“I’ve got to tell you, as a little girl growing up in Chippewa Falls, I never could have imagined that I’d be taking on the richest man in the world for justice in Wisconsin — and we won.”
-Judge Susan Crawford Tuesday night after being elected in a landslide to become Wisconsin’s next Supreme Court Justice
In the wake of that stunning election here in Wisconsin, I reckon there will be a lot of people telling you not to over-read the results of just one state election. Those people will be dead wrong when they do it, but before I address their faulty assumptions, let’s talk briefly about a few of the gigantic things Crawford’s win does for the people of Wisconsin — all with associated affects on America:
- It protects women’s right to choose. Had her opponent Brad Schimel won, you could have expected Republicans to drag women by their hair and back to an 1849 state law here heavily banning abortion. And no, that’s not hyperbole.
- The semi-fair political maps that were finally drawn last year abolishing the most gerrymandered maps in the nation, would have been incinerated by Republicans. And I say, semi-fair because the new maps still favor right-leaning voters who are at best 50 percent of the population here. I will be pushing for truly fair maps in this space in the future, but I’m too damn happy to do much grousing about anything right now.
- It protects the recent restoration of collective bargaining rights for Wisconsin public workers and teachers unions that were lost under Republican control in 2011.
Like I said gigantic.
It also restores what has become a blurry notion of right and wrong in this country, because there is no damn way a grotesque billionaire slime ball bombing into our state and passing out money for votes is anything but wrong.
In fact, it is criminal.
By walloping Schimel by 10 points in a state where razor-thin margins are the rule, the people of Wisconsin put the America-attacking Donald Trump on notice: You’ve gone way too far, sport. Back up now, or prepare to be flattened in the future.
Democrats around the country got the fuel-injected boost they so badly needed, because they finally got around to listening to their voters instead of cowering in the corners, and conceding the floor to these odious Republicans. You feeling me right now, Chuck Schumer?
Because at almost the very moment the Democrats’ new national leader, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, was finally giving his 25-plus hours of good trouble a break, the race here in Wisconsin was being called for Crawford.
If you didn’t feel the earth shift after that one, you weren’t paying attention. And if you weren’t paying attention why in the hell not?
Everything changed in the past 24 hours, and it is the people on the Left, and not most of our damn politicians who we can thank for that. Booker said as much during his heroic speech, and immediately after in a must-see interview with Rachel Maddow:
“I do really credit constituents, who were impatient, who were demanding, who were scared, who were angry, and, very understandably, taking that anger out on Democrats, who have to take some responsibility for being where we are in American history right now.
“But I suddenly realized that I have just got to do something myself. I have got to try to prove worthy for my constituents that I’m willing to step out and step up in some way and hopefully be able to share their stories that were so hurtful.”
And before I continue here, a lot of us have caught a lot of crap for trying to hold Democratic politicians into account since that ghastly election November 5th. Knuckleheads like James Carville have even suggested we stand down. If I had a dollar for every time somebody told me to “stop beating up on your own” I’d have enough money to buy some election.
But if you still somehow didn’t feel the switch in the political winds last night, let me tell you who did: the racist Trump.
Something that got very little mention in the run-up to this crucial race in Wisconsin was the absence of the serial liar in the state. Say what you want about the economy-crasher — and don’t stop — but facts are he has won two out of three times he’s run up here, which is a pretty good batting average for a bunt-hitter.
While Trump did throw his support for Schimel, he made sure to do it from the safety of his nuclear-powered social media accounts. There were none of his unhinged cult rallies in the state, where literally anything would come out of his trashcan of a mouth.
Trump’s absence in Wisconsin did all the talking for him. He knows deep in his empty, black heart that he is failing, and people aren’t at all entertained by what he has been serving. Markets are crashing, food prices are going up, national security is at risk, and benefits like social security are no longer safe.
Human beings are being disappeared.
Never underestimate the vanity of a guy who paints himself orange, and tapes dead ferrets to his head each day before going off to berate the public. He wasn’t going to be seen anywhere in the vicinity of this state, if losing big up here was a possibility.
So the despicable bastard needed somebody to blame for his potential failure — a scapegoat.
Enter oily Elon.
As I was spiking the football in this column, I got this alert from my friends at Raw Story: Trump says Elon Musk will be out of the White House ‘soon’
See? Everything that went wrong Tuesday night was Elon’s fault.
Nobody in history has been better at recycling one-time supporters into trash than Dumpster Donny, but Musk presents a unique challenge. How does he say, “Sure I’d love to take gobs more of your money, Elon, but is there any way I can see you less?”
The answer to that question is, no. Musk completely owns him, even if Vladimir Putin would disagree.
Trump is now being dragged around the world by Putin and here at home by Musk, and the good people on the Left need to be pointing this out every other minute.
What happened up here in Wisconsin Tuesday night, and with Booker’s epic speech on the Senate floor in Washington, completely changed the playing field and how we patriots must look at things going forward.
Never underestimate your power as a United States voter, even if Republicans are doing everything they can to take that power away. Our representatives work for us. That has somehow been forgotten. I will expect the battle to be joined by all those gutless Democrats who ran for cover after November 5th. When we fight, we win.
Never underestimate the women in America. No surprise, all four liberal justices on our court in Wisconsin are women. Watching them on that stage last night gave me goosebumps. They-were-feeling-it. THEY DID THIS. They stood up to the patriarchy and all that damn dirty money, and showed them who was really boss.
Ya know, I dig around in a lot of the corners here in the powerhouse of Madison, Wisconsin, where we voted for Crawford to the astonishing tune of roughly 85% to 15% over Schimel. Let me tell you who you will find knocking on the doors, making the phone calls, working the polls, opening their homes, and fighting back with a vengeance at our one-after-another rallies in this city: WOMEN.
Damn, I am proud to stand with them. And damn I am one happy dude right now.
Forward!
NOW READ: Finally, a Democratic Party leader who will treat us like adults
D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. You can find all his work here, and follow him on Bluesky here.
source https://www.rawstory.com/raw-investigates/trump-in-trouble/