The Progressive: Walker Has "The Right Stuff" For GOP Presidential Bid [View all]

[Scuba]

http://www.progressive.org/news/2015/02/187992/walker-has-right-stuff-gop-presidential-bid

As of this writing Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has yet to formally declare his bid for President in 2016, but that hasn’t stopped him from campaigning for it. Arguably, he’s been campaigning for President ever since winning his first election for Governor in 2010.

Seen in this light, all of the extreme, unconstitutional, and potentially illegal actions Walker’s administration has undertaken make a twisted kind of sense. His slash-and-burn policies of the past four years have nothing to do with responsible state governance. But they do signal to billionaire GOP campaign donors that he is willing to ride roughshod over the needs of the people in Wisconsin to prove that he can do the two things required of any contender for top office: Concentrate power in the executive office and redistribute wealth upwards.

Those were the hallmarks of the George W. Bush administrations and they have been the twin pillars of Walker’s reign as Wisconsin’s Governor. After four years of administrative power grabs, regressive social policies, and massive tax cuts and giveaways to the wealthy, it is clear that Walker’s view of the people, institutions, and resources of Wisconsin amounts to not much more than grist for his political ambition mill.

Rolling back voting rights, environmental and consumer protections, workers’ rights, health care, food and housing supports for people in need, and women’s rights while systematically dismantling public education are not the actions of an administration that plans on sticking around to manage the fallout.