Beloit Daily News editor William Barth has some advice for Gov. Scott Walker:

If you want to win a recall election (and, I assume, you do), get out of the bunker and out among the people at every wide open public event you can find.

That may make your handlers nervous. They’ll tell you there will be scenes, that protesters will stake out the place, hooting and hollering and shouting you down so bad the audience won’t hear a word you say.

They’ll warn you that loudmouths with bullhorns will harass you and everybody else who comes to see you. Demonstrators may shout profanities and make obscene gestures. They might even try to physically block entrances, or clog up traffic. A mob scene. Ugly.

Precisely why you should get out there, every chance you get, if you want to win.

Face it, governor, after your first year one would think it’s impossible in Wisconsin to make Scott Walker look like a sympathetic figure.

But some of these folks — rude, crude, sometimes indecent — are managing to make that happen.

Why?

Because the Midwest and Wisconsin remain home territory for regular folks who still value decency, civility, manners and mild behavior. They are put off by outlandish misconduct.

Even a lot of people who may not like you much, governor, probably like these louts even less.

Barth got to witness firsthand the quality of protesters Walker is attracting at the Rock County Republican Party Lincoln Day dinner, which featured, in the words of Finnegan’s RV Center owner Mark Finnegan, “a few [protesters] even laying down on the ground in front of the doors to disrupt guests from entering. As I escorted my [World War II veteran] guest through the crowd, we were met with an onslaught of profanity, boos, taunting and a childish, obnoxious guy with a bullhorn.”

Finnegan, by the way, was an invited guest for his role in the VetsRoll program, which takes World War II and Korean War veterans to the war memorials in Washington, D.C. His mother, 86, was a “Rosie the Riveter,” and he escorted two World War II veterans.

Finnegan then became the target:

“After I guided her safely inside, I went back out to meet my arriving mother and to escort her through this intimidating group. Someone in the group recognized who I was and immediately the crowd began a chant of ‘Boycott Finnegans’ RV Center!’ … I met my mother and convinced her that these people were simply expressing their ‘rights’ and that she would be safe. She somewhat reluctantly agreed to walk in. … As we tried to walk through the group again, these people (not kids, mostly in their 40s to 60s) continued to focus their boycott chant on our family name and business of 43 years, crowding, screaming and booing not only me, but my beloved 86-year-old mother. The moron with the bullhorn walked beside us while leading the ‘Boycott Finnegans’ chant with that thing only about 12 inches from my ear and that of my mother’s.”

Finnegan clearly has great self-control. Had I been in his situation, the “moron with the bullhorn” would have been eating said bullhorn, or perhaps receiving it as a suppository.

Barth adds:

• The more obnoxious and repellent protesters act out in public, the better Walker’s chances of surviving a recall become. Offending people is not a very good vote-getting strategy.

• Backlash is all but assured. If I were advising the governor, I’d put him out there with this crowd early and often. Bad behavior drives votes to the other side.

Barth clearly is not familiar with the People’s Republic of Madison, whose Sly in the Morning has devised a new excuse for the behavior of protesters, according to Media Trackers:

Well, the way I see it, yelling at Republican donors who are literally giving money to this governor to suppress worker’s rights, versus people egging homes, calling up people who sign recall petitions, harassing people who are collecting recall signatures, are two very different things. I’m not saying that anyone on our side has stepped over the line. They have.

We’re the aggrieved party.

This is like the police showing up to a case where, ya know, the guy’s beat the crap out of his wife. And yet, ya know, she pushed back. Well, ya know, yes, there was a physical altercation between the couple. But who’s the aggrieved party? Who’s the aggressor?

They are!

I’m not sure what kind of mind believes that people who get good pay and outstanding benefits for their work are the equivalent of domestic abuse victims. Then again, the purpose of unions is to get paid as much as possible for doing as little work as possible.