Former Congressman Mark Neumann announced on right-wing talk radio Monday that he was going to run for the U.S. Senate in Wisconsin. There are a lot of reasons that Mark Neumann is bad for all of us, but these show that he's so far out of the mainstream. Mark Neumann is just another ideologue who will push his right-wing social agenda on all of us.

1. He's said he intends to secure the support of Club for Growth. You might remember them as the right-wing Norquist-like group that goes after Republican elected officials who cast more moderate votes. They previously ran ads against U.S. Senators who opposed the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. With policies like this, working families are going to have a hard time getting by with Mark Neumann as a Senator.
2. When Neumann ran for governor in 2010 he ran on repealing the groundbreaking health insurance reform law that gave millions of people and families the right to insurance despite being diagnosed with a pre-existing condition. Newman renewed his pledge to work, in his capacity, if elected, to overturn that law. Turning your back on the sick in their time of need is horrifying enough - campaigning on it is flat out wrong.
3. When Neumann ran against former Senator Russ Feingold in 1998 he ran on a campaign against President Bill Clinton's "spend, spend, and spend" policies - sound familiar? You remember those policies, right? The ones that gave us record surpluses and balanced the budget? He was also heavily involved with then Speaker Newt Gingrich to prevent tax increases. With Club for Growth at his back - Neumann is unlikely to change his support of billionaire subsidies that hurt the working families of Wisconsin.
4. But fiscal irresponsibility isn't Neumann's only flaw - his extremist philosophies are deeply discriminatory. In a widely reported address to the La Crosse Christian Coalition in 1997, according to Uppity Wisconsin, Neumann said that he would never hire an LGBT person in his legislative office if they applied for a position.

“If somebody walks in to me and say, ‘I’m a gay person; I want a job in your office.’ I would say, ‘that’s inappropriate’ and they wouldn’t be hired because that would mean they are promoting their agenda. The gay and lesbian lifestyle (is) unacceptable, lest there be any question about that.”

5. Most frightening, however, is Mark Neumann’s stance on a woman’s right to choose. Neumann was endorsed by Pro-Life Wisconsin which “opposes abortion even in the case of rape, incest and for the mother’s life.” Neumann scored a 100 percent grade on Pro-Life Wisconsin’s survey “vowing to support a complete abortion ban without exception..." The PLW also opposes all forms of birth control access for women. They oppose birth control pills, condoms, and other preventative measures that give women control over their health. Neumann was so proud of this he further pledged "to protect pharmacists who refuse to dispense birth control on religious grounds.”