An independent candidate for Wisconsin Governor has a bunch of ideas he thinks can help turn the state around, if he could get the kind of attention major party candidates receive. Jim Langer is a full-time truck driver who served six years on the village board in Germantown. Obviously, he has an uphill battle. “It’s very hard,” Langer conceded at a recent candidates forum in Loyal. He receives no state money because he failed to raise the minimum of $54,000 necessary to receive state matching funds. “I’m out here for the working people, so I’m dealing with people that are on wage give backs, like myself. I’m dealing with people who are unemployment, and I’m dealing with people on fixed incomes,” said Langer, who figures he’s raised about $700.
What keeps him going? “Just the people that I’ve talked to, they all say they’re fed up with the parties, and I am as well. There’s good people on both sides, the problem is getting them to work together. If I don’t elected, but they take some of my ideas, guess what? I’ve won. And Langer has some interesting ideas. He’s all for legalizing marijuana, at least for medicinal purposes. “I don’t think it’s any different than alcohol. We had prohibition back in the thirties on alcohol. Guess what? It’s legal, somebody found a way to tax it, make money on it, and take a look at the problems we have with alcohol right now. I don’t the problem with marijuana is anywhere near as severe as the problem with alcohol is.”
