The sort of bullshit they talk about is par for the course for Wisconsin Republicans over the past decade. I've alluded to it in the past but I don't think I've really gone into detail and I'm...
Exemplary
The sort of bullshit they talk about is par for the course for Wisconsin Republicans over the past decade. I've alluded to it in the past but I don't think I've really gone into detail and I'm going to do that now.
The first thing they did upon taking power in 2011 was removing school teachers' and other public employees' ability to collectively bargain. Over a hundred thousand people came to protest at the state capitol on its biggest night, but ultimately we weren't able to stop Republicans from doing it. According to this chart I found, Wisconsin's average teacher salary went down almost 7% between 1999 and 2016, with most of that decline coming between 2009 and 2016. That could be because of more experienced teachers leaving or because of pay cuts, but either way it's not a good look. Most districts serving rural areas here are for single towns and the surrounding area, which means there are lots of small districts serving a few hundred kids and are particularly vulnerable to pretty much any change in their situation. They were having money problems long before Republicans took power and those issues were only exacerbated. Removing collective bargaining and a number of other things I'm going to get into created a hostile climate for teachers in the state.
That spring, there was a state Supreme Court election between the conservative David Prosser and the liberal Joanne Kloppenburg. Kloppenburg was up by a couple hundred votes until a clerk in Waukesha County (the most Republican county in the state) "found" about 14,000 votes to give Prosser the win. It was not the first time as the article notes, nor the last that Waukesha County pulled some bullshit to give Republicans a boost. A few months later, Prosser choked one of his colleagues. He still has the job and he's up for reelection next year.
That same year, the state reneged on a contract the previous government had made for high-speed rail to be run between Madison, Milwaukee, and Chicago paid for with money from the 2009 stimulus. The manufacturer sued the state and won $50 million.
Also that year, the 26-year-old son of a Walker campaign donor got an $80k job with the state overseeing environmental matters. Thanks to public outcry he never actually reported to that job as far as I can tell, which is something.
Also in their first year, state Republicans reduced K-12 education funding by a total of $1.6 billion, $700 million through direct cuts to state funding and about $900 million by lowering the amount of money districts could raise through property taxes.
Around the same time, they cut about $300 million from the university system.
In 2015 the state tried to change the Wisconsin Idea, which is the philosophy the university system adheres to and is as sacred to me as any ideal I hold. It's about the idea that the university system should serve every corner of the state and that knowledge is valuable for its own sake, that it will make every facet of life better. That year, Republicans tried to change it to be about meeting the state's workforce needs, and people understandably got really pissed off about that and they backed down. They alsocut another $250 million in funding and ended tenure.
Predictably, this resulted in professors being poached, including at least two that I had when I went to college. UW-Madison, the state's flagship university, has been a world-class university for a long time, but it has started to slip in prestige in the last decade thanks to what Republicans have done.
There's also the Foxconn deal, in which the state gave Foxconn $3 billion and local areas gave another $1 billion to open a factory with 13,000 jobs in Wisconsin. In the two years since, the nearby interstate has been widened and people's homes were taken, but no jobs have been filled. This factory isn't far from the Illinois border and the deal was made at the same time that the state started putting ads on the trains in Chicago to lure people up here even though almost no millennial with better options elsewhere would move here.
I also want to talk about Glenn Grothman, the three-term Republican representative for the Congressional district north and northeast of Madison. He said so much dumb shit that for a while his campaign had to get him to stop talking. We also had Representative Sean Duffy, most famous for being on The Real World before his political career, who called Madison's mayor a communist.
And now back around to voter suppression. Voter ID laws probably handed the state to Trump in 2016. Barring a wave election, Republicans will never lose control of the state legislature. A Democrat is currently governor, but since the party will never control the legislature they can never repair the damage Republicans have done, only stall further damage until another Republican is inevitably elected governor. Unless and until the Democratic parts of the state outweigh the Republican parts, we are going to continue to regress from the place that began the 20th-century Progressive movement to one that looks like Kansas under Sam Brownback.
And now that I've written this all out I'm kind of sad. It's always in my mind that my state is running itself into the ground, but to write it out like this and bring all of it back to my mind is depressing.
Wow, it's amazing what one guy can do. It's also scary how much rides on his work. That is an obscene price, when so many states give voter lists for free.
Wow, it's amazing what one guy can do. It's also scary how much rides on his work.
In Alabama, it costs over $36,000 every time you pull a list. In Wisconsin, which has a huge issue around their purges, it's $12,500.”
That is an obscene price, when so many states give voter lists for free.
Well there's a big part of the problem. The group of people most affected and most able to address it have just thrown up their hands and given up. Nice job DNC!
Given that purges tend to affect Democratic voters, I was expecting to hear that the Democratic National Committee had a robust program to address them. When I reached Reyna Walters-Morgan, the DNC's director of voter protection and civic engagement, she said, “We rely very heavily on our state party partners to do some additional web work and follow up on these issues.” When I pressed, asking if the DNC was examining these lists with granular attention—the way Tingley-Hock does—she said we'd have to go off the record. During this secret, off-the-record conversation, she said nothing of any interest.
Well there's a big part of the problem. The group of people most affected and most able to address it have just thrown up their hands and given up. Nice job DNC!
The sort of bullshit they talk about is par for the course for Wisconsin Republicans over the past decade. I've alluded to it in the past but I don't think I've really gone into detail and I'm going to do that now.
The first thing they did upon taking power in 2011 was removing school teachers' and other public employees' ability to collectively bargain. Over a hundred thousand people came to protest at the state capitol on its biggest night, but ultimately we weren't able to stop Republicans from doing it. According to this chart I found, Wisconsin's average teacher salary went down almost 7% between 1999 and 2016, with most of that decline coming between 2009 and 2016. That could be because of more experienced teachers leaving or because of pay cuts, but either way it's not a good look. Most districts serving rural areas here are for single towns and the surrounding area, which means there are lots of small districts serving a few hundred kids and are particularly vulnerable to pretty much any change in their situation. They were having money problems long before Republicans took power and those issues were only exacerbated. Removing collective bargaining and a number of other things I'm going to get into created a hostile climate for teachers in the state.
That spring, there was a state Supreme Court election between the conservative David Prosser and the liberal Joanne Kloppenburg. Kloppenburg was up by a couple hundred votes until a clerk in Waukesha County (the most Republican county in the state) "found" about 14,000 votes to give Prosser the win. It was not the first time as the article notes, nor the last that Waukesha County pulled some bullshit to give Republicans a boost. A few months later, Prosser choked one of his colleagues. He still has the job and he's up for reelection next year.
That same year, the state reneged on a contract the previous government had made for high-speed rail to be run between Madison, Milwaukee, and Chicago paid for with money from the 2009 stimulus. The manufacturer sued the state and won $50 million.
Also that year, the 26-year-old son of a Walker campaign donor got an $80k job with the state overseeing environmental matters. Thanks to public outcry he never actually reported to that job as far as I can tell, which is something.
Also in their first year, state Republicans reduced K-12 education funding by a total of $1.6 billion, $700 million through direct cuts to state funding and about $900 million by lowering the amount of money districts could raise through property taxes.
Around the same time, they cut about $300 million from the university system.
In 2015 the state tried to change the Wisconsin Idea, which is the philosophy the university system adheres to and is as sacred to me as any ideal I hold. It's about the idea that the university system should serve every corner of the state and that knowledge is valuable for its own sake, that it will make every facet of life better. That year, Republicans tried to change it to be about meeting the state's workforce needs, and people understandably got really pissed off about that and they backed down. They alsocut another $250 million in funding and ended tenure.
Predictably, this resulted in professors being poached, including at least two that I had when I went to college. UW-Madison, the state's flagship university, has been a world-class university for a long time, but it has started to slip in prestige in the last decade thanks to what Republicans have done.
There's also the Foxconn deal, in which the state gave Foxconn $3 billion and local areas gave another $1 billion to open a factory with 13,000 jobs in Wisconsin. In the two years since, the nearby interstate has been widened and people's homes were taken, but no jobs have been filled. This factory isn't far from the Illinois border and the deal was made at the same time that the state started putting ads on the trains in Chicago to lure people up here even though almost no millennial with better options elsewhere would move here.
I also want to talk about Glenn Grothman, the three-term Republican representative for the Congressional district north and northeast of Madison. He said so much dumb shit that for a while his campaign had to get him to stop talking. We also had Representative Sean Duffy, most famous for being on The Real World before his political career, who called Madison's mayor a communist.
We also can't forget Senator Ron Johnson, who is unsurpisingly racist, thinks climate change is overblown, has probably been compromised by Russia, and has most recently been running interference for the regime by stirring up allegations with an investigation into Burisma.
And now back around to voter suppression. Voter ID laws probably handed the state to Trump in 2016. Barring a wave election, Republicans will never lose control of the state legislature. A Democrat is currently governor, but since the party will never control the legislature they can never repair the damage Republicans have done, only stall further damage until another Republican is inevitably elected governor. Unless and until the Democratic parts of the state outweigh the Republican parts, we are going to continue to regress from the place that began the 20th-century Progressive movement to one that looks like Kansas under Sam Brownback.
And now that I've written this all out I'm kind of sad. It's always in my mind that my state is running itself into the ground, but to write it out like this and bring all of it back to my mind is depressing.
Never is a long time. We'll see what happens in November.
We can only hope. The margin is at least close even with voter suppression.
Wow, it's amazing what one guy can do. It's also scary how much rides on his work.
That is an obscene price, when so many states give voter lists for free.
Every time I see your username I think the person who posted your comment was suspended, even though that's not how Tildes works.
Unfortunately the @deleted username is inactive, but @inactive is still available. @username is taken but has not made any posts.
Well there's a big part of the problem. The group of people most affected and most able to address it have just thrown up their hands and given up. Nice job DNC!
Yes it’s terrible, but I think another lesson is that sometimes you don’t need anyone else’s permission to help, if you know what needs doing.