Wisconsin

I'm still trying to wrap my head around what's been going on in Wisconsin these past few weeks, as I'm sure a lot of people are. On the one hand, the Republican-controlled state government wants to pass legislation, which it is perfectly allowed to do, and on the other hand you have really really really really really unhappy liberals.

There are a couple of different ways of looking at the situation, and what should or should not be done. First of all, it is critical to understand that the Wisconsin state government has the authority to create, pass, and sign into law legislation that takes away the collective bargaining rights of state employees. Other states have already done this without uproar that comes anywhere near as close as this.

By passing this legislation, Wisconsin Republicans say that it will help reduce their hundred-plus million dollar deficit. If that is indeed the case, then some praise should be made for the bill being fiscally-responsible. But there are bigger issues surrounding Wisconsin's deficit and the reasoning behind trying to pass this bill.

Scott Walker, the state's Republican governor, harbors a lot of responsibility for the state's financial crisis. He proposed $140 million in tax cuts be handed out and then swiftly turned around to claim that the state had a $140 million budget shortfall. Now we have an anti-union bill that has been grabbing headlines for weeks and protests that don't look like they're anywhere near to ending.

It also came to light that the major motivation behind this bill was not fiscal motivation, but political motivation. By passing this bill, it makes it harder for Wisconsin unions to organize and donate money to political candidates and campaigns, and because most unions donate to Democrats, it weakens the party's ability to raise political funds.

But here's the catch: it's part of the political process and there's nothing Democrats can do about it. Running away to Illinois only postponed the inevitable, and I hope this tactic doesn't become commonplace. Because guess what'll likely happen in the next election? Democrat support will probably rise and Wisconsin will find itself with a majority-Democrat government. Then the damage control can begin.

This is how politics works, and it's too bad that people in Wisconsin won't move on and accept that. When one side is in power it does everything it possibly can with the time it has to get the things it wants done. Then, inevitably, the other side winds up in power and the same thing happens. We saw with the first two years of Obama's presidency and we're seeing it now with Wisconsin.

It's a constant tug of war, and it's always been like that. Only now, thanks to growth in media coverage, widespread communication, and the Internet, we are seeing politics on a stage that it's never been on before. The highly-partisan nature of political discourse we now is merely a natural part of this evolution.

Until next time, Orange Hat Guy