There is a beautiful political commercial by Governor Scott Walker (R-WI) and his family. It is a Christmas season, greeting card that tries to underscore the spirit and principles of Christmas. The setting takes us inside a community hall, to the action at its charity lunch counter. There we see Governor Walker, his wife, and their sons serving meals to the needy. As we observe the scene, Mrs. Walker narrates the following: “The holidays are a time for us to give thanks, and to reach out to those who are struggling. It is a tough time for many families, but here in Wisconsin, we have a long tradition of helping our neighbors. (The scene switches to the governor and his family at home, as his wife continues.) We are grateful for the opportunity to serve the people of Wisconsin. In this season of peace, our hope is that we can put our differences aside and move forward together.”
Then the governor offers the conclusion: “From our family to yours ― Blessings of the season!”
The wonderful tenderness of the commercial is a dramatic and sharp contrast to the political actions and the degrading, contemptuous rhetoric of the governor, during the past year. It reminds me of one of the phases in the cycle of domestic abuse: It is similar to the phase that occurs at the tail end of the abuse cycle, in the hours and days following the physical abuse, when the abuser begins to realize that lawful consequences are imminent, and the victim is contemplating a permanent end to their relationship. It is then that the abuser tries to reconcile with the victim. He brings her gifts and flowers, while pleading with tears in his eyes to do things differently in the future. “Let’s forget the past and start new,” he tells the victim. (Her separated shoulder, broken jaw, and her badly beaten soul, semi-conscious in the hospital bed, should overlook the months and years of verbal and physical abuse: he phony plead implies.) He hopes that although her gut-intuition is telling her that he made these promises in the past, broke them every time, and more than likely he will break them again, his charm is so strong that it will eventually convince the victim to drop the charges and stay in the relationship with him.
Governor Scott Walker’s season-greeting commercial is this tail-end phase of the political and social abuse he inflicted on the citizens of Wisconsin. He is in the hours and days following the verbal abuse of teachers and other public employees. He is in the months following his mean-spirited policies that forced the middle class to bear the entire weight of a balanced budget, endure cuts to their benefits, freezes on their salaries, relinquish their rights to a fair standard of living, subject themselves to un-democratic voter-registration laws, un-Christian-like cuts to their entitlements, reduction in the state’s environmental standards, TORT reform legislation that virtually erases all the rights of middle class citizens to seek grievance for injuries and deaths cause by corporations. . . and a slew of other unethical-but-lawful acts. Now as he faces a recall, with most of Wisconsin’s citizens trying to get rid of him, he is banking on his belief that his charm, and the backing of big money from the folks whose interests his policies advance, he will eventually convince the victims to drop or defeat the recall against him, and to continue their abuser-victim relationship with him.
I think it is quite possible that Governor Walker will convince Wisconsin’s middle class victims to forget the past, and give him another chance. Unfortunately, I am more convince if they do so, the governor’s cycle of abuse will continue ― in fact, like all the other cycles of abuse (domestic, spousal, child. . .),it will become worse!
By
James A. Porter
