Establishment's treatment of Huckabee proves how little they think of evangelicals

The endless stream of attacks on Mike Huckabee leading up to the Iowa primary are fascinating, because their meaning extends so far beyond the primary. It's a clear and compelling message that the GOP establishment cannot and will not tolerate evangelicals who think for themselves.

For two decades, we've watched Republicans fall all over themselves courting church-going voters. We've seen them rally behind school prayer and nativity scenes. We've seen them talk about the "culture of life" and wrap themselves in the cloth.

Now, what do we hear? "Oh, we need to be a party of religious tolerance. We need to find common ground with all faiths."

Convenient.

While Fred Thompson hemmed and hawed about getting into the race, Mitt Romney went to Washington and got himself coronated as the establishment candidate. Look around D.C. Damn near every high-profile Republican in that city is on the Romney bandwagon.

And as we all know, the evangelical faith that Karl Rove and George W. Bush exploited so successfully is suddenly a huge political inconvenience for the establishment. After all, Romney is a Mormon.

There are plenty of good reasons to wish for Romney's demise that have nothing to do with his Mormonism. But the guy the three-martini crowd in D.C. wants is a guy who believes that Jesus and Lucifer were brothers, that the Bible is just one part of a Time Life Series on spiritual guidance. And accordingly, the Establishment's two decade cry of "yay Jesus" has suddenly turned into pleas for religious tolerance and a focus on civic virtue. Those details about the Mormon faith are messy, after all, and evangelicals might not like them.

The Republican establishment needs the votes of evangelicals. But they only want evangelicals around if they're willing to let the establishment determine what the religious message is going to be. For two decades, the establishment has kept evangelicals on a short leash by making sure their leaders were always insiders.

You think it's a coincidence that former Jack Abramoff toadie Ralph Reed was the guy ordained to lead the Christian Coalition to greatness? Of course it wasn't. Reed was the consummate Washington insider. His job was to mobilize evangelical voters and then keep them from causing any trouble. All these years, they've loved that they can give evangelicals some lip service on abortion and some worthless faith-based initiatives, and in return for those peanuts, evangelicals support the GOP neo-con war mongers and economic policies that do most of them more harm than good.

Right now, the GOP uses evangelical voters the same way the Democrats use black voters. Just substitute Pat Robertson and James Dobson for Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. Exact same thing. A kiss on the cheek and a condescending pat on the head, and then they send them to the back of the bus. The rank and file get ignored, while the movement leaders cash their fat checks and go home to their big houses.

Heck, evangelicals need look no further than how the establishment has treated Hucakbee to know exactly what the D.C. crowd thinks of them. The GOP think evangelicals are a bunch of stupid hillbillies. They want evangelical votes but think that evangelicals themselves are too naive and too dumb to ever be allowed a real voice. If it were Thanksgiving, Romney and company would hand the evangelicals a children's Bible and send them off to the kiddie table.

And that's the beauty of Huckabee. Many evangelicals are off the reservation, and it's freaking the establishment out. Just look at this impressive list of people who've gone after Huckabee in the last few weeks. All of them are fighting to retain the political orthodoxy that has provided them with a livelihood. They're not concerned about the GOP. They're concerned about maintaining the status quo that sends them a paycheck every two weeks. And this all coming from the same crowd that pushed GWB on us eight years ago.

But there, again, is the difference. GWB: establishment guy, faux evangelist. Romney: establishment guy, faux evangelist. Huckabee: outsider, real evangelist.

At this point, it's really up to the evangelicals in Iowa. They alone will pick the GOP winner on Thursday.

Electability shouldn't be their concern, because neither Huckabee nor Romney stands a shot in the general. Huckabee and Romney are woefully lacking in foreign policy experience. And Romney comes with the added bonuses of a faith that will turn off countless southern GOP voters and a glaring insincerity that will turn off voters everywhere else. Mitt Romney is just the Republican coming of John Kerry, another rich kid from Massachusetts who grew up with the silver spoon, another rich kid that people believe will say or do anything to be President.

Huckabee might not be the best candidate but at least his campaign isn't pandering to evangelicals out one side of its mouth while insulting their intelligence out of the other. A vote for Mitt Romney is nothing less than a vote to continue that political cycle of violence.

So if Iowan evangelicals are picking between two losers, why not vote for the one who is at least sincere?

From the Department of That Which Might Help You in Iowa Could Hurt You Everywhere Else

From yesterday's LA Times:

But the undertone was clear: Huckabee was casting himself as an authentic sportsman, unlike chief rival Mitt Romney, who last spring had claimed to be an avid hunter before admitting that he had preyed mostly on "small varmints" -- and infrequently at that.

In fact, Huckabee said, not only had he hunted varmints himself -- in addition to deer, ducks, antelopes and, now, pheasants -- but he also was an experienced varmint-eater, having downed his share of fried squirrel, biscuits and Coke as a college student.

"I figured out you could put grease in a popcorn popper and heat that thing up, and you could cook anything," he said in an interview. "So we fried squirrel."

Yeah, Huckabee might hold on in Iowa, but when people look back on his campaign, Colonel Huckster pitching Arkansas Fried Squirrel could be the ultimate jump the shark moment.

And while I'm at it...

I never read Fighting Bob because it's a waste of my time. It's like listening to people at an Assembly committee hearing talk about how the UN is determining Wisconsin's land use policies - a bunch of garbage mixed in with wild conspiracy theories.

But I was bored yesterday and trolled through some of Ed Garvey's contributions. Here's what I've determined.

Scanner Dan

PLUS

Progressive Agenda

EQUALS


Ed Garvey

Neil Heinen is a waste of space.

Christian Schneider has already said everything I could ever have hoped to say about Neil Heinen over on the WPRI website. Go forth and read if you haven't already.

Sanctimonious and grating with a crappy weekend television show, Neil Heinen is Madison's own Mark Belling. Except Belling's show finally got canned. Now when will WISC wake up and discover the douchebag within their own midst?

On Christmas...

Magnificat anima mea Dominum
Et exultavit spiritus meus in Deo salutari meo.
Quia respexit humilitatem ancillæ suæ: ecce enim ex hoc beatam me dicent omnes generationes.
Quia fecit mihi magna qui potens est, et sanctum nomen eius.
Et misericordia eius a progenie in progenies timentibus eum.
Fecit potentiam in brachio suo, dispersit superbos mente cordis sui.
Deposuit potentes de sede et exaltavit humiles.
Esurientes implevit bonis et divites dimisit inanes,
Suscepit Israel puerum suum recordatus misericordiæ suæ,
Sicut locutus est ad patres nostros, Abraham et semini eius in sæcula.

Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui Sancto.
Sicut erat in principio, et nunc et semper, et in sæcula sæculorum.
Amen.

Even amidst the hustle and bustle of a day filled with family and friends, my wish for you is a few quiet moments to consider how the lessons of faith, hope, and love that Jesus shared can help all of us to find the peace that we are searching for.

- RS

It just keeps getting better...

Upon advice from the Liberty Counsel, Green Bay's idiot-in-chief Jim Schmitt instructed city workers today to add some secular elements to City Council President Chad Fredette's plastic-and-holiday-lights homage to the Savior. Yeah, that six-legged wire camel doesn't trivialize the religious nature of the holiday at all.

Wait, it's a reindeer? No way. Reindeer don't have humps.

Again, what Schmitt cannot apparently get through his skull is that every reindeer, every Santa, every tree he adds up there only further serves to trivialize the importance of the very holiday he professes to be defending.

Please, Jim, stop trivializing the birth of Jesus. Just stop already, before your antics escalate into a national embarrassment. Unless the city is going to accept pro bono services from a bunch of right-wing nuts like LC, you're already going to be dropping city tax dollars on a lawsuit from the Freedom From Religion Foundation. The fact that you've allowed exactly ONE private citizen (who happens to be City Council President) to have a display atop City Hall while simultaneously denying every other private citizen the right to have a display might be, shall we say, a wee bit problematic in your legal defense.

It would be one thing if this Nativity scene was part of a comprehensive holiday display somewhere else on City Hall grounds. But you let a private citizen put it up. And then you denied other citizens the same opportunity. That Fredette has subsequently "donated" the display to the city doesn't change the original circumstance at all. And you think having city workers put a reindeer up there is going to shield you in court?

If you are taking someone else's advice on this, lawyer or otherwise, you should probably fire them. They're doing a terrible job. For that matter, so are you, Jim. And you'll probably be getting a lump of coal from Santa, provided he can deliver it to you house. I mean, at this rate, you'll probably have him blown up and tied down on top of City Hall like a Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon in an attempt to further justify this Jesus-based lawn art over your entrance.

Reason #4,568 Louis Butler will coast to re-election (or, Realtors know the score)

The Wisconsin Realtors Association today announced its endorsement of Supreme Court Justice Louis Butler for next spring's Supreme Court election. (No, I will not capitalize REALTORS because that's just asinine.)

In doing so, it is clear that the WRA has a few things figured out.

First, judicial incumbents rarely lose in Wisconsin. Michael Gableman is probably going to get his ass kicked six ways from Sunday. This isn't to say Gableman isn't qualified. Hardly. Supreme Court incumbents just don't lose around here. So if you're the WRA, it's better to play nice with the guy who is almost certain to win even if the challenger's judicial philosophy might be a slightly better fit for your organization. It's all about hedging the bets.

Secondly, they appear to have noticed that their ages-old, de facto policy of orally servicing Republicans up and down the board is a piss-poor political strategy now that the wind is clearly blowing in the Democrats' direction in Wisconsin.

Yeah, that Mark Green endorsement isn't helping your legislative agenda so much, is it? It was a pretty stupid endorsement too since any fool could see that Jim Doyle was coasting to reelection. Hell, your own polling was probably telling you that when you pulled the trigger on the Green endorsement.

That was dumb. This endorsement is smart. And it's good to see that, unlike some others in the game, at least the WRA learns from its mistakes.

While heaven and nature sing, stupidity reigns in Green Bay

So apparently everyone else in Green Bay has to wait for new guidelines to be developed for displays on public property, but City Council President Chad Fredette gets to leave his crappy nativity scene up in the meantime. That was the decision reached on a 6-6 vote at last night's city council meeting, with mayor Jim Schmitt casting the tie-breaking vote in support.

No, no, no... no establishing religion here. No favoritism here. Letting the City Council President's nativity scene hang over City Hall while forcing every individual with another belief to remain silent is obviously the fairest way to handle a matter that desperately needs clarification.

The right decision here was clear, and painfully obvious - take down all the displays until some kind of constitutional policy can be drawn up. Or, let everyone put up whatever they want. When it comes to speech like this, government generally has precious few options. Either you let everyone speak, or you let nobody speak.

But the constitutional answer is never "let the Christians speak and let everyone else suck it."

Alas, the right decision was nowhere to be found in a room filled with people looking score political points. I'm not even sure the Christians are speaking here so much as a council president who is willing to use Christianity as a political weapon.

In a situation that calls for leadership, Green Bay got to witness first hand the pussification of its idiot-in-chief, Jim Schmitt. What Schmitt delivered last night was followership, plain and simple.

The lack of political courage here was mind-boggling. The amount of total partisan jackassery was astonishing. And I say "was" because I couldn't figure it out. And then I saw this picture and everything became crystal clear.


Yeah, someone should ask the former Montgomery staffers what they think of the guy in the back. Or the people who worked on the Grothman campaign. If this were The Wizard of Oz, these three guys would be leading candidates for the Scarecrow.

At least Green Bay has something to be known for now other than the Packers. It's the home of a bunch of buffoons who will trample your rights to free speech while protecting their own right to put a bunch of shitty plastic toys on the roof of your City Hall.

You stay classy, Green Bay.

Green Bay politicians keep swallowing the stupid pills...

Green Bay is a nice little city - a good place to raise a family, so I hear. Unfortunately, its mayor is an idiot.

As I'm sure many of you are aware of, Wisconsin's unofficial capital of immigrant-bashing is now the site of a veritable holy war over chintzy holiday displays placed on top of City Hall. A nativity scene was put up, followed by a Wiccan star. Then the star was vandalized, and now it's on.

In response, mayor Jim Schmitt has come up with a proposal to be discussed tonight by the city council, a coterie of likely unconstitutional ideas. Here they are, according to the Green Bay Press-Gazette:

• Limiting the display area to the roof over the northwest corner entrance between Dec. 8 and Dec. 31 each year.
• Petitions must be submitted by Dec. 1 of each year.
• Petitions must come from Green Bay residents.
• Displays must be a symbol recognized by the associated religion and a symbol of an official holiday of the associated religion of which said holiday is celebrated between Dec. 8 and Dec. 31.
• They cannot be larger than 3 feet high and 3 feet wide.
• They cannot contain any lights or other motorized or electronic devices.
• They cannot contain any written words.
• Petitioners must pay a $100 fee for erecting, removing and maintaining the display during the display period.

Already, out of the gate, you have a policy that blatantly discriminates against those who are non-religious or embrace secular beliefs. Unless we consider believing in no higher power to be a religion, atheists appear to be disqualified from having a display.

Who is Jim Schmitt to say that someone's belief in Festivus isn't serious? Do we really want our public grounds littered with so many unadorned aluminum poles? For that matter, who is Schmitt to preclude Jews from putting up a display celebrating their most holy day, which happens to be in September and/or October? Or Muslims from erecting displays whenever Eid happens to occur?

No words? Hmmm... free speech issues right there.

Limiting the display area to December? Sounds like favoring solstice-related holidays to me.

A fee for the display? Well, two city councilmen put up the Nativity scene, so surely others should be allowed to provide their own labor and upkeep. That way, we're not discriminating against the poor.

It never ceases to amaze me that a small minority of Christians who clearly feel threatened by the concept of religious pluralism feel the need every holiday season to wage this pointless battle. They aren't putting their Nativity scenes up in public spaces to celebrate their faith. They're doing it to pick a fight with those whose beliefs are in the minority. It's nothing other than faith-based bullying.

Here's a great place for a nativity scene: in front of a church. Here's another one: in your front yard.

If you let one group put something up you have to, as far as I'm concerned, let everyone put something up whenever they want. The second you start trying to impose restrictions like the ones that Green Bay's idiot-in-chief is throwing out there, government is setting itself up for a cascading tide of legal bills and little else.

Of course, some Christians today live for the persecution complex. After all, the guy at Wal-Mart that says "happy holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" is considered by some to be a vibrant threat to the Christian faith. And in asserting this, they expose themselves and their faith to ridicule and mockery by believers and non-believers alike.

Those who insist on temporarily slapping nativity scenes and crosses on public properties in December aren't celebrating their faith - they're looking for a political fight. They are using their faith as a political weapon. And by opening up public spaces to holiday displays that range from the serious to the absurd, they are cheapening the very beliefs that so many people hold close to their hearts.

Erpenbach, Friske team up for Wii-diculous juvenile justice bill

In yet another chapter in the onslaught of stupid legislation, Sen. Jon Erpenbach and Rep. Don Friske have teamed up on a bill that would require 17-year-olds that commit non-violent crimes to be tried in juvenile court (LRB analysis is at the end of the post). In support of their bill, they cite evidence that juveniles tried in adult courts for similar crimes are a third more likely to become repeat offenders.

Okay, so the goal is noble. What isn't is their ridiculous funding mechanism: a one-percent tax on all video games and video game consoles sold in the state of Wisconsin.

Certainly, one can understand the inclination to target smokers with taxes in order to fund the health care costs that undoubtedly accrue to taxpayers as a result of smoking. Certainly, some smokers are more susceptible to smoking-related illnesses than others, for a variety of hereditary and behavioral factors. But we can say with all certainly that smoking isn't good for anyone's health.

Are Erpenbach and Friske suggesting that playing video games makes juveniles more likely to commit crimes like "shoplifting, joyriding, or possession of alcohol" (their words from the cosponsorship memo)? So the idea is to transfer these cases back to juvenile court, and pay for it by taxing a parent who scours the city for an XBox 360 for her eight-year-old kid? Or the nursing home that's purchased Wiis and other video game equipment to help keep its residents physically and mentally active?

Seriously, guys. You don't need a new tax to pay for this. You need to find some GPR that already exists. And there's plenty of waste kicking around in the Department of Corrections that you can use to fund this. Here's a start - let's hire enough prison guards so that we don't have to spent $38 million a year in overtime to keep our jails staffed.

Perhaps we could've saved some money by not getting totally gouged when you blew $80 million plus interest for the Stanley prison. Seriously, who the hell else was going to buy that place from Dominion? It's illegal to operate a private prison in Wisconsin, after all. There was only one potential buyer in the market and you STILL found a way to overpay for that place. Here's a better price for it: $12.

What about the state labor costs on that new $25 million computer system that is running light years behind schedule?

If there is one department where you can find the money for this bill, it's the Department of Corrections - easily the most bloated major department in state government. So perhaps the question Erpenbach and Friske need to ask themselves is why they didn't work harder to find potential savings in order to fund their bill, and instead copped out by trying to slap a tax on six-year-olds and grandparents.

Analysis by the Legislative Reference Bureau

Under current law, a person 17 years of age or older who is alleged to have violated a criminal law is subject to the procedures specified in the Criminal Procedure Code and, on conviction, is subject to sentencing under the Criminal Code, which may include a sentence of imprisonment in the Wisconsin state prisons. Currently, subject to certain exceptions, a person under 17 years of age who is alleged to have violated a criminal law is subject to the procedures specified in the Juvenile Justice Code and, on being adjudicated delinquent, is subject to an array of dispositions under that code including placement in a juvenile correctional facility. This bill raises from 17 to 18 the age at which a person who is alleged to have violated a criminal law is subject to the procedures specified in the Criminal Procedure Code and, on conviction, to sentencing under the Criminal Code.

Similarly, under current law, a person 17 years of age or older who is alleged to have violated a civil law or municipal ordinance is subject to the jurisdiction and procedures of the circuit court or, if applicable, the municipal court, while a person under 17 years of age who is alleged to have violated a civil law or municipal ordinance, subject to certain exceptions, is subject to the jurisdiction and procedures of the court assigned to exercise jurisdiction under the Juvenile Justice Code. This bill raises from 17 to 18 the age at which a person who is alleged to have violated a civil law or municipal ordinance is subject to the jurisdiction and procedures of the circuit court or, if applicable, the municipal court.

Under current law, the state imposes a sales and use tax at the rate of 5 percent of the gross receipts on the sale of tangible personal property, including video games, and on the sale of certain services. Under the bill, the state imposes an additional fee on the sale of video games and video gaming devices at the rate of 1 percent of the gross receipts from such sales. This bill appropriates all moneys received from the fee to the Department of Corrections (DOC) and requires DOC to allocate those moneys to counties to pay for state−provided juvenile correctional services and local delinquency−related and juvenile justice services.

Compassionate Care debate makes me wonder: Who's actually in charge around here?

I wrote about the compassionate care bill back in June, but I do have some thoughts on Tuesday night's/Wednesday morning's proceedings. Besides, you all know I watching because I scored that sweet picture of Carol Owens "resting her eyes" on the floor. Thanks to my peeps at Wisconsin Eye for that nice shot.

First things first. Everyone knew the compassionate care bill was going to be amended back into the form it took when it was overwhelmingly approved in the Senate. There was never a doubt about that. So some of you might wonder why the AssGOP didn't just sit on the bill, if they knew that bringing it up would be a certain win for the Democrats.

Here's your Assembly Rules lesson for the day. There is a parliamentary procedure referred to as a pulling motion that is available for all members who wish to bring a bill directly to the floor for action. If a pulling motion is brought, it requires only a majority vote to bring the bill to the floor (at least on the first try).

There is little to no doubt that had the AssGOP refused to schedule the bill, the Democrats would've moved to pull the bill at some point. There's also no doubt that they would've had enough Republican support for the motion to succeed. Jeff Wood and Terry Musser offered the corrective amendment along with Mark Pocan, so the GOP would've lost those two votes, and other members had already made public comments in support of the Senate bill. Heck, one need only look at the vote on that amendment - ten Republicans voted with the Democrats for adoption.

So in reality, the bill was going to come to the floor and the bill was going to pass in the Senate form either way. The only choice AssGOP leadership was whether they wished to stand in the schoolhouse door or whether they wished to avoid charges that they were obstructing the passage of a bill with overwhelming bipartisan support. In that sense, they certainly made the correct political decision in scheduling the bill.

While a procedural move has blocked final passage of the bill until January, there should be no doubt that this bill will pass. It was cute to read in the WSJ yesterday that PLW legislative director Matt Sande thinks his side is "still alive" and that "final passage is not assured." Matt surely is spinning because he is not dumb enough to actually believe that.

The simple truth is that this bill has overwhelming public support because the public sees it as an issue of victim's rights and not as an issue about abortion. In fact, it is quite likely that when the vote for final passage comes in January, the bill may actually receive even more support than it did a few days ago. Republicans who voted for non-adoption of the amendment are now free to say to PLW "hey look, we tried. I gave you my vote in December. You and I both know this thing is passing anyway, and it'd be politically stupid of me to be on the wrong side of a bill that has so much public support."

The AssGOP already gave PLW almost everything it could on this bill. First, instead of routing the bill to a logical committee, like Public Health, AssGOP leadership sent the bill off to the Judiciary and Ethics committee, chaired by PLW mouthpiece Mark Gundrum. Gundrum, of course, could not resist the urge to completely schmuck up the bill before voting it out of his committee. He might as well have just slapped the word "not" in front of all the verbs.

So once again, something Mark Gundrum touched became political suicide for vulnerable and moderate Republicans. AssGOP leadership then waits for his deployment, and after he's gone, schedules the bill for a vote.

When I wrote about this back in June, I figured the AssGOP would at least force the Dems to pull the bill. PLW doesn't even have that much clout anymore. The AssGOP just rolled over. But that's what social conservatives deserve right now.

After their terrible performance in 2006, social conservatives aren't owed a damn thing. How many of them voted "yes" to prohibit gay marriage last November and then proceeded to vote Democrat down the rest of the ticket? Social conservatives get a 3-to-2 win on gay marriage, yet Mark Green loses by seven and nearly every targeted Republican legislator lost. Nice follow-through, guys.

Nobody's afraid of groups like PLW or Right to Life or the Wisconsin Family Council anymore. Those groups can only exert their power when Republicans have comfortable majorities and can sacrifice a few votes to get things passed. With a minority in the Senate and, for all intents and purposes, a 51-47 majority in the Assembly, it's the moderates that have all the power. PLW might as well fire their lobbyists and direct the funds into community-based activities and building their infrastructure. It'd be a better investment of money for the time being, because they aren't going to get jack squat accomplished in the next few sessions.

One last thing worth considering: this bill was proof that AssGOP leadership barely has control of the body anymore. That point couldn't have been missed. The bill brought forward was basically going to end up looking like the Senate bill. Time and again, guys like Dan LeMahieu or Robin Vos would stand in defense of one or another amendment that would basically gut the Wood/Musser amendment. Time and again, moderate Republicans voted with Democrats to table their amendments. For all intents and purposes, it was almost as though the Democrats were controlling the proceedings. The Democrats were winning routine votes that in prior sessions they never could've dreamed of winning.

This spring's floorperiods should be fun to watch. Democrats now know that they can cobble together support for their more reasonable proposals by simply approaching Republicans to support them. They did it with the budget. They did it with the compassionate care bill.

Who needs to wait for January 2009? The Assembly Democrats are running the chamber already.

Goodnight moon... goodnight Carol.

A couple of years ago - in fact, almost two years ago to the day, I wrote a post entitled Assembly Late Night. It was posted at 1:02 in the morning on a Wednesday, during an interminable session of the State Assembly.

At the time, I said the following in regards to the activities occurring on the floor during the concealed carry debate:

Carol Owens is clearly asleep. Is anyone surprised?

Some members laughed. Some members passed my post around caucus. Some members pretended not to like it, but really did. But a lot of members didn't like it.

So here we are, two years later. It's a Wednesday morning at 1:02, during an interminable session of the State Assembly. But thanks to Wisconsin Eye, I don't have to tell you what's going on right now on the floor. I can show you.

Since the Assembly Republicans didn't like my 1,000 words two years ago, perhaps they will like six words and one photograph a little better.

Carol Owens: Wake the F@#$ up.


Happy anniversary to me. Unlike so many of your colleagues who were with you on the floor two years ago, I am still in your midst. Thanks for such a great run. Here's to the memories yet to come.

More proof that Wisconsin Republicans are in the dark

From yesterday's Badger Poll:

Among Republicans and Republican leaning independents there is no clear favorite to be the Republican nominee for President. 30% would vote for Fred Thompson, 25% for Rudy Giuliani, 15% for John McCain, 8% for Mike Huckabee and 5% for Mitt Romney (N=174). All other candidates received less than 5%.

That's right. Lazy Fred's numbers are tanking and he just quit on New Hampshire. He's got no natural base, he's mired in the back of the pack with John McCain and the Mormonator, but what's this? Good news! Wisconsin Republicans love Fred Thompson!

Like Thompson, Wisconsin Republicans aren't working too hard these days, have no clear agenda that anyone will listen to, and have been pretty big losers in the polls as of late.

It's a match made in heaven.

Breaking news... Mitt Romney is a Mormon.

Apparently, Mitt Romney is a Mormon. Who knew?

Many in the Republican institution seem pleased with Romney's attempt to explain/defend his faith; namely, boring old guys like Fred Barnes and people like Hugh Hewitt, who actually thinks Mitt Romney is a "Reagan-like communicator."

In reality, the guy who hit the nail on the head is David Frum:

To be blunt, Romney is saying:

It is legitimate to ask a candidate, "Is Jesus the son of God?"

But it is illegitimate to ask a candidate, "Is Jesus the brother of Lucifer?"

It is hard for me to see a principled difference between these two questions, and I think on reflection that the audiences to whom Romney is trying to appeal will also fail to see such a difference. Once Romney answered any question about the content of his religious faith, he opened the door to every question about the content of his religious faith. This speech for all its eloquence will not stanch the flow of such questions.

If this speech is an attempt to placate Christmas-and-Easter Christians, well, they don't place much of an emphasis on faith to begin with when evaluating candidates. Their support of Romney, or lack thereof, hinges on issues not related to faith.

But to evangelicals and to those for whose Christian faith is a defining characteristic of their political identity, the fact remains that you'll be hard pressed to find any Christian leader who considers the Mormon faith as something under the Christian umbrella.

That isn't a one-way street, either. It was Joseph Smith himself who said that other Christian denominations were "all wrong ... all their creeds were an admonition in his sight, and that those professors were all corrupt."

But now, all of a sudden, Romney wants to give a speech about his faith that is designed to do nothing other than insulate himself from questions about that very faith. In a speech that was supposed to be so clear and defining, it used the word "Mormon" exactly once and the word "Christian" exactly once.

I have no problems with Mormonism, or with Mormons. What people choose to believe is their own personal prerogative, and it is not my place to judge that. I don't think that being Mormon disqualifies you from being President.

But to me, this speech was just another attempt by Mitt Romney to engage in doublespeak. Mitt Romney does not want to explain his faith, he wants to obfuscate it. His speech was nothing more than a shallow attempt to pander to evangelicals by glossing over the substantial differences in doctrine and belief between Mormonism and other Christian faiths. Like, for instance, Romney's belief that God had a wife. Or that Jesus and Lucifer are brothers.

We'll see how voters in Iowa and other early states respond to this speech in the next week. My guess is that Romney's speech will create more questions among its target audience than it answered.

Reason #2,468 I will never be moving to Detroit

Some of you may have heard about this story out of Detroit, in which a 7-year-old girl took six bullets (and lived) to save her mom from a gun-wielding ex-boyfriend.

What's frightening is what occurred when the mother, who convinced her ex she needed to stop for gas, went into the store to pay:

"The first (911) operator clicked off and I dialed again and told that operator a guy with a gun was holding me hostage with a mother and baby and threatening to kill us. I told her the name of the gas station and then she said they didn't have a unit to send."

Yeah. Crazed gunman holding a mother and daughter hostage with a 9 mm semi-automatic weapon is apparently not enough to pull a unit off of whatever the hell else they were doing. Logically, I can only take that to mean that every unit on duty was tending to a matter more severe than a crazed gunman holding a mother and daughter hostage with a 9 mm semi-automatic weapon.

You stay classy, Detroit.

WIVA's wobble, fall down.

Today's appellate court ruling on the illegality of the Wisconsin Virtual Academy (WIVA) is hardly surprising, in my mind. What the Wisconsin Coalition of Virtual School Families does not apparently understand that is that anyone who could read knew full well that their arguments were rickety from the very beginning.

Me, personally? I have no problem with WIVA, except for the fact that such an educational venture in Wisconsin is against the law.

I will admit to finding some irony in the fact that WEAC, more or less, filed suit against a bunch of families making use of public school resources and licensed teachers, families who would otherwise be likely to just homeschool entirely outside the influence of the WEAC Kingdom. Let's be honest. The state can shut WIVA down, but it's not like the affected kids are going back into public schools. Instead of the Northern Ozaukee School District getting money to educate these students, their local school districts will now get money to not educate them.

I've never really much cared where kids went to school or what schools got taxpayer funding - public, private, parochial, non-sectarian, whatever - provided that evidence could be provided that students were meeting certain educational standards. Frankly, if private schools wanted to subject themselves to the same academic standards as public schools, I'd have no problem at all including them in the state's school funding formula. I just don't care if my money is going to Christians, atheists, Jews, Muslims, whatever. I care that kids are learning - something that, in many urban school districts, all too few of them are doing. Remember, if the state makes funds available to any school that meet certain academic standards, it's not doing anything in the realm of the establishment of religion.

So the WIVA ruling is appropriate, but it should open up a larger debate on how schooling should be provided in a day and age when streaming video and high-speed internet can span hundreds of miles in a matter of milliseconds.

Not that the Legislature ever behaves responsibly or sets about to solve real problems, but here is an actual, substantive matter that it could and should address. Perhaps legislators could spend a little more time on this and a little less time on picking a state tartan or burdening drafters with more terrible and hopeless drafting requests.

Is that the Matterhorn?

Nope. Just Fred Thompson's presidential numbers...

Go get 'em, Bucky.

Three cheers to Bucky as he hauls Washburn University to court for trademark infringement. Can anyone seriously say that this logo isn't anything more than the motion W with a little bit of photoshopping?

First, the University of Wisconsin - Madison:



Now, Washburn University:



Okay, so they eliminated the curve at the bottom and took out the shading in the background, replacing it with a simple two-dimensional outline. Is that enough to make it distinct from the UW logo? Guess the courts will let us know shortly.

"Waldo" Thompson still can't be found on the trail

Second verse, same as the first. In today's NYT, Marc Santor discusses how Fred Thompson still can't be found anywhere on the campaign trail. He politely offers up the adjective "unconventional" to describe the fact that nobody can find Waldo out among the crowds. But I could think of another that probably fits just as well. How about "contemptuous"?

Seeing clips of and reading about Thompson's often awkward interactions with regular people, it seems to me like it might not be a question of laziness. It might just be that Fred Thompson doesn't care much for being bothered by the concerns of regular Americans.

Give the other candidates credit. They do, by and large, make an effort to meet regular people and hear their concerns, even if they themselves haven't been able to identify with those concerns in a long time. I seriously doubt, for instance, that Mitt Romney has ever had to contemplate how he was going to make it to the next paycheck. But he schedules town hall meetings, he interacts with voters, he makes an effort to listen.

Fred Thompson can't be bothered. Certainly can't be because he's too busy, because his schedule is wide open most weeks.

I will admit to finding a certain degree of delight in watching this campaign tank, in part because it was supposed to be the great white hope of so many of the mouth-breathers last spring. Fred Thompson was supposed to be their second coming of Ronald Reagan. Instead he's more like the second coming of Steve Forbes - just as boring but without the intellect or the business acumen.

And let's be serious, for a moment, about Thompson's chances. He will be lucky to finish fourth in Iowa. There's a very real chance he could finish sixth in New Hampshire, even falling behind Ron Paul, the internet darling.

In fact, when the highly-respected tabloid The Economist put together its article on the most recent debate, Fred Thompson's name was nowhere to be found. Even Duncan Hunter and Tom Tancredo got a mention. But Fred, as usual, was invisible.

Something tells me that Fred thought the GOP would just roll over and give him the nomination when he decided to run. And when he realized it wouldn't happen, he dragged his feet on entering the race. When he finally did, it was already clear that there was no point to his candidacy. Other candidates had already positioned themselves to move into the supposed "vacuum" that existed in the race, the one that Thompson was supposed to fill.

Here's what Fred can do to help the GOP out. Drop out.

Yeah, that's right. Pull the plug. He's got no chance. He's been successfully outmaneuvered for the vote of social conservatives by Mike Huckabee. Who would've thought we'd be saying that six months ago? Huckabee, a guy who had no money and virtually no name ID, has pretty much propelled himself into the top tier based solely on own skills in retail politics. Who would've thought that Thompson, when given a chance to throw a pre-taped cheap shot in a debate, would have to aim that shot at Huckabee? Bet the Thompson campaign wasn't expecting to be in that position six months ago.

But I think we all know at this point, Thompson is too lazy to drop out. So he'll keep running, and we here at the Playground will just keep laughing. When all is said and done, Fred Thompson will be the new poster child for wasted potential in a presidential campaign. Never has anyone done so little with so much.