{image1}It came a something of a surprise when state Rep. Jeff Stone announced he would start the process to get the twice-vetoed, twice-killed photo ID bill amended into the Wisconsin Constitution.

The surprise wasn't that Republicans want to walk their mandatory voter ID proposal down the constitutional aisle.

The surprise was that the intention came from Stone, a Greendale Republican who has been something of a disappearing political species around the Wisconsin State Capitol: The Moderate Republican.

But the radical right, led by the Assembly speaker and now-congressional hopeful John Gard, rules the GOP in the Legislature, where leaders have settled on a three-legged strategy:

• Embed the right-wing agenda in the state constitution.

• Keep relentless pressure on Gov. Jim Doyle, a first-term Democrat up for re-election next year.

• Win at all costs, even resorting to regular use of Wisconsin's nuclear (constitutional) option, even though politics is really an arena of compromise, not a zero-sum game.

Stone's constitutional ploy fell right into line after the Assembly failed to muster the votes to overcome Doyle's second veto of the mandatory voter ID scheme and before a report out of the U.S. attorney's office that emboldened photo ID fanatics. Doyle's veto came because the bill would have unfairly encumbered the basic voting rights of students, the poor and the elderly.

The override faltered with the help of Republican defectors, by the way, because the bill's flaws were so transparent and purported to fix 2004 election fraud that still is more smoke than fire.

Wisconsin Republicans are also elevating what is basically a moral and religious position against same-sex marriages and civil unions into another proposed constitutional prohibition; that one likely will be on the November 2006 ballot with Doyle in an effort to spike conservative turnout.

The GOP is willing to add these restrictions to the constitution even though this most basic legal document exists to bolster citizens' rights against infringement or denial, including by government itself -- exposing the Republicans willingness to contort the Constitution into the one thing it was never intended to be: a discriminatory document.

The state Republican Party has another yet announced design on the state constitution, and this is the most obviously partisan and political of them all: turning the so-called Taxpayer's Bill of Rights into -- what else? -- a constitutional amendment.

Because we have had heavy spending by state and local officials who couldn't live within a budget, or, conversely, because we have had spending actually backed by officials and their constituents, Republicans want to restrict taxation and spending by constitutional amendment.

There is already a host of such controls: Regular elections, where you throw the bums out. Recall elections, too, where you toss the bums out even faster. How about good, old-fashioned, righteous public pressure? Using the news media and its modern offshoots -- cable TV, talk radio, e-mail and blogs? And don't forget some really, really old-fashioned, once-fashionably conservative practices and beliefs --local control and home rule?

The entire democratic process, come to think of it, should be aimed at citizen management of government actions, like taxation and spending and setting public priorities.

Doyle correctly vetoed the lazy approach sought by lawmakers who wanted legislation to rein themselves in -- so Republicans shifted that battle to the constitutional process, too, because the amending process is one that Doyle cannot block by veto. Pass an amendment in two consecutive legislative sessions, and it goes straight to the voters.

By keeping the constitutional merry-go-round spinning, the GOP is conducting what has become an endless campaign cycle set on autopilot against Doyle -- using the expensive, taxpayer-paid machinery of the legislative process for electoral gains.

These are the Republicans who say they want cuts in state spending and claim to be the party of fiscal discipline, but look at the expenditure of time and money to keep this spin cycle whirring for partisan purposes.

Talk about hypocrisy! It doesn't get any more blatant.

Unless you remember that the GOP claims to be the party of small government; yet state budgets, spending and costly highway debt blew up exponentially under Republican Tommy Thompson's long leadership, and often with the help of some of the very Republicans now demanding a fiscal constitutional amendment to save themselves from themselves.

Come to think of it, the GOP's biggest fake claim is that it's the conservative party, but it's hard to see any conserving or outright conservation going on.

Whether it's treating the Wisconsin constitution with disrespect, or dishonoring the deliberative traditions of the U.S. Senate or endangering state and federal fresh water, timber and petroleum resources, contemporary Republicanism is more and more about easy fixes and short-term consumption than it is about wise governance or a cautious, long-term, conservative view.

These tactics may be immediately gratifying, but no partisan advantage lasts forever. Events and priorities and public attitudes change. Always have. Always will.

Scorched-earth, constitution-tampering in Madison or in Washington, DC, will further inflame an electorate that is already divided several ways -- not just Red vs. Blue.

Could there be a worse insult by Republicans to the legacy of Abraham Lincoln, their party's spiritual founder, and to his inspiring and defining words about the benefits of the common good and the dangers of a house divided against itself?

James Rowen is a veteran journalist and policy adviser who used to work in the administration of former Mayor John Norquist.

The opinions expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect the opinions of OnMilwaukee.com, its advertisers or editorial staff.

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