Why do you want Walker to clean it up, Vega? he didn’t do it. Let’s let some true criminals do the work. The felling Democrats are a good choice. They could actually do something GOOD for their state for a change.

“Sure, ask the protesters to clean up after themselves. ”

That will never happen.

I’m not sure why you believe Walker is on the hook to clean up after your side.

Is it that you have such low expectation for liberals that you can’t imagine them cleaning up their own messes? Or is everyone else just naturally in a position of cleaning up after liberals because liberals are like so smart and sophisticated that they like totally can’t be bothered with that sort of thing?

Sure, ask the protesters to clean up after themselves.

After that though, send Walker out there to show us how much he really care about saving money. Surely you could do it for less money.

Have you ever given a child a marker?
Same thing happens with a democrat.

More bluster from you, too.

It would be the latter.

Sure, just as soon as I have an opportunity to view the estimate.

Is there a link to documentation of the estimate?

The article says “It was not immediately clear how the estimates were made” and “They need a quote from a company that specializes in cleaning historic surfaces”

So I would guess there is a quote somewhere. Certainly that wouldn’t just be pulling this number out of their ass, right?

Well, if the marble can’t be repaired, it might have to be replaced. Remember, we’re talking about marble which might have been laid a hundred years or more ago. Because of it’s age and wear characteristics, the ‘pores’ of it might be wide open and it might be more susceptible to damage from tape adhesives, especially those parts of it which have been exposed to the weather for a long time. Given its likely age, its reasonable to assume that matching it is going to be difficult, if not impossible.

Marble goes for between $50 and $100 per ft². $7.5MM represents only 75,000 ft² of marble at the high end of that price range, 150,000 ft² at the low end. Plus, it’s not every Tom, Dick or Harry who can tackle a huge job like that – the bidding for that contract is going to be between some large contractors with large labour forces and high prices.

To give you a sense of scale, 75,000 ft² is a space 273.86 ft on a side. Not all that large when considering the size and scale of most state houses. It’s easy to imagine that the plaza, steps and front walls and columns of the WI state house contain perhaps that much marble. Certainly if one considers the interior of the vestibule space and the grand staircase(s) such building generally have, with a marble floor and marble wainscoting on the walls up to 10 or 12 ft, I don’t think it’s out of bounds of possibiltiy that there could be more than 75,000 ft² of marble there.

I’m not saying the estimate isn’t being used for political purposes, I’m saying that the estimate itself, might well be very accurate.

Infidel – I played music on weekends up until I was 45. Every band I ever played with used duct tape to hold down the sea of wires and cables a band uses. Miles of duct tape. All the cabling on the stage; all the cabling connecting the stage with the audio board and PA amps; all the cabling connecting the audio board and PA amps back to the PA speakers. It wasn’t unusual to go through half a dozen rolls of duct tape a night. You’ve got to tape cables down firmly so that people don’t trip over them – there are usually plenty of clumsy drunks around where loud music is being played.

Since bands use so much duct tape, musicians tend to buy the cheapest tape they can find. I used to go for those ’10 rolls for $5′ deals at home centres. The thing about cheap duct tape (I love the stuff that’s so cheap they call it ‘duck tape’) the fabric backing of the tape is weak, thin crap, but they use the gooiest adhesive they could get to compensate for it. It always left marks. Always.

I’ve personally ruined, or contributed to the ruin of dozens of floors, walls and even ceilings over the years from slapping yards of cheap duct tape over them, then unceremoniously ripping it off at some later date. If the tear-off took paint, stain or other decoration off – oops – glad it wasn’t my floor or wall.

I know, I’ve walked out of gigs where I left sticky tape residue on stone floors and walls, even down stone steps. What I don’t remember is whether the stone in question was granite or marble. But given my own personal experience with stone counters, I’m sure that if someone didn’t come by in a short while after we left to get the residue off, it was going to become a permanent mark on the surface. I remember one summer afternoon playing on the marble plaza & steps in front of one of grand old public buildings in Flint, MI. It was easily a hundred degrees and we were in the sun most of the day. That cheap-*ss tape literally melted into the stone. We couldn’t even get all the tape off, let alone the residue.

Sweeping up using blowers is different than removing the chemicals left by tape.

True, but it still can’t come close to the $$$ brought in.