It seems that we have reached the point in our community in which liberals have taken the position that election activities should no longer be partisan. Please tell me how this works and why it is so objectionable that candidates running for public office should not be affiliated with a specific position with regard to their core beliefs. If you are a Democrat, you are free to align yourself with the positions taken by today’s Democratic Party. You are free to promote the termination of babies up to birth, or the mutilation of children to accommodate the belief their birth sex is incorrect. You are free to protest against our right to freedom of speech, but the moment there is pushback, liberals scream discrimination. They champion diversity and inclusion, except when it includes diversity in thought.
School board seats are non-partisan voting seats, but the reality is, EVERYONE IS PARTISAN. Everyone is on one side or the other about every issue. Everyone has a particular point of view and that is OK. We will tend to vote for a candidate with a political ideology that aligns most with your own. It has ALWAYS been this way. Bottom line is that school board members will use their ideology as a compass to influence policy and in their decision-making. It is disingenuous to say that an individual will be completely non-partisan or non-political. Liberal candidates will scream the loudest about being non-partisan, but they will be the first to be supported by Democratic organizations like Waukesha United, Working Families Party, Fair Wisconsin, Alliance for Education, Act Blue, Blue Sky Waukesha, and Grassroots Groups.
During our last spring election cycle, it was evident that the liberal “machine” which included the media, paid political agitators and social media trolls collaborated to paint conservative candidates as political puppets of the Republican Party because they were endorsed by WisRed. Although, none of the candidates received any direct funding for their campaign. There was an obviously coordinated effort to paint conservative candidates in a negative light. One example is the school board candidate forum. It is NOT a school-sponsored event. It consists of volunteer or parent groups that host the forum. However, it is typically advertised and promoted as if it is a school district event.
The intent of the forum is to provide the community with an opportunity to learn more about the candidates and their views on school issues. The purpose is to allow candidates a platform to present their platform in an objective and fair manner. The only problem with this forum was that the entire process is rigged. The public is led to believe that a diverse number of community members were involved in the committee and solicitation for candidate questions properly vetted. Instead, volunteers were not chosen among all residents, volunteer names were not made public, and the same handful of individuals formulated the candidate questions. As you can imagine, this gives the liberals the opportunity to ask conservative candidates loaded questions and share questions ahead of time to their liberal counterparts to have an advantage. The partisanship and bias was evident. So, school district candidates like in Waukesha and Menomonee Falls opted to decline the invitation to attend and hosted their own meet & greet. It was the first time that this occurred and created shock waves among the liberal establishment. For the first time, conservative candidates stood up and rejected the games that were played. They were proven to be correct because the spring election gave them full victory across the board.
Now, our spring elections are once again upon us and we are facing the same skewed forum this time because the same approach was taken to improperly solicit the volunteers managing the process. The option to volunteer for this event was not made public and so the people assembled to execute the forum are clearly partisan in their perspective and no conservatives have been allowed to participate in the process. This is not how public-facing events should be facilitated. Disagreement is the nature of progress as we are presented with new ideas and healthy debate about priorities, policies and ideology. Healthy societies thrive on transparency and truth. When informational events are manipulated to favor one side or the other, it leads to stagnation of growth and policies that do not reflect the will of the majority.
Conservative school board candidates are continuing to reject the liberal playbook and decline their participation in the forum. Instead, they will host their own gatherings or forums. Unfortunately, this trend will continue if conservatives will not be allowed a fair process and open discussion on controversial topics and issues.
I will ask you to consider what you have read and decide for yourself if it is right to stifle opposing viewpoints or if this behavior is the liberals’ attempt to elevate their favored candidate. Are these the actions of “non-partisans?”
