Wisconsin: State Assembly leader packing on floor

[Scuba]

http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/state-assembly-leader-packing-on-floor/article_46f5c190-4ea4-11e1-a90e-0019bb2963f4.html

The Republican lawmaker who presides over the state Assembly said Friday he's been carrying a concealed weapon during floor sessions. Speaker Pro Tem Bill Kramer, of Waukesha, essentially controls the chamber during debate, presiding over procedures and controlling the debate. He also can order spectators out of the chamber if he so chooses.

...

He said he feels he needs the weapon given the toxic atmosphere at the state Capitol, and he's not the only lawmaker packing in the chamber. "Have you been in the Capitol lately?" Kramer said. "The saying is you don't need a gun until you need it. I hope I go to my grave having never fired at anything but a paper target."

Bands of protesters still angry over Republican Gov. Scott Walker's contentious collective bargaining law have spent the past year harassing GOP legislators.

One threw a beer on state Rep. Robin Vos, R-Burlington, co-chairman of the Legislature's powerful finance committee, in a Madison bar in September. Last week, protesters heckled Walker from the Assembly's overhead galleries as the governor delivered his state-of-the-state address in the chamber. The next night during debate on a divisive mining permit bill, Kramer ordered the galleries cleared after agitators hung a banner over a railing and hurled profanities at lawmakers.

Bands of angry protesters!!! One even threw a beer!!! The inhumanity!!!!

[gopiscrap]

1. That is so uncalled for

wtf we've become a bannana republic

[julian09]

3. I hope he is a good shot.

The way the rammed that bill through, was like a bannana republic.

[gratuitous]

2. Well, when you don't have a substantive argument, violence is the first resort

I wonder how long it will be before some set of facts or circumstances fit Mr. Kramer's template that equates to "Shoot!" in his mind? And who will get plugged? A protestor? A fellow Republicans? An annoying fly?

[southernyankeebelle]

5. Some how I don't feel sorry for this man. Has he bothered to asked why it has gotten

so bad? What is wrong with the republicans? They are the ones who are starting this crap. The president of the United States gives a speech at a prayer breakfast and you have a Congressman walk out as he is giving the speech and you have a senator Hatch get on the floor of the senate and say Obama thinks he is Jesus. All because his speech was about helping the poor and these people call themselves christians? There mad because Obama spoke from the heart and told them what the real Jesus was about. They didn't like it because they think Jesus was a republican.

[dembotoz]

4. i know bill or at least i knew bill

business contacts

we talked politics from time to time over coffee at a mcdonalds

this was before he got elected...
he seems to have changed
i would not know him anymore

we would discuss
argue would be too strong of a term....

very sad
i used to while not consider him more of an aquaintance
it was at least on pretty good terms

very sad

[thelordofhell]

6. Heaven forbid you listen to your constituents

Just shoot 'em and let god sort 'em out

[Blue Owl]

7. Hey but maybe it was a pink hope pistol with pretty pink bullets

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002262135