A Drug To End All Drugs, Public Funding Poll, Wisconsin’s Progressive Legend

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It seems like every decade brings a new highly addictive drug that rolls across the country, crushing the communities it comes into contact with. Rob Ferrett speaks with a writer who suggests the government create a drug to give to the masses that excludes the negative side effects of drugs like crack, heroin, and meth. Then he talks with a guest about a poll regarding attitutdes towars public funding for a new Bucks arena, and explores the man behind Wisconsin’s Progressive Party – Robert La Follette.

Featured in this Show

  • Progressive Legend Robert M. La Follette Sr. Spent Formative Years In Madison

    Progressive leader Robert M. La Follette Sr. is most readily remembered for his time in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, as well as for his time as Wisconsin’s governor during the late 19th Century and early 20th Century. But those years often overshadow his early years as a student and young district attorne which would shape the foundation of the his later political career.

    “He was the first governor born in the state, and the first to attend the University of Wisconsin, where he was actually quite a bad student,” said Jonathan Kasparek, a professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Waukesha.

    Kasparek said that in those days, the faculty would vote on whether or not a student would graduate. The vote on La Follette resulted in a tie. Then-UW President John Bascom had to cast a deciding vote, ultimately letting La Follette graduate in 1879.

    While not a great student academically, Kasparek said La Follette was exceedingly popular, and learned early on that he could translate that popularity into organizing people. He bought the student paper and began organizing a political campaign for student government.

    In addition, he won an inter-state oratorical competition, which Kasparek said turned La Follette into a campus hero.

    “He learned that he had the ability to motivate people, and to speak and speak well,” Kasparek said.

    After a short legal career, La Follette successfully ran for public office in 1880, becoming the district attorney of Dane County.

    “He did it mostly because he needed the money,” Kasparek said.

    It was during this campaign that La Follette began to show signs of the anti-establishment attitude that would come to define the later years of his political career. Kasparek said La Follette engaged in a confrontation with the postmaster of Madison, who told him the Republican Party already had a candidate running for district attorney, and La Follette wouldn’t be needed. That didn’t sit well with him, so he decided to take a grassroots approach to earning the nomination, going door-to-door in Dane County to talk with voters.

    “La Follette learned that if he appealed directly to the voters, on a one-to-one basis, he could convince them that he would be more interested, and would look out better for their interests than the party bosses they had been voting for,” Kasparek said.

    With that, La Follette entered the world of electoral politics, where he’d go on to have a long and well-documented career.

    Kasparek said his political spirit is still channeled by the politicians of today.

    “Wisconsin voters seem to really like those kinds of politicians that are willing to be independent,” he said. “Both Democrats and Republicans sort of claim that insurgency and populism.”

  • Government Should Help Build A Better Drug?

    The U.S. government shoiuld fund a contest to develop a new recreational drug without harmful side effects. That’s the case made in a recent Reason magazine column; the writer says it’s a smarter plan than current anti-drug efforts.

  • Poll Shows Opposition To Public Funding For New Bucks Arena

    A new poll suggests regional and statewide opposition to public funding for a new Milwaukee Bucks arena. The president of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association for Commerce says despite the numbers, there’s still plenty of good reasons to think about a new arena in downtown Milwaukee.

  • Robert La Follette Shaped Wisconsin Politics

    Robert La Follette touched a lot of bases in Wisconsin politics. He served as a member of the US House of Representatives, was the Governor of Wisconsin, and was also a US Senator from 1906 to 1925. He ran for President of the United States as the nominee of his own Progressive Party in 1924. As Wisconsin gears up for another gubernatorial election, we’ll look back on the influential career of Fighting Bob La Fallotte with Jonathan Kasparek, professor of history at the UW-Waukesha and author of Fighting Phil: A Biography of Philip La Follette.

Episode Credits

  • Rob Ferrett Host
  • Veronica Rueckert Host
  • Chris Malina Producer
  • Jonathan Kasparek Guest
  • Greg Beato Guest
  • Timothy Sheehy Guest
  • Jonathan Kasparek Guest