I've never seen a man react so poorly to good news as Ed Garvey, liberal at law.
The good news: Wisconsin added 12,900 private sector jobs in June -- the largest single-month gain (PDF) since September 2003. What's more, our Badger State accounted for half the new jobs created in the entire Obama-stricken nation, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported.
That is good news, right? Well, you would have thought someone had run over his pet pooch, so downcast was Fighting Ed this morning on Joy Cardin's Wisconsin Week in Review program on the state radio network.
Normally Ed is a cheerful sort -- his avuncular personality is the bipolar opposite of his sour politics of scarcity, victimization and confiscation. But the thought that Scott Walker might actually make good on his pledge to be the jobs governor clearly unnerved my radio sparring partner this morning. His reaction at the Fighting Bob blog sums it up: "Oh, sure!"
If you missed the program you can hear Ed gnashing his teeth by downloading Program 110722C. Might make a nice ring tone. (The snap above was taken from Joy's Facebook page.)
Clearly, Gov. Walker believes in the prescription of U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida: what we need are more taxpayers, not more taxes.
Yes, Wisconsin is prospering, which is why I feel confident in the significant wager I placed with Ed this morning. Ed bets that Democrats pick up a net 4 Senate seats in the August recall election to reclaim control of the upper house. Blaska renews his prediction (made on July 1 and earlier) that Republicans lose a net of one (1) seat but remain in control.
(If the GOP loses 3 -- or all 6 for that matter -- I'm going to say Ed wins because Dems would win control of the Senate. If the GOP loses 2 -- or actually picks up all 3 Dem seats -- I interpret that to mean that I win because Republicans retain control. Fair enough?)
The payoff? The winner gets to write the other's blog for one day. No problemo. I've got enough material for 100 blogs!
Who knew Dems would lose in 2010?
Not these newly non-partisan Dane County Democrats: Brett Hulsey, Mark Pocan, Terese Berceau, Kelda Roys and Sondy Pope-Roberts. The five are plumping for support for AB 198, a bill that would pass off legislative redistricting to unelected bureaucrats.
This bill is a good idea now, the Fab Five say, because "once again the Republican majority is trying to ram through ..."
Less than nine months ago it was the Democrats who were ramming through legislation (RTA, anyone?). If AB 198 was such a good idea, why did not Pocan, Berceau, Roys and P-R ram it through in the last legislative session when they were all in office, their Democrat(ic) party controlled both houses and the governor was Doyle?
Maybe the decennial census just snuck up on them. Maybe they thought Democrats would retain control of the process. Ya think?
Isn't it amazing how bipartisan a political party becomes when it finds itself in the minority?
Mapping, not napping
Democrats filed a pre-emptive lawsuitAnn of Althouse demolishes that argument. "Read that again. Does it even pass the laugh test?" she asks.
The blogging UW law prof cites Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's dictum in Davis v. Bandemer, 478 U. S. 109 (1986):
In order to gerrymander, the legislative majority must weaken some of its safe seats, thus exposing its own incumbents to greater risks of defeat ... There is no proof before us that political gerrymandering is an evil that cannot be checked or cured by the people or by the parties themselves. Absent such proof, I see no basis for concluding that there is a need, let alone a constitutional basis, for judicial intervention.
County map job
For all the sturm und drang from our Democratic acquaintances (for they are ...), 12 Republicans and 10 Democrats are being forced to run against an incumbent in the newly drawn districts. Seems pretty even-handed.
So, where are the good government goo-goos on Dane County's map job? The deep space radio dishes here at the Policy Factory detect not a peep.
Four conservatives are being lumped into two districts. In one of them, Eileen Bruskewitz with Dave Ripp into the towns of Westport, Springfield, Roxbury, Dane, Middleton, Vienna and a little bit of Berry.
This district, Number 29, would be also the most populous at 13,872 people -- 1,305 more than District 32 (City and Town of Verona). That is a 10 percent differential.
The standard population deviation of the state legislative district map = about 1 percent.
Consider also that of the 37 supervisory districts only a minority of 17 would be wholly non-Madison even though Madison comprises less than half the county's population. In fact, 18 districts are either entirely or primarily composed of Madison residents.
The Dane County Board passed this map 17-13 two weeks ago. Conservatives are pondering a lawsuit based on the large population variance, not on any gerrymandering issue.
Pass the malaise, please
Get out your button-up sweaters. It is the 32nd anniversary of Jimmy Carter's "malaise speech." Thirty-two years since a President of the United States blamed the American people for not measuring up to his penitent standards. The Divine Miss Vicki aired Laura Ingraham's mix on Monday. It was too good not to pass along to you.
A hacking cough
Liberal activists hacked a Newt Gingrich phone call, turned over results to Democratic congressman who fed the New York Times. Now the Left is outraged at a London tabloid? The coltish Ann Coulter is all over it.
