Fellow voters of Wisconsin, Republican gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker has a deal for you!
For only $250 per person, you can join Walker and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush
- Main Reception: $250 per person
- Main Reception: $500 per couple
- Photo Opportunity: $1000 per person/couple
- Round Table Discussion: $5000 per person/couple (Includes photo opportunity & main reception)
- Reserved Tables of 8 – $2,000
Reaction to Walker’s pricey fundraiser was harsh, as evidenced by the comments left on Walker’s Facebook page announcing the fundraiser:
- “$1,000 to take a picture with Jeb Bush? LOL”
- “Are you giving away free tickets?”
- “My husband & I would attend but we work AND it is well out of our price range, gotta live within the budget!”
- “No money$$$$$”
- “….$500 could feed my family of 4 for a month. Nice.”
- “If I can get 499 of my friends to chip in a buck can we each take a moment to come in and enjoy the special evening with Jeb Bush?”
Yeah, it’s pretty obvious that holding a $250 a head fundraiser makes perfect sense when unemployment hovers at or above 10% and folks are struggling to make ends meet, but it just goes to show how out of touch Scott Walker really is.
This may fly if he were in NY or LA, but in Milwaukee, no way. His campaign manager should be fired for stupidity for thinking they’re going to get a room full of people at that price.
Given the amount of maxed out donors on Barrett’s campaign finance report, this is quite possibly the dumbest post I’ve ever seen on the subject of political fund raising.
(Even if the entire point was to get to the snark regarding the Facebook stuff.)
Kevin, thanks for everything you add to the discussion!
Wow…pretty telling. Good for them.
Good find Zach. Those Facebook comments are priceless. Think they’ll stay online?
Walker’s already started to delete comments about his use of stimulus money in another Facebook update, so I’m not holding my breath.
I’ve got to say this seems like a silly thing to attack Walker on, as I’m sure Barrett will be having some big fundraisers himself. That’s just how it works.
Last month I received an invite to a Feingold cocktail where the suggested donation was $250. At least with Walker’s rally you get dinner.
The way it breaks out is $81.76 for a picture with Scooter and $918.24 for The Effective Bush ™.
I can only assume Tom Barrett will not be doing any fundraising at this level or above, correct? Or any of the other candidates you endorse on your “Ten in ’10” list? And if they do, you will be the first one to post a similiar entry to this saying they are out of touch, right? Riiiiiiiight.
And you seemed to overlook some of the comments like this:
“i would go but cant afford it as the liberals took all my money”
“Let us stop the class warfare. If you don’t have $500.00 to take your date out on a evening or you don’t like the Bush name, why cut down those who do? Some people are better off financially then others. I for one can’t afford it in this Doyle /Obama economy, but I hope and pray it is a sold out event and the Scott raises a ton of money to combat the other side’s war chest, so in four years I can afford it!”
“Excellent. People, come on. Scott will need a LOT of money to beat Barrett/Doyle/Obama and the Democrat slime machine. Whether or not you like Jeb Bush is not the point, he will draw people that will contribute to see Walker. I’m sure he appreciates every contribution and he received contributions from over 18,000 people. But he NEEDS the big donors too to win. At least he’s not trying to buy the race with his own money like Mark Neumann is trying to do.”
Boy…there sure is a lot of “shooting the messenger” going on here.
Well rightfully so Anon. The “messenger” is not just relaying a message, but saying that it is wrong and out of touch to ask for donations of $250 or more in this troubled economy, even though Democrats have and will continue to do the very same thing. But everything’s apparently okay as long as there’s a “D” behind the name. I also thought this economy was supposedly getting better under Saint Obama, as Zach tried to show with his little graph a couple posts back.
forgot…it seems to me Zach is not the only one saying it is wrong and out of touch. Did you read the comments made by the Walker supporters? They feel it is wrong and out of touch. Personally…I don’t care one way or another what they do but don’t pile on Zach just because he found the comments on Walker’s FB page noteworthy. What are the chances Walker is listening to “the people”??
BTW…why are you trying to bring this around to Barrett? If (or when) Barrett has a fundraiser where his supporters turn on him like Walker’s did feel free to jump all over it. Until then…why not stick to this topic??
Anon, Zach is not simply reporting, he is commenting. He was also selective in which comments he found noteworthy. My point is that it is ridiculous for him to say that hosting this fundraiser is inappropriate when Democrat candidates are doing the exact same thing, yet he will not call all of them out of touch. I only mentioned Barrett because (hello?) he is the Dem candidate for Governor, who will most definitely be asking for money on this scale too. To paraphrase Zach, I won’t hold my breath waiting for him to be critical on that one.
Anon, as for questioning Walker on listening to “the people” as you put it, what are the chances Barrett is? He just raised around $117,000 from OUT OF STATE, including $19,000 from the Justice Fund, a conduit for trial lawyers. So come on, if we’re going to talk about fundraising, let’s start talking about all sides of fundraising.
Okay…I see you do not want to talk about Walker and what his some of his supporters are saying about the “out of touch” fundraiser. Moving on…
Unless you think that when Obama comes to town to stump for Barrett that their FUNDRAISING event will be free or equal to the amount of change you can find in your seat cushions, which is about all that I would pay.
So let’s keep this blog going. Gwen Moore yesterday announced that she is holding a $500 a head fundraiser. So it’s ok for the most worthless human being with an IQ of a grapefruit to do this, but Scott Walker cannot? Frankly, I’m opposed to anyone doing this when people should be saving their money to support their families. Because I don’t see anything on the blogs attacking her motives for this same endeavour.
Gwen Moore gets so much money from special interests that she doesn’t need the fundraiser – unless she fears getting her sorry a** being ousted this November, which all I would have to say is “it’s about time”.
Tom, this isn’t the place for insults and personal attacks. If you want to call folks worthless human beings, feel free to visit “Real Debate” Wisconsin…I hear they love insults and personal attacks over there!
Haha, snap!
Not really. While I recognize these big-dollar fundraisers are a part of the political landscape, that doesn’t mean I agree with them, regardless of who’s holding them.
Fine, but then where’s the post reading “Russ Feingold: ‘So what if the economy’s in the tank; let’s hold a $500 a head fundraiser!'”?
You did the same thing when blasting Palin about offshore drilling, while forgeting to mention that Obama supported the very same. Then when called on it, you cop the “I don’t like it no matter who is doing it.” That may be true, but you don’t seem to post things people in these instances if they have a ‘D’ behind their name.
Let’s be straight up here…Ms. Palin is a dyed in the wool proponent of drill baby drill while President Obama is a recent convert trying to trade off shore drilling for carbon controls with his ‘friends’ across the aisle! The former is smart enough to currently keep her mouth shut while the latter probably regrets his compromise.
You can rationalize all you want, but one is the President and has the power to make it happen. So now how are you going to defend going after Walker for his $250 fundraiser while now Feingold has a $500 with Biden? Is Feingold just a recent convert to fundraising?
My comment here is more than I reckon you’d see from Kevin Binversie criticizing Scott Walker or Paul Ryan.
Sounds like MadCityMan should award that “hypocrisy” tag. Look I realize it’s called “Blogging Blue” but something like this isn’t about a difference of opinion between red vs. blue. It’s pretty blantant when you can accuse Candidate A of not caring about the bad economy by holding a high-dollar fundraiser simply because you hate Cadidate A, but Candidate B does the exact same thing and will still receive high praise here. That’s what I hate about politics because it’s so insincere. Especially for a blog that regularly calls the other side hypocrites. And Kevin Binversie is your standard bearer to excuse poor behavior?
You’re entitled to your opinion, but as I’ve said, my comment in this thread about Sen. Feingold’s fundraiser was far more than you’d see from almost all the conservative bloggers here in Wisconsin if one of their preferred candidates got called out on something.
Oh, and for the record, I’m biased. That’s kinda the whole point of the blog – I suppose I’m just not as “Fair and balanced” as Fox News.
Well there’s a difference between biased opinion based on issues and bias for the sake of bias. I can least understand your posts disagreeing with Walker’s beliefs or positions on issues, or even ads he runs you think are misleading, but even with your bias I can’t understand a post that calls Walker out of touch for running a campaign, when clearly liberal politicans do the very same. With unemployment still hovering at 10%, why isn’t Feingold out of touch for the same reason?!
And really, it’s pretty lame to say it’s ok because you’re just a little bit better than the bloggers you often equate with evil incarnate.
I don’t equate any of the conservative bloggers here in Wisconsin with “evil incarnate.” We may not agree on anything, and some of them may have said some nasty things about me, but I’m sure they’re all really nice folks once you get to know them in person.
Interesting fact: For the first time in a decade, Republican candidates for Congress are raising more than Democrats from small donors.
Not that I expect this to get any mention here even though it certainly was when the tables were turned. If you’re on the left, it’s grass roots. If you’re on the right, the same thing is astroturf.