Walker never once hid his conservatism and he won a high-turnout election in a county that went 61% for Al Gore in 2000. He even managed to eat significantly into the Democrat's share of the black and Hispanic vote. The following is from the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal, which had (typical media Democrat fixation) endorsed Ryan.
Walker didn't concede any sector of the community to his opponents in the primary or the final election, including the city of Milwaukee and African-American neighborhoods where others presumed he would be weak.If this proves anything, it proves that Ronald Reagan's victories in CA and the nation, the Gingrich Revolution in 1994 and Bret Schundler's Mayoral victories in Jersey City were not flukes. Conservatism, combined with the right candidate(s) is a winning formula. Eliminate the media's bias and you need not even be a super-charismatic "Great Communicator"/ Stategist to succeed.An anecdote that shows how effective his campaign was: Ryan appeared on a Saturday afternoon program on WNOV-AM (860) several weeks ago, hosted by Lenard Wells, a retired Milwaukee police lieutenant. After Ryan left, Wells criticized Walker strongly and said he didn't want to have Walker on his program. But within minutes, Walker was at the studio in person, where he went on the air and, as usual, handled himself well. Moments like that show why he did far better than many expected among African-American voters.
Now if only the big old Elephants in the GOP would only listen ...