In Walker's Wisconsin, Supreme Court Election Heading for Photo Finish

Weekly Standard ^ | April 6, 2011 | John McCormack, The Blog

[Cincinatus' Wife]

The Wisconsin supreme court race between conservative justice David Prosser and liberal assistant attorney general JoAnne Kloppenburg is coming down to the wire. With 99% of precincts reporting, Prosser has a 585-vote lead out of nearly 1.5 million ballots cast. The potentially bad news for Prosser is that of the 34 uncounted precincts, most of them are in counties that voted for Kloppenburg, including 12 in Milwaukee and 1 in Dane.

While the results remain unsettled, here are some takeaways from the night:

--Kloppenburg underperformed, compared to John Kerry who narrowly won the state in 2004, in Democratic Milwaukee and a number of surrounding GOP counties, but she overperformed in Dane county, where the state's capital is seated. Looks like all of those state employees didn't like having their benefits cut.

--One week ago, some internal polling showed that Prosser was trailing by the mid-to-high single digits. Turnout was higher than anyone expected. It looks like conservatives woke up in the end and closed the gap.

--The big fear that Walker's budget-repair bill did serious political damage to Republicans has dissipated somewhat. Wisconsin was basically deadlocked but narrowly voted for Democrats in the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, swung to Obama by 13 points in 2008, and then swung to Walker by 5 points in 2010. The fact that Wisconsin's gone back to being a 50-50 state of the Bush years--and not a +13 Democratic state of 2008--is a relief to Republicans.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Reuters: "........As of 12:41 a.m. Central time, Prosser had garnered 727,208 of the votes cast while Kloppenburg had tallied 725,205.

Officials in Eau Claire, Wisconsin were hand-counting ballots into the night, according to the website WisPolitics.com, which also reported that a number of absentee votes still needed to be counted.

If Prosser, a longtime Wisconsin judge and former Republican legislator, holds onto his lead, it will keep the state high court's 4-3 conservative majority intact.

A Prosser victory would be a setback for Democrats, who channeled their anger about the union restrictions into the Supreme Court election campaign as a proxy vote on Walker's policies........"

WisPolitics Election Blog.

Supreme Court race still too close to call, Prosser has narrow lead

"Jean S."Live thread: Wisconsin Supreme Court election - Prosser vs Kloppenburg

[LibLieSlayer]

If we lose they will destroy us... if Prosser wins... he needs to nuke the unions... kill their power and stop them from any future at all. Wisconsin and America depend on their demise... bunch of infected communist malcontents.

LLS

[irish guard]

585 vote Prosser lead right now after more than 1.4 million votes cast. Yipe

[Uncle Ike]

How quaint - the author still apparently clings to the outdated notion that the end-game in close elections has anything to do with ballots actually cast and counted...

[theDentist]

There will be a recount, with ballots “discovered”.

[D Rider]

Prosser will lose by the third recount.

[Ladysmith]

Count on it.

[FroggyTheGremlim]

I'd love to see the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth if, just once, a bunch of ballots were discovered in a garage or warehouse in a Repulican precinct.

[Matchett-PI]

bttt

[harpu]

ELECTION RESULTS

[FlingWingFlyer]

I don’t know how this is going to end because we are dealing with evil and corrupt teachers unions and “useful idiot” college “students” here. However, IMHO, you folks in Wisconsin did an OUTSTANDING job taking on BIG labor with their BIG money and old hippy activist “judge”.

[tacticalogic]

If we lose they will destroy us...

And they're too dumb to realize if they do they're going to starve.

[freemama]

Thanks. We tried very hard! We are now afraid that this election will be decided like Al Franken’s senate election happened in Minnesota.

[RockinRight]

Why does this sound suspiciously like Rossi vs. Gregoire in WA a few ears back?

[1010RD]

That’s the best and most accurate analysis. They came at us with all they had. They poured resources into Wisconsin to defeat America and liberty. Money, man power and their best political brains ended in a draw.

It’s a victory no matter how you count it. If they steal it, it will reinforce the view that the people are under siege by unions. They won’t be able to sustain their momentum going into the upcoming recalls and regular elections.

[GreatOne]

With all due respect, Franken did NOT steal the election from Coleman. What happened is simply this: The Minnesota Supreme Court, without any statutory basis, told both camps that they could review the challenged absentee ballots together, and if they mutually agreed that the ballot should be counted it would. Franken’s team had done it’s homework identifying absentee voters (something Coleman’s idiot campaign workers/attorneys did not), and therefore knew which counties contained their voters. In those counties, Franken’s team was more than willing to agree to count challenged ballots. Conversely, in those counties that supported Coleman, they simply refused to agree to count challenged ballots. That was the margin of victory. Simply got outsmarted.

[montag813]

It’s over. Franken II. Unless the Wisconsin SoS has balls.

[aruanan]

I know that whatever happens the Democrats will try a la Al Franken in Minnesota to screw around until they invent enough votes to win. If they try this, Prosser and the Republicans had better do a take no prisoners, all out assault on voter fraud and build a case that cannot be ignored or, if ignored by those responsible for prosecution, will demonstrate such an egregious violation of laws and ethics that voters won’t ignore it in upcoming elections. It seems there has been too much of a “well, it’ll all turn out right in the end” attitude amongst some Republicans. True, God will give everyone his just desserts in the end, but for us it’s got to be, “FINAL JUDGMENT NOW and we’re going to make sure it happens.”

[April Lexington]

585 vote Prosser lead right now after more than 1.4 million votes cast. Yipe

This number is mind boggling. What is the statistical probability of a tie with 1.4 million votes cast? It seems impossible.

[Houghton M.]

No, we’ll starve. We are the Kulaks to them, the ones who worked and saved and owned.

They worship sheer naked power. They will join the Nomenklatura and become the camp guards with power of life and death. They have no principles, so they can join whomever comes out on top. Those who have principles and refuse, must die beccause their very existence proclaims the evil of the winners. The winners cannot tolerate the survival of anyone who plays by the old rules of Right and Wrong.