Last Friday, shortly after my appearance on
The Sara Schulz Show, I received a phone call. Apparently, there was going to be a forum debating the merits of the Scott Walker recall. The person who was to be pro-recall part of the panel was called away for business and would not be able to participate.
The event was scheduled for Tuesday evening and was going to be held at the beautiful facility of
St. John's on the Lake. The host and moderator of the panel was Tony Busalacchi. Tony was
featured in this Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article from a couple of years ago, and yes, his collection o art is gorgeous.
The anti-recall pundit was Rick Bass (pronounced boss), who had a very impressive bio, including being a member of Homeland Security and being a ranking officer in the Republican Party of Milwaukee County. (That's the same group that had members like Darlene Wink and Tim Russell also as ranking officers.)
The other member of the panel was
Professor Edward Fallone of Marquette University, a most learned man with whose work I was familiar and for whom I had a great deal of respect. Professor Fallone would be a neutral participant there to explain the legal and historical background for recalls in Wisconsin.
Would I be willing to stand in as the pro-recall part of this panel of distinguished men? I almost burst out in open laughter at the thought. Who was I to be on stage debating the future of Wisconsin with these distinguished gentlemen? But after a few minutes of cajoling and flattery ("Who else knows all the issues as well as you?" is like kryptonite to a blogger), I squelched the voice of reason and suppressed the drive of self-preservation and agreed to take part.
Later on, Tony called me and explained the format to me. He would introduce the panel and then Professor Fallone would speak for a few minutes to explain the history and legal issues surrounding recalls. After that, the panelists would be able to ask each of the other panelists one question. After that, the panel would answer questions from the audience.
Seemed easy enough.
But then I spent the weekend obsessing about what questions I should ask. I contacted some trusted friends to use as sounding boards and to get their input. (Thanks for your patience, guys!) I neatly wrote out the questions that I had in my notebook. I reviewed the things that I had written and what others had written regarding the recall to prepare.
Tuesday morning finally came. I was as ready as I'd ever be.
I got dressed in the same ensemble that I wore last year when I participated in a panel discussing the role of social media and the protests. I wanted to
remember the support I received from my #wiunion brothers and sisters that day and use those memories to help carry me through this day.
After work, I went straight to St. John's. I got there a little early, so I figured I'd take the time to review my notes in preparation. But there was one slight hitch to that plan.
I forgot my notebook at home.
Feeling the panic rise, I did what came naturally. I cried. OK, not really. What I did do was get on Twitter and tweeted about my nervousness. The response was immediate and overwhelming. Despite the fact that they couldn't be there in body, my #wiunion family was with me in spirit.
I took that strength and went in.
I met Tony and my co-panelists. Tony then went over the format again. He said that after Professor Fallone gave his introduction, Mr. Bass and I would each have five minutes to speak towards our cause and then we would go to the questions.
Mentally, I started screaming. A speech?! A bleeping SPEECH?!?! No one told me about a speech! First I forgot my notes and now I had to ad lib a speech?! Well, wasn't that great?
I then remembered having written a post about the
five reasons to recall Walker. I tried to remember all of the reasons and try to figure a way to put in a shortened version.
The crowd came in. There was about 50 people there, almost all of them residents of St. John's. They were a charming group of kind senior citizens with a reputation of being very active in their community and having a consistently high turn out in the polls. But Tony had advised us that, like the rest of the state, this was a community divided, with very strong feelings on both sides of the issue.
My nervousness was starting to climb again.
As it turned out, Professor Fallone was a life saver without meaning to be.
In his introduction to recalls, he gave a brief history on how the recall process was introduced into the state constitution. He said that at the time this law was being written and made part of our heritage, the people were outraged. He told the group that the people felt that the businesses were having too much influence on the government. The people felt that the politicians were being controlled by these businesses and that they were no longer paying heed to the citizenry.
Gee, now who does that sound like?
I won't bore the reader with a blow by blow account of the discussion, but I do want to give you some of the highlights.
My question to Professor Fallone dealt with all of the money that Walker was collecting, purportedly for the use of defending himself against the recall (
but got the taxpayers to pay for). As I had surmised, Walker gets to keep collecting unlimited amounts until a recall date has been set, which explains why he is
pulling all these stalling tactics. (On a side note, I called it - the
teahadists are going to sue to prolong the process. I guess
legal defense attorneys don't come cheap.)
My question to Mr. Bass was to explain why it was OK for Walker to come into the Milwaukee County Executive position on a single-issue recall and to
call for Doyle's ouster in 2006 for supposed corruption by his administration but it was wrong to recall Walker under the same offenses. He dodged answering that one.
Mr. Boss' question for me was whether there would be the protests or the recall if the unions had not been harmed. My answer was an unequivocal yes. I pointed out that many of the protesters and recallers were non-union, private sector workers. I added that it was people from all walks of life that were at the Capitol for months on end and it was this same wide sampling of Wisconsinites that braved this winter to collect the nearly two million signatures to trigger this round of recalls. I added that as far as I was aware, there were no public sector unions that consisted of senior citizens, or of children, or of housewives, parents and/or grandparents.
I think that the most moving and inspiring part of the night is that each and every question was directed to Mr. Bass and challenged him on the current state of affairs. That told me that everyone was seeing through the standard talking points offered by Mr. Bass and by WISGOP as a whole.
Mr. Bass took an interesting approach by stating that he's not there to defend Scott Walker and that Scott Walker could defend himself. The other thing that I noted was that during the question and answer time with the audience, he often deflected the question to me to answer first. It was as if he was more comfortable reacting and attacking my points rather than to try to defend or even endorse Scott Walker's actions.
I would say that I scored one of the biggest points of the evening when I, in response to a question about the mining bill, pointed out that it was the mining company that had written the bill and tied that into what Professor Fallone had taught us about the origin of the recall procedure in Wisconsin. Another big point, judging from the reaction of the audience, was when I pointed out Walker's ever-present hypocrisy and made a comment to the effect of, "In Scott Walker's world, every day is
Opposite Day."
After the event, Tony invited us all up to his apartment for a nightcap and a riveting conversation.
I would like to thank Tony and the others at St. John's on the Lake for a lovely evening and a warm reception. I also thank them for the bottomless coffee cup. I think I will by making more use of that than I'd care to admit.
I would also like to thank Professor Fallone and Mr. Bass for a lively discussion and making the nice a success.
I would most like to thank my brothers and sisters of #wiunion, who gave me support and cheered me on, and gave me their strength to successfully meet this challenge. If I were to name each one, it would double the length of this article. But at the risk of alienating all of the others, there is one person I'd like to thank for the strength lent to me and the inspiration to be as good as I could be:
Thank you, Diane.