Wow – from Wispolitics.com:

— Republican Scott Walker plans to withdraw from the governor\’s race and plans to throw his support behind GOP rival Mark Green, according to a top GOP source. See more in the right-hand column at www.wispolitics.com

The original Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article is here.

Let\’s see – the chair of the national Republican Party, Ken Mehlman, tours the state on Thursday, and Walker drops out on Friday – think a discussion was had between Walker and the big shots? The GOP is desperate to have a Republican Governor in Wisconsin in 2008 to help organize support for whomever might be their presidential nominee. It only made sense that they thought Walker was in the way of a strong Green challenge to Doyle.

Walker was a good candidate and will move on to higher office in some capacity. Best of luck to him. Hopefully, the party will take care of him in his next endeavor in exchange for gracefully bowing out now. Here\’s his statement.

The aggressive tactics he started a few weeks ago signaled that he was in need of a Hail-Mary. He must have looked at his polling and tried to take one more big shot, and when those fell flat, it was probably the end.

And while this is bad news for Walker, it is great news for Republicans. In fact, Walker and Jim Doyle are the big losers today. Doyle is now looking squarely down the barrel of a multi-million dollar Green war chest and sagging approval ratings that rival Billy Packer\’s. The cannons can turn on him now, as opposed to September. Not even the fundraising prowess of his toupee can get him out of this.

Now we can get on to discussing the issues that the public is really interested in – like whether Green\’s campaign manager likes Limp Bizkit or not. Or whether he once went to a Bucks game.