When Scott Walker looks back at the ashes of his brief fling as a presidential wannabe he may well realize how much he has in common with Julius Caesar.

It was 44 B. C. when Caesar was killed by Brutus and others in the month of March. The Ides of March marked the turning point in the history of the Roman empire.

This March may well mark the turning point in the political career and aspirations of Scott Walker.

The engineer of his downfall is not a Brutus-like traitor but the man who is, perhaps, the best investigative reporter of our generation. And he’s not some partisan political hack masquerading behind a blog or something.

Michael Isikoff is the chief investigative reporter for Yahoo. He’s worked at NBC, the Washington Post and Newsweek. He broke the Monica Lewinsky scandal that almost brought about the fall of a Democratic president. He got a white paper that laid out some of the previously unknown justifications behind the Obama administration’s killing of Americans in drone attacks.

He’s written about the the war on terror and treatment of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay. He doesn’t have a partisan bone in his body of work. And now he’s got Scott Walker up against the fence.  

Here are the first four paragraphs of the piece he wrote this week:

"John Menard Jr. is widely known as the richest man in Wisconsin. A tough-minded, staunchly conservative 75-year-old billionaire, he owns a highly profitable chain of hardware stores throughout the Midwest.

"He’s also famously publicity-shy – rarely speaking in public or giving interviews. So a little more than three years ago, when Menard wanted to back Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker – and help advance his pro-business agenda – he found the perfect way to do so without attracting any attention: He wrote more than $1.5 million in checks to a pro-Walker political advocacy group that pledged to keep its donors secret, three sources directly familiar with the transactions told Yahoo News.

"Menard’s previously unreported six-figure contributions to the Wisconsin Club for Growth – a group that spent heavily to defend Walker during a bitter 2012 recall election – seem to have paid off for the businessman and his company. In the past two years, Menard’s company has been awarded up to $1.8 million in special tax credits from a state economic development corporation that Walker chairs, according to state records.

"And in his five years in office, Walker’s appointees have sharply scaled back enforcement actions by the state Department of Natural Resources – a top Menard priority. The agency had repeatedly clashed with Menard and his company under previous governors over citations for violating state environmental laws and had levied a $1.7 million fine against Menard personally, as well as his company, for illegally dumping hazardous wastes."

Isikoff’s story goes to the heart of the investigation into Walker’s campaign activities that has resulted in convictions of several aides for multiple violations.

What’s more, it is the first national big-time hit to the governor who has thus far gotten a lot of positive buzz for his jaunts to Iowa and New Hampshire. Walker hasn’t yet announced his candidacy but he’s done everything except make the actual announcement. He has met with all the big money donors and has courted support from the rightest wing of the Republican Party. He has a national campaign staff and offices in a strip mall in Iowa.

Walker’s people, both from his office and his campaign, have denied any knowledge of what Isikoff writes about and the allegations that the governor has played favorites with those who have contributed big money to his campaign. It would be shocking if they did anything else.

The whole idea of "Pay to Play" has dogged politicians for decades and it’s been a troubling burr in Walker’s saddle since his days as Milwaukee County Executive. But he has brushed off all accusations as coming because of political differences or jealousies.

What’s going to be most interesting about this is how seriously it impacts Walker in Wisconsin. This story is almost sure to send Republican big timers running. Nobody wants to even look at a candidate who has the smell of scandal around him.  

That smell has just wrapped itself around Walker on a national level for the very first time and he has, I’ll wager, become another victim of the Ides of March