Paul Ryan as his running mate.

A Good Day for the GOP in Wisconsin and California:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... california

53% in Wisconsin Now Approve Of Governor Walker’s Job Performance:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... erformance

[_EAllusion]

Obama crushed Romney in a hypothetical matchup in exit polling of those who voted in the Walker recall. He won by 12 points, which you can shave down to 10 when you take in the common +2 Democrat lean exit polls often have. And the exit polling made it clear than many of Obama's 2008 voters stayed home as they are "low interest" voters that need presidential stakes to get out to the polls. That Rasmussen poll is a complete outlier for an organization run by a Republican partisan that generally has a moderate Republican lean in its results. Why you'd cite that poll in isolation of the greater context beyond party cheerleading is beyond me.

Romeny is highly unlikely to win WI unless he has national polling numbers that make winning WI unnecessary anyway. He'll take places like Ohio first. Obama has a lot of personal popularity in the state. The reason Obama wouldn't touch the recall is that, in addition to being spineless and unconcerned, he has nothing to gain and everything to lose by interjecting.

[_EAllusion]

Huh. Baldwin is now quite comfortably beating Thompson in a hypothetical matchup according to Rasmussen, of all polling outfits. I don't know what to make of that, but is consistent with the trend-line of her gaining ground and tying him other, earlier polls. I viewed Baldwin as a weak candidate, but there you have it.

Meanwhile, Thompson has fallen into a dead heat with Eric Hovde, which has opened the door a crack for Neumann as well. That's also pretty shocking if only because of the ground Hovde has made up primarily with his wealth. To put it in perspective, you can't even find Hovde vs. Baldwin polling even though you can find Baldwin vs. Thompson, Fitzgerald, and Neumann because he was that much of an underdog. Thompson is a popular ex 3 term governor. It's stunning how effective political advertising is. Hovde is outspending the bejeesus out of his competitors in political advertising, and it's getting him to the top with it.

[_Brackite]

Knowing how big of an economic and financial mess the State of California is in now, I completely understand why GOP Governor Scott Walker did what he did.

Since the time that I created this Thread, two major cities in California have filed for bankrupcy. California is in a really big financial mess now, mainly due to its Bloated Government Pensions there. I believe that GOP Governor Scott Walker did the right thing for his State there.

[_EAllusion]

Knowing how big of an economic and financial mess the State of California is in now, I completely understand why GOP Governor Scott Walker did what he did.

Since the time that I created this Thread, two major cities in California have filed for bankrupcy. California is in a really big financial mess now, mainly due to its Bloated Government Pensions there. I believe that GOP Governor Scott Walker did the right thing for his State there.

Wisconsin has the only fully funded, well managed pension system at the state government level in the country and has had that for ages. So that would make the it the least likely government to need an overhaul to fix is bloated pension system with crippling unfunded liabilities. As far as that goes, Wisconsin's budgetary system was working swimmingly. Interestingly, there was rumbling of Walker trying to raid the pension fund earlier in his administration, but that died down in the recall hubbaloo.

More than that, I supported the compensation concessions such as requiring a restructuring of retirement planning. To me, saying stripping collective bargaining rights was the right and logical response on this point strikes me as like saying social security is a problem for the federal budget, so we should strip 65 year olds of the right to vote to make it easier to defund.