Many recalls, too much democracy

Happened to watch the election returns from Wisconsin on MSNBC Tuesday night, and if you're honest, you know it was a rough night for progressives. It started to be noticeable on Monday when Ed Schultz (or "Big Eddy" as he likes to call himself), started to have a haunted look. He was out there in Madison surrounded by Union types who would cheer, or boo, or moo on cue, but despite his bluster, you just knew things weren't shaping up the way he'd hoped.

Ed kept going on about how the evil Republicans had poured in all this money, but the recall forces had the enthusiasm and the ground game.

Eddie may have trouble differentiating between enthusiasm and desperation. What he didn't explain is that after all the sound and fury of the recall effort, his team actually lost ground in each of the six special elections this week..

The numbers are still a little hazy, but it appears that the two sides spent around $35 million on the recall, all in an effort to punish Republican State Senators who voted for the Budget Repair Bill Governor Walker introduced in February. This controversial legislation was crafted to cure a $3.6 state billion deficit, and required state employees to contribute 12.6% of the cost of their health insurance premiums and pay 5.8% of their salary into the Wisconsin Retirement System, ending the free ride they'd enjoyed previously. The other two most significant impacts were to limit collective bargaining rights for most public employees and to prohibit employers from collecting union dues.

The result was a political tantrum unlike anything seen in years. For weeks, protests in Madison the state capital dominated cable news shows with their distinct lack of civility. All 14 Democrat Senators fled the state to try to prevent a vote, demonstrators mobbed and camped out at and in the Capital building, Republican lawmakers were stalked at their homes, and local businesses were threatened if they did not join the effort to foil the Governor's legislation.

Though Walker might have moved too aggressively on the collective bargaining issue, most of his package was the kind of fiscal castor oil that states and the federal government will need to get their balance sheets in order. If incumbents in Wisconsin and elsewhere fear immediate retaliation that could cost them their jobs, it will make them even less likely to cut deals and make difficult choices.

Equally troubling is that the Wisconsin recalls have turned into magnets for shocking amounts of special interest money, sluiced into the state by conservative groups and pro-union organizations that see the recalls as an existential battleground. Estimates are that third-party groups have spent as much as $40 million on the nine recall elections, which would more than double the amount spent on all 116 of the state's legislative elections last fall.

Beyond Wisconsin, recall rage remains limited, in part because just 19 states allow recalls elof governors and state legislators. One is California, where voters recalled unpopular Democratic Gov. Gray Davis in 2003 and replaced him with Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger, a switch that did little to solve the state's deep fiscal and political woes.

At the local level, where at least 29 states allow recalls, Governing.com says 57 mayors faced recall attempts in 2010, more than double the 23 the year before. In some places, recalls seem like political sport: Voters in Johnstown, Colo., tried to oust the mayor in part for his plan to switch from diagonal parking to parallel parking. But they're a sport states would be wise to limit. In an era of growing deficits and dwindling resources, the problems are far too serious to be left to endless second-guessing and permanent campaigns.