Gov. Walker and his 19th-century GOP/Tea Party legislative throwbacks are again embracing a Southern strategy to create an exclusionary ultra-conservative 21st Wisconsin.
* First it was the push for Voter ID that restricts ballot access principally in urban areas - - read: where African-Americans residents are concentrated (principally in Milwaukee also in part by restrictive suburban zoning and building codes, intentional regional transit disconnects that block Milwaukee workers from jobs, obstruction of affordable rental housing and a 1950's state law freezing Milwaukee's borders).
* Then there were the recently-approved restrictions - - without any supporting data or evidence offered - - signed by Walker into law that limit in-person absentee voting - - again hitting big city voters the hardest. Especially onerous - - an end to weekend hours, especially useful to single-parent households.
* Now the state GOP convention will take up a resolution approving state secession - - a Tea Party-inspired seditious outburst of Obama Derangement Syndrome wholly insensitive to US history, and Wisconsin's many relatives of both freed slaves and Union soldiers killed in the Civil War.
It is laughable to hear Gov.Walker say he and his party are moving the state in the right direction.
Though rate it True if they mean Right - - far-Right direction.
Regarding the GOP Southern Strategy: The New Yorker Magazine, April 7, 2014, has an article (Chemical Valley by Evan Osnos) about a chemical spill in West Virginia. Please read this important article because, as noted, what happens in West Virginia will happen across the US: Bills are written by lobbyists. Environmental Protection is reduced. Koch Industry money influences lawmakers. Smaller government via less money for the DNR types. A business friendly mentality when regulating business. And on and on. Even the state motto is: Open for Business. It seems like the blueprint Wisconsin is following. In West Virginia the results are devastating to people and the environment.
ReplyDelete