Scott Walker: He Never Left Us

Thank higher power of your choice that Scott Walker is not going to be president. But don’t think that it’s not his future goal. And especially don’t think that Wisconsin is done with him. Because he’s still providing Koch Brothers rule in Wisconsin, seeking to turn back a century of political and labor reform during his time in office. He is now decimating the state’s civil service in order that we can return to the spoils system, where a public employee can be fired at any time for political reasons. This is the ultimate in New Gilded Age governance. The spoils system was largely ended during the Progressive Era but at the federal level even before because of James Garfield’s 1881 assassination by a disgruntled member of the Republican Party’s losing faction, which led to the Pendleton Civil Service Act in 1883. That today’s plutocrats want to return us to the Gilded Age should surprise no one, but that we are actually returning to the Gilded Age thanks to the Roberts Court (and of course thanks to Ralph Nader for helping to put him there) is incredibly depressing.