The Debate

Last night I caught the debate between Tom Barrett and Scott Walker. I thought Barrett came across as nasty, bitter and hysterical. He was clearly trying to get under Walker's skin with his repetition of lame, t.v. commercial talking points: "You started this civil war" and "You want to divide and conquer" blah blah blah. He made a total fool of himself with his nagging petulance and empty, emotive attacks. He never addressed his disastrous, feckless term as Mayor of Milwaukee, which has seen unemployment, crime and taxes rise. Walker, for his part, was unflappably cool, rattling off numbers and statistics that bolstered his case for reelection. He referred to Barrett simply as "my opponent" and hardly looked at the man. A high point was when he was offered the opportunity to ask Barrett a question of his own. He cooly turned down the offer, as though a waste of his and our time, while Barrett embarrassingly countered with something like, "Great, I'll take twice as long for my question." How egotistical and childish. His "question" then turned into an unending broadside against Walker. Barrett embodies the kind of angry, bitter, and catty qualities that have permanently latched onto the left in Wisconsin. They never seem happy, always surly, always gloomy.

A revealing moment in the debate came with a question on gay "marriage." Predictably, Barrett, the deviant Catholic, said he supports it, while Walker said he will uphold the state constitution, which defines marriage as between one man and one woman. I am very curious as to what the Archdiocese of Milwaukee will do about Barrett's statement. Barrett is an arch-liberal who flouts the Church's teaching at every turn, and he regularly gets away with it. It's easy to fire arrows at the federal government, way out in DC, regarding Obamacare's odious mandate, but sadly, the in-house affairs close to home often get overlooked.