WALKER WALKS: GOOD RIDDANCE AND TO MR. POTTER $$

SCOTT WALKER WALKS

Good riddance to a candidate bought and paid for by the "Mr.Potters" of our time. Walker's passing may have one good result..exposing the misuse of sinister "Potter-money" in our campaigns.

The media response to Governor Walker's exit from the Presidential race on September 21, 2015 (such as that posted in the NY Times) attribute his poor showing and rapid demise to the rise of anti-establishment candidates, such as Donald Trump and Carly Fiorina. The truth is that Walker was simply a weak and malleable candidate artificially supported from behind by affluent, powerful elites. Walker was plagued with gaffes. At his resignation speech, Walker, seemingly determined not to change course from a string of silly ideas, blunders, and faux pas--like building a 5000 mile Canadian boundary fence---ended his campaign on the unbelievable claim that he was quitting the race to "to help the party unite" against Donald Trump.

Mr. Walker's performance as a national candidate,from the time of Fox News debate on August 6, to his "I will 'suspend' my campaign" speech of yesterday, proved he was not ready for national office. His rise and ignoble fall also revealed how damaging the post-Citizen United, system of funding political elections is to both our state government and national elections. Mr. Walker as a young, ambitious rising politician plotted and schemed to attract the attention and financial largess of powerful out of state funders, whose political agenda and script he slavishly followed. He sacrificed the well-being of his state's citizenry to the rigid ideology of his reactionary masters and to his own political ambitions as he led his state into years of political turmoi, tumultuous recall-elections and economic uncertainty. Thankfully, he was exposed as a "tool" of the Koch Brothers machinery in the crucible of the first few months of the national campaign. That revelation and his own weaknesses were what actually caused his rapid decline in the polls, not his competition.

Walker was such a lackluster, ineffective candidate it is painful to contemplate his return to his old office in Wisconsin. However, one idea does buoy my spirit. As a result of Mr. Walker's poor showing on the national stage he is now useless to his former pay masters. Walker can no longer serve as the "poster boy" for radical experiments in voodoo economics of the far-right oligarchs. The affluent political funders will have little incentive to answer a call for financial support from the Governor's office in Madison. Walker is certainly cut off from that lucrative money source in his next election. The out-of-state right wing ideologues who provided the 7-1 monetary advantage in his three Wisconsin elections have abandoned him. Now he will have to face the voters, citizens, union members, teachers, librarians, police, firemen, and others of Wisconsin, whose incomes and economic well-being he sacrificed on the alter of his political ambitions on his own. I am confident these groups will evaluate Mr. Walker again, and without the benefit of his secret supporters. Perhaps the elder statesmen and women of the State of Wisconsin may even wish to reconsider a new recall election. Walker is now a very vulnerable GOP governor.

I suspect the ashen face and sad demeanor (the NY Times reported) that Governor Walker exhibited at his parting speech, was due more to anxiety concerning his future--rather than disappointment. Who will support his candidacy in his next state election? As a result, I think we will not hear much more from Mr. Walker, and that is good for Wisconsin and the nation too. As for the attempts at controlling elections and candidates by the sinister "Mr Potters"(recall the Lionel Barrymore's character in "It's Wonderful Life")of our post-Citizen's United political world, perhaps, Mr. Walker's one claim to some positive act for our struggling nation may be that his failed candidacy will underscore the chilling impact the "Mr.Potters" of our day have on our democracy. And the hope that such exposure to the cleansing light will engender a reaction by an enraged public from both the left and right to limit the ability of the Potters of our day to undermine our democracy.