FRESH FROM his victory in Tuesday’s recall election, the conservative governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker, yesterday called on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney to follow his example.
“I think the country is hungry for leaders who are willing to stand up and say it like it is and tell people what they are going to do and then mean it,” Mr Walker told ABC television. “If can really lay that out crystal clear to voters here in Wisconsin and across the country, I think he can be competitive.”
Mr Walker delivered a heavy blow to unions, the Democratic party and possibly President Barack Obama by surviving the attempted recall 18 months into his first term. He had enraged the left by curtailing collective bargaining rights for most public sector workers last year. Not only did Mr Walker defeat Milwaukee’s Democratic mayor, Tom Barrett, by 53 to 46 per cent, he stretched his lead over him in the original November 2010 gubernatorial election.
Considered the second most important election in the US this year, the Wisconsin recall was viewed as a microcosm of the fierce partisanship in US politics, centred on government spending, money in politics, income inequality and the comparative rights of workers and employers.
Wisconsin showed that voters prefer a decisive but divisive politician such as Mr Walker to one who consults and seeks consensus, such as Mr Barrett. A Wall Street Journal/NBC poll last week showed that two-thirds of Republicans and 55 per cent of independent voters would prefer a president who fights to one who compromises.
Mr Walker enlisted financial support from right-wing billionaires across the country, outspending Mr Barrett seven to one in a campaign that mobilised $63.5 million on both sides.
Under the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling, Mr Romney will have access to virtually unlimited funds from “super pacs” for his presidential campaign.
Over the past 18 months, Wisconsin has witnessed an unusually high level of political polarisation and anger.
It seemed paradoxical that opinion polls targeting the same electorate that gave Mr Walker a seven-point victory still accord Mr Obama a nine-point lead over Mr Romney. No Republican has won Wisconsin since Ronald Reagan in 1984, and Mr Walker said there was “no doubt” that Mr Romney was still the underdog to win Wisconsin in November.
One reason is Mr Obama’s bailout of the automobile industry. But his failure to support Mr Barrett could leave a bitter taste with the state’s Democratic voters.
The conservative group Americans For Prosperity (AFP) noted in a statement that on June 1st, “The president was in Minneapolis – just 40 miles from the Wisconsin state line – and he chose to head for the tall grass instead of going to Wisconsin and standing with his allies.”
AFP is funded by the billionaire Koch brothers, Walker supporters who have called this year’s presidential election “the mother of all wars”.
The sum total of Mr Obama’s support for Mr Barrett was the dispatch of former president Bill Clinton and a 140-character tweet on the eve of the election: “It’s election day in Wisconsin tomorrow and I’m standing by Tom Barrett.”
Mr Romney hailed Mr Walker’s victory, predicting that: “In November voters across the country will demonstrate that they want the same in Washington DC.”
Grover Norquist, the president of Americans for Tax Reform, who has forced nearly all Republican Congressmen to sign a pledge that they will never, under any circumstances, raise taxes, predicted that the failed Wisconsin recall would encourage at least half of the 24 states governed by Republicans to take action against unions.
