NEWS BLOG (WSAU) With no disrespect to the supporters of Scott Walker, Tom Barrett is now the front-runner in the race for Governor.

Barrett, to most Wisconsinites, is a blank slate. And no candidate is ever more popular when than when the voters can fill in the blanks on their own. And the one thing that most voters know about Barrett is overwhelmingly positive. He risked his life to break up a fight between a young thug and an elderly woman in the parking lot of the state fairgrounds, and paid for it with a severe beating.

Barrett already has a war-chest of $800,000, and he will undoubtedly have access to some of the $2.5-million that Governor Doyle has on-hand. And he will be the beneficiary of landslide support in Madison and Milwaukee, our state's biggest population centers. As a matter of geography, Barrett takes away some of Walker's advantage of being from Milwaukee, too.

What's Barrett's biggest weakness? It may be that he appears not to want the job. There's been a great deal of reporting that Barrett didn't want to enter the race. It's fairly clear that his family needed some convincing too. Scott Walker wants to be Governor. He has for a long time. His challenge is to convince the voters that it's an important difference between the two candidates.

Chris Conley
Operations Manager, Midwest Communications-Wausau
11.15.09