The thing about Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is that less is more. If you're a national voter, his run for the presidency is a new thing and so, mostly, is he. He's a fresh face, and at first his generally low-key style tends to work, especially compared against the backdrop of other, uniformly loud-mouthed GOP presidential candidates.
But as time goes on you may begin to notice that Walker -- here and there, purposely or off the cuff -- disrupts the carefully crafted mien of a reasonable and moderate statesman, as when on Tuesday he extemporized his complaints about LGBT rights in the Boy Scouts and then, as is typical of him, had to walk (or perhaps "walker") back the comment the next day.
Many of us in Wisconsin have long since gotten past the "less is more" stage and regard Walker's presence as more than our fill of unhappy governing and poor policy. For us, Walker represents a "less is less" standard, and as time goes on there's only more of that less. We're hanging on and waiting in expectation for national correspondents and news media to review the record and compare with reality Walker's self-congratulatory rhetoric on "fixing" a "broke" state by being a "fighter" who is "unintimidated."
Surely we'll get there. Until then, on the presidential campaign trail right now it's all mostly about the sizzle of Walker's rhetoric and not the meat of his ideas and policies.
For example, over at The Blaze, a post shared how some reporters were impressed to see the Wisconsin governor delivering his presidential campaign announcement remarks Monday without a teleprompter -- unlike that black guy in the White House and, incidentally, unlike every other president since JFK. This was big! BIG! Or it was just sizzle turned fizzle.
Overlooked by the reporters was that, except for the paragraph or so that covered the anti-climatic announcement of his actual candidacy, the speech has for months pretty much been Walker's stump speech. He wasn't yet an announced candidate in previous outings (although he played one on TV), but he has given variants of this speech many times. Actual presidents give new speeches all the time, and they have far less time to memorize, nor is it often wise to extemporize.
Now, some people apparently including Walker are good at memorization; ask any successful Shakespearean actor. But you won't likely want them as your president, any more than they likely would hire the governor from Wisconsin as their Hamlet understudy.
Let's walk through more of Walker's mien and mind, and briefly survey where this all leads. Join me past the fold.