Last night’s recall election in Wisconsin, in which Governor Scott Walker defeated Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett by a 7 percent margin and outspent him seven to one, is a powerful lesson about a new era of unlimited money in politics, says Nation political writer John Nichols in this appearance on Democracy Now! The results have major implications for fall elections, and Nichols explains some of the hard lessons Democrats will have to apply come November if they want to prove that “people power” trumps “money power.”

—Elizabeth Whitman