Over the past 7 years in Wisconsin government, there has been a skewed opinion. Not only has our current administration caused one of the highest debts in our state history, they have also managed to make our state the 3rd worst state to do business in. Now this is not to stay that it is all Jim Doyle's fault, but I have to say that a Governor of the state must take a lot of credit for it.

Jim Doyle announced last summer that he would not run for a third term in office. This probably has something to do with the fact that his approval ratings have dropped below 30%. The real situation I want to touch on, though, is the upcoming race for Governor. Tom Barret, the Mayor of Milwaukee, and Scott Walker, the Milwaukee County Executive, are the two front runners from the Democratic and Republican Parties, respectively. Now, the race is going to be very important for our state because the winner will be able to shape the direction of our state. Another important piece of the election is going to be how the election will be run. The US Supreme Court found that having the McCain/Feingold campaign finance law was unconstitutional. Not only will this affect our nations elections and campaigns, it is going to also affect our state run campaigns.

Before McCain/Feingold, most campaign money came in as large donations from corporations and the extremely rich. Since it went into effect, however, many campaign contributions were from grassroots efforts. The current campaign within the Scott Walker group has raised a majority of its money with small donations. They have had over 18,000 people donate to the campaign. Everything is going to change now that corporations and any other rich company or non-profit can give as much money and say anything they want.

Many people will argue that this is going to ruin our election system and make it so whoever has the most money wins. I don't believe this is true, especially since both sides have multi-million dollar backers. I am glad that the supreme court has found McCain/Feingold unconstitutional, as you should, too. This will allow everyone to have a voice, just as our fore fathers had intended. Yes, there will be more ads on television now from private organizations, corporations, non-profits, and even religious groups. However, isn't it a good things to allow everyone to speak their mind in an open environment. By keeping people from saying what they want in elections, it only allows certain people to have their voice heard. Whether you are rich or you are poor, you have the same voice. Someone who is rich may be able to make a television ad that costs $10 million, but someone who is poor can go door to door in their neighborhood and give their opinion.

So, by allowing our campaigns to be more open, with less interference from the government, and more input from our citizens, we will be able to elect officials that are doing what we want them to. You may say that with these big interests spending all this money it is going to cause more politicians to "owe" their contributors, but I think that if there is someone else on the other side with the same amount of money ready to attack them for listening to the "big money interests," then there will be a lot less to worry about. Everyone will be held accountable for what they have done because they will have to answer to the other side even more than they have in the past. So, if you want truth and honesty in politics, and you want everyone's freedom of speech to be upheld, then join me in supporting the recent Supreme Court Case decision that repealed the McCain/Feingold campaign finance reform.