Stick It To Madison

Mayor Paul Soglin says that state-imposed fiscal limitations will force the City of Madison to defer downtown public improvements, according to the State Journal.

Soglin, who has pushed to see the plan completed, said ambitious and perhaps costly recommendations for public improvements won't happen quickly.

"We've got a state government that doesn't appreciate the horrendous financial clamp it's put around our neck," he said. "I'm not going to encourage or hold out hope on implementing anything until we figure out a sound financial basis for operating our city."

I don't disagree, as Paul is clearly on the mark, but would take it a step further, as I had done more than a year ago to argue that Walker knows precisely what he is doing.

These fiscal limitations, along with voting and voter registration restrictions now in place to tamp down turnout in campus communities, are a deliberate partisan strategy to diminish Madison politically and economically to further embed one-party, Republican rule statewide:

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Walker, Neumann Take Aim At Madison

Running against Madison with its major university, and state payrolls, has been standard GOP playbook fare, but this year the Republican candidates for Governor especially have Madison in their sights.

Both Scott Walker and Mark Neumann oppose the expansion of high-speed Amtrak rail that would restore train service to Madison and better link the city to bigger economies in Chicago, Milwaukee and the Twin Cities.

And both candidates support restrictions on stem cell research recently laid down by a Federal Judge that would cost that signature UW Madison scientific effort millions in grants and spin-off growth.

Republicans usually target the capital city, a Democratic stronghold, and the UW-Madison, to stir up the out-state base, but this time the candidates are aiming directly at Madison's jobs' base.

So there's your 2010 GOP gubernatorial campaign slogan:

'"Send me to Madison so I can wreck the economy."