The Capital Times, Madison, April 29
Gov. Evers is preserving public health and the right to dissent
Gov. Tony Evers has been a steady defender of freedom of speech, and we respect him for that. When right-wing zealots sought to limit freedom of expression on University of Wisconsin campuses last year, he blocked them. When right-wing zealots rallied against his efforts to keep Wisconsinites safe in the face of the coronavirus pandemic last week, he defended their right to rally.
Asked about the protests against his “Safe At Home” orders, the governor said he respected the protesters’ free speech rights. He said he hoped they would maintain a safe distance apart from one another.
With that, Evers got back to the serious work of advocating for public safety, supporting frontline health care workers and planning for an orderly opening up of the state. The governor kept the protests in perspective, as should we all. Roughly 1,500 people rallied in Madison Friday to object to the lockdown that the governor and public health workers have extended in order to prevent the spread of a virus that - as of Friday - had been confirmed in roughly 5,700 Wisconsinites, and that had killed close to 260 of our family members, friends and neighbors.
The protest went on for a couple hours and led some Capitol Square businesses to briefly suspend operations, out of concern for the health of their customers and the community.
“I find it extremely irresponsible and foolish at this time with the amount of people that are dying (from the coronavirus) every day,” Tami Lax, the owner of the Harvest and Old Fashioned restaurants on the square, told WKOW-TV. But the restaurants were open later in the day, so the protest did not do dramatic harm to folks who are trying to keep their businesses up and running.
The greatest harm was, undoubtedly, to the image of the critics of the governor and the advocates for a science-based response to the crisis. While many of those who have joined recent “reopen” protests in Wisconsin and elsewhere were undoubtedly sincerely concerned about when and how Wisconsin will reopen, their cause was done no good by those who showed in Madison carrying guns or, in the case of a Brookfield gathering the previous weekend, a Confederate flag,
Prominent supporters of the protests tacitly acknowledged the damage.
As The New York Times reported, “Brian Westrate, the treasurer of the Republican Party of Wisconsin, posted to a private Facebook group for organizers and some attendees of the Madison rally, asking people not to bring emblems of causes other than resisting the stay-at-home order.”
Unfortunately, Westrate’s appeal only made things worse.
“Ok folks, I implore you, please leave Confederate flags and/or AR15s, AK47s, or any other long guns at home,” Westrate wrote, adding, “I well understand that the Confederacy was more about states rights than slavery. But that does not change the truth of how we should try to control the optics during the event.”
The stark ignorance of the GOP official’s statement regarding the Civil War led Washington Post political columnist Karen Tumulty to tweet: ”‘The confederacy was more about rights than slavery.’ Somewhere, this guy’s high school history teacher is weeping.”
Friday’s protest took place at the State Street entrance to the state Capitol. Around the corner, out of notice to the protesters at the King Street entrance, stood the imposing statute of Col. Hans Christian Heg. A Norwegian-born anti-slavery activist who became a leader of the Wide Awakes, a group of Wisconsinites that sought to protect fugitive slaves before the Civil War, Heg was a pioneering member of the Republican Party.
Heg’s life story offers a powerful rebuke to those who imagine the Confederacy as anything other than an affront to the American ideal that all human beings are created equal.
When the southern states revolted against the United States in an effort to defend human bondage, Heg organized Norwegian immigrants and others into the 15th Wisconsin Volunteer Regiment. Determined to defeat the Confederacy, he declared, “There is no alternative but this: death and destruction for us and our Government, or the crushing of the rebellion. The latter must be accomplished, no matter what sacrifices be demanded-even though it entails loss of life, property, and everything else.”
The fight would cost Heg his life. Mortally wounded on Sept. 19, 1863, he fell in the Battle of Chickamauga.
Heg and the brave Wisconsinites who fought and died with him knew exactly what they were fighting for, and what they were fighting against. “We came to America because it is a free country,” Heg said. “Its principles of freedom struck a responsive chord in our heart. Our anti-slavery convictions are deep.”
That is the true voice of Wisconsin, a state of Native Americans and immigrants who understood that the Civil War was not an argument about states’ rights but a struggle against the vile practice of human bondage. Most Wisconsinites, Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, maintain that understanding.
While we may differ on the issues of the moment, and while honorable people can debate about the proper timing for the safe and responsible reopening of Wisconsin, the vast majority of Wisconsinites know our history - just as we know our science.
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The Journal Times of Racine, May 3
Despite what McConnell says, every state needs help
In the midst of the worst health crisis America has suffered in 102 years, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell decided it was still a good time to play politics.
The Kentucky Republican, in a April 22 radio interview, said it was time “to push the pause button” before moving forward with “this whole business of additional assistance for state and local governments.”
That’s reasonable … depending on how long the pause button will stay pressed amid, among other troubling signs, record increases in unemployment filings due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
But then his office put out a news release in support of his views: “Stopping Blue State Bailouts,” an apparent allusion to some of the states having financial difficulty being run by Democrats.
Leader McConnell is among the last legislators who should be talking about dependence on the federal government: Kentucky is the fourth-most dependent on federal money for its budget, with nearly 40% of its funding coming from federal taxpayers in blue states like California, red states like Texas and purple states like Wisconsin.
Kentucky is quite different from New York state, but the Bluegrass State is facing a revenue shortfall just the same.
“The number of Kentuckians that have enrolled in unemployment, the shutting down of sales tax collections across the state, extending the filing deadline on income taxes … it will have major impacts on state government,” state Rep. Steven Rudy, a Republican, told the Louisville Courier-Journal.
Here’s where Kentucky and New York state differ: Kentucky receives more federal dollars than it sends to Washington, while the opposite is true in New York.
“This is not the time or the place or the situation to start your divisive politics,” a visibly agitated New York Gov. Mario Cuomo said in response to McConnell. “It’s not red and blue. It’s red, white and blue.”
Or to put it another way, COVID-19 doesn’t care which way your state leans politically.
We think it’s entirely reasonable to mandate that new federal assistance not be used to clean up state messes unrelated to the pandemic. Illinois’ money pit of a state pension system is the result of decades of bad decisions and no decisions; legislators in the Land of Lincoln are going to have to fix that themselves.
We also want members of Congress and President Donald Trump to be conscious of the long-term risk of throwing billions of dollars here and billions of dollars there.
But the fact is, every state’s budget and every state’s economy is being dealt a severe blow by the pandemic, and every state will need some degree of financial assistance from the federal government.
We can, and should, debate the amounts of money to be allocated. But all of the states in question - red, blue or purple - are American states with American citizens.
We’re confident that, despite his divisive rhetoric, Leader
McConnell knows that.
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Beloit Daily News, April 27
This is no time for partisanship
Yes, reopen, but be guided by science, not emotion or politics.
Wisconsin appears to be falling into the same trap as some other states.
Partisan emotion.
When it comes to reopening the economy as America and, indeed, the world continue to grapple with the coronavirus crisis, conflict is sparking along familiar lines.
In Wisconsin, Gov. Tony Evers - who previously was a step behind his counterparts in other states - leaped to the forefront by extending his shelter-at-home order to May 26. Among other things, that could keep Wisconsin shuttered until after Memorial Day weekend, typically the kick-off to a big summer season.
Democrat Evers’ order was met with some public protests and lots of angry chatter on social media. More importantly, the order moved Republican legislative leaders to challenge Evers with a lawsuit, asking the solidly conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court to bypass lower courts and take up the case directly. They say the governor exceeded his constitutional authority. One might wonder: Did Evers exceed it with his first order that no one protested, or only with his extension?
…
Similar patterns emerge across the country. States with Democrat governors are extending shelter orders, while states with Republican governors are moving faster toward reopening. In fact, some states with Republican governors had not put shelter orders out in the first place.
Polling shows the same partisan divide emerging, though support for sheltering remains overwhelmingly strong. An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs poll reported last week shows only 12% of respondents say measures where they live go too far; 26% say not far enough; and 61% say government orders where they live are about right. Overall, about 80% - including 36% self-identifying as Republicans - believe sheltering requirements should stay in place. But Republicans are about four times more likely than Democrats to say restrictions should be lifted.
From the White House it’s mixed messages. The latest presidential advisory follows medical advice and calls for continued social distancing, masks and staying home as much as possible. Federal medical authorities say extreme caution is still needed. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Robert Redfield even said a second potential wave of viral infections could be more difficult unless people maintain mitigating practices, particularly when colder weather returns.
President Trump signed off on the medical advice, but has made clear he favors reopening the economy as soon as possible. And after first asserting he had total authority to order the 50 states closed or open, he then backed off telling governors they would call their own shots. Within hours, though, he tweeted that it was time to “liberate” certain states, all with Democrat governors.
Extremists on both sides are charging off the cliff, like they always do. Leftists are using the crisis to argue for government medical plans for everyone and taxpayer-supplied universal basic incomes for all. Right-wingers accuse lefties of plotting to make America socialist or communist. Some have even showed up at protests carrying assault weapons.
As we said in a commentary last week, crisis reveals character. For most Americans, who are stoically bearing their burdens and doing their very best to help each other, that character shines through. For others - extremists using a crisis to push their political views - a different character is showing.
Look, reopening the economy safely must be the goal of every reasonable person. The key word in that phrase is safely. Democrat partisans can’t tell us what that means. Republican partisans can’t tell us what it means, either. In fact, the last people we should be listening to right now are the partisans.
People need to work to support themselves and their families. Businesses need to make money, and can’t exist selling take-out burgers or applying for government money for long. A collapsed economy hurts everybody.
But remember, this is not a political crisis. It is a public health crisis. Doctors, scientists and public health authorities are the experts who can tell us the best and safest paths forward.
People, put away your partisan prejudices. Take a breath. Put your anger on the shelf.
Listen to those who know what they’re talking about. The experts. The non-politicians. They want to reopen the country, too. They just want to apply science, and exercise caution. Is that so hard to trust?
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