If you've been following my blog for the past several years, you probably noticed that I was not blogging much or engaging in social discussion about Wisconsin political candidates or the election in general for the two months leading up to Tuesday.
I didn't write much because what I saw and understood were some very disturbing trends running hard against several key democratic candidates. What I saw in Wisconsin was a near duplicate replay of the last several election cycles that began in 2010.
For starters, I saw Russ Feingold's polling margin shrink from 11% to 9% to 7% to 5% to plus one or two points, to too close to call to eventually losing by three. I saw statement after statement on social media and ad after ad from the Johnson campaign against Feingold go either unanswered or with the wrong response. I saw messaging and ads from the Feingold campaign that, to me, with six years to prepare, were either off-topic from the issues, unexciting or just too soft for today's political climate.
In a nutshell, I saw a very good candidate and person in Russ Feingold much like Tom Barrett and Mary Burke - and with the same weak campaign. And, I couldn't write about my observations without doing potential damage to his campaign or giving away strategies. So there's that.
But one passage in Feingold's concession speech addresses a small part of what I saw in his campaign and a few others. It's an admission that unfortunately comes a little too late ...
Feingold Concession Speech Excerpt: "I really wanted to get this done. But obviously there's something happening in this country, tonight ...I don't understand it completely. I don't think anybody does."
Sorry, but there are some who understand it completely. I'll leave it at that.
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