Most of us in Wisconsin, like America, are not political animals.
Let's face it, politics is akin to a blur we see as we live our lives, love our families and pursue happiness; it's the American way. Beyond a vague skepticism, most view politics as a spectator sport, a rigged system in which maybe one votes every couple years or so.
Bush, Rove and Cheney knew this truism, and they knew they could get away with a lot before people woke up.
This has changed.
What Scott Walker and the Republican Party has done is awaken a sleeping badger. The fact that people can use the formal structures of democracy to fight back is an exciting prospect.
The fact the political system can be used to protect and indeed inflict damage to those forces assaulting our families is a self-perpetuating dynamic. Never has Wisconsin seen genuine attacks by government to this extent. And the lies and the hypocrisy spread at viral speed over the Net.
Bill Lueders has an insightful piece at
Isthmus, which has arguably run the most comprehensive coverage of the Walker scandal and the new Movement.
An excerpt:
... The daily rallies at the state Capitol since Feb. 14 have drawn more than half a million people, including a crowd of perhaps 100,000 on Feb. 26, a cold and snowy Saturday. For more than a week, mostly student protesters maintained a constant protest presence at the Capitol, banging drums in support of collective bargaining rights and sleeping overnight on cold marble floors, until a judge's ruling that they could be removed prompted them to voluntarily withdraw. The battle has been joined by public and private unionists all over the state, with support rallies all over the nation. These will likely reach a new level of intensity now that the bill has passed as a result of legislative maneuvers the Democrats are plausibly claiming to be illegal.
Most amazingly, the state's law enforcement officers and fire fighters, whom Walker exempted from his benefit concessions and collective bargaining crackdown, have been a major presence at these protest rallies. Warm relations have developed between the protesters and the more than 200 law enforcement officers called in each day from all over the state to keep the peace against no apparent threat; they see each other as being on the same side. When the state began severely restricting Capitol access, Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney pulled his deputies from the security detail, saying he would not let them be used as "palace guards."
