I’ve been on the sidelines long enough.

Here’s what got me off the dime:
Walker’s Trojan Horse (Thanks, Marlene.)

This, in turn, made me see the Senate Democrats’ move in a new light: It affords them — and us — some time to actually examine and bring to light all aspects of this bill.

One final thought: There’s a revenue side to this budget question. Yes, we can actually raise taxes to address state and federal deficits. Our tax burden has steadily been dropping, and government is less and less able to adequately do the jobs most of us want it to do.

The conservative notion that government is bad, and that tax is a four-letter word must be addressed directly:

1. we do want decent schools
2. we do want clean water
3. we do want honest and fair business transactions
4. we do want decent roads
5. etc.

What’s going on in Madison isn’t about convincing some crazed conservative politicians, temporarily in charge of our state government. It’s about convincing the 50% of the people who didn’t vote, yet support our core values, that the state and country they love are being run into ruin by the right-wing — and they can stop it by making their voices heard above the conservative noise machine.

We’re making a good noise in Madison.