Wisconsin Recall Primary Analysis
from Chicago Boyz by Dan from Madison
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Some cocktail napkin math and most likely incorrect analysis of yesterday’s recall primary under the fold for anyone who is interested.
The results of yesterday’s recall election held some real surprises for me – not with the results, but with the percentages involved.
There seems to have been very little crossover. Wisconsin is an open primary state so you could choose to vote in either parties primary for either recall (governor and lt. governor). I voted in the R primary for governor and crossed over to vote in the D primary for lt. governor since the R had no opposition. Personally, I think these open primaries are sort of stupid, and the primaries should be paid for by the parties, but those are different subjects for a different day. The main thrust is that there appears to have been little crossover.
There was a fake Republican on the R side going up against Walker. The results:
Walker – 626,538 – 97%
Kohl-Riggs – 19,920 – 3%
It is a certainty that almost all of those 19,920 votes were crossovers.
Here are the results of the Democrat primary, to pick the challenger to Walker:
Barrett – 390,109 – 58%
Falk – 228,940 – 38%
Vinehout – 26,926 – 4%
LaFollette – 19,461 – 3%
Huber – 4,842 – 1%
So we get a rematch of 2010. Can you believe this? After all of that bucket drumming, chanting, marching around the square, crashing in and trashing of the capitol building, and all the rest, we have the same exact match up we had in 2010. The Democrat party effectively kneecapped the left and progressives by putting a figurative bullet to the head of Falk. I have heard from friends that Obama/Emmanuel had something to do with this but don’t have any firm proof.
Falk early on said she would do everything in her power to repeal Walker’s reforms and put things “right” for the government unions. She received early endorsements from EVERY government union and AFSCME was even running early attack ads against Barrett. The Democrats understood early on that a “union” candidate would get blasted by Walker so they began their “war on women” and crushed Falk. Barrett is a much more centrist candidate. Many of the left will still crawl over broken glass to vote for him, much like conservatives with Romney, but it has got to be a bitter pill to swallow to see how the left and unions were played by the Dems. Hilarious to me, though.
So lets look at this turnout – the Democrats cast a total of 670,278 votes. Hey, wait a minute. That isn’t even close to the number of petitions filed for the recall in the first place (around one million supposedly). What is up with that? Only a few things can be surmised.
Massive peition fraud.
People signed just to feel good, or get a family member or someone else out of their face.
People didn’t understand what they were signing.
Something else?
I don’t get that at all. Hey, YOU are the ones that wanted this stupid recall and you aren’t even going to vote in the primary now to select the candidate to go against the dark lord Walker? Sheesh. What a scam.
The republican turnout was impressive – 646,458 votes – almost MORE than the Dems and for the R’s, there wasn’t really anything to vote for. I am pleasantly surprised at this.
By Barrett winning, it is absolutely clear now that this isn’t about collective bargaining for government unions anymore. It is a power grab by one party over another, plain and simple. Barrett has campaigned FAR away from the union issue and I can only assume will continue to do so.
So prediction time, and a little crystal ball stuff.
I think Walker will win. I also think that the Senate will flip from R to D. I believe there are four state senate races to be decided in the general recall election on June 5. It is going to be a LONG month up here with robocalls, ads, and all the rest.
But what if Walker loses? Well, it isn’t the end of the world. We will have a corporatist, centrist governor who won’t try to take down everything Walker has done. And he won’t be able to because the Assembly is in firm control of the R’s, and appears that it will be for a generation. The legislative business is done for this year and many people will forget a lot of things by the time November rolls around and we have yet another election. When I vote for President in November, it will be the fifth or sixth time I have voted this year. I am sick of it as are many others. But don’t forget what the despicable Russ Feingold said last year – the game’s not over until we win.
If Walker loses, he will be free to help Washington get its crap together, or he could come back in 2014 to run again for governor here in Wisconsin (when the current term for governor ends). |
