The Milwaukee Post

8 • Milwaukee County Post • April 20, 2018 The Democrats in Wisconsin are down- right giddy. They sense that 2018 is the year their decade-long losing streak ends and they once again start winning all the elections in this state. Indeed, they appear to have a lot going for them. The case for 2018 being a Wisconsin Republican train wreck is compelling. It starts with our long-standing history of electing governors from the opposite party of the president. Since 1966, Tommy Thompson is the only Wisconsin governor to win an election when his party con- trolled the White House. Besides, there's the normal bloodbath for a political party in the first off-year election of a presiden- tial cycle. That's just the beginning of the ominous landscape for state Republicans. Paul Ryan is quitting as speaker of the House and is giving up his congressional seat. The Rebecca Dallet Supreme Court win is an indication Democrats have more enthu- siasm than Republicans and are having an easier time motivating their voters. Billionaire activist Tom Steyer is enter- ing the state and plans to spend many mil- lions trying to take out Gov. Scott Walker and save Democrat Sen. Tammy Baldwin. The Kohl millions will be put to work to try to oust GOP Congressman Glenn Grothman with Herb Kohl's nephew Danny trying to win that seat. There's dis- unity among Wisconsin Republicans over President Donald Trump and the acrimo- ny between GOP leaders in the state Assembly and Senate is real. Even worse, national conservative groups seem to have forgotten about Wisconsin. Walker is doing everything he can to sound alarms and let national groups know the GOP here is under siege and that the groundbreaking reforms that have been achieved in Wisconsin are in jeopardy. One of the two major voices pro- moting conservatism in the state, WTMJ- AM radio, have dumped its format in favor of inane prattle. The mainstream media, led by all the Gannett-owned papers including the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, has abandoned all pretense of objectivity and are shilling for Democrats by trashing the Foxconn deal and invent- ing scandals involving the Assembly speaker. All of this points to 2018 being a Wisconsin Republican nightmare. Except for one thing: The Democrats are even more screwed up. The best thing Wisconsin Republicans have going for them this year is the Democrats. Look at their field for governor. This motley bunch looks like extras from the bar scene in "Star Wars." The ones that aren't doddering old hacks in their 70s are Madison radicals. You've got an odd duck businessman whose past is littered with lawsuits, the near-Communist mayor of Madison, a couple of back-bench members of the Legislature, the nerdy state schools chief, a woman who ran for governor in 2012 and got 4 percent of the vote, and you have my old TV panelist Matt Flynn, who started running for office in the 1980s and still hasn't come close to winning any- thing. The incumbent Democrat U.S. senator, Tammy Baldwin, is known for only one thing: helping cover up the drugging of vets with opioids at the VA in Tomah. No one can recall her uttering a position on a single political issue and despite being a senator for six years, hardly anybody even knows who she is. Then there's Paul Ryan's seat. This is a golden opportunity for the Democrats except their leading candidate is a dead- beat dad who was recently in the news for stiffing an ex-girlfriend out of the money he owed her. It's like the Democrats set out to find the most unlikeable loser in south- eastern Wisconsin and chose him to run for Congress. Grothman's opponent Danny Kohl is over 50 but still trying to figure out what he's going to do when he grows up. He's a trust fund baby with a personality more suited to the other cold fish in Lake Michigan. But the Democrat baggage goes beyond the hapless bunch of lefty losers they are putting on the ballot. Memories are still fresh of what happened to this state when we let them run things. Remember Wisconsin in 2010? We had the worst busi- ness climate in the nation, companies were bailing out right and left, the state budget was in shambles, school aid was being cut, the state transportation and vic- tim compensation funds were illegally raided to pay the daily bills and even the teachers union's own magazine was urg- ing retirees to bail out of the state. The only thing going up faster than the taxes was the unemployment rate. With the state's economy booming, jobs being created faster than we have actual workers to fill them, the state budget run- ning a surplus and international business executives describing us as one of the most attractive places to locate in the entire world, the contrast with the disaster the Democrats presided over only one decade ago is compelling. Yes, all of the external signs are pointing against Wisconsin Republicans. History says it will be a bad year. The Democrats are showing both national and state momentum. The Republicans are feuding over Trump and seemingly everything else. Leaders like Paul Ryan are fleeing their jobs. But if there is any group capa- ble of failing to take advantage of all of this, it is our Democrats. They can't find a single attractive human being to run for office. They have radicalized themselves to the point of being unacceptable to the state's mainstream (the world outside of Madison). And, they have a very recent history of absolute, total incompetence. The reason Republicans have won every- thing in this state since the 2010 election, including carrying the state in 2016 in the presidential election, is that they have had the advantage of running against the Wisconsin Democrats. And that's who they get to run against again this year. (Mark Belling is the host of a daily WISN radio talk show. His column appears week- ly in the Milwaukee Post. Send your person- al correspondences to Mark Belling at Clear Channel Communications, c/o WISN, 12100 W. Howard Ave., Greenfield, WI 53228). MARK BELLING STANDING UP for MILWAUKEE State GOP may be saved by one thing: the Democrats OPINION Last week's question What do you think of Ascension shutting down much of St. Joseph's Hospital on the North Side and any possible reduction at St. Francis Hospital? Feel free to address Mark Belling's column. Or, what do you think of Da Crusher statue that is slated for South Milwaukee? (Choose one.) Alderman Bob Donovan's right. They must be thinking people aren't going to get sick. It'll just make it hard on all the other hospitals because they'll have to treat more patients.When you are sick you want care; you don't want the runaround with another hospital. They need to get it done. — Tommy Sukkert South Milwaukee *** Regarding St. Joseph's and Sherman Park, I was living just blocks away from St. Joseph's Hospital since I was out of the service in 1979 until 2013. Our watchdog group began there and we were working with residents in the community, trying to make improve- ments. What's happening with St. Joseph's is really no surprise. Watching from the street level and then going back after the riot in 2016 and talking with people still there, the whole area has been deteriorating. When it comes down to a lot of the blame when you ask the residents and businesses, St. Joseph's is what they come up with.They had been buying up houses and expanding the hospital, and housing their employees. This is an area where there were many diverse ethnic groups. You go over there and take a look, and they're just not there anymore. The Jewish community on the other side of Burleigh claimed they were forced out by St. Joe's, the same thing with the Greeks. St. Joseph's can take the blame for most of it. — Thomas Reed West Allis This week's question What do you think of the U.S.-led strike on Syria to stop chemical weapons? Or, fired FBI Director James Comey is on his book tour. What's your view of him? Or, what do you think of Speaker Paul Ryan's retirement from Congress? (Choose one.) Editor's note: When responding to the Question of the Week, please include your full name with spelling, phone number and city where you live. Phone numbers will not be published. Call 744-6370, Ext. 15 and leave a brief answer. Readers may also send an email to: dmuck@conleynet.com. Question of the week 'Lefty losers' and memories of the last time they ran things still linger

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