I was not "of age" when Joe McCarthy had his way with the Wisconsin electorate, but I did have some contact with people who were still anxious about the possibility of specious denouncement of their politics - a gullible electorate had apparently seen communists under every rock in the state and were comfortable with career assassinations and other mean-spirited antics by extreme right-wing movers and shakers. The John Birch Society had its roots in our polity and I learned a good deal about brazen ruthlessness during my time working as a Republican staffer in the Wisconsin Senate in the mid-1960s.
Whatever the thumps and bumps of the antiwar movement, the state still sported senators Nelson and Proxmire while moderate and traditional Republicans ruled the roost in the governor's office and the legislature writ large.
Notions that the Wisconsin Supreme Court could be decimated, long-standing state agencies subverted, the academic environment in the state crippled by the power of the purse, the renewed use police power once again used to crush union activity, the voting process itself challenged by partisan corrupt practices, and the state's various treasures sent to line private corporate pockets ... well, we are known by the company we keep and the Wisconsin electorate has been thoroughly bamboozled and effectively disenfranchised by clever mountebanks who have certainly done their homework and who would do European-style fascism proud.
One can be thankful that Governor Walker has been sent to the national showers and one can also hope that determined prosecutions can bring Wisconsin back to the ideals of American democracy so abused and disregarded by this bumbling fool and his craven associates. Senator McCarthy was a "burn me once" episode IMHO and this latest crop of ne'er-do-wells are surely emblematic of a "burn me twice" dalliance with dark forces moving about in our national life.
The shabby atmosphere in the US House of Representatives will continue to be a national disgrace until and unless local electorates look past the agit-prop in their political diets and help established figures like Congressman Paul Ryan come to their senses. Re-electing Russ Feingold to the United States Senate is another good idea and last but not least, sending the Walker crew to their just penal desserts would certainly help clear the air in the upper midwest region of this country.