What predictions are you referring to? At the end of the day, a judge who had won multiple times and was supposed to have an easy election (winning the nonpartisan primary by a landslide against the same opponent) might just have ended up losing less than 6 weeks later.
Right, Prosser was supposed to win by a landslide until Walker started overreaching. I was told by friends in Wisconsin that Prosser won his last election with 99% of the vote and that this is the first time a state SC justice has been voted out in WI since the 40's. And today he lost. I'm not sure how true all that is, but Kloppenburg was dead in the water and she won.
via HuffPo 19 counties that went for Walker in the 2010 elections this time flipped and went for Kloppenburg, including LaCrosse (59 percent), Sauk (56 percent) and Dunn (56 percent).
Well now that the right wingers and supporters of Scott Walker lost a 30 point lead and their S. Ct. guy lost, perhaps Major and other contented moderates can join the game. Perhaps even Obama will snap to it? Sometimes you win when you keep fighting and you certainly lose when you keep negotiating over and over against yourself. Interesting quotes from the self proclaimed "serious" Major. Come on board the Wisconsin Express, Major. : glynch major
What exactly is interesting? From the start, I said the Dems could win political points by playing this game, but they had no legislative end game. And they didn't - in case you missed it, the GOP still passed the bill. Interestingly, you skipped this quote: If the goal is simply to win a political fight, then sure, keep fighting. If the goal is to get the best result for Wisconsin public sector employees, then this is potentially a very smart "compromise" for them. The Dems won the political fight. But the side effect is that unless the courts really kill the bill over a procedural technicality (unlikely, and really, the GOP could just pass it again if they wanted to), the end result was that Wisconsin public unions got killed. The Dems didn't have a legislative end game and we saw the result. Their running away didn't accomplish the goal of saving the unions. If they could have made the compromise work - and its unclear if they could have gotten the 3 GOPers they needed - they could have saved the unions, though at a political cost to themselves. I'd argue that's what actual governing is about.
contemporaneous reporting from Althouse, noted the problem on election night: http://althouse.blogspot.com/2011/04/david-prosser-gained-7582-votes-in.html UPDATE, 11:35: Concentrating on the AP numbers, looking at which counties still need to report, I'm irritated by the way Waukesha (strong for Prosser) and Dane (strong for Kloppenburg) seem to be holding out, like it's a game of chicken. Right now the candidates are 50-50%, with Prosser up 6,000+. It's been seesawing back and forth, with Kloppenburg up some of the time. To my eye, it looks as though there are more votes left to report in the places that are pro-Prosser, so I think in the end Prosser will squeak by. UPDATE, 11:43: Dane (Madison's county) is nearly all in. I don't see how Kloppenburg can net more than about 3,000 with what's left of Dane. Waukesha is now shown as completely in, but the numbers didn't change, so I think something may have been misreported. I took the trouble to do a calculation and was going to predict that Prosser would net 40,000 more votes in Waukesha. What happened?
So in 2 or 3 years, you potentially can get the Governorship back, and then after another election to retake both the House and the Senate, you MIGHT get to the point where you can pass legislation to restore the rights that the proposed compromise you hated already had restored by 2012. Excellent work! That's certainly true. While the Democrats did not govern, the Republicans did and made big changes. And as a result, unions got screwed. Excellent job. You strike me as no different than all the elitist people you claim to hate - you are more interested in the Dems getting power than them actually doing the things that would benefit the people you claim to care about.
Well you strike me as a contented moderate Republican who is uncomfortable with change but who is also making a strangely illogical argument. At first you speak of Republicans governing and therefore making changes (btw that is because they got in power) and bad mouth Dems for not winning elections and therefore letting Repubs hurt unions. Then you declaim me and Dems such as those is Wisconsin as being only "interested in the Dems getting power" like that somehow has nothing to do with making changes Dems might want. Then you argue that the way for Dems to "benefit the people (we) claim to care about" is careful compromises with the Republicans. Well it should be no surprise that a Republican would argue that approach. \ Neither should it be a surprise if a Democrat thought the best way to help the people that I claim to care about, is for Democrats to actually win elections rather than keep making cuatious compromises as the Republican move the agenda to the right. Let the Republicans make cautious compromises as the Dems push their agenda for the American people. Perhaps you think the best way for Dems to win elections is to keep cautiously compromising and to keep as little daylight as possible between them and the Repubs as the Repubs move right and set the agenda. Then the people will like them because they are so moderate. I would strongly disagree and think that folks will be just more likely to be cynical and view all poliiticians as the same and not out for the little guy.
Possibly some fishy business regarding votes in Waukesha county. http://www.startribune.com/local/119436904.html Conservative takes commanding lead in Wisconsin's Supreme court race after votes discovered * Article by: SCOTT BAUER and CARRIE ANTLFINGER , Associated Press WAUKESHA, Wis. - A stunning discovery of votes in Wisconsin could give the state's hotly contested Supreme Court race to the conservative incumbent in an election largely seen as a referendum on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's explosive union rights law. Adding another twist, the county clerk who said she incorrectly entered vote totals in the race has faced criticism before for her handling of elections and previously worked for a state GOP caucus when it was controlled by the candidate who stands to benefit from Thursday's revelation. The corrected totals gave Justice David Prosser a 7,500-vote lead over little-known liberal assistant state attorney general JoAnne Kloppenburg, according to unofficial tallies. Before the announcement, it was assumed the race was headed for a recount. The difference between the two had fluctuated throughout the day Thursday as counties began verifying votes, but at one point was as close as 11. Opponents of the law that takes away nearly all public employee collective bargaining rights had hoped a Kloppenburg victory would set the stage for the high court to strike it down. Kloppenburg's campaign manager Melissa Mulliken demanded a full explanation of how the error occurred and said an open records requests for all relevant documents would be filed. Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus said it was "human error" that resulted in more than 14,000 votes from her predominantly GOP county not being reported to The Associated Press on Tuesday. She said the most significant error occurred when she entered but did not save totals from the city of Brookfield, a suburb of Milwaukee. "This is not a case of extra votes or extra ballots being found," Nickolaus said. "This is human error, which I apologize for." Nickolaus worked for 13 years for a Republican caucus that was controlled by Prosser when he was Assembly speaker in 1995 and 1996. She was given immunity from prosecution in a 2002 criminal investigation into illegal activity by members of the caucus where she worked as a data analyst and computer specialist. The corruption probe took down five legislative leaders, all of whom reached plea deals. Nickolaus resigned from her state job in 2002 just before launching her county clerk campaign. Nickolaus also has been criticized by the Waukesha County Board for her handling of past elections and lack of oversight in her operations. An audit of Nickolaus' handling of the 2010 election found she needed to take steps to improve security and backup procedures, including by not sharing passwords. The audit was requested after the county's director of administration said Nickolaus had been uncooperative with attempts to have county experts review her systems and confirm backups were in place. The surprise discovery of votes that could give Prosser the win had liberal groups crying foul. "There is a history of secrecy and partisanship surrounding the Waukesha County Clerk and there remain unanswered questions," Scot Ross, director of the liberal group One Wisconsin Now, said in a statement. Rep. Peter Barca, Democratic Assembly minority leader, said the mistake raises significant suspicion that could warrant an investigation. "It doesn't instill confidence in her competence or integrity," Barca said. Prosser issued a statement saying he was encouraged by various reports from counties as they began verifying the votes. He did not specifically mention the Waukesha County change. "Our confidence is high, and we will continue to monitor with optimism, and believe that the positive results will hold. We've always maintained faith in the voters and trust the election officials involved in the canvasing will reaffirm the lead we've taken." The race was so close, despite 1.5 million votes being cast, that the lead flipped back and forth repeatedly on Election Day and in the days after as preliminary totals were checked and updated. The Government Accountability Board, which is in charge of overseeing Wisconsin's elections, will review Waukesha County's numbers to verify the totals, said agency director Kevin Kennedy. Kennedy said it was unfortunate the clerk didn't double-check the data before releasing it to the media. Kennedy also said such mistakes are known to happen but that "we just don't see them of this magnitude." Nickolaus said she didn't notice an absence of votes because her figures showed a 42 percent voter turnout, which exceeded the 30 percent turnout the county typically sees in spring elections. "That was an amazing amount of votes," she said. "So I had no reason to believe I was missing anything."
