Glenn’s been waiting to talk to Scott Walker for weeks now. The Wisconsin Governor routinely comes out near the top of our audience poll of prospective GOP nominees. But who is he? What does he believe? What are his policies? And does he have any intention of running? Glenn spoke with Scott Walker on Monday's radio show to get some of these answers.
Despite Wisconsin being the cradle of progressivism, Walker has been able to make a lot of accomplishments in the advancement of small government.
"Madison, Wisconsin, which is headed to the left of Pravda, for many out there, it is the home of progressive movement. Collective bargaining was started there," Walker said. "Who would have thought that in that city, in the state of Wisconsin, that hasn't had a Republican for president since 1984, we would be able to take on, four years ago, the Public Employee Union. And not only win that battle, win the recalls against a whole bunch of state senators. Win a recall against me and the lieutenant governor in the state. But now Wisconsin when it comes to public employee unions, we have no seniority or tenure. We can hire and fire based on merit. We can pay based on performance. We're the 25th state in the nation that have a right to work. We have photo ID requirements for voting. We deported Planned Parenthood and the pro-life legislation."
"We cut taxes by $2 billion. Property taxes were lower today than they were four years ago. Who would have thought that would happen? But we said shortly after the 2010 election, we had to go big and we had to go bold. It was put-up-or-shut-up time. And even in Madison, Wisconsin, we were able to get that done."
"What is the secret?" Glenn asked.
"The interesting thing is, to win the center, you don't have to move to the center of the issues, you have to lead. You have to clearly spell out what you're going to do. Tell the people what you'll do, and then do it. And a lot of times in politics, people think to win the middle, to win independents, sort of, independents are squishy or moderate. No, most independents have just been burned many times before. They're not willing to commit to a party because they're frustrated with being told one thing and then people doing another. If you lead, you don't have to be with an independent on every single issue. You just have to look them in the eye and tell them exactly what you'll do. Sometimes that means telling them something that they don't necessarily agree with. But they'll know on all the other issues, that you'll stand firm, when they do care about them."
Listen to the full interview in today's podcast: