Wisconsin Megathread v2: Hagedorn vs. Neubauer

[Virginiá]

Lol

https://twitter.com/sbauerAP/status/1002182904087285761

Most/all of those nicknames suck, and are barely nicknames at that. Like for some of them, all they did was prepend "liberal [profession]" before the person's name. That's not clever lol. It's what Republicans have been doing for generations. Also, liberal isn't that much of a dirty word anymore, so I don't know why they are throwing it around like it matters.

[Virginiá]

I mean, I don't dispute that the Democratic Party is getting a bit nutty with some things, but the idea that only Democrats engage in identity politics is laughable. Republicans have been using identity politics to win elections for years. The only difference between the two is Republicans are shameless enough to use it as an insult despite them milking it for votes.

[Virginiá]

At our Republican conventions we do not have various caucus groups that you sign up to join in order vote as a group to influence the convention. We all just view ourselves as Republicans.

But the Republican Party is racially homogeneous and has less interest groups than the Democratic Party. You guys can depend on an almost unanimously white voter base that doesn't have quite as many diverging interests as the Democrats do.

There is a reason why it is hard for Democrats to unify around one message - because Democrats weave together support through so many different groups, from Millennials and older people, to poor to upscale voters, to whites/blacks/latinos/asian voters and all those smaller sub groups within each race, all who have varying interests outside of the core issues (healthcare, education, jobs, etc). Not that Republicans don't have similar groups (minus minorities), but Democrats have a combination of them that is problematic to tend to policy-wise yet electorally important.

You shouldn't be surprised if it is easier for you guys, although it's worth pointing out that Republicans have had a reckoning themselves and it'll probably get worse before it gets better. Your party's economic agenda is wildly out of step with large portions of the GOP base, particularly as you take on more white working class voters at the expense of professional class voters. Trump knew this even if he didn't care overall. He knew that the voters he needed in the Midwest cared about things like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

coincidentally this guy also was a lawyer for the Miluwakee Archdiocese and helped cover for their sexual assault. sounds like a bottom feeder to me.

See what I mean all you do is attack people.  I suppose the Archdiocese was not to have legal representation.    He actually was a Chairman of your party.

Says the guy from the party whose primary reason for existing these days is the extraction of liberal tears, led by a madman who is widely known as a bully.

[Virginiá]

Please take discussions about pickling Matt Flyn and penis penalties to another thread. Any posts about those topics after this warning will be deleted.

[Virginiá]

Democrats received more primary votes than Republicans. Does Evers beat Walker?

Primary turnout can be helpful to see what kind of enthusiasm gap there is, but it's not really the best for predicting general election results unless it's a top-two primary.

I suppose you could try to make some broad predictions about the overall GE result of all the races if the primary vote is insanely lopsided, though.

[Virginiá]

So Sarah Godlewski spent $150k on an ad to win the state treasurer’s primary. All for a job that pays $70k a year and requires no real work or duties. Hmm. I’m sure we’ll be seeing her name again for the 2022 Senate race after she wins this year.

Republicans stripped the job duties and tried to kill the job, Democrats want to make the job what it was before...

The stripping of powers from the office has apparently gone on for decades, advocated by both Republican and Democratic administrations:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Treasurer_of_Wisconsin#Reduction_of_powers_and_office_dissolution_attempts

Also, Godlewski has no plans to return its previous powers:

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I mean more power to her, as I have little doubt she'll win this year given the environment and the fact that she's the only one in both parties who has run a serious campaign thus far. But it's pretty obvious she only intends to use it as a stepping stone for a higher office run as soon as the opportunity presents itself. Which is fine, since that's what most politicians do with the offices they have.

tbh I do kind of like the idea of a reasonable number of row offices serving as incubators for potential future Gov/Senate/other candidates (even if it doesn't always work out that way), provided they actually do the job they were elected for. Wisconsin's current setup seems reasonable. It could be worse - look at North Dakota or North Carolina

[Virginiá]

I felt hopeless when I voted for Burke in 2014, since I knew it would come down to luck. This year feels different top down, from candidate quality to potential. I think the seat may flip.

And in the midterm before redistricting - the most important midterm there is.

[Virginiá]

2016: If the people you are calling were actual trolls, or were otherwise engaging in trollish behavior, it would be one thing, but you're just labeling people who disagree with you as trolls. That is not acceptable here. Keep the discussion civil.

[Virginiá]

Evers will win...the state leg will flip...and progressive policies will be ushered in. Get ready for voting rights, medicaid expansion, etc...!

All of my family (all of whom are Independents) who voted for Walker three times is supporting Evers solely due to Walker's refusal to distance himself from Trump, and they live in the rural areas of the state. I just hope to God other Independents follow suit in this once progressive state!

Wisconsin just can't afford all the extra spending to be brought in by Super Nintendo Evers. Vote Scott Walker in November. If he didn't restrict your ability to vote, that is.

What does this mean?

It's a pun on Superintendent, I believe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=av4lbel9aIo

[Virginiá]

Prediction:
Baldwin +7 ("GOLD STANDARD shows Baldwin leading.")

Walker + 3 and everyone decides Marquette is no longer the Gold Standard until they show results they want.

What I don't understand is why every other poll has shown Evers leading, while every Marquette poll  in this cycle has indicated Walker either leading or tied with Evers. Vukmir was the closest she'd ever been to Baldwin on the last Marquette poll. The Marquette poll obviously skews Republican.

Nope, the Marquette poll was lauded by the Atlas users until they showed uncomfortable results vis-à-vis this state.

Seriously? You do this too. You have no standing to complain about other people when you casually praise polls that confirm your biases and then turn around and trash the same outfit for showing results you don't like:

Gravis is gonna Gravis. Doesn't fly with a D+3 Generic ballot. Manchin +2 I can believe.

Compared to:

IN-SEN Gravis: Braun +1

Told you guys. This is Bayh 2.0, R+10 election day.  Where are those mocking me now?

[Virginiá]

Former aides give Wisconsin Gov. Walker re-election headache

https://www.apnews.com/35bb8cada6524e6ba6e6e9e4440d2be7

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[Virginiá]

I really hate this part of politics. It can get so vicious at times, and usually with attacks that completely lack context that would make them significantly less attack-worthy if provided. It's all just so shameless. Just throw anything at them, even if it's blatantly false or irrelevant, and see if it sticks.

[Virginiá]

Walker's recent tweet about the Marquette poll:

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1979/44801415072_3c481a691f_o.png

Booo Walker, Marquette had Feingold+1 in their last poll. For all Walker knows, Feingold really was up +6 in September. The race just changed in the end for well-known reasons. So Walker's tweet is misleading. No surprise there.

[Virginiá]

That seems to be the one argument that people claiming that Walker is favored have left: That the polls were wrong in 2016. Of course, it's not a good argument, and often those who make it end up doing worse than the polls suggest, not better. However, I think it's pretty clear to anyone following this race how much trouble Walker is in, and I think that even he knows that he's losing right now.

Yeah, I mean, he's just saying it to rile his people up. He obviously is seeing his internals and I bet he is down in them, or tied at best. I just think it says something about people in general that they would lie about that stuff just for some raw-raw pep tweet. It's symbolic of just how little certain types of pols care about the truth, which coincidentally Walker is a poster boy for.

On a side note, Walker being down really shouldn't be that surprising. He was never a particularly strong incumbent as far as I am concerned. His wins were pretty small and they happened in GOP wave years, and the recall happened under a Democratic president who was still more unpopular than popular at the time, with the same approvals that got Democrats blown out in 2010. Not to mention Walker was an incumbent and they usually have an advantage.

An actually-strong incumbent ought to have winning margins that look more like Tommy Thompson's, where he won 4 terms in a row, and every race but his first was won with mid-high double digit margins. Walker's winning margins have nothing on that. And at least Thompson could win his first election under the 6-year itch of a Republican president, where Democrats won the House popular vote by just shy of 10 points.

Meanwhile, Walker's first Democratic wave election and he's already on lagging behind in the polls, and as an incumbent no less. He's just a bland empty suit Republican who won a few elections and somehow got branded a master of elections and politics.

[Virginiá]

Very little enthusiasm for the Republican ticket in Burlington, a pretty Republican city in WI-01:

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WI might surprise more than believed in November. We'll see.

I really hope Democrats can flip at least one chamber of the legislature if they win the Govs office. It's critical because Wisconsin Republicans are exactly the type to use their remaining power in the legislature to refer a constitutional amendment to the ballot in 2020 to take away the Gov's ability to veto new maps. I wouldn't put it past them to try and end same-day voter registration too (Walker already looked into it but deemed it to expensive). They need to pass the amendment by a majority vote in two back-to-back sessions to get it on the ballot, which means if they lose the state Senate this cycle, they can't do it in time.

Never underestimate what corrupt, partisan lawmakers will do when backed into a corner and threatened with the loss of power they have come to take for granted. Pennsylvania Republicans seriously entertained impeaching every Democrat on the state Supreme Court for overturning the Congressional map, and they already made moves to try and take away Democrats' influence in redistricting just like I mused about above. I'm not 100% the WIGOP will try this, but we're bound to see them try this in a couple states if the losses are bad. They are not going to go quietly.

[Virginiá]

I don't think the state is dumb enough to go along with that. They just rejected an obvious power grab to eliminate the Treasurer position.

Well, on one hand, sometimes voters are smart enough to reject these kinds of power grabs (Minnesota even rejected voter ID, yet other states didn't), but on the other, Wisconsin voted for Donald Trump of all people, and has seemed completely unbothered by the ethics issues surrounding Walker & Co. So I'm not exactly taking solace in the idea that they can be relied on to reject a measure that changes redistricting rules. To voters, it's a boring and confusing process that only happens once in a while and the amendment language for stuff like that often looks pretty innocent (or can be made to - re: North Carolina judicial amendment). Democrats could wage a big persuasion campaign against it, but given their poor track on ballot initiatives prior to 2018, I'm not sure I trust that either.

At any rate, it's just better that Republicans can't put anything on the ballot in the first place.

[Virginiá]

Wait, hold on. I want to merge the last dozen or two pages.

[Virginiá]

OOOF

Sorry, I didn't intend to merge 20+ old pages (I was hoping for just 12 or so), but you hadn't posted in this thread since May, so I had to go way back to still keep you as the thread author.

[Virginiá]

What kind of coattails would we need to flip at least one of the legislative bodies in this state? Are Dem booms only concentrated in Milwaukee or Madison?

I don't know why you keep bringing up this "Dems are concentrated in..." - Just look at the presidential numbers and that will give you a good idea of where Democrats can look for seats, which as useful as it is, still doesn't even include reach targets like the special elections they won:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1YZRfFiCDBEYB7M18fDGLH8IrmyMQGdQKqpOu9lLvmdo/edit#gid=1077872047

District 5 - Vukmir's old seat: 47.71 - 46.69 Trump seat -- Open seat
District 17: 51 - 43 Trump seat, but 56 - 42 Obama seat -- Big swing, Dems may have a shot
District 19: 50 - 43 Trump, 49 - 49 Obama/Romney


There are some other big Trump seats that were only marginal Romney seats, so depending on how you think the wave will go, and the dynamics of those seats, Democrats could pull a rabbit out of the hat in one of them. If you don't think so, keep in mind that the only reason Democrats are even competitive in the state Senate this cycle is because they pulled a rabbit out of the hat twice in big Trump / marginal Romney seats.

[Virginiá]

Game over. Walker’s got this one in the bag. The Electric Company vote is gonna come through bigly for Walker.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qbF6GcES3-4&feature=youtu.be

Best ad of the decade.

Dear lord

I can't sink any further into my seat

[Virginiá]

Democrats need to fight back with an aggressive, well-funded campaign of cloud seeding over the WOW counties. Make it rain bigly!

[Virginiá]

It'll be key to watch how Republicans in the legislature behave. They could try to remove the Governor from the redistricting process, but voters will have to approve it. What I will say is that if they wanted to do that, it basically costs nothing. But the big failure of the North Carolina GOP's amendment schemes this cycle might help instill a sense of futility in the WIGOP. Although walking away from this election with little-to-no erosion in their legislative ranks might embolden them. I dunno.

Also there is no guarantee the WIGOP has a state Supreme Court majority by the time the maps need to be redrawn. I think Democrats have some opportunities, and at worst, the GOP will only have a small majority on the bench.

Edit: Actually, seems like Republicans will likely have a bare majority for redistricting, but that hardly means the GOP will just gerrymander through them instead, if it falls to the judges.

[Virginiá]

Couple things: 1) There is not enough time for Repubilcans to get a Consitutional Amendment on the ballot in time before 2021. It has to pass in two consecutive terms. That is unless they call a special session before January. 2) If there is a deadlock regarding redistricting, the federal courts will get the authority to drawn the lines, not the state courts. Look at Virgina for example.

Can't they just pass it in 2019 and then again in 2020? Certainly there are at least two sessions between 2019 and 2020, and of course special sessions.

Virginia's redraw was done by federal courts because a federal court struck down the original map. I was curious myself who does it in a deadlock during the actual, official new census redistricting, so I looked up Minnesota, and evidently they have a state court panel do theirs due to the deadlock.

[Virginiá]

Ohhh ok, thanks. Fair enough!

[Virginiá]

Even the WISC will vote against the power grab.

It depends on what it is I imagine. I don't know exactly how powerful the WI Governor is and what exactly he can do, but if the WIGOP is like the NCGOP, they will probably try to limit his input in election stuff and place restraints on his ability to freely staff his administration. Maybe also take away the ability of the executive to pass some kinds of regulations as well. This is all pretty typical.

Can't say I'm surprised at this. The Republican Party these days is a place where ethics go to die. Too many corrupt politicians who are drowning in the money and priorities of wealthy people and corporations. Not to mention the dangerous trend of anti-democratic tendencies over the past generation.