Everyone can stop with the manufactured outrage that Mary Burke's job plan was basically copied from platforms put forth by other Democratic candidates across the country in the past. Was anyone really expecting new ideas from a politician in this day and age? And was there anyone who thought that Mary Burke spent a couple of days hammering out a thirty-plus page document on Macro-economics? Here's what most likely happened:
A group of Burke campaign and Democratic party staffers were probably on a conference call one day when someone said "If we're going to attack Scott Walker on job creation, we should probably have a jobs plan of our own." To which someone else replied, "Great idea, but all of us have only ever worked in the public sector, so how do you actually create jobs?" And then someone else said "Like we've always proposed: with lots of new government programs and spending." And then somebody said "Well, we should probably promise more money for education so that the teachers unions and the college faculty get on board with it." And then another person said, "And we should propose a bunch of street and bridge projects so the public works unions support it." And someone else said, "Don't forget renewable energy projects so the environmental groups get all excited." And then somebody suggested, "And let's talk about providing a bunch of grants for urban renewal so the black leaders think they are getting something too!"
After a few minutes of backslapping and self-congratulating on what a great jobs plan they had just developed, somebody had to ask "Okay, so who's going to write this all up?" To which one of the Democratic Party folks said, "Don't worry, I know this guy--Eric Schnurer--who has written a bunch of jobs plans for other candidates around the country. He can just substitute "Wisconsin" for the names of the other state's plans and we'll be good to go."
So Mr Schnurer cuts and pastes the "Mary Burke Invest for Sucess" plan together and emails it back to the Campaign folks--who give in the cursory once over and release it to the press. Mr. Schnurer even provides a talking points summary page for the candidate to memorize and it's time to go out and give speeches about how "I have developed a plan to create jobs." It's all as original as "I plan to fix the state's problems by raising taxes on the rich." When is someone going to be accused of plagiarism for that?
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Actually Jonathan,
ReplyDeleteSome of us had and original idea, reverse Gov. Walker needless cuts, $1.5 billion to 2.6 million Wisconsin school children, students, teachers and workers. This creates 21,000 jobs. Then invest in energy efficiency and save taxpayers $1.9 billion and create 11,000 jobs. Then take federal healthcare help for $1.9 billion and create 19,000 jobs. The sources for those are UW Economists, the Energy Center of WI, and the non-partisan Fiscal Bureau. That's a good start to getting out of the hole we are in and getting WI working again.