For progressives in Wisconsin, the saddest finding in the latest Marquette University pre-election poll wasn’t that Republican Gov. Scott Walker had a very slight lead in what is still a toss-up race with Democrat Mary Burke.
The most disturbing number in the poll was one showing Walker was successful in using “dog whistle” political rhetoric to stir up racial hatred and demeaning stereotypes of poor people in need of public assistance.
After months of polls showing the governor’s race in a dead heat, Walker resorted to hate politics by proposing a plan that’s illegal under federal law: to deny food stamps and unemployment benefits to anyone who fails a drug test.
Never mind that the proposal could actually result in Wisconsin losing more federal funds and many of its major employers losing federal tax credits.
A month before a tight election, all Walker cares about is reminding racists and others who hate the poor that Democrats like Burke support government assistance for people in need and Walker wants to treat poor families like dirt just like they would.
Sad to say, the Marquette poll showed 56% statewide supported drug testing those seeking food assistance or unemployment benefits and only 41% were opposed.
The beauty of a racist dog whistle is that many decent people can’t even hear it. That gives deniability to both Walker and his supporters that he is intentionally appealing to racism.
In fact, based on actual facts, programs such as food assistance and unemployment benefits really have nothing to do with race. When African Americans make up only about 6% of the state population, far more whites than blacks receive food assistance, unemployment or any other public benefits.
But, of course, Walker’s mean-spirited proposal has nothing to do with actual facts.
Truth and demographics aside, the racist stereotype of a recipient of government benefits is a black single mother in Milwaukee being paid to have children while she lolls around on what Congressman Paul Ryan calls a “hammock,” using food stamps to buy steak and lobster.
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Only right-wing radio explicitly paints recipients of government aid in such graphically racist terms. But right-wing Republicans, including Walker and Ryan, have learned how to insert those images in invisible ink between the lines of their speeches.
Denying Food to Poor Kids
Drug research has repeatedly shown that whites and racial minorities use illegal drugs at about the same rate. But for whites, drug addiction is a public health problem requiring treatment. For anyone black or brown, though, drug addiction is a criminal problem requiring incarceration.
Now Walker wants to declare drug use an excuse for the state to deny food to hungry children and even the minimal means of survival for families of working people who lose their jobs through no fault of their own.
Fighting hunger in America began as a bipartisan program by Democrats and Republicans who believed no child should go to bed hungry in the richest nation on earth.
Food stamps, now actually no-shame plastic cards, were a joint mission of liberal Democrat George McGovern and conservative Republican Robert Dole, both farm state U.S. senators.
It wasn’t just hungry families and farmers who won. So did the entire U.S. economy. With everybody in America able to buy more food, more jobs were created to grow, distribute and sell food.
That is, until Republicans like Walker decided that far too many poor people were able to buy food for their families. He wants to deny food to any family headed by someone who fails a drug test.
About two-thirds of those receiving food assistance in Wisconsin are children. Maybe if those kids go hungry, it will teach them a good lesson about what can happen to them if they use drugs.
You would think Walker would feel at least a little guilty about denying unemployment benefits because of drug use. After all, Walker himself is far more responsible for unemployment in Wisconsin than demon drugs are.
All over this country, there are people at all income levels and in every job category going to work everyday who use drugs in their personal lives. It’s just that there are far fewer people going to work in Wisconsin than there are in most other states.
That’s because Walker blew a $3 billion hole in Wisconsin’s economy with public employee jobs cuts and wage reductions in order to give huge tax breaks to wealthy campaign contributors he claimed would start creating 250,000 jobs.
Only those folks didn’t do it and Wisconsin continues to trail most other states in job creation. Who knows? Maybe the wealthy spent all those enormous tax windfalls on drugs. The rich have always been able to buy more expensive drugs than the poor.
Instead of demonizing hungry children and the unemployed, maybe Walker should start drug testing the wealthy before he turns all of Wisconsin’s wealth over to them as corporate welfare.
