October 16, 2004

Milwaukee Gets Its Ballot Request

Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker agreed to print up 938,000 ballots. Any unused ballots will be returned to the county so all ballots are accounted for.

Let's put this large number of ballots into perspective. In September, 382,000 people registered to vote. The population of Milwaukee is just under 600,000. A request of 938,000 ballots assumes every registered voter will need 2.45 ballots. Let's assume GOTV brings out 100,000 new voters who will register at the polls. Then each voter would need 1.94 ballots. Does the city think its voters are idiots who can't figure out how to cast a ballot? Milwaukee doesn't use the infamous butterfly ballot, and with recent investigations into voter registration fraud such a large request understandibly raised Scott Walker's eyebrows.

Gov. Jim Doyle stuck his nose in this local spat. He called for the state election commission to investigate. He then went over the top when he said, "I've personally never seen or heard anything like this in all of the years that I have been in politics, that anybody is somehow suggesting that we shouldn't have enough ballots for people." This was smart politics by Doyle because in two years he'll face re-election. His opponent probably will be none other than Scott Walker. This was Doyle's first shot in the 2006 governor's race.

Then we have John Kerry continuing his habit of demogoging every issue to scare his base and tar Republicans. He told the Journal Sentinel,

What is this notion that the printing of a ballot is going to be an entitlement to fraud? That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.

It's their job to make sure the right people are voting and the right number of ballots are there. I find that these excuses around the country are nothing more than the denial of constitutional rights, the most fundamental constitutional right there is.

"County Agrees to Print Ballots Requested by City"