Opinion

Cheeseheads in black robes

To many people, Wisconsin has a reputation for clean, honest politics as practiced by its farm-fresh Green Bay Packers fans. Guess again.

Right now, the Badger State is embroiled in an ongoing, union-led effort to recall its Republican governor, Scott Walker.

His crime? Trying to bring some fiscal sanity to Wisconsin — in the form of pension and collective-bargaining reforms.

Which, needless to say, has made him Public Enemy No. 1 to Big Labor.

As well as to much of Wisconsin’s judiciary, apparently.

Seems that 29 judges — about 12 percent of the statewide total — were among the signers of petitions to get a recall-Walker initiative on the Wisconsin ballot.

And not a single one of them thinks there’s anything ethically improper about being directly involved in partisan politics.

First Amendment free-speech rights and all that, you know.

Indeed, the reasoning used by some of the judges (who were outed by the Sheboygan Press) to defend their joining the Dump Walker campaign is so tortured it should be subject to UN sanctions.

“I wasn’t advocating for any political party,” said County Judge Mark Warpinski. “I was advocating for the recall process, which I thought was completely separate and apart.”

Especially outrageous is the fact that one judge never disclosed that he’d signed the petition when he issued a temporary restraining order against one of Walker’s voter-ID bills.

Perfectly neutral, huh?

This is the kind of thing that even New York’s judges would be too ashamed to try.

Well, some of them, anyway.

Because of their inability to control their partisan instincts, the Wisconsin 29 may have made themselves heroes of the left, but they’ve morally disqualified themselves from hearing any matter involving either Walker or the Republican Party.

And if they don’t understand why, they don’t belong on the bench — period.