June 21, 2012
Quo vadis?
I have been calling lots of friends to determine "Plan B" now that governor Walker is governor for real. I am finding that here are precious few great ideas laying around. Regular voters are Burned out. What do we do?
Einstein said it best: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result."
FDR once said, "Do something. If that doesn't work, do something else but for heaven's sake, do something."
Fighting Bob Fest will be the testing ground for ideas we are collecting. Get ready!
Please tune in today to Fighting Bob Radio today at 11 a.m. Eric Schubring, David Giffey and I will be joined by Andy Kroll from MotherJones.com.
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Suggestions from this former Democratic candidate for Assembly (twice ran, twice whupped) and Democratic Party County Chair.
1.) Tell the Dummycraps to go to hell. Form a third party. The Working Families Party, while it does not run candidates, has a good starting point for issues to stand for.
2.) Stand for your issues statewide. Dums are so used to trimming district by district that all they do is look coniving or bumfuzzled.
3.) Work for your candidate. I had lots of people who said they supported me but they did nothing, contributed nothing, and wanted to tell me how to run the campaign but never had their name on a ballot for anything.
4.) The sixties are dead. Shoot guitar thwanging protestors and people who want to have their say on sight. OK, don't shoot them, but bust that damned guitar over their heads. The public wants grown-ups, not whiners, slackers, boy-men, and other assorted whack jobs. Put on your big boy pants and keep your cool.
5.) Forget about the top of the ticket. That will be bought and sold. If you believe in the people, want to serve the people, then run for the people's houses, the state assembly and state senate. Find races where the GOP might be vulnerable and the where the Dems keep fudging it. Or, where the Dems have really pooched it. Run.
6.) Forget the rap on negative. Fighting Bob was not worried about the opposition's tender feelings. If you want tender, join group therapy. This is an election, let them know you aren't going to be pushed around. Despite what the fuzzy headed and tender hearted liberals want to believe the public will respect a fighter. The GOP knows this, why don't you?
Take it or leave. You asked so there you have it. You have to live with it. I got out while the getting was good and if it weren't for the coming attack on my wife's teacher retirement fund I really wouldn't give a rip how low Wisconsin sinks. Sad, true, but...
-Griebnotz Doerkpfester | (Really Glad) I Escaped, WI. | June 21, 2012
Sorry, but I forgot a really important one.
Quit crying in your beer, especially in public. The voter does not trust cry babies and whiners. If you think YOU are disappointed and burned out think about that working mother trying to make a go of it. Or the guy who hasn't had a regular job in over a year. Or the teachers who no longer have any rights. Or.... You see my point. If you are going to be political then you are public and you better not show weakness. People who have been kicked around don't need weakling to represent them, they want fighters who don't crap out, cry around, or give up.
-Griebnotz Doerkpfester | (Really Glad) I Escaped, WI. | June 21, 2012
And when you get that third party going, treat all 72 counties the same and respect all people therein. Don't for heavens sake be like Dems who pick and choose their counties based on where they think they can get the most votes. Rural people are just as important as those in Dane County and the Milwaukee metro area. Put the opposition on notice by identifying and prioritizing issues and giving real solutions that people understand.
Let that third party have a backbone to support the changes that need to be done.
-Pietr Haikuu | Hurley, Wis | June 21, 2012
My entire voting life has been spent voting for the lesser of two evils, except for my vote for McGovern and a certain gubernatorial
candidate that formerly represented football players, hell I even voted for Lee Dreyfus (and I'm glad I did). Not no more, I'd rather vote for a third party candidate that gets tromped than a lesser of two evils that turns out to just has bad or worse. Bring on the third party candidates.
-Dole O'Mite | Waukesha County | June 21, 2012
There was a lack of good examples of the harm that the Walker agenda was doing. The right wing is good at picking some small point that resonates with voters and beats it to death until it becomes accepted fact. An example: my brother-in-law and his 84 year old father voted Dem for the first time in their lives. Why? They are involved in our township board, and some new regulation prevents them from renting out the town's road equipment to other townships - those jobs go to the private sector now, apparently. This incensed them. (I know this is not a widespread "thorn", but an example of the little things it takes to turn a vote.) I suggest Dems focus on how the rural roads will not be plowed in a timely fashion now, due to the above fact and the cutbacks in general. Plowing always gets a Wisconsinite's attention.
-Snowbound | Central Wisconsin | June 22, 2012
Ed, thanks for helping us all keep the faith. We are learning that no matter what the election or the strengh of a specific Republican candidate, we will always face a seemingly unbeatable coalition that includes a tsunami of big money, solid motivated blocs of evangelical Christian and conservative traditional Catholic voters, folks who need guns to feel empowered and the gun industry that leads them,a Tea Party that too often is fueled by racial prejudice and plain old moderate Republicans who hate to spend money on the "commons" and the vulnerable. They start with a bloc of 45% and build from there, we progressives start with 35%. Barack won in '08 in large part because he and his team were able to mobilize traditionally disenfranchised voters. That will be difficult to do again. Think we have to define what is important to us and organize and talk to not only our own base (Milwaukee, Dane and Northwest counties) but also those folks living outside of our traditional strength areas.
Re:3rd parties, they can only work if we first work for system of instant run off voting. thanks again for all your efforts.
-Sam Romano | Oregon Wi | June 22, 2012
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