Dictatorship in the heartland

It appears that Scott Walker, otherwise known as The Man With No Soul (and you can see it in his cold, dead eyes), is planning to run the state of Wisconsin like a complete and utter totalitarian dictatorship under his control (emphasis mine):

Following the lead of Michigan GOP Governor Rick Snyder, Walker is said to be preparing a plan that would allow him to force local governments to submit to a financial stress test with an eye towards permitting the governor to take over municipalities that fail to meet with Walker’s approval.

According to the reports, should a locality’s financial position come up short, the Walker legislation would empower the governor to insert a financial manager of his choosing into local government with the ability to cancel union contracts, push aside duly elected local government officials and school board members and take control of Wisconsin cities and towns whenever he sees fit to do so.

[snip]

Should these reports prove accurate, Walker’s plan would resemble-if not directly mirror- the legislation signed into law by Gov. Snyder of Michigan which gives Snyder extraordinary powers to take over municipalities when he determines them to be in financial trouble, further permitting him to actually fire locally elected public officials when he deems it desirable.

Gov. Snyder’s extraordinary law became all too real this week when Emergency Financial Manager, Joseph Harris, appointed by the Governor to take charge of Benton Harbor, Michigan, issued an order which took away all powers of the city’s elected officials.

Yes, this has really happened right here in the United States of America.

Walker’s plans give further credence to the notion that the efforts of the GOP governors with Republican majorities in their state legislative bodies are part of a coordinated plan to enforce a right-wing agenda designed to not only destroy state, county and municipal employee unions, but to take control of local governments by replacing elected officials with appointees, both corporate and individual, of the state’s highest executive officer.

Such a law would additionally give Walker unchallenged power to end municipal services of which he disapproves, including safety net assistance to those in need.

According to my sources, the plan is being written by the legal offices of Foley & Lardner, the largest law firm in the state, and is scheduled to be introduced to the legislature in May of this year.

NOW can we say that the right-wing Republican Koch brothers agenda is NOT about any kind of freedom, other than for corporations to run roughshod over our lives and our ability to function as a democracy?

Will we tolerate this?

I'm afraid it's too late to do anything but. The only tool we have is at the ballot box, and Americans proved themselves last year to be too stupid, ignorant, and gullible to be trusted with something as important as the vote. Perhaps there is a small hard core that still believes in the Teabagger agenda, at least until it hits them personally (as it will). But most people who voted-by-tantrum last year had no idea what they were actually voting for. Republican governors overturning local elections by fiat, Republican legislatures passing stupid legislation codifying debunked claims into law about a President into law for the sole purpose of keeping him off the ballot, partisan Republican election officials possibly rigging election results -- these are all evidence that it is already too late to prevent the relentless march towards complete corporate oligarchy.

I hope you enjoyed America. Because you don't have it anymore.