Well, it was the Packers' turn in the barrel this week, and the 2018 picture wasn't pretty.
I grew up in Minnesota but I’m being completely earnest when I tell you that, while I like my home state, I also appreciated its neighbor to the East. I had friends from Wisconsin. I went to camp in Wisconsin. Wisconsin has cheese, beer, and pretty woods. For the bulk of my life, it seemed like a perfectly normal, good little state. But now I know the truth about Wisconsin, and that is that it’s actually a fucking loony bin. The governor is a union-busting turd. The biggest city is more segregated than apartheid-era Cape Town and was run, until very recently, by America’s Most Corrupt Sheriff. Their most prominent congressman will go down as one of the most spineless enablers in human history. The cops beat up a Milwaukee Buck and laughed about it. The citizens have brains and asses made of boiled weisswurst. The entire state is a series of cool cities surrounded by psychotic suburbs in which people have been stifling their racism in the name of politeness for so long that their eyes are now just swirling like cartoon characters. It’s a cut-rate Illinois filled with crackpots, serial killers, and racists. Wisconsin is INSANE.Why you little Mud-Duck bastard, you are…..pretty correct. This is how we appear to the rest of the country after voting for Donald F’ing Trump for president and a dimwitted college dropout for Governor 3 times (!!!)
Some of the comments by actual Packer fans/Wisconsin residents in the article are also far from endearing.
Fuck this fanbase who would chop their own arm off for Clay “OMG Hair” Matthews and Jordy Nelson, but wouldn’t recognize Mike Daniels or Davante Adams in their own jerseys.
I’m a Canadian who moved to Northeast Wisconsin - holy fuck these people are drunk.
I’m not shocked this state went for Trump. It’s drunk, it’s racist, it puts hunter camo on everything, and it’s absolutely terrified of taking an alternate route to Miller Park.
A buddy was a professor at Marquette and went out cycling when he first moved there. He ended up on MLK. Some white dude pulled over and yelled “get in.” He asked why and the dude said “you’re going to get killed.” Probably someone from Waukesha.
That said, if you are an African-American in a bar in Green Bay you won’t pay for drinks since everyone will think you play for the Packers.
We continually seem to think Scott Walker is an electable human being and not the evil dad in every Nickelodeon movie from the 90s.
…Michigan and Pennsylvania were always suspect. Wisconsin was not. Wisconsin was the “SUPRISE, WE’RE ASSHOLES” of the 2016 election. Michigan and Pennsylvania are much more like Ohio and Florida, in that they’re inhabited by mostly douchebags already.
And here’s a sadly accurate football take from a commentator.
All it took was one fateful October Sunday afternoon in Minnesota, fucking Minnesota of all places, and an Anthony Fucking Barr sack, to reveal the Packers for what they are: a fraudulent, house of cards organization that was lucky enough to see a cross-bread of Moses and Jesus fall into their laps as their quarterback. Ted Thompson’s defense, entirely built with his 90+ 3rd to 7th round draft picks, looked like the French army in 1940, and Mike McCarthy stuck with a QB who was unable to throw a single TD in Lambeau Field.You may notice a certain edge to the fans’ letters, and I think a lot of it is the general know-little idiocy that has been allowed to be in control of much of Wisconsin politics starting in 2010 at the state level and Ron Johnson's election to the US Senate, and culminating in the state going for Trump in 2016. I know I have found a lot less humor in seeing some drunken yah-hey-dere dipshit wearing a variation of a Cheesehead chanting “GO PACK GOOOOO!” when he/she comes onto my TV screen since Act 10 and the related culture war was dropped on all of us 7 years ago.
Us in the home state of Titletown have to do better than we’ve been showing to the rest of the country. On the field, in the voting booth, and in our everyday lives. All are very possible, and 2018 could become a memorable year in Wisconsin where things turned back into the greatness that we used to have.
But some people in Wisconsin need to get it together, be honest about what they're seeing, and demand more.
Whenever I despair over the current state of Wisconsin, I look to our neighbor to the northwest and think, “Man, I wish I never left Minnesota.” My youth in that state was generally a very happy one, and I will always have warm feelings for it. Sometimes during my trips down Memory Lane, though, I take off my rose-colored glasses and remember my former home for what it really was...and still is. It’s far from perfect.
ReplyDeleteMy childhood surrounded me with casual bigotry...black jokes, Polack jokes, gay jokes, you name it. There were also plenty of beer-soaked blowhards. Unfortunately, all of these things still exist. For example, the Teddy Bridgewater era may be over, but I can tell you that a number of Vikings fans made it clear that they were none too happy we had a black quarterback. Even if he had finally led us to a Super Bowl win, they would have found something to nitpick over.
Up until that fateful year of 2010, I viewed Minnesota and Wisconsin as interchangeable. During my 30 years in Wisconsin, we elected Tommy Thompson to four terms as governor, sure. But we also continually elected two U.S. Senators named Herb Kohl and Russ Feingold. I saw both Minnesotans and Wisconsinites as an eclectic mix of political purple...and believe it or not, I still do.
In 2010, the political climate was just right for a cynical, dead-eyed dolt to be elected governor...by the skin of his teeth, even during a huge Tea Party wave. In 2016, Donald Trump and Ron Johnson also just barely won. I believe we would have probably gone for Hillary IF SHE ACTUALLY BOTHERED TO CAMPAIGN HERE. That fatal mistake of hers also took Feingold as a casualty, too, unfortunately.
The point I’m trying to make is this, Jake: When I get depressed thinking that Wisconsin is nothing but a bunch of batshit-insane conservatives, I remind myself that there are actually millions of Wisconsinites just like me and you. Now if we could just all GET OUT AND VOTE, we can take out the garbage and begin to return our state to the respectability it deserves.
You've got a valid point. And I do think "progressive, decent Wisconsin" still exists, as long as people get over their apathy and VOTE THEIR VALUES.
DeleteLikewise, Scott Walker had never done better than "replacement level" in 2010 and 2014 (GOPs won by 5-6 points nationwide, Walker won by 5-6 points here).
With the national environment around Dem +7, and Walker's record looking worse in 2018 vs 2014, that makes it likely this guy can/should be beat. Just EXECUTE, dammit!
PS- Anthony Barr driving Rodgers into the turf was dirty and deserved a fine.
Regarding the Barr hit: I agree with you.
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