Wisconsin Republicans may not be scientists or believe much in logic or science, but they're working overtime to make the quantum-physics hypothesis of parallel universes a functional reality. Because while they clearly inhabit an alternate reality where Democrats are evil masterminds while the GOP is a crusading, grass-roots reform group, the rest of us live in a universe that in those respects is pretty much just the opposite. Consider this set of facts, dating back to 2010 and fresh right up to new revelations this week:

1. As Milwaukee County executive, Scott Walker ran an inner office that contained an illegal, secret, private email system that Walker aides used to avoid Open Records laws in doing the public's business.

2. A "John Doe" probe (akin to a grand jury proceeding in other states) looked into that secret email system among other issues and eventually several top Walker aides were convicted of felonies as a result.

3. The Doe probe, meanwhile, triggered a second Doe investigation that eventually focused on potentially illegal coordination between Walker's gubernatorial campaign and supposedly independent "dark money" groups aiding his election with huge spending.

4. Conservatives, including some of those dark money groups, sued in every available (but only friendly) court alleging the probe was a Democratic "witch hunt" (even though it was run by a bipartisan group of district attorneys and a GOP special prosecutor), and that their reputations and free-speech rights were violated by the Doe inquiry -- even though the Doe proceedings were secret by law until conservatives leaked word of the case to the press (but only, e.g, the Wall Street Journal, friendly press).

5. Predictably, the friendly courts, including the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which includes several justices ELECTED WITH HUGE FINANCIAL HELP FROM THOSE SAME DARK MONEY GROUPS as well as a former Wisconsin GOP legislator, agreed to quash the Doe proceeding (it remains in limbo, pending possible appeal).

6. Victory for conservative principles! Which apparently include lying, illegally leaking sealed court documents, violating anti-coordination campaign spending laws, attempting to silence the prosecutors they've accused, destroying evidence, and more. Meanwhile:

7. Thanks to an aggressive Madison TV news station, we now know that Gov. Scott Walker's office has had the very same kind of secret, illegal email system that existed in his county office and which led to those Walker staff convictions. None of which we'd know about if it weren't for Wisconsin's election finance laws, the John Doe process, and state Open Records Laws, along with the state's non-partisan Government Accountability Board (GAB), which assisted in the Doe inquiry as part of its operating mandate.

8. Which is why, obviously, Wisconsin Republican legislators are blitzkrieging through a package of bills right now that would 1.) Gut the Doe process; 2.) replace the GAB with a partisan elections board along the lines of the Federal Election Commission, ensuring that nothing useful will actually ever come out of it 3.) gut the state's Open Records laws; 4.) gut the state's election finance laws. And in some cases make these "reforms" retroactive, potentially masking other past political misdeeds.

So, for Wisconsin citizens who actually care about the rule of law, good government, open government and democracy itself? It is gut-check time.

Also read the stunning new article here from UrbanMilwaukee.com, which lays out the newest on the Walker secret emails.

And remember: Until recently, Walker was the GOP presidential candidate who didn't hesitate to criticize Hillary Clinton for having government correspondence on a private email server, like several secretaries of state before her -- not even, mind you, a SECRET server maintained INSIDE government, like Walker's, but a legal, known one, set up in her home and overtly traceable to State Department email servers.

Can it get more Alice in Wonderland than all of the above? Three words: Mad Tea Party!