Until this past fall, most residents of Milwaukee County didn�t even know the name of our county executive. He was a colorless little man in a colorless little post. Then he got caught up in a scandal. Unlike the Mayor, he did not mess around with women. While Milwaukee is fairly conservative, politicians here still can weather a bit of a sex scandal. The bit where the woman accuses the Mayor of asking her to put an apple between her knees is a little racy for this town but we�d made it through the Lewinsky business without fainting so we were prepared to handle it.

The County Executive, however, finds himself in the kind of scandal that will not blow over. Milwaukeans are cheap. His scandal involves our money�lots of our money. His problem is bigger than the money, though. We seem not to rouse ourselves when a lot of money goes from Joe on the street to corporate welfare. We can stand the money going to corporations. His problem is that the money in his scandal concerns pensions.

What has happened is that the county pensions have been sweetened, really sweetened. Our County Executive himself (as well as many other top figures) ran through a pension plan that gives lump-sum payments, generous pensions, and payout for remaining sick leave. Somewhere, somehow, he seems to have missed one of the big changes in this town. He seems to have missed the years of beer company retirees and other company guy retirees losing health benefits they were promised and, in many cases, having their pensions yanked as we became part of the rust belt. He seems to have missed the deep fear and anger among a generation who votes. Combine �taking my money and I�m on a fixed income� with �for someone to get a much better pension than me� and you�re talking volatile.

But yesterday our County Executive outdid himself in misreading the community that he used to claim to know so well. He filed a lawsuit against a group of senior citizens spearheading a recall campaign for failing to file a document that the election commission told them they did not have to file. He then was stupid enough to have his attorney suggest that the document intentionally was not filed for some advantage although even the attorney could not figure out what advantage it would confer. The attorney couldn�t figure out the advantage because the form would have contained no information not already known. If he had any hope of forestalling recall, he just deep-sixed it.

I�ve not signed any recall petitions. The damage is done on the money front and due to arcane pension laws apparently cannot be undone. Recall elections are expensive and this guy does not have much time left to serve. I guess I�m a cheap Milwaukean too. I don�t want to pay for the recall on top of everything else. Besides, I see some talk radio and other folk rushing to the forefront of this recall effort and it makes me queasy and uneasy.

But if all these petitions that Joe and Mary and Stan collected standing out in the cold in front of supermarkets go on these grounds, I would reconsider if they tried again. I would do it not because I would be more of a believer in recall but because we rely on their faith in process.

So, County Executive, bring on the lawsuit. Try to kill democracy in action in order to save it. For once, I�m feeling hopeful that such tactics won�t work. When it�s all over, I think we�ll still be able to utter our local slogan with pride: Thank goodness we�re not Chicago.

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