Mike McCabe: Dysfunction Junction Leaves Wisconsin Poll Workers & Voters At Risk Of Death

Time to act to protect Wisconsin, Governor.

By Mike McCabe
Our Wisconsin Revolution (4/4/20)

The Wisconsin Legislature. Where common sense goes to die.

With legislative leaders refusing to answer the call to convene the legislature in special session today to delay next Tuesday’s election and turn it into a mail-in vote, the last hope for the necessary postponement of the election is the governor using the emergency powers he possesses under the state constitution and state law and issue an executive order.

Going ahead with in-person voting on Tuesday is both a serious public health hazard and a recipe for disaster for our democracy. In Milwaukee, for example, there will be just five election day polling locations, instead of the usual 180. And only days before the election, city officials don’t know yet where those sites would be or who would staff them. Well over half of the poll workers in the city have notified election officials they will be staying away from the polling places on election day. A sharply reduced number of polling places will make for larger crowds at the few open locations at a time when social distancing is being encouraged and mass gatherings are banned in the state.

I urge you all to urge the governor to act. No one should be forced to choose between their health and exercising their right to vote. And poll workers and other election officials should not have their lives put in danger.

CONTACT THE GOVERNOR

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What Governor Evers Can Do. So, Why Won’t He Do It?

[Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt  from a press release from Mike McCabe at Our Wisconsin Revolution early last week, before Evers called the special session the Republicans irresponsibly boycotted. The governor can still act. — Mark L. Taylor]

By Mike McCabe
Our Wisconsin Revolution (4/3/20)

“…We’ve also been hearing the governor and his supporters saying he can’t do anything about the date and it’s up to the legislature. This is also untrue. Legislative leaders have been totally and shamefully AWOL, but there are at least three courses of action the governor could take on his own. Instead of saying the election is going forward on April 7 and calling up National Guard troops to try to replace poll workers who’ve decided to stay away from polling places, the governor could unequivocally say it is impossible to safely hold the election next Tuesday and clearly say it is unconscionable to force people to choose between their health and exercising their right to vote.

“Another option for the governor is to call the legislature into special session on the subject of postponing the election to force legislators to vote to make people choose between personal safety and participating in our democracy.

“Or, as Milwaukee election attorney Michael Maistelman told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the governor could use his emergency powers to delay the election if he determined the current date would threaten the safety of the public. The same emergency powers he used to issue his “safer at home” order. This is what Governor Mike DeWine did in Ohio. It’s what many local officials in Wisconsin are begging him to do, including some from his own party.”

  • ‘Over our heads in chaos’: Wisconsin On Edge Of Election Fiasco Amid Pandemic — As states across the US delay their primary elections in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, Wisconsin has decided to stay the course – and it is in complete disarray. Some 111 jurisdictions don’t have enough poll workers to staff a single polling location for the Tuesday vote, and the governor has enlisted Wisconsin’s national guard to help run them. One election official said he feels “sick” asking people to work the polls, knowing it could kill them. … Read The Rest

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We Know Who The Democrats Are Against, But What Are They FOR?

This has to be very pleasing to him. If this election is all about him, he wins again.

By Mike McCabe
Our Wisconsin Revolution (3/18/20)

The current White House occupant’s time in office has been about one thing over all others: Himself. How he has the best words, the smartest ideas, the biggest accomplishments, the greatest presidency.

As sure as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, his campaign for reelection—like his 2016 run that put him in the nation’s highest office in the first place—will be all about him and how he alone can fix what’s broken in the country.

The curious thing, the dangerous thing, is that the opposition’s 2020 campaign is shaping up to be all about him too. Ask Democratic politicians and party officials and they will tell you the election is all about defeating him. Ask Democratic voters and most will tell you the election is all about getting rid of him.

This has to be very pleasing to him. If this election is all about him, he wins again.

This election not only needs to be about how to get the nation beyond the disruptions of a global pandemic but also how to guide the country through three revolutions we are going through all at once.

There’s the economic revolution driven by globalization and automation that is producing grotesque inequality as well as financial insecurity for millions of workers who labored in factories for family-supporting wages with health insurance and retirement pensions and watched their jobs exported overseas or automated out of existence. He has an answer for it: Slap tariffs on foreign products and those manufacturing jobs will come back here. Just saying his answer is wrong and he’s got to go will not be enough.

There’s the social revolution that is fast turning the historically dominant group in our society into a minority. He has an answer for it: Build a wall spanning the entire southern border and make Mexico pay for it. Just saying his answer is wrong and he’s got to go will not be enough.

There’s the ecological revolution that threatens life on this planet. He has an answer for that: The climate crisis is a hoax and we can go right on polluting without harm. Just saying his answer is wrong and he’s got to go will not be enough.

Rumping

Democrats are united about who they are against. They are not united in the least about what they are for. One says Medicare for All and three others say nope it’ll never pass and besides we can’t possibly afford it. One says Green New Deal and four others say it would bankrupt us. One says student loan forgiveness and five others say sorry but we had to repay our loans. Never mind that their loans were puny compared to the debt students are buried under today. Never mind that no one ever bothers to ask how we will pay for the next war. Never mind that the effects of climate change, if left unchecked, will bankrupt us.

Back in medieval times, if you had the right bloodlines and knew the right people, you were given the privilege of an audience with the monarch. After properly genuflecting and kissing the ring, you could make conversation. But as you did, you lived in fear of being rumped. That’s when the king found you tiresome and turned his back on you. Rumping meant banishment from the royal court.

In a democracy, the citizenry is sovereign. When the national conversation needs to be about more than him, we can give him the rump. We can turn our backs on him and banish him from our thoughts. It’s not too late to make this election about economic inequality, health insecurity, environmental insanity and so much more.

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