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By DOUGLAS BELKIN
SHEBOYGAN, Wis.—One night last week, Kay Robbins sat at the bar at Al & Al'
s with about 40 other teachers celebrating a colleague's retirement. Talk
turned to what talk often turns to in Wisconsin these days: Gov. Scott
Walker.
"He's a weasel," Ms. Robbins said to a lot of nodding heads. "A lying weasel
."
Across town at the 8th Street Ale Haus, Kip Ertel, a 50-year-old social
worker, sat drinking with friends and talked about Mr. Walker in wholly
different terms. "He's the first real grown-up the state has had in a long
time," he said.
Tuesday's election on whether to recall Mr. Walker has so bitterly divided
this state that many residents live in parallel societies, limiting
themselves to like-minded friends, separate drinking holes and sympathetic
media outlets.
Triggered by a backlash against the Republican governor's move 15 months ago
to crimp collective bargaining for the state's public employees, the recall
race has pitted neighbor against neighbor, damaged decades-old friendships,
and, in one case, led a woman to drive into her husband when he tried to
stop her from voting for Mr. Walker's opponent in a primary last month.
Wisconsin has long been a purple state with a fluid middle. Its U.S.
senators have included both Robert "Fighting Bob" La Follette, the
progressive champion of the early 20th Century, and Joseph McCarthy, the
fiery anti-Communist senator of the 1940s and 50s. Four of its past eight
governors have been Democrats; four have been Republicans. While Wisconsin
has voted Democratic in every presidential election since 1988—Barack Obama
won in 2008 by 14 percentage points—the 2010 election gave Republicans
control of both houses of the state legislature and ushered Mr. Walker into
office.
Mr. Walker and his supporters say curbing public union's collective-
bargaining rights is essential to balancing the state budget, lowering
property taxes and creating a business-friendly environment. Union members
and many Democrats say public-sector unions weren't the cause of the state's
budget problems and argue that Mr. Walker has used his office to drive an
ideological agenda well to the right of what most Wisconsinites want.
Both sides, along with the national political establishment, would see a
victory Tuesday as a validation of their position and a harbinger of the
public mood heading into November's presidential election.
This spring, as the recall entered the home stretch, political positions
have become so hardened that a Marquette University Law School poll late
last month found only one in every 50 likely voters hadn't decided how to
vote. The poll showed Mr. Walker ahead of his Democratic opponent, Milwaukee
Mayor Tom Barrett, by seven percentage points, within the margin of error.
More than one-third of respondents said they had stopped speaking about
politics to someone because of disagreements over the recall.
"I don't have any of them for friends anymore," Mr. Ertel said of those with
whom he might disagree. "It's just better to ignore them."
The race has drawn tens of millions of dollars in political donations—much
of it from outside Wisconsin—into a state of just 5.7 million people. Much
of it has found its way into negative advertisements. In Sheboygan, a
Republican-leaning middle-class city of 50,000 on Lake Michigan roughly
halfway between Milwaukee and Green Bay, yard signs are ubiquitous and
bumper stickers run to the demeaning.
Recall Vote Divides State
Carol Zoren, a 73-year-old Democrat, sports a bumper sticker on her car that
says "Vote Republican Values: Debt, Corruption and Invented War." A few
weeks ago, a man started screaming at her in a parking lot. "He said he was
a veteran and he didn't fight for people like me," she said. "I told him to
buzz off."
Politicians have tapped into the discord. At a bratfest behind the Sheboygan
County Republican headquarters, State Assembly Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald, a
candidate for the U.S. Senate, told a crowd: "The Democrats will do anything
to steal an election; I do believe that." The comment drew loud applause.
John Plesetz, a 65-year-old retired small-business owner, bumped into a high
-school friend at the Charcoal Inn a few months ago. They sat together over
eggs and sausage and toast until politics came up. Mr. Plesetz is a tea-
party conservative. His old pal, a union member, left the table in a huff.
They haven't spoken since. Mr. Plesetz isn't sure they ever will.
To some Sheboygan old-timers, the atmosphere is reminiscent of that during
the Kohler Co. strike that started in 1954 and dragged into the next decade.
Thousands of strikers surrounded the port to prevent shipments of raw
material from being trucked to a nearby plumbing-supply factory. Violence
wasn't uncommon, and churches, bars and grocery stores became identified
with one side or the other.
For Ms. Robbins, the teacher at Al & Al's, the anger is disrupting her
family. A few months ago, one relative stormed out of her eighth-grade
daughter's concert after an argument over politics with another. Ms. Robbins
now is fretting about a Milwaukee Brewers baseball game she is supposed to
attend with her son and his staunchly Republican wife on Friday.
"My son told me, 'Mom you can't talk about politics,' " Ms. Robbins said. "I
told him 'Fine, but she can't either.' " |
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