Master_Pedant wrote:
Jacoby wrote:
One of the weird things about this election night was how far off exit polling was from the real results. They were projecting it to be a close race and it was a blowout.
The polls were trending in the right direction though, from an advantage for Barrett to a Scott Walker victory. I goes Scott Walker honestly persuaded the people of Wisconsin that he was right on collective bargaining issues with these uber-relevant to the issue ads.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icGujXPWhDo[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpq4koa8mO8&feature=relmfu[/youtube]
I didn't see either of those ads specifically but there were ones on that mentioned that subject. The MPD's misreporting of violent crimes is a pretty serious issue however and the implication is that it was done for political reasons. I'm not sure how much Tom Barrett personally had to do with that if at all but he has cited lowered crime rates as evidence of his leadership. Milwaukee has one of worst school districts in the entire country and was ranked as the 3rd poorest major city in America quite recently so I think Tom Barrett's record of leadership was very relevant to the race, it was fair game in my opinion. Barrett has also advocated wasteful spending on $70 million on a trolly car in a part of downtown where there isn't anything to use it for and already spent $40 mil on renovating the seldom used Milwaukee Theater all while our cities buses are struggling to survive, our infrastructure is getting dangerously outdated, a failing school system, and poverty through the roof. To Barrett's credit he did try to reform the school system himself by establishing mayoral control but was pushed back by the teacher's union. The guy was just a tremendously weak candidate.
I'd say Walker's central theme of his campaign was that his reforms were working and that mayor Barrett would undo them and move the state backwards. Barrett's campaign ran mostly on being a unity candidate that would 'end the civil war in Wisconsin' while attackin Walker primarily on cutting taxes for the rich, his 'war on women'(dubious to say the least), and the John Doe investigation. Barrett made the mistake of attacking Walker early on a jobs report that said Wisconsin lost jobs last year that ended up being revised later showing the state had actually gained 30k+ jobs leaving Barrett with egg on his face. After that, Walker attacked Barrett's record as mayor of Milwaukee and cited his reforms as working.The collective bargaining issue wasn't really a central part of Barrett's campaign.
21 Jun 2012, 12:25 pm
