Rep. Dale Kooyenga (R-Brookfield) corrects Democrats’ falsehoods about the state of state finance:

The Annual Fiscal Report, which reports Wisconsin actual, not forecasted financial performance, reflects continued good stewardship of Wisconsin’s finances.   Don’t be confused by Mary Burke, and the media’s previous sky is falling headlines.  Wisconsin is in better shape than during the Burke/Doyle years by every metric.

Wisconsin ended the fiscal year with over a half billion cash on hand.  That is the second largest cash balance Wisconsin has had in the 21^st century, second only to last year’s fiscal year.  The rainy day fund, since Doyle’s last day in office, has increased 16,500%.  Even with our tax cuts, we have had the largest two years of tax collections in Wisconsin history.  Remarkable how that works, Republicans cut taxes, and we realize more tax receipts than previous Democratic administrations armed with higher taxes.  Tax receipts are down slightly from last year, but the reason for that decrease highlights a core conservative philosophy.  Withholding tables were adjusted, which reflects the fact conservatives believe you shouldn’t be granting the state an interest free loan, it’s your money.  Withholding tables were adjusted downward last spring by ten percent to let you keep more of your cash, yet the amount of cash collected from the previous year was only down by 6%, because of growth in the number of Wisconsin residents employed and higher wages for existing workers.

Wisconsin democrats will continue to engage on a campaign of gender, class and racial warfare.  However, a look of the actual numbers shows Republicans have directed tax cuts to the middle class, made significant progress on the minority education gap, expended BadgerCare to 100% of the population at poverty below, and made had the largest commitment to fighting domestic violence in the nation.

The annual financial report also shows $141 million more was spent on education than the previous year. Wisconsin’s schools have never been more financially solvent.  Statewide school fund balances rose 32% from 2009 to 2013.  In 2009, schools collectively had a fund balance of $1. 6 billion and in 2013 the total fund balance increased to $2.1 billion.   Additional spending on education is not a measure of success, higher graduation rates and ACT scores are.  ACT scores have increased since 2010.  The last year Democrats were in charge, the high school graduate rate was 85.7%.  In 2013, after three years of Republican control, and Act 10, the state graduation rate increased by 2.3% to 88%.  Measurable progress was made in closing the gap between minority graduation rates and the rest of the state.  In 2010, the African American gradate rate was 60.5% and in 2013 improved to 64.8%.  In 2010, the Hispanic graduation rate was 69% and in 2013 improved to 74%.

How many times have you heard the tired refrain tax cuts for the rich?  The fact is Governor Walker’s tax cuts were targeted to the middle class.  Today’s tax code is more progressive than in 2010.  The bottom tax rate was lowered from 4.6% to 4.0% and the top rate was lowered from 7.75% to 7.65%.  The rich are paying a larger percentage of the total tax bill than they did during the Doyle/Burke administration.

The actual results show the last round of fiscal doom and gloom by Democrats and the media was Enron math.  The actual results reflect significant progress, and if the current trends continue, Wisconsin will end the year with revenue that exceeds expectations by $220 million.

Given the dump heap that was state finances in 2010, Democrats have really forfeited any right statements about government finance. Unfortunately, voters sometimes make the wrong decision and those wrong decisions led to the Deficit Doyle and Democrats Too era of the late 2000s. Politicians need to be prevented from making bad decisions through constitutional limits on spending and tax increases.

You would think that a candidate who has great difficulty coming up with original ideas would be more circumspect about criticizing the source of others’ ideas.

But not Mary Burke, as Christian Schneider reports:

In an interview immediately following revelations that she had lifted swaths of her jobs plan without attribution, gubernatorial candidate Mary Burke explained that the linguistic heist “was about bringing together great ideas, from anywhere.” She added, “I don’t care where they come from, and, in fact, if Wisconsin is going to have a growing, thriving economy, we have got to be open to more new ideas.”

Clearly, Burke has a keen sense of humor, as she has taken to calling her economic plan a “square deal” — a term stolen from Teddy Roosevelt’s domestic program of the same name. Thus, in order to demonstrate her unquenchable thirst for “new” ideas and to prove she’s not a plagiarist, Burke has lifted the uncredited title from a nearly 115-year-old program. As a result, Burke should be arrested for the murder of satire.

But Burke’s supporters evidently do not share her sense of humor. They do care where ideas come from, and even if they are “great” ideas, they may not come from “anywhere.” Specifically, they may not have anything to do with the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

It has become an article of faith in liberal circles to claim that much of Gov. Scott Walker’s agenda was written by the Koch brothers-funded ALEC. Many of the ALEC “model legislation” bills have been conservative ideas for years; but once liberals think they have the ALEC stench on them, they suddenly become “special interest” legislation.

The strategy here is obvious: By tying Republican bills to ALEC, the left can argue that no individual legislator or governor could possibly support such initiatives; that they are being pushed by the same type of moneyed interests Roosevelt fought near the turn of the 20th century. They also claim that Burke’s plagiarism is far less important than Gov. Scott Walker having ALEC write all his bills. (They don’t even sniff the irony of accusing Walker of plagiarism by using the same recycled talking point over and over.)

Of course, taking ideas that have worked in other states and running them through the legislative process isn’t even close to the word-for-word theft Burke’s campaign engaged in. And set aside the hypocrisy of accusing Walker of bowing to “big money” — the centerpiece of Burke’s plan, raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, is an idea straight out of liberal think tanks and big Democratic donors, such as organized labor.

What Walker opponents never mention is the fact that many of the laws the governor signed had never previously passed because of the presence of special interests blocking them. For instance, the world saw what happened when Walker proposed Wisconsin join the 24 states with either limited or no public-sector collective bargaining. The 2011 Capitol eruption was the primary reason previous governors never tussled with the public unions and their funding mechanism — funds that heavily favored Democrats.

In fact, many of the laws Walker has signed have been around for years but were always thwarted by his predecessor, Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle. Doyle routinely resisted expanding the Milwaukee school voucher program, and, just coincidentally, public teachers unions spent millions on his behalf come campaign time. In 2004 and 2006, Doyle vetoed concealed-carry bills, and in 2005 he vetoed a voter identification bill, all of which were sent to him by Republican Legislatures. By the time Walker signed them, both bills had kicked around the Capitol halls for around a decade, and both bills garnered Democratic votes; to lay their passage at the feet of ALEC is preposterous.

In their book More Than They Bargained For, Journal Sentinel reporters Jason Stein and Patrick Marley looked into allegations that ALEC had influenced introduction of Walker’s union plan in early 2011. They found “little evidence that ALEC was directly involved,” with Legislative Reference Bureau deputy chief Cathlene Hanaman saying that there was “no prefab language” supplied to legislative attorneys tasked with drafting the bill.

Those believing ALEC writes Walker’s bills also have little understanding of the legislative process. Other than the budget bill, legislation originates from lawmakers, not from Walker — his primary power is simply approving or denying bills the Legislature sends to him. Bills that are introduced, receive public hearings, are subjected to amendments, pass a full house, then go through the same process in the other house before they reach his desk. Not quite “Walker snaps his fingers and implements ALEC’s agenda.”

The fact is that where the ideas come from is much less important than whether they are good ideas. ALEC’s are here.