January 6, 2022 at 11:11 a.m.
What people want in 2022; what Democrats don't
What people want in 2022; what Democrats don't
This is the year when the idea of nonpartisan elections is likely to finally bite the dust. On the state level, technically nonpartisan Supreme Court elections have been openly partisan for years, but that partisanship hadn't overtly infected local nonpartisan races, at least not to the saturation point.
Still, the notion of nonpartisan races has been a bit off-the-rails for a long time. One wonders why such local offices as county clerk and sheriff are still considered partisan contests, while such positions as county supervisor are considered nonpartisan, when said county boards spend millions and millions of our tax dollars for a variety of government programs beyond core, state-mandated services.
Many of those non-mandated programs are relics that are, and have long been, liberal follies. Here's looking at you, UW Extension.
Anyway, as our story today indicates, Oneida County is about to have a number of partisan contests in its county board races, as liberals try to take some seats and conservatives try to stop them. Oneida County is not alone.
The push by liberals in local "nonpartisan" races is occurring because the liberal agenda has been largely thwarted on the state level, and so "progressives" - while they prefer imposing big-government policies statewide - are trying to do piecemeal, county by county, what voters prevented them from doing through state statute or rule.
And progressives think they can be successful despite their awesome unpopularity because so few voters have paid attention to county board races, at least in the past. So if they make sure they get their comrades out, they think they have a shot in races literally decided by a handful of votes.
Poor liberals. We have no idea whether these shenanigans will work in the spring elections, but, even if they do, their time in the sun will be short, for as soon as they raise taxes and fees for all sorts of boondoggle programs, as well as move to the best of their ability to destroy peoples' property rights, they will be booted out - again - by an energized population.
For those who doubt that proposition, just remember Bill Korrer and that gang.
On the state level, the contours of the elections are beginning to take shape, and that's not good news for "progressives" either.
The three big intertwined issues are Covid-19 protocols, support for police, and education.
Democrats continue to push punitive Covid-19 restrictions when it is plainly obvious that none of the measures has worked or will work. Most masks don't work, and make that especially so when it comes to Omicron. Lockdowns didn't work, either, and the vaccinated continue to get sick and spread the virus, despite what our president says.
As cases surge to record numbers, even liberals now are seeing the handwriting on the wall, that this is an endemic disease that will be with us for a long time, and the only course forward is effective treatment and protection for the the vulnerable populations who are in fact at serious risk.
This is how liberal Washington Post scribe Jennifer Rubin put it last week on Twitter: "As we recognize that covid-19 is not a deadly or even severe disease for the vast majority of responsible Americans, we can stop agonizing over 'cases' and focus on those who are hospitalized or at risk of dying."
That's well said, but many of us have been saying it for almost two years now, and it's a 180-degree flip on her part.
And this week, writing about the Omicron virus in of all places, The New York Times, David Leonhardt finally acknowledged that Omicron is milder: "[T]he sheer size of the Omicron surge may argue for caution over the next few weeks. But the combination of vaccines and Omicron's apparent mildness means that, for an individual, Covid increasingly resembles the kind of health risk that people accept every day."
The Times hasn't yet acknowledged that Omicron is also milder for the unvaccinated, but baby steps. The bottom line is, there is an increasing realization that Covid-19 is with us endemically, but can be managed. Masking should be ended because it is useless except to signal membership in a subservient caste; vaccines should be a voluntary option, and especially available for the elderly and other high risk groups; and fully pursuing effective treatment is the pathway for the future. Pfizer's new oral treatment is a good step forward.
Life must return to normal, in other words, as even some liberals are understanding. The problem within the Democratic Party and the new Covid left who control it - and for people like Tony Evers and Josh Kaul - is they are part of a political movement that wants a permanent pandemic so they can maintain absolute power and control.
It's a fantasy, and it spells trouble for Democrats in November, here in Wisconsin and nationally.
Democrats also have problems in the suburbs and among independent voters for their pandering to the criminal class and leftist mobs and for embracing defund-the-police rhetoric and measures.
Republicans in the state Legislature pounced on that issue this week with a package of bills designed to address law enforcement personnel shortages, to which Democratic leader Gordon Hintz responded by saying the GOP was actually responsible for underfunding police.
Say what? Yeah, it's another leftist lie. Hintz's argument is that the GOP opposed Evers's massive proposals to increase municipal aid dollars going to local governments. That part is true, but what Hintz failed to mention is that municipalities would not have had to spend that money on law enforcement, and, given their penchant for liberal social welfare spending and personal pet projects, likely would not have.
In a November 2020 Oneida County budget discussion, to cite one example, when discussion came up about eliminating the UW Extension, liberal supervisor Bob Mott questioned why non-core programs and services should be treated differently from core, mandated ones. Only a bubbled liberal cannot seen the difference between the two, but that's another story. Here's what he said:
"It's really interesting to me that they work on Extension when we have the sheriff's department, whose budget is $1,648,591 and we're looking at Extension at around $193,000," he said. Mott went on to emphasize just how much money the county was spending on the sheriff's department and wondered why it wasn't on the chopping block, too.
Mott did add that he wasn't necessarily against anything the sheriff's department was proposing, but should we really give such local officials blank checks and trust that they would fully fund law enforcement over feel-good programs like the Extension, especially when their party has been vocal about defunding police?
The answer is no, and voters are aware of the shell game being played.
Add to that that the governor is opposed to using Covid funds to hire police but has no problem floating $14 million into the coffers of minor-league baseball teams, and you see what a lie Hintz is telling.
Finally, on education, Democrats are in trouble, too, and this is especially bad for them because they have owned the education issue for decades, until recently.
But support for teaching critical race theory has helped to erode suburban and parental support for the party, and the Democrat and union-driven obsession with closing schools without any evidence they need to do so is further digging the Democrats in a hole.
Just this past week, Milwaukee and Madison schools closed their doors, and slammed the gates on children's education again, proving they are entirely disconnected not just from the science but to any political tone outside their own echo chamber. Not to mention from the needs of children.
At least on the issue of education, Republicans are almost never as bold as they should be. Parents, independents, and suburbanites are taking a new look at the party, but if the GOP really wants to have them come over in droves, it must become the party of full school choice. Half-baked support for choice doesn't cut it in an age when one party is pursuing the transformation of schools into ideological education camps, taught mostly remotely.
Parents are standing at the barricades, and the GOP needs to be there with them fully.
Taking back and opening up our schools, keeping our communities safe, returning to normal social and economic life - these are the things people want in 2022. Too bad the Democrats are opposed to all of them.
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