[img_assist|nid=140577|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=95|height=135]You don't even have to read past the headlines to realize just how warped Republican politics are in Wisconsin these days. Here are three examples you could see on TV newscasts and news media web sites this Valentine's Day evening. Just feel the love:
1. "Citing budget cuts, sheriff to limit security for Obama's visit" -- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel headline.
Fake Democrat David Clarke, the Republican friendly, right-wing sheriff of Milwaukee County, is using a budget dispute with the county executive as an excuse not to fully protect the president of the United States when he appears in Milwaukee on Wednesday. Unprecedented, and reckless.
2. "Wisconsin governor to join Obama for visit to Milwaukee firm" -- Chicago Tribune headline.
Yes, Scott Walker makes national headlines by announcing he's going to greet the arriving president, whom, as we noted, is arriving in our state without sufficient local security. Maybe when Sheriff Clarke realizes his political buddy is attending, he'll change his mind and beef up protection.
This, of course, would be the same Scott Walker who has been working overtime criticizing Obama; the same Walker who, the Tribune reported, has been telling supporters a victory for him in a recall election would be a "devastating blow" against Obama's re-election. As Walker has often noted, the president believes collective bargaining between workers and managers is a good thing. Horrors! But Obama's poll numbers also are way up, so it's time to pose for holy pictures, apparently.
Walker is planning to hang out with his political object of scorn when the president speaks at Milwaukee's Master Lock Co. to celebrate the return of once-offshored jobs. Walker presumably hopes to bask in the glow of a positive job creation development that Walker and his pals say has nothing to do with an improving economy -- which doesn't exist except of course when Walker claims credit for its existence.
Stay tuned to see if, after he tries to shake hands with Obama at Milwaukee Mitchell Airport, Walker wags his finger in the president's face and lectures him, like that other outrageous Republican governor did a little while back in Arizona. Republicans these days are big on having your cake and eating it, too.
3. "Senate will return after midnight to give final approval to wetlands bill" -- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel headline.
As if the hugely deregulatory mining bill wasn't bad enough, Wisconsin GOP legislative leaders decided to ram yet another awful, anti-environment, special-interest bill through to passage in secretive, blitzkrieg fashion after paying only lip service to the need for discussions with sportsmen and others concerned about our state's waters and wildlife. Ho hum. Bidness as usual.
And there, dear readers, is your Wisconsin Day in Republican Crazy for Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2012. Another day of crazy begins Wednesday. Can we ever hope to keep up?