March Madness On And Off The Court

While we celebrate UW-Madison's comeback win against Oregon Saturday night and give props to UW-M for its earlier valiant but losing effort against higher-seeded Villanova, it's been hard to miss other madness afoot in our state this week:

Like seeing Marquette's basketball coach Buzz Williams bolt without warning from a city that embraced him for a long-term, big dollar deal in Virginia.

Then learning that a real book publishing company reportedly paid Scott Walker at least $340,000 to 'write' a book that has sold something like 16,000 copies despite a book tour and gobs of free media from adoring conservatives and fawning talk show hosts.

And watching a seamy GOP-led, lobbyist-compliant Legislature debate late last week exactly how many pennies it could squeeze from cancer patients who only wanted to access a new class of easier-to-take oral chemotherapy drugs.

The final version of the bill isn't done yet because lobbyists haven't handed key legislators their last-minute language.

Scott Walker added to the shameful scene by allowing, after seeing which way the winds were blowing that, yes, he'd sign the measure after having said a bit earlier he didn't know enough about all this chemotherapy business to have a position on it.

Maybe he'd been too busy word-smithing his book to jump start paperback sales.

Or maybe he was adding fresh spin to his stump speech since last week's job growth data showed Wisconsin mired in 35th place among the states, guaranteeing that a jobs comeback for Walker as the 2014 election approaches is as doomed as was Oregon's failed fourth-quarter at the Bradley Center.

Too bad Walker didn't take the Buzz Williams approach - - just grab the money and head out of town.