Friday, January 27, 2012

Scott Walker's Road To Ruin Is 25 Feet Long

According to a criminal complaint alleging misconduct in office, and multiple felonies, twenty-five feet is the distance from former Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker's office to the office of Kelly Rindfleisch, his Deputy Chief of Staff in 2010.

That shorter, folks, than a first down, without any linebackers, guards or tackles in the way.

The complaint alleges she used her taxpayer-paid job and resources to perform allegedly-illegal Republican campaign organizing and fund-raising using a secret computer email system setup in her office by another Walker staffer and also used by other partisan campaign operatives,.

Did the boss, County Executive and now-Governor Scott Walker - - or the Chief of Staff - - ever walk down the hall and stick his head in her office and say, "Hey, Kelly, what's shaking?"

Did they ever have staff meetings, when people went around the room and discussed what they'd been working on for the people of Milwaukee County - - the folks paying their salaries and benefits - - and what was on their plates?

Was this a public office doing the public work, or was it a partisan consulting firm using public resources . with a communications system hidden from public view, to save campaigns the trouble of paying for their own staff, offices, and equipment?

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

What the lame stream media is not telling you is that Walker himself requested the investigation.

xoff said...

She was spending half of her time doing policy work for Walker's gov campaign, she said,and the other half raising money for Davis.

Did Tom Nardelli, the chief of staff, ever wonder what his deputy chief of staff, Rindfleich, was doing? Did he ever see any work product?

As someone who, like James Rowen, has been a chief of staff in a government office headed by an elected official, I can safely say this couldn't happen without the boss knowing. The only question is whether anyone can prove it.

Anonymous said...

Take this story, and for just a minute pretend that it's the private sector we're talking about.

What staff members for the CEO would set up and/or participate in a secret internet network, knowing full well that if word of it became public, would be a huge embarrassment to the CEO?

Talk about a career killer.
There's no way in hell that Walker didn't know this was going on.

GoyitoMKE

A. Wag said...

QB sneak back in the day. Hail Mary today. Everybody: Go long.

Other Side said...

Charlie Sykes was taking the offensive (well, doubly so) and claiming bias by the media. Why hasn't Chisholm gone after Barrett and other libs he's asking?

Doesn't there need to be a spark before the fire?

Anyway, it's revealing. In Sykes' mind, Dems are always guilty of malfeasance and Republicans are simply unfortunate.

I noticed he didn't defend any of the staffers.

Anonymous said...

This is what happens when you are expelled from...er... drop out of college and miss the class covering "plausible deniability".

Let all children beware.

James Rowen said...

Right back atcha.

Anonymous said...

xoff, see the comment posted on your site about the Walker "no laptops, no websites" email -- that he used his private gmail account to send it, and during the workday. (The workday for the recipient, Russell, too.)

Anonymous said...

Did this same system exist within DOA and state government? Why didn't Sec. Huebsch categorically deny it? Why did Depty Sec. Archer carry around more than one blackberry according to some state employees?

Anonymous said...

Could he be that naive not to know?

Say What? said...

Perhaps not - given that he wrote that email to stop all of this using his private email and sent to his staff's private email.

Wait - did they have a ethics, morality or smart merit badge?

John Casper said...

1:28 Wrong.

Nardelli talked to the DA's office in April 2009. AFTER that, knowing Nardelli had serious misgivings, Walker turned over Operation Freedom's finances to the nonprofit run by Russell.