Anyone who has been not living under a rock the past year has heard something about Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.  His hidden agenda to strip unions of their rights despite failing to mention that in his campaign has created a great deal of strife.

One one hand – the Republican base loves it.  And that leaves me to ask just how so many middle income Americans view unions as being anything other than pro-middle class…and thus unions are organizations that largely benefit these middle income Americans who are in support of the removal of unions.  One has to shake their head.  On the other hand – you have Democrats who really, really dislike Scott Walker; some hate him with vitriol.  I would suggest that this vitriol was very much earned through hard work.

In PPP’s survey of 900 voters Feb. 23-26, Walker’s approval rating among Republicans was 92 percent. His approval rating among Democrats was 7 percent.

“I can’t think of another governor in the country who has either 90 percent approval in their own party or 90 percent disapproval in the other party,” says Tom Jensen of Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm that polls independently in Wisconsin and other states (and has had a good track record nationally).

Walker’s partisan “approval gap” — the 85-point difference between his Republican and Democratic approval ratings – is unmatched among governors. No one else is in the neighborhood (the closest in recent months are New Jersey Republican Chris Christie and Minnesota Democrat Mark Dayton; their partisan approval gap is 66 points in the PPP surveys).

Source: Milwaukee Wisconsin Journal Sentinel

But not only is there a big gap in partisan feelings for Wisconsin’s governor…there is clear and empirical evidence that his “jobs” agenda through anti-union legislation isn’t working.  And it may be getting worse…

When Walker took office, Wisconsin had about 2.74 million jobs. For the next six months, the state ticked upward slightly, increasing the official tally to about 2.77 million. But beginning in June, the state started a six-month slide that cost 35,000 jobs and left it about where it started.

Source: HERE

Wisconsin lost 1,700 jobs in December, according to preliminary data for that month. That includes a loss of 3,900 private sector jobs and a gain of 2,200 government jobs.

Source: BadgerStat

But have no fear – two of America’s richest men – Charles and David Koch i.e. the Koch Brothers – are FULLY supporting Governor Walker with millions in support through their astroturf organization – Americans for Prosperity – with ads like this to make Wisconsinites feel good about their current environment and their Governor by extension:

Despite not mentioning Walker, the ad is consistent with Walker’s own strategy in the lead-up to the all-but-certain recall election, which has involved launching positive TV spots that tout the results of Walker’s controversial budget repair measure that curbed collective bargaining for public employees.

“Thanks to recent reforms, Wisconsin’s government is working more effectively and more efficiently,” a woman in the 60-second spot says.

Source: National Journal

And conservative groups are trying to muster up as much energy as they can to prevent the dam from breaking.  These groups have invested a lot of money and time into Governor Walker – and frankly…as I have said many times – Wisconsin is Ground Zero in the labor movement.  If Wisconsin successfully recalls Governor Scott Walker – you will see a national shift away from anti-union legislation like the bills in Indiana and the unsuccessful bill in Ohio.

Two Wisconsin tea party groups, We the People of the Republic and the Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty, claim to have signed up 11,000 volunteers and trained 4,000 of them to scrutinize the estimated 1 million signatures gathered by Walker foes. That signature total was nearly two times the 540,208 needed to launch the recall process; nonetheless, the two groups’ vetting operation, VerifyTheRecall.com, was created to root out duplicate signatures and “downright fraud” found in recall petitions for Walker and Lt. Governor Rebecca Kleefisch, their website says. Meanwhile, the Wisconsin branch of Americans for Prosperity, the Koch-funded group that helped train and grow the tea party, held a town hall earlier this month touting the budget reforms enacted by Walker and state Republicans.

Source: Mother Jones

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