Ah, now it's "perpetual War" in Wisconsin

[n2doc]

Wisconsin's rallying cry: Throw the bums out
In this once-tranquil state, activists are gathering signatures to trigger recall elections of 16 state senators – 8 Republicans and 8 Democrats. It's been political warfare since the union law's passage.

Nicholas Riccardi, Los Angeles Times
April 4, 2011



Reporting from La Crosse, Wis.— In Wisconsin, the new normal is perpetual political warfare.

Ever since a Republican governor and GOP-dominated Legislature pushed through a law to curtail the collective bargaining rights of most public employee unions, this normally get-along state has engaged in all-or-nothing partisan combat.

Activists are gathering signatures to trigger recall elections of 16 state senators — eight Republicans and eight Democrats. Analysts and political professionals in both parties agree that the Republicans are more threatened. Democrats could even retake the Senate if they oust three Republicans without losing any of their own seats.


more

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/la-na-wisconsin-recall-20110404,0,6692845.story

So... we should just quickly give up? I wasn't aware that the kochroaches had given up. No peace until victory!

[ewagner]

1. Giving up = suicide...

What I've been struck by since immediately after the Walker election, is that Walker doesn't seem to understand that people fight hardest when their very existence is at stake....and that's exactly what he set out to do.

He set out to make it a life-or-death struggle for the Unions
He set out to make it a life-or-death struggle for the Democratic Party

Surrender for either the Democratic Party or the Unions means suicide.

Walker turned this into an existential battle...Tommy Thompson, for all his faults, knew he could get his way by co-opting the other parties and getting them to give him some, but not all, of what he wanted, a little bit at a time...Thompson was (and probably is still) several magnitudes smarter than Walker and the Koch brothers.

Our side cannot give up...we cannot give in or we will lose everything...we won't be able to get it back by giving in and waiting for the next election because the radical agenda of the Republican Party will become the "new normal" and the citizens of Wisconsin will have to content themselves in future elections with the choice of "being hung with a new rope or an old rope." ....and just like the whole national political "normal" has moved to the political right without Americans taking much notice, so will Wisconsin....the new choices will be between "center-right"(which is constantly moving ever-more rightward) and "radical right".

We cannot lose this fight...

If we do, then we of the progressive/liberal beliefs will be wandering in a strange wilderness for the next 40 years.

[Taverner]

2. Exactly - and we need to make an example of this struggle

It has to be successful, and it has to work as a "how to" for future struggles

[socialist_n_TN]

9. Good post and I agree.........

Wisconsin is a template for this struggle, which is why everybody is looking at that state.

The RW meme that they TRIED to put out right after the law was passed, was, "Give up. It's the law now and there's no use in fighting it anymore." That made some inroads, but ultimately it didn't work.

I say it only over when WE say it's over. Whether that's in Wisconsin or Tennessee.

[DainBramaged]

3. as the press tries to demonize the Left yet again

political war my ass, Walker is a whore, that's all.

[Doctor_J]

4. It's actually a struggle between real Americans and the Cock brothers

between democracy and fascism. the other posters here are correct. If Walker wins this, democracy is dead, both in WI and the US. I have doubts that we are ready to do whatever it takes to hold off the Cocks

[Search4Justice]

5. Good informative read, thanks. n/t

[HereSince1628]

6. The powers do not like it when the people don't follow the script.

Geometrically, we call this orthogonality. Being politically orthoganol tends to just piss off the folks in power who depend on the 'peed-ons' being not only predictable but also passive.

Walker and the Fitzgerald boys pressed too hard, unlike the graceful bending of society to the right advocated by Morris/Clinton via the DLC, and they have caused a catastrophic failure of the polictical mettle.

(With all do apologies to the bards involved): Something's happening here, and what it is ain't exactly clear. But the state's dems have decided to do something very unliberal. We are making a stand. We could lose, we may win, but things will never ever be the same again.

[Scuba]

7. That would be the city of Viroqua, not Veroqua. n/t

[bobthedrummer]

10. Yep, the county seat of Vernon in the Driftless Region n/t.

[Scuba]

11. A city built over a huge cave, with "blind" trout in a subterranian stream. n/t

[bobthedrummer]

13. Home of WDRT Community radio

http://www.wdrt.org

[Scuba]

14. I hear Viroqua is a "hippie town" now. Is that true. It sure wasn't in 1968. n/t

[bobthedrummer]

15. LOL-not at all

:rofl:

[hfojvt]

20. must be thinking of Richland Center

the Pine River Food Co-op seems to be doing well, having moved into where the corner drug store was. There are large numbers of old hippies living in the Gays Mills area to the south of Viroqua.

[hfojvt]

19. kinda marginal to call Viroqua a "city"

says the guy who used to live close to Hub City.

[Ellipsis]

8. "Once tranquil state" not a care in the world, just laid back midwesteners...

Yah! just laying on hay stacks chewing on straw, staring at the clouds.

Ohh, look cows!

[sarge43]

17. Sam Houston called it.

"They (Northerners)are not a fiery, impulsive people ... But when they begin to move in a given direction, they move with the steady momentum and perseverance of a mighty avalanche."

In other words, don't piss off the Badger



Oooo, tractor!

[madrchsod]

12. once again it`s everyone in the land between the mountains are rubes

only the east and west coasts are the beacons of enlightenment

[Scuba]

16. I beg to disagree...

Madison, Wisconsin - March, 2011

[madrchsod]

18. i was being sarcastic...in fact,

madison should be the capital of the of the land between the mountains.