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Wisconsin Green Party candidate Nelson Eisman will be in La Crosse today, trying to grab a sliver of the statewide media attention from incumbent Democrat Jim Doyle and Republican challenger Mark Green.
Nelson won’t be on the tube with Doyle and Green because he’s not polling above 10 percent, the criteria set by We The People Wisconsin, which organized the debate. In a recent poll, Eisman had 3 percent.
“Three percent is wonderful,” Eisman said, given that “day in and day out, my name is not in the news articles.”
Because the Republican candidate’s last name is Green, Eisman joked that he should have changed his name to “Vote Republican.”
Eisman and his wife of 30 years live in Madison and have three children and three grandchildren. He’s a public employee and chairman of the Madison Commission on the Environment, a member of the Dane County Regional Planning Commission, and “a Universal Life minister who does free weddings and funerals and believes in a totally secular government.”
The subject of tonight’s debate is quality-of-life issues such as education, health care, the marriage amendment, campaign finance reform, immigration, energy and transportation.
Eisman said if he were in the room with Doyle and Green, he’d talk about “what people need from their government” instead of political wedge issues such as the death penalty and the “marriage protection act” and stem cell research.
“The people of Wisconsin need fully funded public education, not by the property tax but by a progressive income tax,” Eisman said. Corporations, which now pay one of the lowest income tax rates in the country, need to pay more to support education, he said.
“The people of Wisconsin need universal health care like they have in Canada,” Eisman said. “We don’t have to wait for the federal government.” Wisconsin businesses would benefit and gain a competitive advantage because they wouldn’t have to pay such high insurance premiums, he said.
Chrysler saves 40 percent on the cost of building minivans in Canada because of universal health care, Eisman said. “We can do it in Wisconsin.”
Eisman said he’d talk about paying for prenatal care and other programs that will improve Wisconsinite’s quality of life. He’d also make sure Wisconsin schools provided a nutritious meal to every student.
Reid Magney can be reached at (608) 791-8211 or rmagney@lacrossetribune.com.
