Spending cuts are hot in the political marketplace

[Geee]

Washington Examiner:

One of the things that fascinates me about American politics is how the voices of the voters as registered in elections and polls are transformed into changes in public policy. It's a rough and ready process, with plenty of trial and error. But for all its imperfections the political market seems to work.
Three developments during the past week illustrate this process. Developments, not results, because each is part of an ongoing struggle that will not be resolved soon.

The first was Tuesday's election for the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

Democrats and public employee unions rallied against the bill sponsored by Republican Gov. Scott Walker and passed by the legislature scaling back public employee unions' bargaining privileges and stopping the automatic flow of dues money from the state treasury to the unions and their allies in the Democratic Party.

The public employee unions hoped to defeat a Republican Supreme Court justice and create an activist liberal majority that might overturn the law. Turnout increased from 793,000 in April 2009 to 837,000 in the February 2011 primary to 1,494,000 last week, and examination of the returns shows big increases where unions are strong.

But the anti-spending enthusiasm that brought so many conservatives to the polls in November was still operative in April, and the Republican seems to have won by 7,000 votes. And Democrats' efforts to recall Republican state senators seem unlikely to net them the three seats they need for a majority.

A maximum effort by the unions, combined with Republican hamhandedness, was not quite enough to reverse last fall's result in a state Barack Obama carried by 56 to 42 percent.