Well, after tonight's results, Governor Walker has every right to feel like a rock star. His approach to solving Wisconsin's fiscal mess -- challenging public section unions and their "fiscal cancer" which had been devouring Wisconsin's state budget -- has resonated throughout the country as other states struggle to balance their own fiscal mess.
Governor Walker's medicine was to balance the budget by curtailing collective bargaining, asking state employees to pay more for their health care and pensions, and by giving schools and state agencies the freedom to openly negotiate their ever-increasing costs.
As a result, Walker becomes the first governor in history to survive a recall election, and provides damaging evidence that anti-union legislation is alive and well in Wisconsin. There's little evidence that the rancorous and divisive positions taken by public employee unions will abate anytime soon, but nonetheless, I can't tell you how terrific it feels right now.
After months of chaos including vandalism, lies and union thuggery in Madison (which is what community organizers like Obama thrive on) I feel like the storm has passed and a nice cool breeze is blowing in. I'm convinced that the people of Wisconsin were fed up with teachers complaining about having to pay a small part of their benefit costs, while so many others were paying double digit increases or losing their job entirely.
My wife and I walk by a house that is the poster child for everything I've hated about this recall. Handmade signs calling for Walker's recall -- not one but three, even a UNION PROUD sign pasted to the front window -- , someone standing on the street corner by their house asking for recall signatures, and frequent trips to Madison and Riverside Park to protest Walker's attempts to balance the state budget. It's been a struggle to walk pass those signs without wanting to knock some sense into them, but I realize you can't reason with a rabid dog. And something tells me their passion hasn't gone away. Chances are they will continue to smoke their pot and watch "Red Ed" Schultz and Rachel Maddow on MSNBC.
What's Walker's re-election mean?
Fortunately, the damage done to the union's monopoly will stand. And hopefully spread as another two years goes by. It's interesting to read in the Wall Street Journal that membership in the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), a union founded in Wisconsin in 1936, has declined in state from 62,818 in March 2011 to only 28,745 in February of this year. Membership in the American Federation of Teachers has declined instate from 17,000 to 11,000. I'm still looking for the membership numbers for the state's largest public-sector union, the NEA, but it's safe to say their numbers are down, as well.
In addition the state budget has been balanced. The unemployment rate has been dropping and is now below the national average of 8.2%. Property taxes are down, even if only a little. Apparently, fraudulent sick leave policies -- which allow employees to call in sick and then work the next shift for overtime pay -- have been ended. And the government has stopped forcibly collecting union dues from the paycheck's of state workers.
I've read a number of articles where school districts throughout the state are finally able to negotiate their healthcare benefits. Instead of taking what the union representative offered, schools are choosing alternative health plans that are saving them millions. In a few situations, schools remain with the union, but at a significantly lower cost. Competition works in the private sector -- it's great to see that it works in the public sector, as well.
Last but not least, the myth that union bosses represent their member's interests has been exposed as a lie. Now that union dues are voluntary, tens of thousands of union members have stopped paying them (as indicated above). Because unions used this money to play a major role in national politics, the implications of this change could be significant. Union bosses's bloated political action budgets aren't going to be as big as they were in the past. And if Walker's success can be duplicated in other states, think of the damage this will inflict on future union influence on elections starting with this fall's presidential contest.
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I spoke to a client this morning who had breakfast with a Democrat who was saying that Republicans (specifically from out-of-state) bought this election. "I guess money speaks," he was saying. Well, if it wasn't for the protesters who stormed Madison in February and made a major issue out of this, none of this would have happened. So the burden lies squarely on their shoulders. And how hypocritical is it of them to say money bought this election? President Obama has been fundraising ever since he took office in 2008. There's no questions money was spent in this state, but with good reason. People wouldn't have been contributing money if they didn't believe passionately about the cause -- when attacked, we attack back!.
The good thing to come out of this is that it has put Walker and Wisconsin into the national spotlight, given the Republicans a road map for fighting unions in Ohio, Florida, Texas and North Carolina, and shown that character counts. Walker didn't cave in on his conservative principles. He didn't compromise on his agenda, didn't reach across the aisle, and didn't apologize for changing the way things are done.
Walker said he was going to change things in Wisconsin, and he did. Changing a progressive state like Wisconsin which has voted Democrat in each presidential election since 1988, isn't easy. But unlike Obama, who couldn't admit to the change he wants, people liked what Walker brought to Wisconsin, and he raised millions of dollars (and gained voters because of it). One poll I saw had over 33% of union households voting for Walker.
That's why Walker won -- he didn't leave the state when it came time to vote, and he stuck to his principles when the union thugs brought out the big guns.
Last night, the left-leaning media (is that redundant?) was having a hard time reporting the election results. Early in the evening, they were calling it 50/50, and too close to call. At best they were indicating Walker was barely surviving the recall attempt. Surviving? Most of us were expecting a close fight, a late night and maybe even a recount before knowing the results. As it turned out, we knew the results before 10:00 CST. That doesn't sound like survival to me. Sounds like Walker kicked some ass.
Nonetheless, the folks at CBS, ABC, NBC and cable outlets spun the news of Walker's victory as being secondary to the fact that Obama had actually had a good night. Exit polling showed many of the people voting for Walker would still vote for Obama by 8-9 points. I've always said that this recall was about Wisconsin politics, not necessarily national (meaning Obama). The people of Wisconsin (Democrats, Independents and Republicans) DIDN'T like what the Democrats were doing to Walker.
I'm convinced the media over-reached early on by claiming this was going to be a referendum of Obama's presidency. As more and more polls indicated Walker was going to win, they more they backed off, saying politics is local.
I also think Obama is going to have trouble in Wisconsin this fall -- only because the president didn't support the unions, and didn't show them the respect they think they deserve. Obama's biggest supporters have always been the unions. The fact he didn't fight hard for them is going to come back to haunt him. When it come time to push out the vote and call in a favor, I don't know if they're going to be there. In Obama's mind, he is always the biggest person in the room -- not the unions, not the teachers, not the state workers, not the media. He should know better though, 'cause that's not the Chicago way.
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Walker may speak about mending fences and bringing both parties together, but if last night is indicative of anything it's that he doesn't have to back down anymore.
Let the Democrats come on bended knee. Let the Democrats support Walker's way of balancing the budget and cutting taxes. Let the Democrats realize that unions controlling our failing education system doesn't work anymore. Let the teachers and state workers have a voice with less influence from union bosses when it comes to paying for benefits and pensions. And let the losers from last night who proclaimed "Democracy is dead!" go back to Michigan were they have an audience. Let other states facing the same budget difficulties learn from Scott Walker that you don't have to be afraid of unions any more.
Because the union way is no longer the Wisconsin way.
If Scott Walker was a rock star before, he's a superstar now. FORWARD WISCONSIN!
I'm glad you brought out the left's lame argument that this election was "bought"....it is so typically hypocritical of them to cast stones at Walker for trying to raise funds to keep his seat in an effort THEY started, yet not blink an eye at the supreme leader, President Obama, who has done NOTHING but campaign and raise BILLIONS of dollars for his re-election from the very first day he set foot into the White House. And yet so much of the money the left wing raised for the Wisconsin recall effort didn't actually go to the campaign, but into the union coffers. Hopefully the pendulum will continue swingin towards fiscal responsibility toward the use of taxpayer dollars.
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