It isn’t official news yet, but the big announcement is likely coming on Thursday:
One month to the day after the start of the effort to recall Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker from office, organizers have scheduled a Thursday press conference to provide a “special update” on how the effort is going.
And several liberal blogs and pro-recall Facebook pages said Wednesday that the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and United Wisconsin, the two groups spearheading the recall, already have collected more than enough signatures to force an election.
The effort to recall the Republican governor kicked off on Nov. 15, and organizers have until Jan. 17 to collect more than 540,000 valid signatures to force a spring recall election.
The blog New Dog Democrat reported Wednesday that more than 550,000 signatures have been collected and that organizers want to hit the 1 million mark before the deadline.
A million signatures?!? Just two weeks ago they were aiming for 750,000.
A million signatures would be, symbolically, a thermonuclear maelstrom. Even 540,000 valid signatures will be fucking huge!
Aside from likely derailing Walker’s harmful “stewardship”, and, you know…maximizing the possibility I can visit my family this summer, this is huge for Washington and other states.
The Walker episode sends a big shot across the bow of, what is almost certainly, a coordinated Republican Governor’s agenda.
For us here in Washington, what does this mean? It means Rob McKenna is put on notice. Walker made campaign promises that seemed quite moderate. Once elected, he turned to a radical Republican agenda. He cut education funding and betrayed public employees while giving out tax breaks to businesses, he did his damnedest to disenfranchise voters at the margins of society. And, in general, he steadfastly disregard the will of the people.
Would Rob McKenna really try pulling the ol’ switcheroo on Washingtonians the way Walker did to Wisconsinites? Well…if his decision to join the Republican AG lawsuit against the Health Care Reform law of 2009 is any indication…two years ago, I would have said, “absofuckinglutely!.” Now, with the events in Wisconsin, I think McKenna is forced to scale back on his agenda.
Should McKenna win next year, Washingtonians will owe Wisconsinites a huge debt of gratitude.
Update: They aren’t quite there, yet. The number of signatures gathered so far is 507,000, leaving a mere 33,000 more to gather. Practically, they will need something over 100,000 additional signatures to account for challenges and duplicates. Organizers have another month left to do that.
Was there ever any doubt? Polls have consistently shown Walker with about 38% of the vote in a hypothetical recall election. By next summer, Russ Feingold will be Wisconsin’s governor.
Also, let’s not forget that fed-up Wisconsinites are circulating more than Walker recall petitions. They’re also targeting four more GOP state senators. They only need to knock off one of them to take control of the state senate.
And we all already know what Ohio voters did to that state’s Walker-like anti-labor legislation, don’t we?
Walker got into office on false pretenses. He never told voters he was going to slash nearly a billion dollars from public schools and gut public workers’ rights to pay for eliminating taxes on rich manufacturers. His problem is that when you knife people in the back, they get mad and knife you back. He seems not to have thought through that part of human nature.
Mrs. Rabbit says she expects violence at the press conference. She thinks some Republican will show up with a gun. After all, they’ve been ramming signature gatherers with cars, assaulting them on sidewalks, and ripping up their petitions.
“This should be about right and wrong, not partisan politics,” Mrs. Rabbit says. “People need to see how wrong they [Republicans] are.”
Um, dear sweet wife, it looks like they do.
Recalling Walker — and I’m convinced it WILL HAPPEN — is a big deal. It’ll show the Machiavellian plotters in Wingnut Central that they DO NOT have the public’s support for their War Against Workers. Of course, they already know that, which is why they’re waging their War Against Voters. They know the only way they can prevail is by preventing American citizens from voting in their own country.
If there’s a coup in our country, and our legitimate elected government is overthrown, I won’t submit quietly; I’ll fight in the spirit of Grant at Shiloh.
Darryl, where in Wisconsin is your family? I have Wisconsin ties, too. Maybe our families could get together sometime?
“Should McKenna win next year, Washingtonians will owe Wisconsinites a huge debt of gratitude.”
Here’s some good news that’s been flying under the radar of most progressives. We all know GOP primary voters and caucus-goers are unhappy with their choices. But wait, there’s more, the D.C. punditry is predicting one, possibly two, third-party candidacies this year. Regardless of whether Romney or Gingrich gets the GOP official nomination, it looks like Ron Paul and possibly also Donald Trump are going to mount independent candidacies that will SPLIT the GOP vote. On the other side of the ledger, it looks like Michael Bloomberg is NOT going to run as an independent or third-party candidate. What this means is the GOP vote will be split between two or three candidates and Obama will need only a little over 40% to win. Clinton won in 1992 with 42% of the popular vote and we’re looking at another 1992 folks! The Republican Party is more horribly fractured than my progressive friends realize! The GOP ringmasters have a real problem on their hands. I mean a REAL problem! Either they have to talk Ron Paul out of running, or Ron Paul has to drop dead, or they CAN’T WIN because Paul will get at least 10% to 15% of the right-of-center vote. Ironically, the better Ron Paul does in the remaining debates, the better things get for Obama! In fact, Obama likely will owe his almost-certain re-election to Ron Paul. It seems to me Ron Paul should get a cabinet post out of that. I say give him Bernanke’s job. Us pensioners on fixed incomes don’t need no more fucking Quantitive Easing! Screw the banks! If Ron Paul is in charge of the Federal Reserve there won’t be any more monetary inflation and the banksters will have to pay their own fucking debts!
“..it looks like Ron Paul and possibly also Donald Trump are going to mount independent candidacies that will SPLIT the GOP vote.”
I’ve stated before that I plan to write-in Ron Paul for prez and Dennis Kucinich for vice-prez in the 2012 presidential race. I see no reason to change that because the Reps and Dems are as fucked-up as a football bat. {Yes, I realize Paul and Kucinich use the Republican” and “Democrat” labels, respectively, but they’re not the real McCoy in either case. I like Paulfor his Libertarian stand, and I like Kucinich because he’s a plucky and interesting guy.)
As long as people keep voting for the shit, Republican or Democrat, that’s what we’ll get: the shit. Write-in somebody you truly want rather than following the damn entrenched parties.
@7,
You realize, of course, that making Ron Paul the head of the Fed will mean an end to the Fed, a return to the gold standard and withdrawal from the IMF and World Bank by the US. Somehow I don’t think you’ll support those possibilities.
“In fact, Obama likely will owe his almost-certain re-election to Ron Paul.”
Just like Bill Clinton owes his first term to Ross Perot. I voted for Perot back in the’92 election because I didn’t like Bush or Clinton all that much.
I like Ron Paul now primarily because he wants to end this crazy American Empire that’s costing us so much blood and treasure to maintain.
I don’t know what Walker (and the Republicans) were thinking. Wisconsin is NOT Alabama. Trying to push this far right nutty agenda is part of their delusion that EVERYONE is secretly to the far far far far right of Nixon, who along with the real life Reagan is too liberal for the modern Republican party. The Republicans have shot SO far to the right they’ve killed their chances for the next election cycle.
Say, Congress had a 38% approval (not good) when the Democrats ran it, then after the BIG SWEEPING NEVER SEEN BEFORE takeover/shift in the 2010 election when Republicans took the House (and effectively the Senate in that they filibuster 99% of all legislation)…surely now that we have the Tea Party people we want in Congress their approval must be 50% or 60% or higher right? er…. 9%?
I don’t understand. We elected all the Tea Party right wing people that we supposed wanted. They’re in power and doing what they promised…so why is their approval rating 1/3 of what it was when the Democrats ran Congress? (head scratching) OH! Like with Walker, their campaign promises always sound good, especially if you’re scared that we just elected a black man to run the country and you just want ANYONE who opposes him…then they get in office and you realize you elected crazy people who don’t know what they’re doing. Ah. You don’t think they’re crazy? They’re still looking for Obama’s birth certificate, sure he’s a secret Muslim and will outlaw Christianity any second, and I’m SURE he’s coming for your guns next week! (sigh)
@9
You realize, of course, that making Ron Paul the head of the Fed will mean an end to the Fed
Of course he does. Try looking the word “facetious” up in the dictionary.
He also understands that returning to the gold standard would be just about the most idiotic Economic policy ever implemented. What amuses me is that you appear not to understand this. That is, however, what happens when people try to make Economics fit into the procrustean bed of their preconceived notions about “liberty”.
re 10: To play devil’s advocate for the moment: Don’t you think that a factor that pulled the U.S. into WWII was its isolationism?
@9 No, making Ron Paul head of the Fed will result in monetary policy stalemate and keep the money supply where it is. The Fed Chief isn’t a dictator. There are other people on the Fed Board.
@11 “I don’t know what Walker (and the Republicans) were thinking.”
They were thinking, like all absolutists, that once they took over Madison their seizure of power would be irreversible and no one would be able to stop their agenda.
We’re now less than an hour away from the Wisconsin Democratic Party’s press conference. Milwaukee TV station TMJ4 says its sources told the station recall organizers have enough signatures.
http://www.todaystmj4.com/news.....56538.html
Meanwhile, the signature count on United Wisconsin’s website stands at 507,333 and signatures are coming in at a rate of 18,000 per day. United Wisconsin needs 540,208 valid signatures, or 25% of the votes cast in the 2010 general election, to force a recall election. Their goal is 720,277 or 33%.
http://www.unitedwisconsin.com/
It sure does look like Walker’s on his way out. All the polls indicate he will get less than 40% of the vote.
And what is the GOP reaction to all this?
“State Rep. Jeff Fitzgerald (R-Horicon), the top GOP lawmaker in the state Assembly, said the state might need to replace its elections and ethics agency, saying it has strayed from its nonpartisan mission.”
http://www.jsonline.com/news/s.....69843.html
Roger Rabbit Commentary: In other words, if his side doesn’t win, they’re going to go home and take the football with them!
The Fifty Percenters
This is what 30 years of rightwing policies have reduced our once-proud nation to:
“Squeezed by rising living costs, a record number of Americans — nearly 1 in 2 — have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income.”
And here’s the conservative response:
“[A] senior research fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, questioned whether some people classified as poor or low-income actually suffer material hardship. He said that … safety-net programs … have gone too far ….”
http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_n.....low-income
Roger Rabbit Commentary: In other words, conservatives aren’t happy unless people are living under bridges and going hungry.
It’s the Huntsman surge in NH!
Nah, then they’d just complain about all the people living under bridges. These people are just mean spirited and petty.
@13
Ending American empire doesn’t necessarily mean becoming isolationist.
The British had one of the biggest empires in the history of empires and the average English guy was better off after they dismantled their empire.
RR @ 6,
“Darryl, where in Wisconsin is your family? I have Wisconsin ties, too. Maybe our families could get together sometime?”
Madison (We’ve discussed our family’s WI roots before at DL. I’m the guy with the beard.)
Stop by again and we can plan a post-Walker celebration in the motherland….
re 21:
@13
Ending American empire doesn’t necessarily mean becoming isolationist.
Being able to respond quickly to military challenges around the world without having to go with the nuclear option may be cheaper in the long run.
We now have permanent bases in Iraq and Afghanistan — enough manpower and weaponry to put the kibosh on many a tinhorn dictator’s dreams of regional hegemony. (Historical note: Henry Kissinger used the term ‘Soviet hegemony‘ as often as he could when dealing with the Russians because he knew the phrase infuriated them.)
I lived in WI for a little while when I was a kid. Little fly speck of a town over by the Iowa border called Dickeyville.
Glad to see the recall going forward. I’ve been puzzled as to how someone like Walker and a bunch of like minded folks could get elected in Wisconsin.
@ 14
No, making Ron Paul head of the Fed will result in monetary policy stalemate and keep the money supply where it is.
I have to confess, that statement surprises me coming from you, Roger. The money supply fluctuates with normal banking activity (every time a bank loans money, it creates money out of thin air–a statement that’s true regardless of fractional reserve requirements). A policy stalemate would mean that the Fed would be unable to react to changes in the money supply, not in a money supply that’s constant.
@22 I’d love to stop by DL sometime, but I can’t hop there anymore because I’ve been functionally blind in one eye since February.
@25 I’m just being irritable about the Fed’s inflationary money-printing policies. I don’t like inflation.
@ RR 26
Been hanging around that cosmetics factory again?
Considering that Wisconsin State Law allows any single person to sign the petition more than once (See below link) and the fact that all that is needed is a valid address. So Mickey Mouse and Adolf Hitler are apparently signing to recall the Governor. I guess ACORN is alive and well in the Wisconsin Democratic party and doing everything it can in order to drown out the legitimate voices of real voters!
http://www.wisn.com/r/29958007/detail.html
@29
According to the link you’ve provided.
@29
Dean Logan is in da house!
Yay!
Although they still wont “get paid fairly” but this is a step in the right direction.
IAFF Fireman @ 29
You’ve been duped. The procedure they use is exactly as prescribed by law. The suspicious names are flagged. But they must be challenged to be removed. The system isn’t as good as what we have in Washington, but it is the same system used to recall Democrats.
Try to read a little more critically….
@28 Nope. Detached retina. Two surgeries so far, one to go.
@31 More likely GOP operatives. This is the kind of shit they like to pull. This and tearing up petitions, which is a felony if they get caught. Oh, and at least one overzealous Walker supporter will be making a court appearance for a disorderly conduct citation after assaulting a couple of signature gatherers. Another typical rightwing knuckledragger.
Phony Website Claims Signature Drive Over
“MILWAUKEE- Someone could be in big trouble for posting a phony website page … [that] claimed enough signatures have already been gathered to force a recall election for Governor Walker.
“[The] website stirring controversy is Occupy-Madison.com. A post from this weekend appeared to be a statement from recall organizers, claiming the group ‘succeeded in collecting all the necessary signatures.’ The writer also claimed they were ‘suspending all collection activity.’ Not so, say Democrats. …
Democratic Party Spokesman Graeme Zielinski told TODAY’S TMJ4, … ‘[T]hese folks are resorting to dirty tricks because they can’t defend Scott Walker’s record.’ …
“Government officials … are … looking into the website, to see if its creator violated any laws.”
http://www.todaystmj4.com/news.....38033.html
Roger Rabbit Commentary: As the man said, when Republicans can’t defend their record, they resort to dirty tricks. Tsk, tsk.