Indeed, a quick check at 10 a.m. today didn’t show any headlines about the Wisconsin Republican power grab either on the front page of the digital Washington Post or the Wall Street Journal.
The front page of the New York Times did have this piece way down at its digital bottom, “Are Rural Voters the ‘Real’ Voters? Wisconsin Republicans Seem to Think So.” The argument the Republicans are making is that a Democratic governor does not represent the true will of the entire state, just the will of the city “mobs” who don’t work.
The Wisconsin legislature, on the other hand, represents the will of the those who work with their hands and do not accept government handouts; i.e., the rural whites. The mostly white Republican Wisconsin legislature then feels justified in limiting the power of the just elected Democratic governor. Why? Because he doesn’t represent these rural whites, the only true and worthy citizens of Wisconsin.
“In much of Wisconsin, “Madison and Milwaukee” are code words (to some, dog whistles) for the parts of the state that are nonwhite, elite, different: The cities are where people don’t have to work hard with their hands, because they’re collecting welfare or public-sector paychecks.
That stereotype updates a very old idea in American politics, one pervading Wisconsin’s bitter Statehouse fights today and increasingly those in other states: Urban voters are an exception. If you discount them, you get a truer picture of the politics — and the will of voters — in a state.”
Regarding Krugman’s remark about Hungary, Matt O’Brien wrote in April about Hungary:
“At this point, Hungary might be best described as a dictocracy: a de facto one-party state where others are allowed to compete in elections only on such unequal terms that they basically have no chance of winning.”
But Democrat Tony Evers did win the governorship. Thing is, in one-party (and that party being the Republican party led by Republican legislators) Wisconsin, his win is not acceptable. Therefore the Republican legislature representing white Wisconsin feel that they must curtail the power of Governor-Elect Evers to represent the rest of and all of Wisconsin.