James Rowen
Op Ed

Walker Is a Jobs Killer

He promised 62.500 new jobs per year, admits state adding less than half that.

By - Dec 31st, 2017 02:06 pm
Gov. Scott Walker. Photo from the State of Wisconsin.

Gov. Scott Walker. Photo from the State of Wisconsin.

You may remember Walker’s repetitive and broken pledge to create 250,000 new private sector jobs in one, four year term.

The Journal Sentinel reported earlier this year that only 185,000 jobs net were added to the state workforce in his first six years as Governor – – so about 30,000 a year and at a rate less than half what was needed to keep his signature pledge made throughout his 2010 and 2012 campaigns.

So now with another re-election campaign underway that will be a referendum on his performance, Walker is throwing out on Twitter new spin and misdirection that changes the numbers, reframes what’s promised and defines failure as success; Walker now cites creating or retaining – – new category – – nearly – – new qualifier – – 30,000 jobs in 2017.

Does Walker think we won’t see through this trick he Tweeted Tuesday:

And he repeated it on Wednesday:

Does Walker think we don’t remember him saying that 250,000 new jobs was a floor, not a ceiling?

Promise of 250,000 jobs hasn’t changed, Scott Walker says

This fundamental dishonesty will continue in Wisconsin until mainstream media aggressively confront Walker with the facts, and his record, and hold him accountable, or his Tweet will disappear into the ether without effective, widespread contact and correction.

And if retaining jobs is now a win, what say you, Waukesha, Sheboygan, Oscar Mayer, Caterpillar, Wausau Paper, Manitowoc Crane, etc., etc.?

Here’s the truth:

Walker would have needed the Wisconsin economy to add (not retain) jobs at a rate of 62,500 annually to have met his 250,000-new-jobs-in four-years-promise.

In fact, there is fresh reporting that shows Wisconsin’s job growth is more a crawl than a broad-jump:

The Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, also provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, are considered a more accurate measure of job growth…

The latest quarterly estimates, from June 2016 to June 2017, recently found that Wisconsin’s private-sector growth ranks 28th in the nation, with a manufacturing growth rate of 0.8 percent. The quarterly census also found a drop in manufacturing jobs in Wisconsin in 2016.

So back to Walker’s shaky ‘created and-retained 30,000 jobs,’ which is apparently the new 62,500 when conjuring alternative numbers and searching for votes.

And don’t get me started on how many of those new jobs were due to the national economy and President Obama‘s stimulus investments.

And how many jobs Walker sacrificed by turning down at least $810 million in Obama-era Amtrak rail bed upgrades, train repair and assembly funding, hundreds of millions of dollars in Medicaid expansion funds and more millions for rural broadband upgrades.

Walker is a jobs-killer.

James Rowen, a former journalist and mayoral staffer in Milwaukee and Madison, writes a regular blog, The Political Environment

Categories: Business, Op-Ed, Politics

56 thoughts on “Op Ed: Walker Is a Jobs Killer”

  1. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Walker is way ahead of Doyle’s 8 years who lost us 130,000 job in 8 years. That is over 300,00 differences and now Foxconn, Amazon and others are coming in to make us Tech center of Midwest.
    Everyone escaping Illinois and their leftist leaders that have wrecked the state. Poor Rauner has bad time fixing it.

    Illinois is led by lefties who have wrecked the state make excuses daily, stuff their pockets with money, raise taxes galore never fix problems of education, Crime.

  2. As long as radical Republican’s, use trickle-down economics or, what I call, Ryanomics to guide economic policy decisions, we will stumble and fall into a comparable third world nation.
    This will be represented by a small number of entitled rich, a bigger number of somewhat comfortable minions that serve the 1% and millions of hopeless poor.
    This is the trend for the last forty years of Regan Kemp believers repeating and repeating their big lie and the huddled masses waiting for the idea to produce results, The results are in. The middle class is shrinking and our quality of life is slipping away.

  3. Little Boots says:

    @WCD. NEWSFLASH! Doyle hasn’t been Governor for a looong time now! You can’t blame Doyle for Walker’s gross incompetence or negligence anymore!
    DUMP WALKER 2018!!

  4. Little Boots says:

    There are NO jobs in northern Wisconsin, only unemployment, poverty and hopelessness thabks to career politician Scott Walker. Walker even vetoed high speed internet so we can’t even start a small business. It’s 2018 folks. People at least need the internet! Walker has destroyed Wisconsin.

  5. Dennis says:

    Really? WCD wants to talk about Doyle? Typical Republican tactics to try and distract from the truth. Uhh, do you remember the great Republican depression? That’s not on Doyle.

  6. Mike says:

    Wisconsin’s unemployment rate is 3.4%, below the 4.1% US rate. Foxconn will create more jobs, presumably lowering the rate even further. Giving Obama the credit for Wisconsin’s jobs is laughable. I guess adding trillions to the national debt is the answer. If your line of reasoning is correct, Obama is the real jobs killer. Your rules. I now understand why you are a “former” journalist.

  7. Little Boots says:

    @Mike, Poverty rates are at 30 year highs in Wisconsin! Yes people have jobs, the unemployment rate is lower but the jobs people do have are low pay, slave wage jobs with no benefits, far from what our parents had in Wisconsin and the unemployment rate in Wisconsin is still higher than Minnesota and other midwest states under Walker. Wisconsin is dead last in new business starts ups and entrepreneurship. Obama saved the US economy after Bush and the republucans imploded it but Wisconsin missed out on a lot of the recovery due to career politician, big government moocher Scott Walker’s gross ineptitude and his 4 billion dollar corporate welfare Fox Con job, will only serve to rob taxpayer’s of their money and their children’s futures. We could have added more decent paying jobs (18,000+) and businesses while ADDING revenue to the state by legalizing cannabis like California just did rather than giving all our money away to a Chinese company for a few soon-to-be automated or innovated into nonexistence jobs. This is what happens when you let a career politician and life long Big Government moocher like Scott Walker, who has no business experience, make your business deals Wisconsin! You lose! Disaster! Meanwhile, poverty and hopelessness grow in Scott Walker’s Wississippi.

    DUMP WALKER AND ALL REPUBLICANS 2018!!!

  8. The extent to which Walker’s Wisconsin has been a prototype for Trump’s America becomes more striking by the month. First, the great promises to “create” jobs. The only way government “creates” jobs is by hiring public sector workers for needed functions, something that is anathema to government-hating Republicans. The real agenda is to cut taxes or give away tax dollars, deregulate everything and gut environmental protections to make rich donors and ideologues happy in a state (and now a country) that has become a plutocracy.

    Then there is the need to make the past an evil failure, the Doyle/Obama routine, now perfected at the highest levels by Walker and Trump and parroted by the likes of Mike and the WCD. These lies are intended solely for the audience of true believers who believe them because they want to; and who, like George Constanza, think that they can’t be lies because they do believe them. And, in this school of dishonest thought, even if Walker and Trump are liars and frauds, which they are, the Democrats are even worse; therefore the need for a steady stream of alternative facts about Doyle and Obama’s records to be able to change the subject..

    Finally, there is the cult of personality built around mediocrities like Walker and Trump; and in each instance, fueled by racial animus and nativism that makes the 30% stick with them despite all of the lies and failures. Without race and nativism, Trump would be just a crooked, pathologically lying real estate fraud and reality television sexual predator, and Walker, who, unlike Trump, didn’t inherit daddy’s money, would be nowhere.

  9. Jake formerly of the LP says:

    Mike- If Walker was doing as poorly as “job-killer” Obama, Wisconsin would have 110,000 more jobs. OWN THE FAILURE you 30%er, and make it New Year’s resolution to read more and shoot your gutless mouth off less.

    https://jakehasablog.blogspot.com/2017/12/good-jobs-report-bad-income-reports.html?m=0

  10. Thomas says:

    The author of this article uses factual information well. If half the voters of WI respect facts. Walker will need to find work in the private sector in 2019.

  11. Mike says:

    Little Boots: You need to get your facts straight. First, poverty rates hit a 9 year low in 2015, using WPM as the measure. By other official measures it’s still lower than when Walker took office. Yes, Nebraska has a lower unemployment rate. Iowa has unemployment rates one tenth lower than the unemployment rate in Wisconsin. Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Minnesota are higher. Entrepreneurship Growth is ranked 23rd among larger states. Funding for our state’s pension fund is the best in the nation, so our public sector retirees will get what was promised to them, unlike our neighbors. I agree that cannabis could be an interesting addition, but entry level jobs in the cannabis industry aren’t much higher than minimum wage. The voters of Wisconsin don’t seem to mind having Walker as our governor, which is the real measure of his administration.

  12. Thomas says:

    Mike, you challenge Little Boots facts. I challenge you to challenge Rowen’s facts. Your “23rd among larger states” jive begs a question as to where WI ranks in that equation. Where does WI rank among the 50 states in terms of population?

    The voters of WI were conned 3 times by Walker. If Walker cannot accomplish in 8 years what he said he could do in 4, voters here could wake up to the fact that the man behind the curtain of dark money is not really a wizard.

  13. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    WE have the largest number of people working in history And a Milwaukee dupe, worst run city in country, is complaining about Walker?

  14. Little Boots says:

    @WCD, Poverty rates are at 30 year highs in Wisconsin! People are working, yes, but they are working 2-3 low pay slave wage jobs with no healthcare or benefits! Career politician Scott Walker has turned Wisconsin into Wississppi!

    VOTE OUT WALKER AND ALL REPUBLICANS 2018!!

  15. TransitRider says:

    WCD, the fact is Walker promised 250,000 new jobs in 4 years and hasn’t delivered (in even 6 years). It makes no difference who points this out; 185,000 actual jobs is always less than Walker’s promised 250,000 jobs.

    Walker’s failure is striking considering how well the USA (under Obama) did during that time. In 2012, GOP presidential candidate Romney’s key promise was bringing unemployment down to 6% by the end of his first term. Obama did exactly that in under half the time Romney predicted (5.9% unemployment by September 2014).

    Considering that Obama was able to deliver 6% unemployment in half the time, Walker’s inability to deliver on a 4-year promise (even after 6 years) is even more surprising.

    p.s. Your claim of “the largest number of people working in History” is, in and of itself, no big deal because Wisconsin also has the highest population ever.

  16. Little Boots says:

    @Mike, you need to check YOUR “facts!” Sorry, bud, lies from career politician Scott Walker or Sean Hannity don-t equal “facts.” Poverty rates are at 30 year highs in Wisconsin and growing due to the gross ineptitude and negligence of career politician Scott Walker.

    POVERTY RATES ARE AT 30 YEAR HIGHS ACROSS WISCONSIN

    http://archive.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/poverty-across-wisconsin-reaches-highest-level-in-30-years-b99676529z1-370157381.html/

  17. Little Boots says:

    Career politician and Big Government moochet Scott Walker’s Wississippi is not thriving. Poverty rates in Wississippi are at 30 year highs. People are working, sure, for wage slave salaries with no benefits! Wissisippi has one of the fastet shrinking middle classes in the country now. Good, hard working educated people, particularly young educated people are indeed, fleeing the state. Why? Because of Walker and his policies. Remember, if it were up to him, abortion would be illegal, gay marriage would be illegal and doobie smoking would continue to be a mortal threat to society itself They aren’t buying it. So now he wants to try to bribe them back by spending 7 more million of taxpayers’ dollars. Not gonna happen. Wississippi is dead last in new business start ups and entrepreneurship. Wages and the economy, outside of “socialist” Dane County, which is actually thriving, lag our “socialist” neighbor to the west Minnesota, which is running circles around Wississippi economically and socially, attracting many of our best and brightest. And you know what? They did it all in a healthy bipartisan way, not by dividing the state and pursuing a bitter, partisan “divide and conquer” strategy that Walker employed ripping the social fabric of the state apart. Schools have been defunded. The best teachers are fleeing the state. The roads and infrastructure in Wississippi are crumbling and the state still has an unresolved one billion dollar and counting, DOT budget deficit. The republicans have unconstitutionally gerrymandered the state elections, destroying Democracy itself in the process. Voting rights and rates have in fact been seriously negatively impacted by the voter ID law. The prisons in Wississippi are overflowing and the state cannot afford its prison industrial complex any longer. Anyone, usually currently sitting in a cage for nonviolent drug “offenses” should be immediately released. The state desperately needs criminal justice and drug war reform, including ending cannabis prohibition which would add revenue and honor basic civil rights. If the state is “thriving” Why did Walker hand over 4 BILLION in corporate welfare to a Chinese company for soon to be obsolete or automated/innovated-into-nonexistence jobs? Wississippi has been Foxconned by Walker. This John Doe investigation into Walker and aids and subsequent investigations are disconcerting all around, one might even say “greazy” to say the least. How much out of state big corporate money has Big Government moocher Walker taken? Is it true that the same money going to him is going to fund judicial seats? This is the same Walker speaking at a far right wing conference featuring white nationalists and yes, it appears even a Nazi. Career politician Scott Walker did not create 250,000 jobs. He failed and rather than take personal responsobility he sold the state down the river and handed 4 Billion dollars in corporate welfare to a Chinese company. Scott Walker is a jobs killer, a prosperity killer, a Democracy killer, a civil rights killer and a killer of Liberty and freedom itself.

    Dump Walker 2018!
    Dump all republicans 2018

  18. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Thanks for admitting that Walker has added 185,000 jobs, non Government, while the left lost us 130,000 in same time. big difference.
    Wisconsin is one of states where the budget is balanced, pensions are balanced, people are working and we are expanding. More teachers working.
    The only places that are disasters are the Democrat run cities, the schools in the urban area, MPS, Milwaukee county, and the city of Milwaukee is in the top ten worst run, and top ten most violent.

  19. Mike says:

    Little Booties:

    https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/2017/05/23/uw-madison-researchers-find-modest-drop-poverty-rates-2015-wisconsin/339635001/

    Lowest poverty rates since the WPM was introduced 9 years ago. Walker has only been in office since 2011.

  20. David says:

    WCD likes to keep pointing out the job loss under Doyle but he’s ignoring the elephant in the room. Doyle’s term occurred during the presidency of George Bush, and ended right about the peak of the great recession that happened under Bush. The whole nation’s unemployment rate was 10%! The job loss during Doyle’s term was Bush’s failure, not Doyle’s.

    Conversely Walker was fortunate enough to be Governor while Barack Obama was busy fixing the economy. The whole nation came back during Obama’s term but Wisconsin has lagged behind our Midwestern neighbors due to Walker’s policies.

  21. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Doyle lost jobs while Walker has increased jobs under Obama’s 1.8% growth. We expected coming back from a recession would get better growth but Obama’s inept handling of economy stifled growth.

  22. Little Boots says:

    @David, all republicans like Mike and WCD can do is blame Doyle, blame democrats, blame fightin Bob LaFollette, blame everyone and everything except the man in charge, in power for almost 8 years akwho is actually responsible for the poverty and hopelessness soaked nightmare Wisconsin has become. It’s called “accountability” and taking “personal responsibilty” republicans. Look into it! But hey there is one thing we all agree on.

    SCOTT WALKER IS A JOBS KILLER!!

    DUMP WALKER 2018!!

    DUMP ALL REPUBLICAN CHARLATANS 2018!!

  23. Little Boots says:

    @Mikey, sure the article you linked showed that the rate dropped modestly, great, BUT it’s still at 30 YEAR HIGHS!! Is it that hard to understand??

    DUMP JOB KILLING, PROSPERITY TRAMPLING IDIOT AND CAREER POLITICIAN SCOTT WALKER!!

  24. Mike says:

    Little Booties,
    Still, it’s down on Walker’s watch. Went up the most under Doyle. And if Doyle’s problems were directly related to Bush, Then Walker’s slower pace is due to Obama’s anemic growth. Your rules.

  25. Little Boots says:

    @Mikey, NEWSFLASH! Doyle hasn’t been Governor for years! You can’t blame him anymore! Of course it went up under Doyle, Bush and the republicans imploded the economy! Remember that little global economic crashie thing Mikey? Remember that? That was thanks to half-wit republicans like Greenspan and Bush! Thank God Obama was elected so he could save the global economy and spur a truly epic economic recovery! Too bad Walker’s gross negligence and incompetence negated a lot of the recovery in Wisconsin.

  26. Little Boots says:

    @Mikey, It’s called REALITY Mikey! Try some! He likes it! Mikey likes it!

  27. Mike says:

    Obama saved the global economy? LMAO

  28. Mike says:

    Southwest Airlines giving all 53,000 + employees $1000 bonus. I thought tax reform didn’t trickle down. Hmmm. That makes well over half a million people in a week getting $1000 bonuses, and many more getting raises. Must be Obama, huh?

  29. Mike says:

    Former Jake: Getting a little testy, are we? I have noticed the libs always resort to the slurs when cornered. But since you believe this is acceptable behavior, now that mommy has fed you dinner, go back to the basement, and do a little reading yourself. Beyond that, I see no reason to respond to your rantings any further. Wisconsin’s unemployment rate is still a full percent lower than the national average. How is that a bad thing? Perhaps if Obama had managed 2% growth, the picture would have been rosier everywhere.

  30. Caligula says:

    @Mikey, Oh Mikey you hate everything! You even hate reality itself! Try some freedom and reality Mikey. He likes it! Mikey likes it!

    https://youtu.be/vYEXzx-TINc

  31. Jacob pickard says:

    Let me see Russian, oh I mean Republicans say that government can’t create jobs, but yet in Walkers case he can.

    Hypocrites

  32. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Govt. creates the atmosphere for jobs to grow as most of our jobs come from small businesses. Few biggies like Amazon, Foxconn relocate.

  33. Terry says:

    Walker’s Wisconsin is officially CLOSED for business! What a failure Walker and republicans are. Pathetic!

  34. Terry says:

    @WCD, right! What governments should NOT do is hand over 4 BILLION dollars in taxpayers’ money in corporate welfare to a Chinese company for soon to be obsolete technology or jobs like career politician Big Government moocher Scott Walker did.

  35. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    It comes down to the nutty left that now fights jobs and prefers peoel to stay on welfare and food stamps.

  36. Terry says:

    @WCD, Wrong. First it comes down to fiscal and personal responsibilty and republicans and career politician Big Government moocher Scott Walker have shown neither. Why? Because Scott Walker and republicans are the biggest moochers in the state and country respectively!
    Yes, that is correct. So it would behoove you to be careful what you wish for. It’s the Red conservative republican states that are the Welfare Queens in the USA. Yes, that’s correct!

    Thriving progressive blue states like Washington State, New York, California, Massachussets etc. with bustling, robust economies pay astronomically more to subsidize all the failing, lazy moochers in conservative red states with struggling economies, like Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana etc. Yes, that’s right! Progressives in blue states that actually work and have great economies subsidize the moochers and welfare layabouts in all the poor failing red republican states!

    http://www.businessinsider.com/red-states-are-welfare-queens-2011-8

    So be careful what you wish for. It’s Republicans afterall that are the bums and moochers in America and progressives can’t be expected to subsidize all these mooching republicans forever!

    The only part of Wisconsin that is truly thriving is Dane County, home of all those evil “socialists” aka those educated people that actually have good jobs and work everyday. Why do republicans hate prosperity and freedom?

    The failed traitorous Putin and Trump loving republican’s motto is:

    Corporate profits over people! Party over country! They are wrong!

    Republicans do the opposite of what Jesus taught.
    They afflict the afflicted and comfort the comfortable. Republicans are wrong!

    Dump Walker 2018!
    Dump all republicans 2018!

  37. Terry says:

    All anyone needs to know is that career politician Scott Walker and republicans are crooks and charlatans. Just ask all of Walker’s aides that are in jail!!

    http://host.madison.com/ct/opinion/column/joel-mcnally-wisconsin-showed-trump-how-to-corrupt-justice/article_d85836c7-21bc-5d90-980e-3ae3f42638d2.html

    Career politician Scott Walker corrupted Wisconsin’s once clean government, divided the state, unconstitutionally gerrymandered the state (aka rigged the elections) they drove the economy and state into the ditch and then sold the state out to a Chinese company. Republicans call that “success.” The rest of the state calls it a total nightmare.

    Dump Walker and all republicans 2018!!

  38. Mike says:

    Terry,
    California is the biggest welfare State in the country. Get your facts straight. You are dead wrong here. Look it up, and you will se what an idiot you look like. Perhaps a retraction would go a long way to restore any credibility whatsoever.

  39. Terry says:

    Mike,

    Here’s the list again loser.

    http://www.businessinsider.com/red-states-are-welfare-queens-2011-8

    You are WRONG! California and virtually every other liberal state pays far more to subsidize the “rugged individualust” I mean, lazy, mooching conservative red states with failing economies. Read it and weep, LOSER!!

  40. Terry says:

    Here’s some more articles for everyone about how all the poor, failing, conservative republican red states are being subsidized by thriving liberal blue states. That’s right! Red states are Welfare Queens! Enjoy!

    https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/which-states-are-givers-and-which-are-takers/361668/

    And some more…

    https://www.google.com/amp/amp.slate.com/blogs/the_reckoning/2012/10/25/blue_state_red_face_guess_who_benefits_more_from_your_taxes.html#ampshare=http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_reckoning/2012/10/25/blue_state_red_face_guess_who_benefits_more_from_your_taxes.html

    And some more…

    http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2017/11/please-cut-the-crap-about-red-states-subsidizing-blue-states/

    Need anymore? Of coursr our friend Mike can’t cite a single article to back up his lies but hey, I guess that’s what losers do! Happy reading everyone. Hey republicans! Get off your lazy butts, stop sucking off of democrats welfare and get a job losers!

  41. Mike says:

    Terry,
    By “rugged individualists” do you mean the 138,000 homeless people living outdoors? While empathizing with their plight, compared to these snowflakes, Milwaukee’s homeless, living in boxes outdoors in this weather, are the real rugged individualists.

  42. Terry says:

    Here’s some more reading on how thriving liberal blue states are subsudizing all the failing conservative republican red states. Republican states are the biggest recipients of socialism in the country! They are actually the welfare moochers in the USA!

    http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_reckoning/2012/10/25/blue_state_red_face_guess_who_benefits_more_from_your_taxes.html

    And some more…

    http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2017/11/please-cut-the-crap-about-red-states-subsidizing-blue-states/

    And some more…
    https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/which-states-are-givers-and-which-are-takers/361668/

    Stop mooching republicans and get a job! The liberals can’t pay your bills forever! Moochers!

  43. Terry says:

    @Mike, Enjoy the reading Loser!

  44. TransitRider says:

    Mike, regarding the one-time $1,000 bonuses being paid to some workers…

    For the worker it means a one-time payment of about $700 (after taxes) in return for assuming $18,000 of additional debt (the tax law increases the debt by $1.5 trillion, or about $4,500 per person, or $18,000 for a family of 4).

    Do you think it is a good deal to assume $18,000 in additional debt for a one-time $700 payment??

  45. Mike says:

    TR,
    Was it a good idea to ask Americans to assume the 9 trillion or so debt accumulated by Obama for little or no progress?
    $1000 is a lot of money for most of these people, in their pockets, right now. It would buy a lot of transit rides.
    There is every possibility that the net effect of total growth may make Trump’s tax cost considerably less than forecast.
    Even using 1.5 trillion over ten years, your number would actually be less than 12,000 based on 126 million households (the 2016 census number).
    Hey, I don’t like the staggering debt load we have, but this one could pay off.

  46. Thomas says:

    Part of the 50% increase in the national debt during Obama’s 8 years in office was used to pull our nation out of the worst recession since the Great Depression. By contrast, the national debt nearly tripled during Reagan’s 8 years; moreover, our second worst recession since the great depression took place early in the Reagan years. Reactionaries disrespect #s in addition to ignoring facts. WCD, for example, keeps repeating some bullshoes he heard from some redneck 50 years ago about how Milwaukee is the worst run city in this country. WCD is apparently unaware that Baltimore, Detroit, and St. Louis (to name a few) are U.S. cities. WCD knows nothing about Milwaukee.

  47. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Anyone that can read knows the problems in Milwaukee. having lived here 60 years, owned property, written hundreds of newspaper articles, ran 100 campaigns, know them all.
    Anyone that bothers to check where Milwaukee sits in crime, check FBI. Milwaukee is annually ranked as one of worst run cities in country. Arne Duncan called MPS a “National Disgrace”, check with Borsuk.
    None of the worthless leaders has any plans to fix anything.
    Oh, we do have a trolley to nowhere and a Bucks toy.

  48. Thomas says:

    Thanks, WCD for referencing reading in post # 47. I hope you have taken cues from some on this site to enroll in remedial reading and writing classes at an adult high school.

    Re your residence, I do not believe that you live in Milwaukee. You demonstrate no recognition of the communitarian spirit that distinguishes this city. I suspect that you live in a place such as Minotony Falls, West Belch, South Fart … Your writing frequently features gasses common to those climes.

  49. Thomas says:

    Correction: Minotony (sic) Monotony Falls in post # 48. My writing gets sloppy sometimes when I respond to WCD.

    Visit any one of the 3 Urban Ecology Centers if you wish to experience Milwaukee’s communitarian spirit. A winter event at their Washington Park branch will take place from noon until 4 p.m. on 1/27/18. Be there or be square.

  50. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Job Killers:
    Number One is use of drugs as the great majority of Employers now use drug testing as they do not need addicts, Pot heads, drunks on the job.
    They are not productive, take sick leave all the time and are pretty much worthless.
    In this state, this year, we should see 1,000 overdose deaths, not counting those that become infected with HIV from syringe passing and their long term deaths.
    The long term deaths where I worked with for 40 years in REHAB, Nursing homes, the DUI’s in Colorado, from Po,t is up 66% since legalization causing more deaths of the Pot heads and those they kill. Crime is way up. The sellers of Pot are pushing kids to use Pot, a certain number then go on to hard drugs, then to morgue. Mostly young women. Hate your kids; then legalize Pot.
    In Milwaukee county, last year 3,000 overdoses and around 400 deaths.
    In one period, Oct. 12: Journal 11 dead in 4 days, mostly young women.
    Nationally the FBI estimates 100,000 kids in morgue this year, crime up, DUI’s way up, HIV’s way up from swapped syringes, longterm deaths are way up, in Rehab, from long term use; ruined brains, kidney, hearts, livers.
    When you see the Potheads, addicts talking on this site you know how Pot, drugs are for your brains.

  51. Thomas says:

    WCD, If you are lumping me with “potheads … on this site,” forget about it. I haven’t bought pot in over thirty years. I stopped doing that when my oldest son started speaking. I did not wish to explain to him why I had to call someone from a pay phone near a diner, exchange cash for weed in a bathroom in that diner, then share a meal with someone to whom I had little to say

    I have sustained long friendships with many people who have used pot regularly for many years. None of them died from pot.
    People are dying from opioids all over this country. Weed is no threat to anything other than the ambition of some hard core users. Those who need to toke at a bus stop on the way to work could be hard pressed to arrive on time at the many jobs coming soon to Foxconn.

  52. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Pot is killing people on the road, their lives daily.
    About 10% get addicted to Pot, many more get dependent, habituated to the drug.
    Use of Pot leads to use of harder drugs so says the CDC and the FDA, and most intelligent experts on the problem.
    In Colorado pot use has drive up DUI’s 66% and the crashes, deaths, crime is up, overdoses are up.
    POThead Syndrome is real.
    If Pot is no problem then why do 70% of employers test for it before hire? No one wants Potheads at their job site. As for a few anecdotes; means nothing when millions are users and helping to destroy lives.
    You can tell the Pot users and how it has infected their brains by the entries on these sites, the peoel that make them.
    Drunks, addicts, Potheads are responsible for most of societies ills. They lie, cover up, hide, steal, crash cars, ruin families, die in Rehab, wreck society every day. Read the charts in Rehab, thousands that I have seen and you will understand every quickly.

  53. Mike says:

    WCD,
    For a long time, cocaine was considered an addictive hallucinogen. May still be.

    There is no real evidence of pot leading to stronger drugs. 100% of people on heroin drank milk when they were babies. There is no instance of pot overdose.

    Just FWIW.

  54. Wisconsin Conservative Digest says:

    Cocaine has caused major problems in the world: crime, murder, slavery, families lost, countries corrupted, public officials, cops corrupted.
    FDA, CDC, the leading experts in the world call it a Gateway drug. When you read the entries of the Potheads and their apologists here you can quickly see how they have fried their brains.
    “Jut say No”!

  55. Terry says:

    @WississippiCuckservativeIndigestion, spoken like the true rot gut liquor drinking, junk food eating, pill popping hypocrite you are! You get nowhere with such blatant lies and hypocrisy.

    Cannabis is a beautiful healing herb.

    DUMP WALKER 2018!!

    DUMP ALL REPUBLICAN LIARS, BIG CORPORATE HUCKSTERS AND CHARLATANS!!

  56. Terry says:

    Republican moochers, welfare queens and entitlement addicted moocher red states need to stop crying and get a job! Progressives in Madison and in thriving blue states can’t support you lazy drunk bums forever!!

    Career politician and Big Government moocher Scott Walker’s Wississippi is not thriving. Poverty rates in Wississippi are at 30 year highs. People are working, sure, for wage slave salaries with no benefits! Wissisippi has one of the fastet shrinking middle classes in the country now. Good, hard working educated people, particularly young educated people are indeed, fleeing the state. Why? Because of Walker and his policies. Remember, if it were up to him, abortion would be illegal, gay marriage would be illegal and doobie smoking would continue to be a mortal threat to society itself They aren’t buying it. So now he wants to try to bribe them back by spending 7 more million of taxpayers’ dollars. Not gonna happen. Wississippi is dead last in new business start ups and entrepreneurship. Wages and the economy, outside of “socialist” Dane County, which is actually thriving, lag our “socialist” neighbor to the west Minnesota, which is running circles around Wississippi economically and socially, attracting many of our best and brightest. And you know what? They did it all in a healthy bipartisan way, not by dividing the state and pursuing a bitter, partisan “divide and conquer” strategy that Walker employed ripping the social fabric of the state apart. Schools have been defunded. The best teachers are fleeing the state. The roads and infrastructure in Wississippi are crumbling and the state still has an unresolved one billion dollar and counting, DOT budget deficit. The republicans have unconstitutionally gerrymandered the state elections, destroying Democracy itself in the process. Voting rights and rates have in fact been seriously negatively impacted by the voter ID law. Walker and republicans’ policies loot and pillage our environment. The prisons in Wississippi are overflowing and the state cannot afford its prison industrial complex any longer. Anyone, usually currently sitting in a cage for nonviolent drug “offenses” should be immediately released. The state desperately needs criminal justice and drug war reform, including ending cannabis prohibition which would add revenue and honor basic civil rights. If the state is “thriving” why did Walker just hand over 4 BILLION of taxpayers’ money in corporate welfare to a Taiwainese, ahem, Chinese company for soon to be obsolete, (via automation or innovation) mediocre jobs? Wississippi has been Foxconned by Walker!! This John Doe investigation into Walker and his aids (including those in prison for their past illegal activiyies) and the subsequent investigations are disconcerting all around, one might even say “greazy” to say the least. How much out of state big corporate money has Big Government moocher Walker taken? Is it true that the same money going to him and republicans is going to fund judicial seats? No wonder the “courts” throw out any ruling against him now! This is the same Scott Walker who just spoke at a far right wing conference featuring white nationalists and yes, it appears even a Nazi!
    Career politician Scott Walker did not create 250,000 jobs. He failed and rather than take personal responsibility he sold the state down the river and handed 4 Billion dollars in corporate welfare to a Chinese company. Scott Walker is a jobs killer, a prosperity killer, a Democracy killer, a civil rights killer and a killer of Liberty and freedom itself.

    Dump Walker 2018!!
    Dump all republicans 2018!!

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