On... progress?

Here's the thing: The Godwalker's bill was always going to pass the state Assembly.  After a grueling 61-hours of debate that started Tuesday afternoon, the bill's passing just after 1 a.m. on Friday morning was an inescapable eventuality.  With an Assembly of 60 Republicans, 38 Democrats and a lone Independent, not even a U.S. Army Psy-Ops team could have swung the vote enough to prevent its passing.  While the vote was 51-17, four Republicans broke party ranks, siding with each Democrat who voted.  Siding with each Democrat who voted, it is noted, because 28 total lawmakers did not.

28 didn't vote?  On a state bill that dominated national airwaves and the blogosphere much of the week?  What happened?

Legislative chaos and a rushed vote happened, the result of Republicans exercising a rarely used rule to suspend debate.  This nuclear option demands 15 members to second it, but:

Assembly Chief Clerk Patrick Fuller said afterward he was not sure whether that had occurred, saying he had heard the order to start a vote on the final passage of the bill and had done so.

Later Rep. Kelda Helen Roys (D-Madison) said, "We never imagined they would do it as they did, not even properly using the nuclear option." 

Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca (D-Kenosha) said Democrats would "explore every option" in deciding whether or not to challenge the vote.

To recap: Assembly Republicans have better than a 3:2 advantage of their opposition and they can't even get the vote done proper.  The Titanic gleefully greets another member of the 'foul up of a colossal magnitude' club.

The Assembly Democrats obviously took this well:

Democrats erupted after the vote, throwing papers and what appeared to be a drink in the air. They denounced the move to cut off debate, questioning for the second time in the night whether the proper procedure had been followed.

"Shame! Shame! Shame!" Democrats shouted in the faces of Republicans as the GOP lawmakers quietly filed off the floor and a police officer stood between opposing lawmakers.

"Cowards all! You’re all cowards," yelled Rep. Brett Hulsey (D-Madison) as another Democrat tried to calm him down.

The Godwalker will, with the tact of the proverbial bull in a china store, frame this passing later today as a democratically-elected body doing their democratic jobs and go on to note how much he hopes the Senate Democrats will end their tomfoolery in Rockford or Chicago--not Madison--and come home to do theirs.  To come home and do their jobs to prevent the needless laying off of thousands of state employees.  That they are directly and wholly accountable for public employees potentially being laid off.  That this is only about balancing the budget and nothing else. Governor Walker will say this because intellectual honesty is not a goal he strives for, and to expect anything else from him now would be a shining beacon on one's insanity.

But this is not to say the situation is void of hope or to say progress is an uncrossable Rubicon.  Four Republicans--who voted, one must hysterically have to add--broke rank and sided with the Democrats unanimously opposed to the bill.  The four Republicans: Dean Kaufert, Neenah; Lee Nerison, Westby; Richard Spanbauer, Oshkosh; Travis Tranel, Cuba City.  To laud these legislators as heroes is too much, but in the face of a bill with bantam hope of being stopped and in the face of an objectively deceitful, dishonest and disingenuous Governor's office, these four Republicans have stood tall to prove that this day is not yet over. That light can still reach them. That the black hole of propaganda and disinformation pushed by the Governor's office and regurgitated by Senate Republicans cannot yet trap the truth.  That the Senate Democrats are not undertaking a Sisyphean endeavor.  Not yet.  Not damn yet.