Across the country there are stories about “school lunch debt,” a heinous sentence that should give every person a great deal of shame. Children denied lunch because of a $9 debt. There is a wealth of mental health stress that we inflict on children in the name of lunch “fiscal responsibility”.

The Republicans clearly should get whooped next fall. Unfortunately, at the same time they spectacularly and desperately fall apart, Democrats are quietly fizzling. Nationally, they  somehow have even lower approval ratings. The Democratic establishment might be the only people unpopular and inept enough to blow this chance.

To Sara Rodriguez, what will you do differently than our current Governor? Using obstruction as an excuse for not accomplishing more progressive wins won’t cut it. This question needs to be asked of every single candidate in the race for governor, and if Democratic messaging tries to tell us that things are going great in Wisconsin already, they need to be laughed at.

The only thing Tony Evers seems to care about is his brand as a folksy bipartisan compromiser, but under his aw shucks facade, this governor is making morally depraved choices with dire consequences in people’s lives.

If we lived in a time of effective antifascism, genocide denial would earn you a knuckle sandwich. A swastika-sporting holocaust denier trying to erase resolutions at the Democratic Convention would be lucky to leave the room with all their teeth. The same logic would apply to genocide denier Dustin Klein, but we don’t live in a time of effective antifascism.

If Senate Democrats use the leverage they have to pursue our four demands and deny Governor Evers the opportunity to sign another trash budget, the harm Vos wants to do (and that Evers is willing to accept in the name of bipartisanship) will be significantly reduced.

Democratic voters and party members need to assert themselves against the donor class and their priorities. We need to demonstrate our dissatisfaction with the status quo politicians and their cautious, fascist-appeasing strategies. Overall, we need to deter Tony Evers from running for another term.

Republicans are not operating from the same position of unified strength they held before. If Evers utilizes his leverage, then it is they who will be blamed for passing an unsignable budget. For the first time in the six years, Evers has decided to enter into negotiation with Robin Vos and the other forgettable Republicans in his coalition.

Wikler and Remiker’s biggest achievement is massive fundraising hauls from rich donors that inundated our state with ubiquitous 30 second ads, avalanches of junk mail, and nonstop door knocking; all things that annoy, rather than inspire voters. Their biggest innovation is year round campaigning. They have people constantly volunteering and donating in fear. We are literally running scared door to door and picking up the slack for uninspiring politicians who deliver us crumbs.