Posted on 01/07/2012 3:06:57 PM PST by afraidfortherepublic
PLATTEVILLE — At Ed’s Café, a table full of old-timers finished their coffee and ribbed a fellow member of their lunch bunch about fixing his truck.
It was all good-natured fun at this Platteville truck stop, popular among rural residents and people passing through on U.S. 151.
But when the talk turned to politics, as it tends to do at Ed’s, the group of men grew stone serious.
They had plenty to say about what they see as the terrible state of affairs in Wisconsin’s divided political climate, just nothing they wanted to share with Wisconsin Reporter — at least for attribution in a story.
Like many rural Wisconsin residents, these men said they are not happy about the barrage of recall campaigns that have hit the state for the better part of the past year, including the latest effort to oust Gov. Scott Walker and Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch.
Ben Cargill, 27, a cook at Ed’s, wasn’t shy about expressing his disdain.
“If you ask me, I think it’s a waste of time and money,” he said, adding that recall supporters should have to pay the bill for the cost of recall elections.
Unlike many of his Platteville neighbors, Cargill said he thinks Walker is “doing a fine job,” balancing a state budget once bogged down by a $3.6 billion shortfall.
Cargill said his father, a retired baker at University of Wisconsin-Platteville, has an entirely different view of a governor who led the effort to reform collective bargaining for most public employees. Walker’s budget repair bill also requires public workers to contribute more to the cost of their health insurance and pensions.
Along the rolling hills of U.S. 151, from just north of Dubuque, Iowa, through Iowa County, signs speak for or against Walker, even though the recall story doesn’t often seem to be told in Wisconsin’s rural reaches.
While the images of protests and petition signing from Madison, Milwaukee and the urban parts of the Badger State often make headlines, small-town Wisconsin could have a big say in the state’s political direction.
Grant County, home to Platteville, the largest city in far southwest Wisconsin, helped Republican Walker beat Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, a Democrat, in the 2010 governor’s election. Walker received 52 percent of the votes in Grant County, mirroring his statewide election numbers.
More than 52 percent of voters in nearby Lafayette County supported Walker.
But heading north along U.S. 151, in Iowa County, neighbor to Dane County and the Madison metropolitan area, support for candidate Walker fell off to 44 percent of the vote.
Little town split
Mineral Point is a dividing line.
This historic little Wisconsin city founded on mining and defined, in large part, by its artisan community is like a lot of Badger State communities — split over the recall question.
Chuck Bennett, a Mineral Point resident who’s “proud to be” 50, asserts the math works out closer to 65 percent to 35 percent, with Walker on the short end. His front yard sports a bold red “Recall Walker” sign, and a few other signs are in his neighborhood.
Bennett asserts Mineral Point is divided because of Walker.
“My biggest issues are, along with a lot of people I know, is what he didn’t reveal in his campaign and what he came out and did,” Bennett said, noting Act 10, the bill dismantling collective bargaining that Walker rolled out in February. “It’s just another way of lying.”
That sentiment is common among Walker’s opponents, repeatedly espoused by the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, leading the recall campaign.
Bill Spevacek, 77, a member of the Democratic Party of Iowa County, said he and his wife have signed the petitions and support Walker’s recall for the same reasons.
“The closest word I can come to it is ‘criminal,’” Spevacek said. “He didn’t tell us anything about knocking off state employee unions.”
The cancer survivor said he joined his son and 12-year-old grandson at the Capitol in February, among tens of thousands of people protesting Act 10. Spevacek joked that his part in the demonstrations at least qualifies him as Time Magazine’s Person of the Year, which heralded 2011 as the year of the protester.
“Walker, in my estimate, has been a total failure, and the quicker we get him out of office the better we’ll be,” he said.
In an interview late last month with Wisconsin Reporter, Walker said the charge that he had Act 10 in the bag is patently false. He said this charge mainly comes from big union bosses who “can’t get their hands on union dues” anymore.
“Did I plan the bill? No. But I laid out the parameters,” he said.
“The irony of all ironies with what’s transpired, particularly of late these last few months, is most people in Wisconsin and across America get upset with politicians who break their promises,” Walker added. “I’ve actually fulfilled my promises, and I’ve got people who don’t like that. That’s fine. They’re right to do that, but it does kind of run contrary to where most people get their outrage. It’s usually because someone did something they said they wouldn’t do.”
Jim and Patricia Johnson advertise their political convictions in their front yard
The Johnsons are fans of the governor, a fact betrayed by the blue “Walker We Support You” sign on the lawn of their home along Mineral Point’s U.S. 151.
Jim Johnson, a 79-year-old former executive with Wisconsin Power & Light Co., a subsidiary of Alliant Energy Corp., said Walker has done some positive things in his year in office.
Johnson’s brother, Ken Johnson, 79, also of Mineral Point, has debated politics with his big brother for years. Ken, a “strong union man” who worked as a machinist for 29 years, said he would never vote for Walker.
“I feel state workers should pay more for their retirement and for their health care, they should pay their fair share,” he said. “But I don’t think in any way (Walker) had the right to step in with collective bargaining. Let the people bargain.”
The brothers Johnson do agree on one political point: The governor should not be recalled.
“I believe when you elect a man for his term, he should serve his term out,” Ken said. “If you don’t like it, go back and vote against him the next time. All they’re doing is opening a can of worms with this recall.”
And they both agree that civil discourse has too often broken down in Wisconsin politics.
“You’re not going to get everything you want in life. You have to give and take,” Jim said. “I think the give-and-take process right now is in deep trouble with the Republican and Democratic parties.”
« 2012 off with a bang in Wisconsin
I think you should expand this into an article and get it published. Great work.
TS
I think you should expand this into an article and get it published. Great work.
TS
I agree with The Shrew. This would make a terrific Letter to the Editor of your local paper!
The Wisconsin Governmental Free Scheisse Army (GFSA) is MAD! They're really MAD!!!
I don’t speak ‘DRUM’
Get some folks together and set up a stand of your own, far enough up the road so they don’t see you. Collect your own recall signatures. Most people (I hope) won’t stop to sign again when they reach the real recall supporters.
If you do encounter one of the other groups, offer to turn in their signatures for them. Mighty neighborly of you.
Before Walker took office, the Dem governor, Jim Doyle, was continuing the long Dem Party tradition of spending the state into a deep hole. The privileged state public union workers didn’t have to contribute anything to their health and retirement. When Walker took office one year ago and started cutting into the three billion plus deficit, the Dems howled from here to Mars. Now, one year later, the deficit is no more, and we are now running a three hundred million surplus. As usual, the Dems claim we’ll have people dying by the hundreds of thousands (I exaggerate slightly) because of Walker’s cuts. Baloney.
I agree with all you say. All I can think is that the Dems and unionistas (essentially one and the same) think that we’re all stupid. If they didn’t know Walker’s plan before the election, they weren’t paying attention.
teachers in this country are the biggest pigs and waste of resources going.
The pic of the petition folks looks like the groups I saw here in NW WI for a few weeks. 3-5 people with signs, but no one ever seemed to be signing anything; it was just the campaigners standing there talking among themselves. Haven’t seen even that sort of group since early Dec. or so. I almost think it’s just a facade to make people believe the signatures they submit are real.
There are maybe three or four recall signs around here. I just noticed a marquee-type sign outside a local appliance store and propane dealership that said “God bless Scott Walker for lowering my taxes”. I need to order propane on Monday. I may just call them instead of my usual dealer (although I doubt they’re pro-recall either).
I don’t know. I was inside the GOP headquarters, listening to Rebecca. The protesters were across the street from the HQ.
Didn’t y’all also put an end to union dues being collected by employers out of staff paychecks? That’s what’s really killing the rats.
I learned all this after stepping outside to take a picture of the guy's truck, which had a recall sign on it. I kid you not, this is how the conversation went with this guy.
These people are lying, he was clear about what he was going to do.
LOL! That could be considered fraud.
FUNNY!
Yes! Now, dues have to be collected by the unionistas and the members don’t have to give them permission. The scary thing is that the unionistas need to get the people’s bank info in order to set up the auto-deduction. Can you imagine giving some guy you barely know your bank account info so he can deduct money out of there on a regular basis?
I am an introvert and I try to be sociable to people because I know it’s the right thing to do. This is the thanks I get. LOL!
Couldn’t happen to a nastier bunch of miscreants.
God, I’m glad I live in a right-to-work state.
The apparatchiks are entrenched, have got their early retirement, yearly raises, full ride bennies and perks, and have no intention of giving them up.
They have the CPUSA and their allies the Democrat party behind them, weak opposition from the right, and appear to be unstoppable.
If they succeed in Wisconsin it will be the fault of the National GOP and the RNC.
If you are with the government whether it be state local or federal you are on easy street.
The rest of us are suckers who had better shut up, pay for some useless bureaucrats early retirement and salary on top, and like it.
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