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Articles by David Blaska
Hey, Democrats! What’s the big idea?
The Capital Times Idea Fest kicks off next Monday. This weeklong program is not a robust contest of ideas like Bill Buckley once hosted on his televised Firing Line. More like a Members Only, progressive treehouse. No-Girlz-Allowed! Secret password required. Heresies will be condemned, orthodoxes confirmed, slogans recited, pronouns observed. Idea Fest features a line-up of the Democrat party’s made men, like governors Tim Walz, J.B. Pritzker, and Tony Evers.
We need more guns in schools & churches
The signs aren’t working, people! The ones that prohibit firearms. Crazy people intent on death — others and their own — don’t obey no stinkin’ signs. We’ve been saying that for years.
Is Justice Bradley the canary in the coal mine?
Is Micah Parsons the second coming of Reggie White? Creating almost as many shockwaves as the Packers signing the mega-millions edge rusher away from the Cowboys is the retirement announced Friday 08-29-25 on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Conservative jurist Rebecca Bradley will not seek another term — a gut punch to Republicans. Her fundraising might have been a clue — she had done none.
Shooting children as young as 6 years of age praying in their church at the start of a school day is about as depraved as it gets. The shooter was someone who “transitioned” from male to female. 23-year-old Robin Westman could not have been in his/her/whatever right mind. Got to be crazy to do something so hateful. Maybe he was crazy before he became a she. Maybe the other way around. A subject for further study. Maybe Bobby Kennedy Jr. will trace it back to the recombinant Covid 19 vaccine.
John Bolton is a traitor only to Donald Trump, politically
MAGA world is delighted that the Federal Bureau of Investigation raided the home and offices of John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser. Commentary critical of Donald Trump is treason enough for the totalitarians. Under the banner of the local county Republican party comes this Orwellian truth/speak: The John Bolton raid isn’t random — it’s about his long-running spree of stealing & leaking classified information, a pattern he’s gotten away with for years.
Donald Trump puts out fly paper and Democrats belly flop right onto it. Every time! The President takes over law enforcement in the District of Columbia, a wholly owned subsidiary of the federal government. (It’s right there in the Constitution.) Our progressive … acquaintances respond by ululating the specter of jack boots on cobblestones, broken glass, and Deutschland Krankenwagen Sirenes.
Pooping and popping at Madison’s Social Justice Center
Madison’s woke progressives invoke “economic justice, social justice,” and “racial justice” as phonetic talismans to justify redistribution, disorder, and race-shaming. Should surprise no one that our beloved city has a locus for this political malpractice. The Social Justice Center is located at 1202 Williamson Street. Progressive Dane, Democratic Socialists, and the Tenant Resource Center are among the 14 “justice” agencies harbored there.
Skedaddling to Illinois!
Playing 9 at Glenway on this fine 5th of August. City course here in the middle of the near west side is guarded by wide swaths of coneflowers, rudbeckia and other prairie plantings. After the round, enjoy a tap brew from the patio overlooking the ninth green. May score some corn again today from the Stoneman farm on S. Syene Road in Fitchburg. Corn is always young and fresh.
Listening session protests well organized
It’s catnip for MSNBC and its ilk— the urban myth that The People are rising up spontaneously, like mushrooms after a heavy rain, to protest at back-home listening sessions the threat to democracy represented by elected Republican congressmen. The peanut gallery at Blaska Policy Werkes is not that gullible.
Who will milk our cows?
Does anyone outside the MAGA cult believe that all illegal immigrants are — in the President’s own words — “killers, rapists, and drug dealers”? We stipulate: if you did not immigrate to the U.S. through proper channels, then you are (perforce) illegal. To the extent that immigration law went unenforced under previous presidents, America put out a de facto welcome mat. The door was open.
UW-Eau Claire suspended a professor for flipping over a lit table the College Republicans set up on election day in April. Must sit out a whole year, without pay. Won’t be promoted to full professor. The perp, José Felipe Alvergue, chaired its English department! In a sense, the prof fell victim to progressive entitlement syndrome. We know of no conservative professors flipping over Planned Parenthood or Young Socialists lit tables.
Why are people fleeing Gov. Pritzker’s state?
The Capital Times has landed a truly big fish to speak at its annual Cap Times Idea Fest on 09-13-25: J.B. Pritzker! The Illinois governor will “bring the fire,” publisher Paul Fanlund gushes. Maybe Gov. Pritzker can light up a revival tent like Elmer Gantry. Missed his keynote speech to this year’s state Democratic convo. The larger question is, does the man have anything to say?
Finished reading over this Independence Day weekend a book that explores the meaning of patriotism: A Good American Family; The Red Scare and My Father. David Maraniss wrote his 12th book about his parents, especially his father Elliott, our own editor back in the day. A Good American Family is an easy read, sprinkled with familiar names, Madison WI references, and guest appearances by the likes of Arthur Miller, Gerald Ford, and John Wayne.
Something crazy this way comes
Try this theory on for size: Donald Trump has driven Democrats so crazy that the party of the coastal elite, still tethered to identity politics, has chosen to refine its political plutonium to weapons grade rather than use it for peace and meet middle America halfway. Instead of returning to the party of JFK and (oh, let’s say) Dick Gephardt (tribune of real working people), they’re doubling down with A.O.C., David Hogg, and now, for mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani.
Healthy soil, healthy folks?
Few personalities have been more consequential and just damned interesting than Jonathan Barry. Former Dane County executive, state legislator, UW Regent, deputy secretary at Workforce Development, business exec in the private sector, candidate for governor, and Democrat turned Republican. That’s only a partial list. Probably his most enduring claim to fame is helping found Madison’s farmers market 51 years ago, after he parked his farm produce truck on State Street and the City kept ticketing it.
It’s always Armageddon
It’s a Rorschach test, the shootings of those Minnesota state legislators and their spouses. Over-heated conspiracists are grasping at whatever straws they can find (some of them plastic) to prove that the killer was an unholy warrior against their version of truth and justice.
Madison’s anti-Trump rally may well be …
Just returned from the “No Kings” march down State Street to the Capitol in Madison WI today. Found a (bum-proof) city bench outside the Overture performing arts center. The fellow across the street had a better idea, observing the festivities from the open window wall of a whisky bar. (Madison really is great that way.) After an hour the anti-Trump marchers were still coming strong six blocks away from their rendezvous at the University of Wisconsin Library Mall.
Another insurrection - this one not pardoned
It’s Pavlovian, or something. What is it about Democrats that make them want to fly warp speed into the fly paper with the resolve of jihadists boring into the World Trade Center? Do progressives promise their own virgins? Los Angeles is burning again — this time over President Trump’s enforcement of immigration law. Yeah, Trump is a one-man synonym for “excess” but the progressive Left takes his bait every time.
Democrats stick with losing formula
An illegal alien turns a flame thrower on Jews in Boulder CO who were seeking the release of prisoners held by Palestinian terrorists. The same day, U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Hamas) and Gwen Moore (D-Milwaukee) attempted to pose for holy pictures with illegals held in the Dodge County jail for I.C.E. Denied their Sen. Van Hollen moment, we don’t know if the two Democrats consoled each other over margaritas afterward.
None dare call RoJo a RINO
Good news, Madison WI progressives. You can recharge your Teslas without being hectored by the Raging Grannies. Elon Musk has crossed swords with Donald Trump. Says his Big Beautiful (Budget) Bill is “a disgusting abomination.” Not a lot of nuance there. Bad News, MAGA cultists. Like Musk, Wisconsin’s most influential Republican has broken with Donald Trump on that budget bill. Unlike Musk, Sen. Ron Johnson has a vote. With the aid of his famous graphs and charts, Sen.
One of the guilty pleasures of the Trump regime is the suffering it causes Democrats, dues-paying or otherwise. They’re paying for their perfidy in propping up old Joe Biden as the only Democrat — sentient or otherwise — who could beat Trump, that existential threat to all that is holy and decent.
Judge Berz laid down the law
Dane County Circuit Judge Ellen Berz presided over the Khari Sanford trial a few years ago. That’s the kid who took the parents of his girlfriend out of their bed in their night clothes on a cold March night, drove them to the UW Arboretum in the same vehicle the parents had lent him, and shot each of them in the back of the head. Not exactly remorseful, Sanford tried to cash out their automatic teller accounts. That was five years ago.
Worse than Watergate!
What was Watergate all about, Alfie? Richard Nixon bugged Democrat headquarters to ferret out what his political opponents were up to in an election year. Seems almost noble, in light of the Joe Biden cover up. For four years, Joe Biden’s tight inner circle or “politburo,” as some call it, restricted access to and stage managed a stumbling, cognitively impaired cipher in order to trick voters into another term in the world’s most powerful office.
No black smoke at Republican convention
After a brief sanity break, returned to the convention floor south of Wausau to witness a miraculous sight: 500 Republicans shaking each others’ hands! Like in church! Doubt that this apparition qualifies as a miracle because we cannot attest whether election-denying Cultists shook hands with establishment Loyalists or whether Turning Point USA operatives clasped palms with each other.
Girding our loins for the WI Republican convention this weekend, we would be remiss if we did not take a good, healthy swig of 100-proof schadenfreude at the discord dividing Democrats. Our faith in human nature is gratified that even the party of Elizabeth Warren finds David Hogg insufferable. Democrats say they want to reconnect with people who carry a lunch pail to work but they elect the smug, know-it-all, whippersnapper as a national vice chairman.
WI GOP looking for someone to make the peace
We’ve been monitoring the rumblings among the deepening factions of the Wisconsin Republican party with morbid fascination. Yes, it is a party in transition — reinvigorated by the Tea Party 15 years ago, broadened by Trump 10 years ago. Republicans snatched working people from the party of FDR, we’re winning minorities, but we’re smarting from recent defeats. Got the issues on our side.
Republicans are battling for their soul
In our Boomer-addled imagination, the Wisconsin Republican convention opens May 16-17 outside of Wausau with a full screen, close-up of Bette Davis. As Margo Channing, she advises, “Fasten your seatbelts. It’s going to be a bumpy weekend.” The long knives are out. Names are being taken, scores settled, loins girded. Should be a fun time! JFK said it: Victory has a thousand fathers; defeat is an orphan. Not beating wimpy Tony Evers in 2022 hurt. Losing to Tammy Baldwin again in 2024 hurt like hell.
Is the Madison school shooter’s father guilty?
We don’t have an opinion on everything. It just seems that way. We’re pleased that the new Pope was raised in Chicago and educated in the U.S. but he is not “an American cardinal” as some have written. He is or was a cardinal archbishop in Peru. We do hope his selection jump starts a return to faith. Might even penetrate the Stately Manor.
Madison WI progressives are the ‘uniparty’
Questions we never expected to see askedin The Capital Times: “Progressives have full control of the city and its schools. Is it for the better?” Figures that it is a freelance journalist, not a CT staffer, posing the question — Marc Eisen, formerly editor of Isthmus. Mr. Eisen never really answers his own question, perhaps leaving it to the eye of the beholder. Isthmus, his old stand, wouldn’t touch it.
Fantasizing Gov. Tony Evers’ arrest
Tom Homan, Trump’s border czar, is not going to arrest the governor of Wisconsin. Not unless he finds Tren de Aragua laundering money in the governor’s washroom. Not if he wants to validate the Leftist paranoia that this democracy has become what we used to call the DNR — Damn Near Russia. Not if the Trump administration wants Wisconsin to vote cobalt blue for the next decade. This blogge is on record that Judge Hannah Dugan was rightly arrested.
Democrats are stuck on fly paper
The Head Groundskeeper is old enough to remember fly paper — a mainstay of every farm house in those days. Suspended from the light fixture over the kitchen table, a sticky strip of inch-wide paper buzzed with the desperate death struggle of the common housefly, inches above our daily bread. We thought of that background buzzing after the arrest of Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan, from all the usual suspects. Our progressive Democrat(ic) … acquaintances cannot help themselves.
WI Republican minority stuck in reverse
The Republican Party of Wisconsin is cracking down on anti-Vos election deniers and took a sideways slap at Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA, which is seen as attempting a hostile takeover. RPW announced an emergency change in bylaws Monday, coming after the fractious 8th Congressional District caucus in Green Bay April 5.
Our own worst enemy
The Wisconsin Republican party has been infected with a virus. It may yet prove to have originated in a change of function laboratory in Wuhan. More likely, it originated in Washington D.C. or Mar-a-Lago FL. The sickness expresses itself as a bad acid trip every time a Republican loses an election. It’s never our fault. We lose an election and the deniers fixate on some nefarious algorithm, duplicitous but unnamed election clerks, or that invincible puller of invisible strings, George Soros.
What’s it all about, Alfie?
At some point, the law of diminishing returns kicks in, we tell the good gummint goo goos who want to limit campaign spending, especially after the hundred million dollars spent on the recent and lamentable WI Supreme Court race. How many prematurely released pedophiles — beyond the wildest nightmares of the kookiest QAnon addict — can a campaign postulate before voters become anesthetized? It’s like images of grieving mothers out of Gaza — sorry, we get it, already.
Be like Brad
This is what it’s all about, kids. Brad Schimel is a mensch. He took his loss in this week’s WI Supreme Court race like a real man. No whining, no tinfoil-hat conspiracy mongering, no excuses, no dumfukkery. Where has that been these last five years? What a wonderful account in this morning’s Wisconsin State Journal.
Wasn’t even close, was it! Brad Schimel, hero of American youth, lost 55.0% to 45.0%, to a liberal Dane County judge, Susan Crawford! Ten percentage points is a landslide on any tote board. This pig has no lipstick. Ben Wikler and Rachel Maddow are popping corks. Anyone still think more Musk would have helped? More Trump? Wisconsin may be less purple than once thought.
Quit with the same old same old
Attention authors! News outlets are hungry for your prescriptions of what Democrats can do to emerge from the political wilderness. Use your imagination! The New York Times editorial board this Sunday says (here Blaska cuts to the chase) Democrats should quit reading the New York Times. [Democrats] should admit that their party mishandled Mr. Biden’s age. Leading Democrats insisted that he had mental acuity for a second term when most Americans believed otherwise.
Who is toughest on criminals?
Which WI state supreme court candidate imposes the toughest criminal sentences? It’s Brad Schimel, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.You didn’t seriously think it was the George Soros candidate, did you? The analysis found Schimel generally sentenced those convicted of felony sexual assault to more time behind bars than Crawford. But both candidates’ decisions closely followed the recommendations of prosecutors in their counties for all felony severity levels.
Audit all of the University of Wisconsin
The wine cellar at the Stately Manor was down to its last few bottles of screw-top plonk, necessitating a trip to HyVee supermarket for reinforcements. Right next door, a couple dozen (mostly) women of a certain age were chanting and waving signs at the Tesla charging station. Turns out these good Madison WI progressives condemn carbon and support electric vehicles but have turned against the man who popularized EVs, Elon Musk.
Democrats need to lighten up
We bribed the orderly to allow us to stay up late and watch The Trump Show starring Jim Carrey Tuesday night 03-04-25 on the Manor’s b&w Philco. Not since the shoot-out at the Oval Office last Friday have we enjoyed such political bread and circus! Tuesday’s State of Disunion address had it all! The Nielsen ratings aren’t in yet for the President’s Siegfried and Roy act but we’re guessing his numbers challenge the Oscar telecast.
We shall flag and fail
Reasonable people can disagree about America’s role in Ukraine — if you can hear them above the shrieking from the True Patriot psych ward. After Friday’s smackdown in the Oval Office, Volodymyr Zelensky is getting the same treatment that John McCain (“the traitor!”) got when the late senator disagreed with the Re-Maker of American Greatness. Did you know? The president of Ukraine was a porn star! A coke addict! That’s the chatter on MAGA social media.
Susan Crawford has 2 sheriffs
You may have seen that Susan Crawford campaign TV ad. Would help to know that the two sheriffs endorsing the liberal Dane County judge for state supreme court are, themselves, Democrats in good standing from right here in bright blue Dane County. Sheriff Kalvin Barrett is so P.C. that he insists the people locked up in the jail be called “residents,” not “inmates.” Regards I.C.E. as the enemy. As for former sheriff David Mahoney, he endorsed my opponent for school board in 2019, Ali Muldrow.
We will wait for the Good Gummint Goo-Goos to demand Wisconsin quit electing its supreme court justices— but no breath shall we hold! This year’s WI Supreme Court election is expected to blow past last year’s $56 million that elected Janet (spell it with me) Protasiewicz. Rain gear is advised for the merde that will be thrown through April 1. Our court races are more partisan than Tammany Hall.
Another gaggle of Madison progressives will self-medicate with a protest march and righteous fulmination at the Wisconsin State Capitol here in Madison next Monday noon 02-17-25. “Not My President’s Day” is ballyhooed as a 50-state “fight against fascism” (that word again!) and for “government accountability,” by the 50501 Movement, co-sponsored by a Bernie Sanders (Socialist-VT) group. One is tempted to join them if only to learn exactly what form that resistance might take.
Wisconsin Democrats were hoping their own Ben Wikler would be chosen chairman of the Democratic National Committee. But not even $250,000 from George Soros’ billionaire son could pull their state chairman over the finish line this past weekend. Democrats instead elected the state chairman responsible for Tim Walz in Minnesota, some guy named Ken Martin.
Is anyone cheering Trump’s pardons?
Leave it to Donald Trump to poop in the punch bowl even as the smart set danced the inaugural night away. Not 12 hours after promising a new “Golden Age,” the reinstated President unconditionally pardoned fifteen hundred cop beaters, vandals, and seditious conspiracists attempting to subvert the Constitution on January 6, 2021. Donald Trump has taken ownership of the January 6 insurrection. Maybe the man does have a conscience.
Well pardon us all to hell!
If history keeps happening, we’ll need to circle every day on the calendar in red. Americans know what happened on 9/11 as well as July 4. June 6 is remembered as D-Day; October 7 for Israel’s nightmare. December 7 is a day that will live in infamy. So will January 6.
Act 10 has been in court more often than Perry Mason!
You are not a Dane County judge in good standing if you have not ruled against Act 10, the statutory limitations on government employee collective bargaining. Bonus points if you supported the recall of Act 10’s author, Gov. Scott Walker. The latest judge to make his progressive bones here in Madison WI is Jacob Frost.
We’re good
We’re not disappointed Donald Trump won — and very impressed that he did so with so many Republican defectors. RINOs like us. We voted Libertarian. Wisconsin put him over. How DO we do it? We’re pleased as spiked punch that Kamala Harris lost. Once again, The Donald benefited from a weak opponent. Democrats sowed Tuesday’s defeat four years ago when they nominated (and elected) a deeply diminished and weak man. Donald Trump will make the better President; for moral leadership, we have to look elsewhere.
Kamala, Bernie, and AOC!
If Donald Trump could quit lying about losing his last election he would be headed for a landslide victory in this one. (There’s still time!) Because the progressivism he’s running against has been disproven, repudiated, and shamed. When you think about it, what has Election Denial gotten Donald Trump except the defections of half his cabinet, many of his high-level aides, a batch of retired generals, various Bushes and Cheneys, his own Veep, and Wisconsin’s own Paul Ryan and Mike Gallagher?
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