WI is polluted with RW leaning media. The state's largest paper(Milwaukee Journal Sentinel) endorsed Walker and many smaller outstate papers are just as bad. AM radio is overwhelmingly RW, and the few progressive voices that are left are being lost or marginalized daily. Two of the larger RW squawk-boxes are located in Milwaukee and their broadcasts conveniently reach into the suburbs the surround Milwaukee. These suburbs are disaffectionately referred to as the ring of fire because they are the reddest parts of the state(even country in certain instances).
This ties into turnout. Repugs in WI have demonstrated as of late that they will show up at the polls even if the damn polling place is burning down. It doesn't matter what time of year, it doesn't matter what the weather, it doesn't matter how obscure the election is. Being whipped up into a frenzy by the RW media only exacerbates their determination.
Elections are won and lost on how the two largest dem strongholds, Madison and Milwaukee, turnout to counter the ring of fire and a few smaller, scattered repug leaning areas.
Madison and Milwaukee are the two largest cities in WI, are densely populated, and overwhelming democratic. A perfect scenario for huge turnout via voter drives and busing voters to the polls is would seem. At times that is exactly what happens- but if the vote doesn't involve the POTUS the results are disappointing to say the least.
WI dems turn out very strong for presidential elections, and the results speak for themselves; WI has gone blue for president since 1984. Polls show there are more Wisconsinites that identify as democrats over repugs so when turnout is good this is no surprise.
This is a big problem that I don't have an answer for, and not just for the recall, but for all other non-president elections past and yet to come. There was a large GOTV effort in Milwaukee for the recall. The volunteers were there, transportation was there, but voter interest wasn't there.
There are a few other smaller contributing factors to the recall not working out: The timing, while somewhat out of our control, was pretty bad. Wisconsinites don't vote in early June. Most students have gone home, and residents and parents minds' are tuned to vacation and enjoying the brief summer. I also believe some people got burnt out over the struggle that by that time had been going on for well over a year. Several more elections had taken place than usual by the June 5th recall election that led even some more to "voter fatigue".
Of course there is no solid consensus as to what exactly went wrong or what could have been done differently to change the outcome. A better candidate perhaps? One that was more closely involved in the protests possibly.
I've spent a lot of time reading and pondering the issue and the above is the conclusion I've come to.
A sticky(sometimes referred to a pinned post) is a post that always remains at the top of a group or forum. Usually they contain forum rules or routinely discussed FAQs. You can see the one at the top of GD that Skinner put up.
= new reply since forum marked as read