Gov. Scott Walker earns national praise for speech in Iowa

We're fresh off a weekend that some political experts are calling the unofficial kickoff to the 2016 presidential campaign, and guess who's generating the most buzz?

“Scott Walker impresses at Iowa Freedom Summit, strongly hints at 2016 bid” , reads a headline from the Washington Times.

“Best in show—Wisconsin's Scott Walker outshines competition in Iowa”, a headline on slate.com.

“Walking away with It-- Walker Shines at Iowa Freedom Summit”, a headline from the Iowa Republican reads.

Almost everywhere you turn, you can find some national editorial saying Governor Scott Walker was the big winner over the weekend. In fact, every speech from last weekend's conservative Iowa Freedom Summit is up on c-span.com, and Walker's speech has been watched more than double the amount of any other.

For all the praise he's getting nationally, back here in Wisconsin Democrats say the state's current budget is in such bad shape it needs a budget repair bill. They are as critical as ever of the Governor saying his full attention needs to be on this state.

“We're walking down the road to having Scott Walker spend more time out of Wisconsin than in Wisconsin, and that's not what he said he'd do. When he campaigned he said he'd be here. He'd be working on putting Wisconsin back to work; making sure Wisconsin had a balanced budget. That's not what he's doing now.\" said Mike Tate, the chairman of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin.

According to the Associated Press, Walker is already scheduled to travel to New Hampshire in March to speak a Republican Party event. We reached out to the Republican Party of Wisconsin and Scott Walker's campaign spokesman for a comment, neither got back to us at the time of this post.