Curmudgeon's Corner

Political Bits & Pieces...

Posted by Al Campbell on Sept. 9, 2010

Political, Quality of Life, Wisconsin, U.S.

Walker-Neumann:

Scott Walker has finally responded more directly to Mark Neumann and may’ve stepped in it in so doing.  The race must be tightening since Walker finally ran an ad that directly hit Neumann; the first I recall of that nature this season.

Neumann fired back earlier this week with a quickly done spot that again attacked Walker as a “career politician”.  This attack may’ve scored some points while I doubt that the earlier jabs along those lines had caused much damage to Walker.  Neumann has run a very smart campaign even though I find it distasteful.  He has managed to spend a lot of his own money, too.  He determined, apparently, that the real battle for him was getting past Walker while Walker was running against Barrett for the most part.

Milwaukee County Sheriff Race:

Sheriff Clark may be in for a shock on next Tuesday.  He has always run on the Democratic ticket but has refused to become a member of that party.  This has perturbed the Democrats since Clark acts and talks more like a Republican than a Democrat.  Given the requirement to vote a party ticket on September 14^th, there could be a shortfall of votes for Sheriff with many of those being attracted to the Walker-Neumann race instead.  Either Walker or Clark stands to possibly get hurt so far as turn-out in Milwaukee County.  Walker needs the lion’s share of those votes.

Barrett Gets Help:

Jim Doyle has just dumped $1 million into a Democrat-driven political fund that promises more funding of advertisements to help Barrett in his race for the Governor’s seat.  That will cause more angst among the Walker supporters who fear that, if he bests Neumann, he may’ve been ‘dirtied up’ by Neumann to the point that he’ll have lost some support across the state.  With more money available for the Barrett campaign, either directly or indirectly, this could have the effect of making the Governor’s race much more competitive than it appeared it would be until now.

Absentee Ballots:

The 45 day requirement for absentee ballots to be out to those who are overseas obviously cannot be met.  There are simply too few days following the 14^th to make it possible for the ballots to be printed and mailed in time.  This could cause fewer votes from those overseas and that, given the military make-up percentage of those votes from overseas, could cost the Republicans more than the Democrats.

Johnson-Feingold:

Judging from the poll numbers that we’ve received so far, it appears that Russ Feingold has met a very solid challenger in Ron Johnson.  Johnson had no problem with money since he, like Neumann, had enough to be able to spend several million to get his name recognition up to a solid level.

He has not always come across as the political pro since he has never run in a political race before.  That has seemed to be of benefit to him this year since people are pretty well determined to rattle Washington’s collective cage this fall.  Incumbents are largely fighting uphill battles and Feingold is no exception.  He is in a real race this time unlike virtually every other re-election campaign he has had since first being elected.

Importance of Money:

The ‘little guy or little gal’ is virtually assured of never being taken seriously in races beyond those that are community-wide or county-wide.  It takes a very substantial amount of money to run campaigns for the state Senate, even for the state Assembly and certainly for state-wide offices at the gubernatorial level; and even more staggering sums for national office.

The old pros seldom get beaten once in office because they have the war chest necessary to dirty up their competition with repetitive commercials.  Sen. McCain is a prime example of that tactic and it stinks.  He simply buried his opponent having spent more money in this year’s primary than he has spent in all his prior races for the U. S. Senate combined.  His wife’s fortune from the inherited beer distributorship she runs came in very handy.

Harry Reid is spending huge amounts to try to convince his home state voters that he is something they don’t think he is, and he is running neck and neck with his challenger.  Interestingly, Reid has never polled well amongst his Nevada citizenry and he has still won races.  His son, Rory, is trailing far behind the Republican candidate for Governor of Nevada.  Rory got to the point where he politically disowned his father by using only his first name of Rory on campaign signage in in campaign commercials.

Given all the money that it takes to run for such offices, is there any wonder that influence peddlers gain easy access to the officeholders following elections?  Remember that Obama pledged to have no lobbyists in his Administration and we find quite a few there today.  The labor organizations spent heavily to get Obama elected, and they are being very well taken care of today as the result.

This cannot be what the founding fathers had in mind.