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Grace Voss: Wisconsin needs to lead on farm worker protection
Protecting farmworker health through climate-responsive labor standards is not only a moral imperative, it’s essential for the resilience of Wisconsin’s agricultural future.

Mike McCabe: New dog, old trick
Zohran Mamdani was just elected in one of the few places in the country that still allows a once-common practice called fusion voting, a practice that made Abraham Lincoln’s presidency possible.

Dave Cieslewicz: Sunset of Trump?
That orange glow you see on the horizon may be Donald Trump setting in the west.

Peter Schubert: Milwaukee can benefit from pocket urbanism
Imagine a string of pocket districts along the lake and river: each with its own identity, but connected by transit, trails, and curated experiences.

Gregg Hoffmann: Pros and cons of data centers
Water guzzling, jobs costing, high tech monsters or the future of communications and business. Those extremes can all be found in news coverage and discussions of data centers.

Dan Knodl: Lawmakers owe victims as much compassion as they give inmates
We can support decent conditions in our prisons and still remember who the justice system was built to protect.

Brian Fox and Tulio de Oliveira: Science without borders: How Wisconsin and Stellenbosch are redefining collaboration
What began as an exchange between individual researchers has become a partnership that reflects how science can advance discovery, education and innovation on a global scale.

Claire Reid: Money now more important than Milton or Macbeth at UW schools
Dramatically fewer University of Wisconsin System students are pursuing degrees in the humanities — including English, history and the arts — than a decade ago.

William Osmulski: Weighting criteria, not cut scores, masking underachievement in Wisconsin Schools
Although the new cut scores get the blame for inflating school and district performance, the real culprit is the practice of category weighting.

Michael Barrett and Pamela Barrett: Green efforts stymied by state bureaucracy
Our little neighborhood bar, the Harmony Bar & Grill, attempted to work with the state’s energy efficiency program, Focus on Energy, as we upgraded refrigeration, HVAC, insulation and advanced energy controls to maximal EnergyStar standards. At every turn, Focus blocked these Inflation Reduction Act-eligible energy efficiency investments.

Maya Livni: We can be a plastic-free Milwaukee if we demand action that protects our planet
Plastics are not just a pollution problem — they are a fossil-fuel problem, a public-health problem, and a climate problem.

Michelle Bryant: The power and peril of political rhetoric
Expressing frustration or disappointment is natural, but we must avoid rhetoric that inadvertently undermines our own causes, provides ammunition for those who would use our words against us, and could lead to our own peril.

Bill Kaplan: No Democratic circular firing squad
On Election Day, voters took a big step toward a Democratic wave in 2026. Democratic unity is essential to winning a Democratic-led Congress.

Paul Fanlund: Democrats should just shut up and watch Trump flail
It appears many Democrats never heard the adage, “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

Arthur I. Cyr: Dem gains may not translate to 2026 elections
Some limited wins are still a long way from decisive victory in next year’s midterm Congressional elections, when the voters will choose the entire House of Representatives and one-third of the members of the Senate.

Gregory Humphrey: Johnson should not collect $500,000 for his January 6th actions
For Johnson to now have the ability for financial compensation from the very government whose democratic processes he sought to disrupt is completely offensive to the principles of public service.

WisOpinion: ‘The Insiders’ discuss a bipartisan vote to audit the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction
The WisOpinion Insiders, Chvala and Jensen, discuss the recent bipartisan Legislative Audit Committee vote to audit the Department of Public Instruction following a series of issues involving the department. Sponsored by the Wisconsin Counties Association and the Tommy G. Thompson Center on Public leadership.

Erik Iverson: 100 years and counting: WARF dollars spurring innovation
Over the course of our 100 years, through patenting, licensing and investing, WARF has provided more than $4.5 billion in support to the university. That funding has advanced scientific research in every field you can imagine—from life-saving medical treatments to groundbreaking work in energy, engineering, and beyond.

Mark Lisheron: Most UW System schools’ enrollments are stagnant as tech colleges flourish
While undergraduate enrollment in most University of Wisconsin System schools trends downward, there has been a dramatic increase in students choosing the state’s technical colleges since the pandemic.

George Mitchell: DPI dupes Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
The Journal Sentinel took DPI’s bait and left its readers with a completely misleading impression of choice school results.

WisOpinion: ‘The Insiders’ assess the GOP field for Wisconsin governor
The WisOpinion Insiders, Chvala and Jensen, look at who’s in and who’s out in the GOP field for Wisconsin governor. Sponsored by the Wisconsin Counties Association and the Tommy G. Thompson Center on Public Leadership.

Rewind: Your Week in Review for Oct. 10
On this week’s episode of “Rewind,” WisPolitics.com’s JR Ross and Wisconsin Public Radio Capitol Reporter Anya Van Wagtendonk discuss the governor’s race, a Waukesha County judge’s ruling requiring state election officials to verify voters’ citizenship, the continuing fight over legislative oversight of administrative rules and more.