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Governor Scott Walker cuts wasteful spending on leftist university system

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I knew that the mountain of skulls of his enemies was real!
I knew that the mountain of skulls of his enemies was real!

This is from The Daily Caller. (H/T Scott)

It says:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is poised to win a huge victory on education as the state legislature passed a budget that repeals state tenure guarantees while also slashing the budget of the University of Wisconsin.

[…]The two-year, $73 billion budget approved Thursday makes a host of changes Walker has sought in the realm of education. Wisconsin’s school voucher program is expanded, and $250 million in funding is taken from the University of Wisconsin. That’s down from the $300 million cut Walker originally sought, but still a substantial haircut.

Bowing to the fait accompli, later on Thursday the University of Wisconsin approved its own budget, implementing the big cuts expected of it. About 400 positions will be laid off or will go unfilled, and the university’s budgets no money for pay hikes. The school’s situation is made tougher because the legislature has also frozen in-state tuition.

While academics have accused Walker of sabotaging the school’s competitiveness, Walker has refused to yield, arguing that professors should be teaching more classes.

[…]University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank sent a letter to Walker Friday begging him to veto the changes, saying they would drive away current and prospective faculty.

[…]Angry faculty have directed a great deal of venom toward Blank and the UW board of regents, accusing them of letting the tenure provisions pass by failing to make a loud protest.

Walker is expected to sign the budget by Monday, when he is scheduled to officially announce his presidential campaign.

Keep in mind that the angry faculty and the chancellor are all Democrats, so this is nothing but an attack on influential leftists – hitting them where they hurt. The pocketbook.

Universities are very far on the left, and – like big corporations, big unions, mainstream news media, trial lawyers, and Hollywood – they donate almost exclusively to Democrats:

Ivy League educators overwhelmingly supported President Obama with their campaign donations in the presidential election, reinforcing the suspicions of critics who say their bias also shows up in the classroom.

Some 96 percent of faculty and staffers at the eight universities who donated wrote their checks to Obama, and at Brown University, just one professor contributed to Mitt Romney’s bid, according to a study by student political advocacy group Campus Reform. In all, the employees of the prestigious schools sent more than $1.2 million to President Obama and just $114,166 for Romney’s campaign — a ratio of more than 10-to-1.

Think conservatives are welcome  on these leftists campuses?  About as welcome as Jews would be at a Nazi party rally.

Why is it important to do cur funding for a leftist university? It’s important because it is another step in Walker’s war on the left’s ability to give donations to Democrats. What Walker likes to do is go after the big leftist elites and take their money away and return it to the ordinary taxpayers who earned the money in the first place. This is the simple, low-key way of turning the Titanic around. Removing the influence of the left on politics by removing the money they have to influence politics. The advantage of this is that not only does it solve the fiscal problems that most Americans care about, but it also makes it harder for the left to push for more liberal laws and policies on social issues. They don’t have the money any more, the taxpayers have their money back.

Although some impatient Christians attach a lot of importance to people like Ted Cruz, who talk tough on social issues, but have never been able to move any legislation, I think we should be more interested in governors like Scott Walker and Bobby Jindal, who have had to work with legislatures to get the bills they want signed into law. Walker in particular is very good at appealing to moderates, independents and libertarians. He wins elections because he focuses on doing a good job for the middle class on financial issues. If you look a little deeper under the surface of his fiscal policies, you can see how his policies promote common sense conservative values and personal responsibility.

We need to favor people who win the tough battles and get things done in purple / blue states. No sense electing a conservative firebrand who loses in the general election because he has nothing to say to fiscal conservatives who also happen to be social liberals.

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