Why Kloppenburg's Win IS a Big Deal!

Update on the Kloppenburg/Prosser Supreme Court race in Wisconsin:


As most of your know, on Thursday (yesterday, April 7, 2011), the Republican Clerk of Waukesha County in Wisconsin, one Kathy Nickolaus, announced that she had somehow forgotten to add 14,000 votes from the town of Brookfield, Wisconsin, into the vote counts she reported early Wednesday morning.  As Brookfield, Wisconsin, is an overwhelmingly conservative, Republican burg, those 14,000 votes were cast overwhelmingly in favor of the conservative incumbent, David Prosser, thus giving him the lead by about 7,500 votes.


Vote canvassing and auditing continues, and there is still talk of a recount. We will all have to wait and see what happens as a result of this "miscounting".  (I will comment on the particular situation involving Ms. Nickolaus in a separate blog entry a bit later.)


Though the numbers used below will have to change should Waukesha's updates be found to be correct, most of this article still holds:


Kloppenburg, an unknown liberal Democrat, came from a 20-odd point deficit a few weeks ago to glean a vote count within one half of one percent of the long-time conservative incumbent Prosser.  But, as my fifth grade teacher used to say, "Almost never got there", and that is never more true than in elections.  But it's only just begun, and Kloppenburg did carry 19 more counties that controversial conservative Republican governor Scott Walker carried in November.    


This article as originally written:
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Right now Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Joanne Kloppenburg is winning the race with a mere 204 vote lead.  It is likely that the Republican incumbent, David Prosser, will request a recount, so it isn't over yet.


Many Republicans are trying to devalue the importance of Kloppenburg's win.  "It's only 204 votes," they say.  No, Republicans and baggers, it is much, much more than 204 votes.  And some Democrats are concerned that this vote was too close; they feel that Kloppenburg should have won by a lot more.  


Below, two very cogent and clear descriptions of the importance of this election and explanations of why a victory of a mere 204 votes is much more than it seems:


From "Cinnamonape" at Huffington Post:

"Just some interestin­g number crunching to show what this means. Prosser won the non-partis­an collective Primary in early February with 55% (247,500 votes). Kloppenbur­g only had 25% (112,500 votes).By all sane estimates Prosser would have won in a landslide again. Kloppenbur­g wasn't a particular­ly attractive or charismati­c candidate, lacked anywhere near the experience of Prosser, and lacked the benefit of incumbency­. In fact she was easily painted as someone on the left, where a centrist candidate might be viewed as more electable.

But then Walker, Fitzgerald and their crew began to wreak havoc with their budget reform plans....a­nd although Prosser wasn't even directly involved with those events,anyone associated with Walker became a  lightening rod.

As you can see from the above Kloppenber­g, a 30% underdog, rallied from that deficit to, apparently­, defeat the heavy favorite.

But there is even more to the story. The run-off resulted in a tripling of voter turnout (from 450,000 to almost 1.5 million).

Looking at this in terms of just "new turnout".  Prosser was able to mobilize 492,500 more voters to support him besides those that showed up to the original primary. But Kloppenbur­g brought out 627,500 more voters than voted for her in the Primary. That means that while Prosser brought out 2 new voters for every one in the Primary, Kloppenbur­g brought out 5.5 for every one voter supporting her in the primary!

This is a stunning turn-aroun­d in a short two months.. ­and the only thing that explains it is the failure of the Wisconsin Republican­s to govern in a manner that befits "Represent­atives of the People." "

From "Forward Progressive" also at Huffington:

I'm tired of people saying "I'm upset the victory margin wasn't higher" if you looked at what Joanne was up against you should be ecstatic if she even won by one. I'll spell it out here....

1.) it's a spring election, traditiona­lly very low turn-out which typically is good for Republican­s (Prosser)

2.) She was out spent by prosser. (he spent 1.8 million and she spent 1.2)

3.) He's an incumbent, typically harder to beat an incumbent.

4.) She was a virtual no-namer to, us, Wisconsini­tes 6 weeks ago

5.) Prosser was supposed to be "untouchab­le" to any challenger

This is a HUGE victory, stop demeaning it.

An Open Letter to Joanne Kloppenburg

From "MovieGuy2010" at Huffington Post:


"Funny how these things work out.

I promise you, not a single Democrat outside of Wisconsin, and many inside had ever heard of JoAnne Kloppenbur­g a couple of weeks ago. Really she was a token candidate, NO one expected this until Scott Walker decided to become Ronnie Reagan Jr. and kick the Unions of WI in the teeth to make his Teabagger bones.

First. JoAnne, if I may be so bold. Please don't forget who put you in that exalted seat, and why.

We have PLENTY of judges there for the political powers that be, you were elected by us poor working schmucks who have been getting kicked in the teeth for the last couple of decades.

We are not asking for an inside job, just a day in court and a recognitio­n that we matter as well as people that can call the governor and get their call taken any time of the day. 

So, you have gone from an unknown asst Attorney General to a name that MIGHT be a rallying cry for working class folks tired of being the scapegoat for disasters we didn't cause, but mostly landed on us anyway.

Do us proud, Supreme Court Justice Kloppenbur­g. Sometimes fate picks people out, and puts them in the right place at the right time.

This time, it was you."

Wisconsin Supreme Court Battle: The Aliens are Coming!

Democrat Joanne Kloppenburg, virtually unknown in Wisconsin until a few weeks ago, defeated the incumbent Supreme Court Justice Repubican David Prosser in a very narrow, but important victory.  


She won by a margin of 204 votes; she received 740,090; he received 739,886 votes.  It is unclear if all of the absentee ballots have been counted as yet, and it is very likely that the Republicans will request a recount.


This is an exceptional victory for the forces who are fighting for the rights and futures of working people everywhere.  Just a few weeks ago, Ms. Kloppenburg was a virtual unknown running against an incumbent, and he had outpaced her by about 30 percentage points in the primary.  A 20% turnout was expected; about 33% of registered voters actually did vote.  


Those of us posting at Huffington Post entertained each other as we kept track of the returns online, but the following gets my vote for the funniest reply of the day:


Republican poster claims:  

My Uncle is an election judge in Madison. He said they caught 13 people voting for Joanne that actually lived in Illinois. They followed them to the parking lot and wrote down all the Illinois Plate Numbers. 
God Bless 

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MovieGuy replied:

My second cousin twice removed is an election judge in Madison as well, and he said, he watched hundreds of people after voting for Prosser, go the parking lots and peel off their skin to reveal they were giant orange weasels from the moons of Altarus 7! 

He said, they were then picked up by a giant flying saucer driven by John Bohener, who was squeaking and chirping away at them in some kind of alien language! 

My second cousin ran after them, and demanded to see their long form birth certificat­es but Boehner just chirped out “Give our regards to Scotty, we are off to visit our leader David Koch in California­!"

Thanks for the laugh, MG!  We're going to have to watch for those orange space ships as the recount gets under way!