Show me a good loser, and I'll show you a loser

Why don’t they fight?

Last week at a town hall meeting with Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner, the theme seemed to be one of frustration, including with the Republican Party. I wrote my column for the Waukesha Freeman (two quarters and its yours) on that very subject:

While the audience was politically right of center, judging from the applause at different times, their frustration with the Republican Party was clear.

One of the first questions asked of the congressman: "Why don’t Republicans fight?" Sensenbrenner replied they are fighting but that effectively he and Kramer are "out of the legislating business." The legislative agendas are being set by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (a Democrat) and Assembly Speaker Mike Sheridan (a Democrat).

Still, the congressman noted, House Republicans were successful in voting unanimously against what he called the "non-stimulus stimulus" bill.

Unfortunately elections have consequences, a theme on Saturday. Despite the frustrations of many in the room, there is little Republicans can do at the moment except to protest every step of the way toward massive increases in state and federal spending.

However, even that little bit may be beyond some of our current Republican office holders and officials. At the end of my column I mentioned the RNC Chairman Michael Steele/Rush Limbaugh debacle. Turns out that’s not the only Michael Steele goof. Byron York reported:

But some Republicans who were not particularly upset by Steele's references to Limbaugh were appalled when Steele, during the same program, sat quietly while CNN host D.L. Hughley said that last year's Republican National Convention "literally looked like Nazi Germany. It literally did." GOP insiders who saw the performance unanimously agreed that Steele was seriously, perhaps unforgivably, remiss in not challenging a television host who compared Republicans to Nazis.

Wisconsin GOP Chairman Reince Priebus (an early endorser of Steele for the RNC chairmanship) responded, "I think the criticism is stemming from those who like the way things have always been done. Well, that's not going to happen. Michael Steele promised wholesale change, and he's delivering it.”

I don’t think anyone in the room at the Sensenbrenner town hall meeting last Saturday wants the RNC to continue doing the same things, and I certainly don’t believe that of the 19 million Rush Limbaugh listeners. But sitting there nodding while someone calls your party a bunch of Nazis is not what they want either.
David Freddoso at National Review Online “The Corner” also lists five other occasions where Republicans just refused to stand up:

1. Minority Leader John Boehner (Ohio), speaking on Obama's proposal for health insurance, offered conciliatory words: "I think that having Senator Ted Kennedy involved in this process would help us get to a solution. That's what the American people want, they want solutions...I think if there's a way to provide every American with access to affordable, quality health insurance, we ought to find a way to get it done."
2. On the omnibus, Boehner helpfully declares that he has the votes needed to sustain a presidential veto. He is daring the president to keep his promises on spending, but does anyone believe that President Obama is going to make nice and veto his own spending bill?
3. After that, I spoke by telephone with New York State Assemblyman Jim Tedisco (R), the Republican candidate favored to replace Kirsten Gillibrand in the U.S. House. He expressed clear disagreements with many of Obama's positions on both social and fiscal issues, but his comments on Obama himself and his performance were extremely kind: "I think he's trying hard, he's trying to do the best he can for the country. Some of it is good, and some of it is not so good." (Obama, who carried his Congressional District, is extremely popular there.)
4. I had a few conversations about Sen. Sam Brownback (R, Kan.), a stalwart pro-life legislator who could not even pay lip service in opposition to Obama's appointment of Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D). This despite her unusually deep connections, even for a pro-choice politician, to some of the most unsavory characters in the abortion industry. Along with Pat Roberts, his fellow Kansas Republican senator, Brownback released a statement anticipating healthy dialogue and discussion with her once she is in Obama's administration: "It's an honor for the State of Kansas to have an elected official appointed to the president's cabinet...We will be able to pick up the phone and talk directly with the secretary about issues that are important to Kansas."
5. Again, Obama's omnibus spending bill, which is huge and contains several troubling policy changes. Among other things, it could yank two of Sasha and Malia Obama's classmates out of their good school and put them back into a terrible school, all because of Democratic obeisance to teachers' unions, which want to eliminate the District of Columbia's school choice program. It is barely shy of the votes it needs for passage, but not for lack of a few Republican votes.
   

All the base of the party wants is someone willing to fight. I have a hunch that this will come up often at tomorrow’s Defending the American Dream summit.

Some things to add to your calendar

This Saturday, I'll be at the 2nd Annual Defending the American Dream summit sponsored by Americans for Prosperity. It's at the Midwest Airlines Center in Milwaukee, and registration starts at 8:00 AM. The agenda looks packed. For those of you in northern Wisconsin, transportation is available.


For those of you in the Green Bay area looking for a shorter day, there is a Tea Party in the frozen tundra at the Titletown Brewing Company 11:00 AM to Noon.

Those of you who missed the Sensenbrenner town hall meeting at the Waukesha Public Library (aka the Taj Ma Larry) or couldn't squeeze into the room, here is his town hall meeting schedule for this weekend.
Saturday, March 7th

9:00am West Allis Public Library

1:00pm Shorewood Village Hall

Sunday, March 8th

1:00pm West Bend City Hall

"Unpaid taxes may be the Lord working in mysterious ways"

It was a packed house at today's town hall meeting with Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner and State Representative Bill Kramer. There were 90 people there (not including staff), three times the normal amount according to Congressman Sensenbrenner. Among the notables: former Waukesha mayoral candidate Jim Young, blogger M.E. from Stand in the Trenches, Alexander from A Little Off Main, Waukesha County Treasurer Pam Reeves, former Waukesha County Supervisor Alicia Silva. The Spring City Chronicle also reported Lynn Gaffey, owner of the Almont Gallery, was there. Token liberal Waukesha Mayor Larry Nelson was there but did not speak or ask any questions.

I say "token liberal" because this was clearly a conservative crowd. The most critical questions were those wishing the Republicans would fight harder against President Obama and Governor Doyle.

Sensenbrenner replied that "elections have consequences" and that he and Kramer are "out of the legislating business." The agenda is being set by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Assembly Speaker Mike Sheridan. However, he pointed with some hope to the House Republican unity in voting against the "non-stimulus stimulus bill." In response to a question about universal health care, he also pointed out Democrats had a bigger majority when Hillarycare was shot down in the House.

When asked about alternative fuels, Sensenbrenner explained some of the problems with ethanol, noted that biomass fuel is still a ways off, and then declared his support for nuclear power to applause from the room.

To the amusement of the room, one woman asked who is it in Washington that determines they don't have to pay a fine when they don't pay taxes. "Why, the secretary of the treasury," replied Sensenbrenner. He then explained that he did not think Treasury Secretary Geithner made an innocent mistake, and he praised Feingold for voting against Geithner.

Along the same lines, in response to another question about universal health care, he pointed out that the President hoped to have an easier time pushing it through because former senator Tom Daschle is a former majority leader and something of a policy wonk on the issue. "Unpaid taxes may be the Lord working in mysterious ways."

One person asked about the federal stimulus bill, noting that the $13/week we'll be giving back next year in taxes. Sensenbrenner told her, "Your calculator works better than the one in Washington."

On the subject of global warming, Sensenbrenner called the proposed "cap and trade" carbon tax "cap and tax." He said global warming sceptics were being subject to "scientific fascism" in the way they are ridiculed and personally attacked.

"What is clear," he told the audience, "is the economic devastation of cap and tax."

But the repeated question was what could the members of the audience do to help fight the Democrats? Both Sensenbrenner and Kramer answered the best thing people could do is stay informed and tell their friends and neighbors. To one member of the audience with a brother-in-law in Wausau, Kramer and Sensenbrenner listed the Democrats representing the city and told him to tell his brother-in-law to call those Democrats. Sensenbrenner also suggested they all show up the next time Feingold had a meeting in Waukesha and express their concerns to him.

As for Senator Kohl, Sensenbrenner noted dryly that the only way any of the audience would see him is to "purchase $110 seats at a Bucks game. You might see him there."

It's too bad neither Kramer nor Sensenbrenner said, "Join the Republican Party."

Something to add to your calendar this morning

Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner and State Representative Bill Kramer will be at the Waukesha Public Library (aka the Taj Ma Larry) for a town hall meeting at 1:00 PM today. The massive explosion in federal and state spending will be the main topic today, although I'm sure both Sensenbrenner and Kramer will have more than a few things to say about Governor Doyle's taking of the money for the Real ID program.

As both the Badger Blogger and Lakeshore Laments reported, the state has been collecting the $10 fee per driver's license to institute the federally mandated Real ID. Now Doyle's raiding the money for the state budget.

Glenn Frankovis at Badger Blogger:

Jim Doyle has decided that he will not budget any money to comply with a federal anti-terrorism law even though the state has been collecting a $10 fee per driver’s license to do so for over one year amounting to about $12.5 million so far. Why? “Doyle said he expects the law to be overhauled now that his fellow Democrats control Congress and the White House”, or to put it in the new motto of the Democrat Party, BECAUSE WE CAN!

From Kevin at Lakeshore Laments:

It’s no secret to any Wisconsin political watcher that Governor Jim Doyle - a wholly owned subsidiary of WEAC - has hated the REAL ID Act from Day One. The only shocker is it’s taken him this long to finally attempt to worm his way out of it.

The fact he’s screwed the lot of us by taking the already paid fee money and is re-routing it for other budgetary purposes shouldn’t shock anyone. After all, this is a man who’s literally rewritten more laws with his powerful line-item veto than anyone in state history.

There’s two ways this will be handled. One will be either the Department of Homeland Security declaring the State of Wisconsin is in non-compliance, calling down the thunder if/when Congress lacks the time to make the changes Doyle believes are coming down the road.

The second is Jim Sensenbrenner raining down fury, because Doyle’s messing with one of his babies.

Will wrong on 17th Amendment

Conservative commentator and Chicago Cubs fan* George Will wrote a column attacking Senator Russ Feingold's proposed change to the 17th Amendment to require special elections in the event of a US Senate vacancy. Instead, Will would rather we repeal the 17th Amendment entirely and allow the selection of senators by the state legislatures. (ht: Boots & Sabers)

Feingold's proposed amendment has attracted support from many quarters, including conservative Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner. My own support for the idea was expressed in a column I wrote for the Waukesha Freeman.

Will, however, believes the selection of senators by the state legislatures would be more in keeping in line with the Founders' ideas of federalism. He also attacks the idea as an assault on the constitution akin to Feingold's "campaign finance reform" attacks on the first amendment.

Will's proposed solution would actually hurt federalism, not aid it. Will fears the senators have become bound to the special interest groups in Washington D.C. But Will misses that the states themselves have now become special interests no longer interested in federalism. Across the country state governments are begging for handouts from Washington D.C. It would only get worse if the senators were to lose some semblance of independence from the states they represent. "Bridges to nowhere" and "state bailouts" would be less of a scandal and more of everyday occurrence if the senators were forced to answer to the legislatures rather than the people.

To call Feingold's proposed constitutional amendment an attack on the constitution itself, and then to equate it to Feingold's war on our rights to free political speech, is just attacking by association without substantiation. Clearly the amendment process is built within the constitution and is no more of an attack than Will's own proposed repeal of the 17th amendment. In addition, Feingold's proposed amendment is actually supportive of more democracy in the process of selecting representation, not less like his legislative attempts to repeal the first amendment. Ironic, yes, but so is Will's attempt to tie the two together.

As for the progressive tradition and the poor senators selected by the voters of Wisconsin, yes we have elected Senators Feingold and McCarthy. We also elected Gaylord Nelson, Robert LaFollette, Herb Kohl, and William Proxmire, for whom neither Will nor I would ever have voted.

However, to point to these senators and blame the 17th amendment, Will needs to demonstrate that had the legislature been in charge of selecting senators that we would have done better than these men. A look at our current legislature would certainly disabuse such illusions, and had it been left in the hands of the legislature in 1980 we would never have had Senator Robert Kasten for two terms.

But then, such a qualitative analysis of the senate under the current vacancy-filling method is what has impelled Wisconsin's junior senator to present his proposed amendment.


* I mention it, but we should not take his support of the Cubs as an indicator of the soundness of his judgement. Right?

Memo to liberals

I should just allow you to waste your money, but don't fall for this Facebook ad:

Seriously, you're not going to beat him.

Sensenbrenner endores democracy for the senate

Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner joined Wisconsin's junior senator Russ Feingold in supporting a constitutional amendment to require elections to fill senate vacancies. (I previously wrote about the issue for the Waukesha Freeman.) Sensenbrenner said in a statement:

"Wisconsin is one of only a handful of states that has never had a U.S. Senator appointed," Congressman Sensenbrenner said. "We have always filled our vacated seats with a special election, allowing the people to choose who they would like to represent them. Given the recent fiascos and horse-trading we've seen regarding some of the Senate appointments in Illinois, New York, Delaware, New Hampshire and Colorado, the time has come to close the appointment window. That is nothing to denigrate the people who have graciously agreed to serve in those positions, however, the people did not elect them, one person selected them."

Who will pay Kennedy to be Democratic Chair?

I wonder what the Portuguese is for, "I know all about getting paid by donors"? Former Portuguese instructor and current President of AFT-Wisconsin Bryan Kennedy is running to replace Joe Wineke as Chair of the Democratic Party.

Kennedy is most famous for his failed runs for congress against long-time Republican incumbent Jim Sensenbrenner. In his last run, Kennedy took the questionable approach of actually paying himself a salary out of campaign donations, arguing it was necessary if he was going to campaign full-time.

Kennedy's best performance was 35 percent in 2006, which might raise questions about what exactly recommends him as the Democratic Party's top strategist.

Outgoing Chair Joe Wineke came under fire from the party faithful for taking a $2000/month lobbyist job for AT&T. What special interests will pay Kennedy a salary this time, and will the party faithful stand for it?

Election tomorrow

The Wigderson Library & Pub normally does not make candidate endorsements, only product endorsements for a hefty fee. However, there is a race where I have taken more than a passing personal interest is the 57th Assembly District Republican Primary. Jo Egelhoff is a blogger and proprietress of FoxPolitics.net. She would also make an exceptionally bright and perceptive Assemblyman, a shortage of which we see on both sides.

Talking with some non-party types, Barb Larson-Lloyd would make a very interesting candidate for the office of Register of Deeds for Waukesha County. She is not a traditional politician and has worked over 20 years in the title insurance industry. She is running against a county supervisor Jim Behrend who seems to have the endorsement of the local party establishment.

Finally, there's the Sensenbrenner-Burkee primary at the congressional level. Since Congressman Sensenbrenner is actually one of the good guys in the Republican Caucus, I really don't understand why he has a primary opponent. I also really disliked Burkee's plan to team up with the Democratic candidate before the Democrat dropped out. The whole race just seems unseemly. At best it's just a waste of time. Tell the Libertarian Party to find some other way to win an election.

For those of you looking for a little help with your ballot, here is the Pro-Life Wisconsin Victory Fund list of endorsements and the Wisconsin Right to Life PAC-endorsed candidates.

If you're looking for predictions, Sensenbrenner wins handily and Ruth Page Jones beats Steve Schmuki. None of Tom Reynolds' candidates win.

Can we please have the blind leading the blind?

Mass e-mailer Jack Lohman is following legislation proposed by Senator Bernie Sanders (S-VT) that would require all members of congress to put their investments in blind trusts, eliminating potential conflicts of interest.

Of course, it would have the obvious but unintended benefit of removing the Milwaukee Bucks from Herb Kohl's management.

Maybe Senator Feingold would actually make money before his senate career comes to an end if someone else was handling the investments.

While I think Lohman's examples are hardly as terrible as he imagines (both Pelosi and Sensenbrenner would probably continue to vote the same way) , I have a hard time coming up with any criticisms of the plan other than I think it impractical to include the state legislature.