3% Accuracy Is New Walker, Wisc. GOP Standard

Talk about a lowered bar.

* Remember all the predictions of bad signatures on petitions to recall Scott Walker, raising the specter of one of the Republicans' biggest fake causes - - voter fraud?

Righty talk show hosts said at least 25%, maybe more, would be tossed.

When the review by state officials was finished, roughly 3% of over 900,000 signatures gathered by meticulously-careful gatherers, were discarded as illegible, duplicated or otherwise unacceptable. 97% is a great score in just about any contest or examination.

* Then there was the horrible, $7.5 million in damage allegedly caused by disrespectful protesters during demonstrations inside the State Capitol and on its grounds against Scott Walker's collective-bargaining power grab last winter.

That big dollar number was also bandied about by hysterical, agenda-driven talkers, and was even provided during a court hearing in Madison by Walker administration officials to justify a push for new rules to close the Capitol and save it from Vandals for posterity - - but in reality to chill protesters' First Amendment rights and insulate GOP legislators and Walker officials from the consequences of their actions.

On Wednesday, the final damage remediation figure was released: $200,000 in labor, material and custodial costs to reseed lawns and repair marks and minor damage to walls and pillars - - regrettable expenses, yes, but in no way proportionate to dishonest early claims and the way the numbers were falsified and politicized.

And again, coincidentally but tellingly, the hard number was about 3% of an original overblown estimate.

The final figure even included about $14,000 to hire a consultant to help declare a true number - - apparently a task no Walker appointee could handle.

See the pattern?

First the sky is falling due to shenanigans on the other side.

Then the data comes out - - the numbers were 3% fact, 97% fiction.

Though it does make Walker's 60%+ PolitiFact tally look positively saintly.