Although the national press seems to have moved on to bigger and better things, those of us in Wisconsin still have to deal with the fact that Scott Walker remains the governor - at least for now. Fortunately, we are a hardy and determined bunch. Maybe it's the long, hard winters, maybe it's the farming tradition, or maybe it's all the cheese. But we are still working hard to make sure Governor Scott Walker does not forget about us - the people of this great state.
And so last night, when Walker appeared in Racine to speak at the Racine County Economic Development Corp.’s 28th Anniversary event, protestors appeared as well.
"Some were protesting his decision to do away with the reciprocity agreement between Wisconsin and Minnesota’s university system, meaning Wisconsin residents would pay the higher out-of-state tuition rate at Minnesota state schools. Some were protesting the collective bargaining issue, some were protesting Walker’s decision to not defend the state’s domestic partnership provision.Kelly Gallaher of Community for Change ticked off the reasons that groups were there to protest Walker’s appearance, saying 'it’s pretty much a hit list of all our progressive ideals.'"
At the event, Walker spoke for about twenty minutes, tooting his own horn. He noted with pleasure his moves to strip power from other elected authorities in the state and his massive deregulation initiatives, and congratulated himself on stripping collective bargaining rights from state employees. He even tried to spin the massive protests as something that worked to his advantage:
"'The irony of all the attention in January and February is we got the attention of the job creators. It probably helped us draw attention to Wisconsin as a place that's heading in the right direction.'"And once again, Walker took credit for the creation of 25,000 jobs in Wisconsin "since he took office." Sadly, most of those jobs are the result of initiatives by former Governor Jim Doyle, a fact that was pointed out by State Rep. Cory Mason in the Racine area Journal-Times after the RCEDC event.
But that's another diary.