Beyond Parody: Post-Recall Protesters In Madison, Wisc.

The folks at the MacIver Institute took a camera to the State Capitol in Wisconsin the day after the Recall Election:

And these people wonder why they lost.

FILED UNDER: 2012 Election, US Politics, , , ,
Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. MBunge says:

    Libertarian intellectuals really don’t like democracy, do they? For all their talk about individualism and liberty, they viscerally recoil from the messiness such things inevitably involve and long for some sort enlightened authoritarianism.

    Mike

  2. People are free to live whatever lives they wish, MBunge, and express themselves however they wish.

    I am free to evaluate their behavior and determine whether or not it is likely to be viewed as reasonable and whether they are likely to persuade their fellow citizens to agree with them.

  3. Tsar Nicholas says:

    Not surprising. Leftism after all is a severe mental disorder.

  4. Jenos Idanian #13 says:

    @MBunge: “viscerally recoil?”

    Dude, I am reveling in this. I am laughing my ass off. I am eating this up with a spoon. I am unashamedly gloating over their loss.

    I deeply, passionately, almost physically love displays like this. Their tears are sweet, sweet nectar. Their lamentations profoundest music to my ears.

    However, there is an element of MSG in this.

    I want more.

  5. PD Shaw says:

    And these people wonder why they lost.

    The dude specifically said they didn’t lose, this is the beginning of a new phase of the winning. Quit trying to shape other people’s realities with your calling of elections; its not over, don’t leave, don’t leave . . . .

  6. James H says:

    The dude specifically said they didn’t lose, this is the beginning of a new phase of the winning.

    Did he also mention tiger’s blood?

  7. rodney dill says:

    Sheen said it best, “Duh! Winning.”

  8. @Doug Mataconis: Mike isn’t criticizing your freedom to “evaluate” and “determine” “fellow citizens.” Just that your evaluations are smug and reductive.

  9. @James:

    Just that your evaluations are smug and reductive.

    “Smug” and “reductive” being another way of saying he disagrees with them.

  10. @Doug Mataconis: Maybe. That’s not really material. You’re being smug and reductive, which aren’t qualities I appreciate, even if I agree with the point.

  11. Jenos Idanian #13 says:

    @James: I think Doug and I agree on one point: if they’re going to be such bad losers, we intend to be bad winners.

  12. James H says:

    @rodney dill:

    I beat you to the joke by a full half-hour.

  13. Ken says:

    These harsh criticisms of Doug are completely fair and right.

    Doug unfairly minimizes and belittles how that brave activist lady stood up against not just one CNN chartered bus driver, but against drivers of buses charted by big corporate media everywhere.

  14. Dustin says:

    @Jenos Idanian #13: Right, because conservative bad behavior is only ever on display as a response to liberal bad behavior. If it weren’t for liberals, conservatives would show us all how much better people they really are.

  15. al-Ameda says:

    @Tsar Nicholas:

    Not surprising. Leftism after all is a severe mental disorder.

    Interesting, there’s a kind of symmetry with the observation that Rightism is a severe rectal disorder.

  16. Jeremy says:

    @MBunge:

    Oh jesus. You go on about democracy, but apparently, you missed the part where democracy actually happened, and you lost. Get over it.

    Liberals love democracy, all right. Right up until it delivers results they don’t like.

  17. Jeremy says:

    @al-Ameda:

    Leftism as a mental disorder, rightism as a rectal disorder? I buy that.

  18. al-Ameda says:

    @Jeremy:

    Liberals love democracy, all right. Right up until it delivers results they don’t like.

    Oh please, the hypocrisy of conservatives on this …

    Conservatives are no different. Republicans never accepted Bill Clinton as legitimately elected so they spent 8 years trying to remove him from office by any means necessary – the House impeached him and could not get the sane Senate to convict him.

    More recently, as soon as Obama was elected the Birther Movement burgeoned and a majority of Republicans believed the allegation that Obama was not born in this country. They wanted Obama tossed out.

  19. Jenos Idanian #13 says:

    @al-Ameda: Just so we’re clear: you lost, right?

  20. @MBunge:

    Sheese. Someone ate their Cranky-O’s this morning.

  21. rodney dill says:

    @Jeremy:

    rightism as a rectal disorder?

    Yea, the leftists are a pain in their ass.

  22. al-Ameda says:

    @Jenos Idanian #13:

    @al-Ameda: Just so we’re clear: you lost, right?

    Yes, Tom Barrett lost, who is disputing that?

  23. Bleev K says:

    @Jenos Idanian #13: On every article about Sarah Palin, there’s at least one message from you where you’re acting like these idiots on film. Don’t forget: “we’re them, they’re us.”

  24. mattb says:

    @Jenos Idanian #13:

    Just so we’re clear: you lost, right?

    Seems to me that Obama winning in 2008 never stopped you or a lot of folks on the right from complaining about lack of vetting and all of the other “problems” with the election.

    That said, it’s always the right of the winner to gloat and the right of the loser to play a victim (or “but, what about” card).

  25. Liberals LOL says:

    LOL @ the loony liberals

    LOL

  26. @Jenos Idanian #13: Oh, I know Jenos. I know.

  27. al-Ameda says:

    @Liberals LOL:

    LOL @ the loony liberals
    LOL

    LOL at the loony conservatives:
    “I will tell you that I had a mother last night come up to me here in Tampa, Florida, after the debate. She told me that her little daughter took that vaccine, that injection, and she suffered from mental retardation thereafter.” –Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), on the HPV vaccine, Fox News interview, Sept. 12, 2011

  28. Ken says:

    Now, al-Ameda. It’s a well-known fact that Republicans are granted power to diagnose maladies upon taking office. Bachmann’s only a Representative, so her power is limited. Senators can diagnose whether or not someone is in a persistent vegetative state just by watching a videotape.

  29. Tillman says:

    What’s the parody? The post, the video, or the resulting thread? Jesus, aren’t we always lamenting how American politics is turning into a team sport?

    @Doug: You constantly go on about people bringing up stupid shit in politics. What’s your answer to this fresh hell of yours? This furthered the dialogue about our country’s recovery…how, exactly?

    In closing, what is wrong with you people?

  30. Jenos Idanian #13 says:

    @Tillman: Lighten up, Francis.

  31. G.A. says:

    More recently, as soon as Obama was elected the Birther Movement burgeoned and a majority of Republicans believed the allegation that Obama was not born in this country. They wanted Obama tossed out.

    I don’t care where he was born but I know for a fact he was raised and groomed by communists to be their puppet.

    And he is a card carrying socialist and union thug to boot.

    And a Bear fan.

    I am starting to feel sorry for him the more I learn:( He is so messed up…

    I am beginning to see that it is not his fault…..

    lol…..

  32. G.A. says:

    Sheen said it best, “Duh! Winning.”

    lol I like “Duh! Not losing.” Better….

  33. al-Ameda says:

    @G.A.:
    I don’t care where he was born but I know for a fact he was raised and groomed by communists to be their puppet.

    And he is a card carrying socialist and union thug to boot.
    And a Bear fan.
    I am starting to feel sorry for him the more I learn:( He is so messed up…
    I am beginning to see that it is not his fault…..
    lol…..

    After Obama is re-elected how soon do you think it will be before the Republican House initiates the expected impeachment impeachment proceedings?

  34. Jenos Idanian #13 says:

    @al-Ameda: It turns out that Obama actively sought out and joined the socialist “New Party” in Chicago back in the 90s. And since he’s always denied it (it took the release of New Party record minutes to document it), there’s no record of him ever resigning his membership.

    This doesn’t make him a socialist, of course. My own hunch is that the membership was very much like his membership in Jeremiah Wright’s church — not based on sincere beliefs, but simple political opportunism. He saw the New Party as a way to get an advantage, so he signed up. Then, later, when they’d done all they could for him, he threw them under the bus.

  35. G.A. says:

    After Obama is re-elected how soon do you think it will be before the Republican House initiates the expected impeachment impeachment proceedings?

    lol dude he was toast when he came out for gay marriage for sure, but it still would have been another tsunami regardless. I am also of a mind not to really blame him for all the crap that I told you guys would be exposed one day or another. I truly am felling kinda bad for him.It is looking to be so much more then i could have imagined.

    Jenos, he is a puppet a collage kid puppet….all that other stuff are his background, he is not as smart or as ruthless as our friends here purport.

    I like to give him labels to irritate our friends.They know this but can’t help themselves from attack with the programed responses, mostly.once in a great while i get a intelligent or humorous response.

    Most of these neo Marxist and new Fabians and the other mixes of evolutionary political/religions have no idea that they are or what they are.

    He is a jumble of lib worldview evolution and is more used then a user but not by to much.Imagine me with the right upbringing and a teleprompter, um wait, I would have figured out what was going on…But i am an arrogant self absorbed attention junkie. But unlike him I have learned to fight against my self centeredness and delusions of grander with the help of God and rehab, and can reason with myself and others when I fell like it.

  36. al-Ameda says:

    @Jenos Idanian #13:
    He’s governed as a Liberal Republican, are they socialists?

  37. Jenos Idanian #13 says:

    @al-Ameda Let me repeat and expand:

    He’s not a socialist, they were suckers.

    And as “he’s governed as a Liberal Republican,” please. His policies have occasionally fallen that way, but over his staunch protests.

  38. matt says:

    I would love for a real socialist to be elected president just to see your wignut heads explode across the internet.. Hell at this point just a solid left wing president would do the job..

  39. Jenos Idanian #13 says:

    @matt: Conversely, considering the total pants-wetting hysteria your side had over a quasi-right-winger like Bush II, I can only imagine what would happen if we had a full-blown conservative — or, even, a true libertarian — in the White House.

    The leftist exploding heads would put every single 4th of July celebration to shame.

  40. matt says:

    @Jenos Idanian #13: Based on history it’s pretty obvious that there would never be a “true” conservative in office…