Rallying to recall Walker
By
MADISON, Wis.--In the largest state action since the now-famous "Wisconsin Spring," close to 40,000 people gathered at the Wisconsin capitol building in Madison on November 19 once again to express their outrage and solidarity against vicious attacks on workers.
Organized by the recall group United Wisconsin, labor's We Are Wisconsin and the Democratic party, the rally was designed to kick off a massive recall petitioning effort across the state to remove Governor Scott Walker and Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch. Petitioning began November 15 and before the rally, United Wisconsin announced petitioners already had gathered 105,000 of the 540,000 necessary to force a recall vote.
Anger at the governor drove tens of thousands to volunteer for the petitioning drive and to attend the rally, but that anger did not stop with the governor or the other state officials charged with implementing the worst set of anti-worker policies in decades.
Adding to the chants for recall and last winter's "This is what democracy looks like" was the Occupy movement's slogan "We are the 99 percent," and it was very clear from signs and speeches that the movement's message was not lost on the crowd despite Democrats' efforts to keep the recall message on point.
About 250 people from the Occupy Madison movement, along with radical labor, student and socialist activists attended a rally earlier in the morning outside the offices of Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, the largest business lobby group in Wisconsin and a huge contributor to Walker's war chest, to highlight the role of both ruling class parties and corporations in attacks on working people. The rally was part of a national week of action calling for "jobs not cuts" from the national Senate supercommittee, and was initiated by Socialist Alternative.
While the recall effort has energized labor, students and activists, the lessons learned through the Occupy movement, especially the attacks on protestors by liberal Democrat mayors across the country, has underscored the need for a strong, sustained and independent fightback.
