Big education issues won't change with Wisconsin election results

Alan Borsuk:

In the closing moments of Thursday night's debate between the two candidates for governor, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett raised a point that intrigues me. In fact, separate from all the other aspects of Tuesday's historic recall election, I think it resonates across the debate about education in America:

Brass knuckles or handshakes?

Share a cup of coffee or send incendiary tweets?

What's the best way to get things done amid differences?

Facing Scott Walker, the Republican governor who sat next to him at a round table at Marquette Law School, the Democratic challenger said, "You and I know that if you had accepted back in February of 2011 the offer from those employees to allow them to pay towards their health care and towards their pensions, we wouldn't be sitting here tonight."

Walker replied, "That's just fundamentally wrong." He said that even as public union leaders offered to accept cuts in benefits for their members, following Walker's proposal to strip public unions of almost all their powers, local unions across the state were rushing to make contract deals that protected their benefits.

"Actions speak louder than words," he said.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at June 4, 2012 1:34 AM
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