Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is projected to win the recall election, per NBC, CNN and Fox.
Congratulations to my native state (and sorry, Mom).
Wisconsin's state motto is "Forward". Now it's time to move forward in the Evergreen State and end collective bargaining privileges for our government employees.
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at June 05, 2012 07:15 PM | Email ThisCrypto-Commies: 0
America: 10
Get ready for a repeat of 2010, Democrats. Wave bye-bye.
Posted by: Attila on June 5, 2012 07:22 PMI see the Lt Gov kept her job too. I wish I could find results for the 4 senate seat recalls...
Posted by: RagnarDanneskold on June 5, 2012 07:44 PMMore than the history the result made, I'm afraid the public service unions made their own ugly history.
"This is what democracy looks like".
Posted by: RagnarDanneskold on June 5, 2012 07:58 PMI'm not as confident that public sector unions could be thwarted here, but electing McKenna would be a good start.
Posted by: Palouse on June 5, 2012 08:18 PMPUH-lease.
And go read the massively hypocritical statement of the Maryland Governor when he spoke on Fox moments ago.
Really? He's going to say with a straight face that WI and the country are tired of class warfare? Does he NOT hear his President Downgrade?
Posted by: RagnarDanneskold on June 5, 2012 08:27 PMBest of all, the myth that union bosses represent their members' interests has been exposed as a lie. Now that union dues are voluntary, tens of thousands of union members have stopped paying them. Membership in the Wisconsin chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union (AFSCME) has dropped by half. Membership in the stat's American Federation of Teachers (AFT) is down by over a third. Given unions' influential role in most elections, the national implications of this trend are staggering.
God bless Wisconsin. Similar reforms can't come soon enough to Washington.
There is no way we could continue to pay public employees exorbitant wages with lavish benefits, retirement at 55 and lifetime pensions. The math just doesn't work. And there's no way we can give free healthcare to all. And there's no way that wind and solar can match the energy density of fossil fuels and nuclear.
The Left has been living in the bubble for years. Reality has finally come to call.
Posted by: Jeff B. on June 5, 2012 11:40 PMHe didn't 'survive' anything. He crushed them, and with good reason.
Onward.
Posted by: jimg on June 6, 2012 04:48 AMI think someone forgot to tell them about the Walker recall fiasco.
... crickets ...
Posted by: James on June 6, 2012 10:12 AMRemind me again, what was that lefty mantra we heard so much... oh yes: THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE!
Now, it's time for us to MOVE FORWARD!
[/snicker]
Why is it that the Dems are sore losers and unable to let go, while the GOP accepts defeat more gracefully and tries to make the best of being in the minority and usually moves on. if the GOP loses in November in the POTUS, there will still be less collective violence than there was by the left in WI. Religion is politics for much of the left.
Posted by: KDS on June 6, 2012 10:58 AMThanks for that link. Yeah, remember how the oh so civil Lefties who comment here: Dorky Kid, Bruce, MikeBS, etc. lectured us about the Arizona shooting of Gabby Giffords and about the dangerous bellicose rhetoric of targets?
Crickets now.
The usual hypocrisy of the Left. Targets are great, as long as they are on conservatives. Racism is great, as long as it pertains to whites. Etc.
It's fairly clear that liberals are quite angry about their loss last night.
With it being quite a decisive win, why are you directing your anger and hateful vitriol against us, rather than the media who misled you so egregiously? Why are you unwilling to challenge what your constantly told to believe when you live in evidence to the contrary? And the same goes for your politicians - how do you so easily believe and repeat what is usually so easily debunked by plain common sense?
I'm not being my usual sarcastic self here - I really want to know, because I simply cannot understand a mindset that allows oneself to deny reality when faced with reality.
Posted by: RagnarDanneskold on June 6, 2012 12:11 PM..and check this out, from a Wisconsin polling place, one of those communist art Obama posters on the wall as people voted!
http://vocalminority.typepad.com/blog/2012/06/two-pics-that-show-our-mainstream-media-is-completely-out-of-touch.html
I'd like to know similar things of our Lefty commenters. How is it that they think that Wind and Solar are really going to supplant baseload energy when they are intermittent and only a small percentage of the energy density of baseload sources?
Or how is it that man and his factories and SUVs in a tiny percentage of the earth's total area can compete with the vastness of oceans and ice covering almosts 3/4s of earth, the Sun and all of the cosmic rays from Supernovae throughout the Milky Way and neighboring galaxies. It just plain arrogant to think that we amount to sqaut in light of all those larger forces acting on the system.
Leftists really believe what they are told, but they never stop to do the obvious what engineers call "sanity checks" wherein basic check calculations about large systems rule out obvious design impossibilities.
I can't imagine going through life blindly believing what I was told by a largely unscientific and uneducated media cabal, without doing enough of my own research to verify outlandish claims such as 20 foot sea level rise and baking to death or freezing to death in the span of a few decades when in all of human history earth has maintained a largely moderate climate compared to the real extremes that existed in earlier pre-human eras. Or peak oil, or nuclear fear, or on and on.
To be a Leftist is to be a lamb.
Posted by: Jeff B. on June 6, 2012 01:23 PMLeftists don't necessarily believe any of the garbage they spout. They simply use fairy tales such as global warming and legislation like Obongocare to promote their twin causes of statism and collectivism. Their ultimate goal, of course, is the absolute power that results from control/authority over every aspect (food/energy/employment/medical care, etc.) of our lives.
Posted by: Saltherring on June 6, 2012 02:49 PMHITLER/DNC FINDS OUT SCOTT WALKER WON WISCONSIN
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=VC_ult6-Tb4
Posted by: Monterey on June 6, 2012 08:42 PMThat's one of the better ones in the Hitler series.
I'm sure that's pretty similar to the scene at Demo Kid's bunker in the basement of his parent's house, where he and other Leftists had gathered to celebrate the Walker recall.
Posted by: Jeff B. on June 6, 2012 09:21 PMIsn't "Forward" Obama's re-election slogan as well?
Posted by: Richard Pope on June 6, 2012 11:05 PMIt could be argued Vladimir Lenin in 1917 moved the Russian people forward also....onto collective farms and into state-owned mines and factories. So what's your point?
Posted by: Saltherring on June 7, 2012 09:53 AMGovernor Walker has shown the principle of smaller government is politically and practically doable. Look at what happened in San Diego and San Jose, two blue cities in bluest of blue California. If public fiscal sanity can happen in the Golden State, it surely can happen in the Evergreen State despite the dire wailing and gnashing of teeth from the hysterical libs.
Posted by: FurryGuy on June 7, 2012 10:57 AMENDGAME
Posted by: Hellpig on June 7, 2012 11:46 AMThey can't do it the honest way of asking.
Posted by: Medic/Vet on June 7, 2012 12:32 PM....and so is completed the circle of corruption, eh Queen Christine?
Posted by: Saltherring on June 7, 2012 02:39 PMIn other words, how refreshing to not have to have your opinions disagreed with?
I suppose the absence of Democratic comment is because there's not much to say. The people of a faraway state decided to keep their anti-union governor. I would not have voted for him, but why would I comment on that, let alone on a blog about Puget Sound politics?
Posted by: Bruce on June 7, 2012 03:21 PMThe national Democrats are trying to go with that too.
Posted by: Palouse on June 7, 2012 03:48 PMExcept here's Rachel Maddow admitting that the Dems can't win without unions. Or Brown Skinned People. Or Women. Or insert self-described victim group here.
This is a great day because it's the first step in crushing the whole collectivist victim culture of the Left.
Posted by: Jeff B. on June 7, 2012 06:11 PMWith it being quite a decisive win, why are you directing your anger and hateful vitriol against us, rather than the media who misled you so egregiously? Why are you unwilling to challenge what your constantly told to believe when you live in evidence to the contrary? And the same goes for your politicians - how do you so easily believe and repeat what is usually so easily debunked by plain common sense?
I'm not being my usual sarcastic self here - I really want to know, because I simply cannot understand a mindset that allows oneself to deny reality when faced with reality.
They are clearly unwilling and/or unable to answer, but I did get an oblique 'answer' in one of the most horrendous ways possible: a 29 yr old friend of my sons died.
My son, whom most of you have previously read, wrote this to all of us in our family. I suspect it will get posted on one of his blog sites.
I post it with his permission.
A Friend of Mine Died Because He Was Stupid
I'm kind of hurting right now, but I'm going to exploit his death for a moment to make a very clear point about the difference between leftists and rightists.
My good friend of mine was killed yesterday in a car wreck. He ripped around a curve, jumped the curb, and smashed into a light pole. Killed instantly. It's no good. He was a good guy, and I liked him (which is not something I can say about a lot of people). I found out early yesterday from his family. Sucks. Being the sort that I am, I wanted to know the details. Namely, I wanted to know if he was drunk. So, I called up a cop-buddy I know and got some "off the record" information. He told me what I already knew, gave me the added information that he wasn't wearing a seatbelt, and then stated that he couldn't talk about an "active investigation." That's cop-speak for, "he was under the influence" - they're just not sure of what (that's for the coroner to determine). Well, I already know it wasn't drugs, so I'm guessing he was probably drunk. And I can see it too. He got hammered, jumped into his car, and smashed into a pole. Knowing him, I can see that being the case.
It's no secret that I am right-leaning. I'm neither conservative nor Republican - but many have made it pointedly clear that I am an enemy of both liberalism and of Democrats. Having now got over the initial horror of my friend's death, you know what I started thinking about? How people react to the sudden death of a loved one.
Emotionally. They react emotionally. It's an emotional thing. It hits you like a brick to the face, and sometimes it's so hard that you have to sit down just to digest it. I did. That's why, when I got the news, it was prefaced by, "You'd better sit down."
The question then is, what do they do with that knowledge? Here's the difference between leftists and rightists. My friend died. Died in the prime of his life. He was probably drunk, he wasn't wearing a seatbelt, and now he's dead. You know what I'm NOT doing? I'm not jumping into action and getting on a soapbox to demand that there should be [government] forces in place to prevent this kind of thing. I'm not whining about seatbelt laws, or DUI laws. I'm not whining that there should have been some kind of controls in place to keep my friend from downing a bottle of Jameson (his drink of choice) and getting behind the wheel. I'm not whining that there should be some kind of power to have kept my friend from dying. Because I know that power does not, and never will exist. Not without complete totalitarianism. And if that's the price for life, then it isn't worth it.
He was stupid. He was my friend, but he was stupid. He made the CHOICE to (in all likelihood) drink. He made the CHOICE to get in his car. He made the CHOICE to not wear his seatbelt. And those choices cost him his life. They were stupid choices, but they were his to make. I lament his death - but I do not think that others should be deprived of those choices, of the freedom to make stupid choices, simply because I'm emotionally pained by the loss of my friend.
Leftists do. Leftists live in a naive world where they truly believe that every bad thing that can happen in life can be prevented by regulation. They are wrong. There's no debate to be had about it - leftists, liberals especially, are just plain wrong. About everything they believe. Why? Because the concepts of "personal responsibility" and "self reliance" do not enter into their tiny little pea brains. They cannot fathom the notion that the consequences of one's actions are natural and that people are personally accountable for them - especially when the accountability happens to be death. My friend made a stupid decision. You know what? It was his to make. His choice cost him his life, but IT WAS HIS TO MAKE.
And you know what? Nevada already has laws against DUI and against not wearing seatbelts. THEY DIDN'T HELP. Do you think my friend cared about the threat of prosecution against the freedom of doing as he pleased? He didn't. People are going to decide, for themselves, how to live their lives. They may decide poorly, and the consequences of their decisions may be fatal - but that's the difference between right and left. The left wants to protect people from themselves. The right accepts that you can't.
The sudden death of my friend did not spur me to take to the streets to pretend like I could ensure that such a thing never happened to anyone else ever again. That's an idiot leftist mentality. Rightists look at the situation and say, "Yea, that sucks. I'm going to miss that guy" - and then they reform their own lives so as not to make the SAME mistakes. But nowhere in our minds does it even occur to us that we should take steps to subjugate people into preventing them from their own stupidity.
That's a leftist thing. That's what liberal Democrats do. They're an emotionally-reactionary pack of whiny stupid animals who truly believe that the logical principle of cause and effect can be circumvented by law. And for whatever idiotic reason, they seem to think that a deprivation of personal liberty is a worthy thing when it comes with a noble (but asinine) intention. It's not.
A friend of mine died because he was stupid. It's a terrible loss, and I'm really hurting because of it. But you know what? I accept that he made his choices in life - poor as they ended up being. THAT'S the difference between right and left. Right accepts that people have the absolute right to determine the course of their lives - even if it doesn't quite pan out for them the way they wanted - and that any consequences are their own fault. Left does not. Left believes that people should only made the choices dictated to them by the "benevolent" powers-that-be who arrogantly believe that they what's best for everyone, and that there's someone that's to blame beside the victim for every tragedy that ever occurs.
My friend is dead. He died senselessly and needlessly. But it was no one's fault but his own. We all make decisions that affect the course of our lives. Sometimes they're bad decisions. But you know what? They're MY decisions. And to hell with anyone who thinks they have the right to make them for me. -DTW, 6/7/12
So why do I think my sons essay answers my original question? Because he succinctly captures their simplistic worldview and trusting naivete. They don't question. They simply parrot without questioning WHY they do or the veracity of WHAT they parrot. It's the mindset of a toddler: mommy will solve all problems, I do what she says because she says so and it please her when I mimic her words and actions.
I absolutely LOATHE leftists who quickly scream "We have to DO SOMETHING!!!!!" whenever a tragedy happens. It's nausea-inducing.
Posted by: Bastiat Fan on June 7, 2012 07:06 PMA good read. Thanks for sharing. My condolences to your son. He's right. As I teach my own kids every day "good choices." And also as your son points out, a willingness to learn from the mistakes of others. Humility.
You have to chuckle when you think of our usual Lefty commenters and the word humility.
Posted by: Jeff B. on June 7, 2012 07:46 PMAlthough your son tried to make a political point out of this, his argument has more holes than a piece of Swiss cheese. The main argument against drunk drivers is not that they may kill themselves, but they may kill an innocent driver. He can't say "it was no one's fault but his own" to anyone killed by a drunk person recklessly driving a multi-ton missile. And while no law -- including DUI laws -- is 100% observed, there is lots of evidence that stricter DUI laws and enforcement have resulted in fewer people driving drunk.
Apparently his (and your) argument is that there's no point to having laws because some people will break them, and you don't mind sharing the highway with people who aren't capable of controlling their vehicles. I'm thankful that few Americans share your attitudes.
Posted by: Bruce on June 7, 2012 10:50 PMI think most recently he's suffering from OH MY GOD, PAUL ENDORSED ROMNEY disease.
Hopefully he'll recover... we'll pray for him - which is more than he'd do for us.
Posted by: RagnarDanneskold on June 8, 2012 08:52 AM