Farewell to Feingold?

Businessman Ron Johnson aims for an upset.

BY John McCormack
August 9, 2010, Vol. 15, No. 44
Lake Geneva, Wisconsin

During a two-hour fundraising cruise in southeastern Wisconsin on Sunday, July 18, Republicans feasted on bratwurst, sauerkraut, and beer as they chatted about their good chances of sending a Republican to the U.S. Senate for the first time since 1986. Polls show a tight race developing between Democrat Russ Feingold, the three-term incumbent, and Ron Johnson, an Ayn Rand-loving, pro-life Lutheran, plastics manufacturer from Oshkosh. Johnson led Feingold 48 percent to 46 percent in a July 29 Rasmussen poll.

Democrats thought they had dodged a bullet when former Republican governor Tommy Thompson decided in April not to run, but Johnson has emerged as a formidable candidate. First, he doesn’t have Thompson’s baggage of having been both a Washington lobbyist and a Bush administration official. When Johnson delivers brief remarks to the 200 Republicans aboard the boat, he makes it clear he didn’t like the spending spree of the last administration. Republicans were racking up “$300 [or] $400 billion deficits. But now we’re talking $1.5 trillion. And our national debt is $13 trillion. That’s simply unsustainable. It’s intergenerational theft. It’s wrong. It’s immoral. And it’s gotta stop.â€