Tonight brings us part two of the gubernatorial recall debate, I will go out on a limb and predict that Barrett will win handily. There is a reasonable chance in my mind that [i'm with stupid] won't even show up. But if he does he will be coordinating his next out-of-state fundraiser on his blackberry. I will go even further out on a limb and say it won't make the slightest difference to the election results. The battle lines are drawn pretty solidly at this point. There are two issues to address today.
The first issue is this sign rental business. Giles at Daily Kos puts the top rental fee at $125, meaning the nonpolitical couple from the other day got ripped off. Well, price you pay for not paying attention. After getting Giles' take, I looked for these bloated signs and where they were placed. Though my observations were not even close to scientific, the stand with [i'm with stupid] signs were placed rather oddly in most cases. Behind electical equipment, at the bottom of hills, behind trees. Combine this with the signs on farmer's land being far from the houses, and the sneaky allegation becomes awfully plausible. The champions of private property ought to be ashamed, but we know shame is just not a viable option in the pursuit of power by cheesehead fascists.
Speaking of private property, what is going on with the deer hunting issue? Ignoring the obvious is second nature for 'wingers, but has [i'm with stupid] and his texas "deer czar" started to walk back their desire to sell off public land and charge hunters a huge fee? The first person to run up the warning flag on this one was right on the money that deer season is a sacred time for many Wisconsinites. There have to be some hunters out there who aren't interested in this scheme, even some non-Democrats. The right must understand at some level that the kind of people who hold hunting as an almost religious principle are not going to be pleased. Tradition might even trump ideological zealotry. See here for more information. Kos has an even more in-depth analysis here, gosh I hope this is the cheesehead fuhrer's bridge too far.
Yes, this story needs to be spread to everyone that hunts. Even if [i'm with stupid] is recalled and does not pull it off, the next asshole will try it. Obviously, selling off public land and privatizing deer hunting is not like crushing the right to organize. First, the 'winger assholes have not spent over a century laying the groundwork for an American "Enclosure movement" in the same way they have demonized unions. So any initiative to give our would-be aristocracy their own private hunting preserve would by neccessity need to be done silently and with deniability. Second, this would be irreversible. Not like many other 'winger schemes that good people in office can just reverse or repeal the crappy laws. No, once the public lands are gone, that's it. It would probably take a revolution to get them back for the people. Do you want that? I know I sure don't. I can only hope Wisconsin hunters will start to question who's side their nra leaders are really on when they jump on this. Certainly not the rights of sportsmen.
These two issues are utterly loathsome. But instead of just being outraged, we should take some heart in them. First, when you drive through the countryside there is some comfort in knowing that most of the people out there were paid for putting up those ridiculous signs. Second, this may be the only case in the history of "trickle down" economics where some of the filthy lucre actually made it down to the people. So putting some disposable income into the hands of people almost guarrenteed to spend it will help, inadvertantly making [i'm with stupid] and his plutocratic donors closet Keynesians. And deer privatization, if there was ever an issue served up on a silver platter, this is it. If we can't pull this off with one of our most sacred traditions on the line, not only are we finished as a party, but the state of Wisconsin will have proved to be irredeemable.
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