Getting it right: Walker withdrawal foretold

It's times like this, with Scott Walker's withdrawal from the race, that sends pundits to search their files to see how right or wrong they may have been in what they have written about the race.

There are no doubt plenty of embarrassing pieces making the case for Walker, how he would beat Mark Green, and why he was the stronger candidate. We won't try to dig them all up, tempting as it might be.

But, on the other hand, credit is due to my friend and sometimes Xoff Files blogger Jim Rowen, who first wrote on June 13, 2005:

The need for self-preservation and strong legacies are usually just as strong as ambition in the politician's mentality: Walker should think long and hard about the implications of a primary loss to Green, which would leave Walker weakened as he tries to solve the county's substantial difficulties.

A better plan is the strategic, early end to his campaign. There'd be no shame in it, and only smart politics.

Walker's stepping aside would spare Republican voters the need to choose among two almost identical right-wing opponents, open the way to a simplified partisan and ideological choice between Doyle and Green, and give Milwaukee County taxpayers what they really need and are paying for:

The full-time attention of a full-time county executive.

Rowen revisited the topic on Jan. 9, 2006 with this Capital Times column:

Walker Would Be Wise To Step Aside In Favor Of Rep. Green

By James Rowen

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel carried a long piece the day after Christmas that surely struck the Wauwatosa home of 2006 gubernatorial hopeful Scott Walker like a meteor-sized lump of coal.

The Journal Sentinel's David Umhoefer wrote that some GOP insiders were suggesting that Walker, the Milwaukee County executive, step aside in favor of the apparent front-runner, Green Bay Congressman Mark Green.

Walker responded that he had no such intention, had already raised $1 million, and was modeling his underdog campaign on Lee Sherman Dreyfus' upstart, upset 1978 GOP primary win.

Give credit to Walker for quick thinking and an active imagination -- but his campaign and Dreyfus' have little in common.


Dreyfus was a wily outsider who parlayed his teaching and communications skills into a charming, grass-roots crusade.
Walker, by contrast, is the consummate partisan insider, a career politico who began as a state assemblyman and has become the darling of Milwaukee's right-wing talk radio hosts.

It was Walker's talk radio allies, ironically, who ripped the 79-year-old Dreyfus on the air last year, mocking the former governor as "King of the RINO's" (Republican in Name Only) for opposing one of their fashionable ideological touchstones: the knee-jerk tax freeze.

And let's not forget that Dreyfus was a university professor and administrator, while Walker left Marquette University before graduating.

Though he skillfully rode a local taxpayers' revolt into the Milwaukee county executive's office, Walker, at age 38, has little of the broad and moderating experience that helped Dreyfus seize the public's imagination, win the 1978 GOP primary and ultimately defeat the incumbent, Gov. Martin Schreiber.

Walker's essential dilemma in the primary race against Green is this: They share the same, right-of-center Republican base.

It would be different if Walker were to the right of Green, or to his left, or had some special blend of history or achievements -- something ... anything -- to differentiate him in a meaningful way from the Green Bay congressman.

But that is not the case. Rather, Walker's campaign rests on political projections: Walker believes he can outpoll Green in ultra-Republican Waukesha County (more likely it will be a roughly even split), and pull in more Republicans in Milwaukee and its suburbs than Green (though it's probably true that Green will clobber him in the Fox Valley and in most of Wisconsin's Republican smaller cities, villages and towns).

Furthermore, Walker holds an office -- county executive -- that is a curiosity in Wisconsin. Only10 Wisconsin counties have elected county execs, putting Walker further outside the political mainstream statewide.

Let's face it: Member of Congress is an impressive title. It's an office most voters understand.

Milwaukee County is an enviable base from which to campaign for county executive, not governor. And the more that Walker runs to Milwaukee, the more outstate voters will run the other way, because no matter how unfair, there is anti-Milwaukee bias in the statewide electorate.

Barring a political earthquake, Walker's "from-Milwaukee" baggage will help Green win the GOP primary victory next fall.

Which brings me back to Walker, and why he should be watching the trial balloons some Republican veterans were floating in the Umhoefer/Journal Sentinel piece: strategic withdrawal.

* Last June, I wrote an analysis of the Walker campaign for WisPolitics.com and argued that Walker would and should abandon his foundering race.

At the time, I wrote:

"Walker made no secret of wanting to use the county executive's office as a platform to seek the governorship, but that may have looked more achievable in 2002 as a long-range plan than it does in the short run today.

"The need for self-preservation and strong legacies are usually just as strong as ambition in the politician's mentality: Walker should think long and hard about the implications of a primary loss to Green, which would leave Walker weakened as he tries to solve the county's substantial difficulties.

"A better plan is the strategic, early end to his campaign. There'd be no shame in it, and only smart politics.

"Walker's stepping aside would spare Republican voters the need to choose among two almost identical right-wing opponents, open the way to a simplified partisan and ideological choice between Doyle and Green, and give Milwaukee County taxpayers what they really need and are paying for:

"The full-time attention of a full-time county executive."

Which makes him look like a very smart man today.