Scott Walker is Born Again

Tuesday Scott Walker’s rudderless campaign for Governor took a decided turn for the worse.

Armed with only a handful of Cheetos, Walker started a Republican food fight with opponent Mark Green, when he called on Green to return nearly $30,000 in campaign contributions he got from Tom Delay’s PAC from 1997 to 2003. Walker claimed that Green needed to return the money in order to purify himself so that he could appropriately wage attacks on Jim Doyle’s fundraising practices.

To his credit, Mark Green’s Campaign did not release their own arsenal of over-ripe tomatoes in response.

So I have a few questions for Scott Walker.

1. When and how did the 38 year old professional politician become pure? Was it divine intervention? A belated Christmas miracle? Or was it just more of the unprincipled posturing that is becoming all too common among alleged conservatives lately?

2. When did he decide that Wisconsinites expect purity from their politicians? I think they‘d be delighted with leaders who are simply not corrupt.

The fact is, Jim Doyle’s fundraising is under scrutiny because of the appearance of a “quid pro quo,” which is Latin for give me money if you want a lucrative state travel contract or permanent gaming compacts.

Walker has personal experience with such questions of impropriety. In 2004 the U.S. Attorney looked into the process by which a $100 million bond deal was awarded to the employer of some of Walker’s major campaign contributors. Walker didn’t return any of the $25,000 raised at a Chicago event that followed the bond deal, even after three of the donors were indicated for a bribery and kickback scheme involving government officials in Illinois.

Green on the other hand accepted money from a fellow Republican House member. This fellow House member was recently indicted by a politically motivated Democrat Prosecutor in Texas. Walker is not suggesting that Green did anything wrong in accepting these contributions over the course of time. There’s no quid pro quo here, nor is there any evidence that the money Delay gave Green was obtained illegally. Still the new “purer than you” Walker has declared the need for some higher standard when it comes to political fundraising.

Forget about principles like innocent until proven guilty and the freedom to associate with others without fear of retribution. Our leaders simply can not be trusted to do the right thing, so we must eliminate all political fundraising during the state budget process. Perhaps we should eliminate political contributions altogether and fund elections entirely with taxpayer dollars.

Walker’s new platform is starting to sound more compatible with the "People’s Legislature Party" headed by Ed Garvey and Nino Amato. Maybe Walker should consider running as “the People’s Candidate”. That way he can continue to give Doyle the ammunition he needs to inoculate himself against allegations of real corruption, in what appears to be an orchestrated effort by his administration to extort money from businesses and special interest groups who want to do business with the state.

I have known Mark Green since 1989 and I am a contributor to his campaign for Governor.