Great way to do some holiday shopping:
The River Alliance of Wisconsin is auctioning off an amazing collection of fun and unique items. Proceeds from the auction help keep Wisconsin's rivers and watersheds clean, healthy and fun to enjoy for everyone.
We've filled the catalog with an exciting selection of items. You're sure to find something to fit every budget and for everyone on your holiday shopping list.
Millions more in untracked loans by Walker's signature 'development corporation' are piling up.
You would think the party that lost November 6th after so badly
botching campaign truth-in-advertising - - 'Chrysler is moving Ohio jeep
production to China' - - and election-night (Dick Morris, et al)
predicting- - 'Romney will win in a landslide' - - would give its
penchant for fantasy and false-speaking a rest, but not Scott Walker
when it comes to why Wisconsin should get rid of election-day voter
registration.
If you listen to Walker, his proposal to end it has nothing to do with
Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan getting drubbed on November 6th in Wisconsin
through record turnout when about one-sixth of the votes were cast after same-day
registrations, often by students and those mean-spirited "urban
voters" that Ryan blamed for his defeat.
No - - Walker is concerned with those overworked "wonderful volunteers" who choose to work the polls election day and had a lot of registration paperwork to handle.
I've done a bit of poll-watching in more than one Milwaukee election and I
have never seen or heard a poll worker complain or face any unmanageable
registration-related matter.
I blogged about it after the 2008 presidential election - - also a
big-turnout event - - and offer a few paragraphs about that experience:
A report in the news yesterday- - text, video here - - provides more evidence that melting polar ice and warmer temperatures - - both setting records - - will make devastating storm surges like that which wrecked the East Coast during Hurricane Sandy more frequent and destructive.
Coincidentally, environmental writer and organizer Bill McKibben brought the same message to a Madison audience as part of a national information and organizing tour last night. (Hat tip, Clean Wisconsin, as organizing host) I'm still looking for mainstream media coverage of his sold-out talk at the Masonic Temple.
This little inside game will backfire:
A controversial coal-fired ferry could chug through the waters of Lake Michigan for as long as it floats, under a special provision slipped into a U.S. Coast Guard reauthorization bill.Many posts about this battle to stop the willful pollution of Lake Michigan on this blog.
Well said.
Sly provided solid air time for Milwaukee political and environmental issues.
If you're not on Twitter today, you're missing something:
Tim Russell joins Kelly Rindfleisch, et al, admitting illegal behavior while on Scott Walker's Milwaukee County Executive staff. The John Doe probe by the Milwaukee County DA's office into Walker's official and 2010 gubernatorial campaign activities continues.
Set your Twitter dial to Seely's feed for gems like this:
Sen. Grothman asked how close Ashland County is to Gogebic mine site. Informed by Chair Cullen that mine is IN Ashland County.And yes, for the record - - this is the same State Senator and Colbert Nation "Lady Hero" Glenn Grothman, (R-West Bend), who recently opined without a molecule of proof that there was massive voting fraud on November 6th in Wisconsin.#wismine
In Maine, the suspect voters were black.
Maine Republican Party Chairman Charlie Webster is once again alleging possible voting irregularities, this time claiming that groups of unknown black people showed up in some rural towns to vote on Election Day.Wisconsin GOP congressman and high-profile bad loser Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney's running mate, was smart enough to say "urban" instead of black, but the message was the same.
Though in Wisconsin, the fraudmesiter with data is GOP State Sen. Glenn Grothman, the pride of West Bend:
...Senator Grothman says that he believes it's possible if not probable that 200,000 people committed voter fraud in Wisconsin this year.The last Republican to put a number to voter fraud in Wisconsin was national GOP chairman Reince Priebus - - the same guy who helped steer Romney/Ryan on to the rocks - - and PolitiFact rated his claim "false." Five months later, an unrepentant Priebus was right back at it.
That would be this iron mining company:Iron mine still alive, Walker says
"Senate rejection of the mining reforms . . . sends a clear message that Wisconsin will not welcome iron mining. We get the message," said a statement from Bill Williams, president of Gogebic Taconite LLC. "(We are) ending plans to invest in a Wisconsin mine."Don't you hate it when the official story changes?
Hard to have faith in a Walker-dominated 'regulatory' agency doing the right thing with the Wauwatosa project when it just jettisoned a host of previously-operating green energy programs.
"Two More Years!" is not much of a campaign slogan, and neither is "Hey, I'm batting .100."
Read on.
Gov. Walker is out and about telling friendly audiences in display case appearances that a top priority in the next two years is...get ready for it...jobs...though continues to have trouble with the grammar and the numbers:
"When I talk about creating jobs, jobs aren't Republican jobs or Democrat [Sic] jobs. They're Wisconsin jobs."I'm not hearing many people chanting "two more years!," as this this is the same issue on which Walker based his 2010 gubernatorial campaign - - even very specifically pledging to create 250,000 jobs and 10,000 new businesses after one term.
The state's October 2012 jobs report showed a loss of 6,000 private sector jobs, pushing the total for the year back into negative territory. With the latest figures, our calculations show that Gov. Scott Walker has created about one-tenth of the jobs he promised that would be created by the end of his four-year term.
Hartford GOP State Rep. and 'Arrest-The-Feds' Don Pridemore has a bigger job in his sights.
As I wrote yesterday:John Doe probe of Walker aides continues
That's his wish; I'm hoping for a pony.
Dumbfounded, denial-driven Republicans are trying to figure out how the heck they got defeated in a second straight Presidential election.
And as President Obama hits the road to marshal grassroots support to ensure Congressional implementation of his election-validated tax plans, I offer up this piece of video that explains in less than 60 seconds what defeated Republicans four years ago and again on Nov. 6, and will win the tax fight, too.
He's back in the display case:
Governor Walker appears unwilling to hold genuinely public sessions
prior to the introduction of his 2013-15, or next election cycle budget,
so you can expect to see him receive "input" as carefully-staged and
packaged as the settings where it'll be offered.
Republicans fuming about failing to take the country back are promoting another fake narrative to validate their election-night denial of reality by further discrediting President Barack Obama's legitimacy.
Four years ago, Obama was a laughable community organizer, and worse, a foreign-born Muslim Kenyan Socialist with a phony birth certificate and no birthright to civic participation like those held by real Americans like Michelle Bachmann or Donald Trump or Rick (Oops) Perry or Grover Norquist to run for President or play kingmaker.
Now he's a swindler like Arnold Rothstein - - the fixer of the 1919 World Series - - sitting atop a national vote-stealing conspiracy covering small towns and big cities in suburbs in northern and southern states.
In Virginia, listen to the Republican Attorney General:
Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) told a radio host he completely agreed with her assertion that investigations are needed to determine why President Obama lost “every one” of the states with photo identification requirements for voting, yet won re-election. Cuccinelli, who has lost most of the major legal cases he has brought since taking office in 2010, told the host she was “preaching to the choir.”In Maine, the suspect voters were black.
Maine Republican Party Chairman Charlie Webster is once again alleging possible voting irregularities, this time claiming that groups of unknown black people showed up in some rural towns to vote on Election Day.Wisconsin GOP congressman and high-profile bad loser Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney's running mate, was smart enough to say "urban" instead of black, but the message was the same.
...Senator Grothman says that he believes it's possible if not probable that 200,000 people committed voter fraud in Wisconsin this year.The last Republican to put a number to voter fraud in Wisconsin was national GOP chairman Reince Priebus - - the same guy who helped steer Romney/Ryan on to the rocks - - and PolitiFact rated his claim "false." Five months later, an unrepentant Priebus was right back at it.
A new Florida law that contributed to long voter lines and caused some to abandon voting altogether was intentionally designed by Florida GOP staff and consultants to inhibit Democratic voters, former GOP officials and current GOP consultants have told The Palm Beach Post.There's some real voter fraud for you - - with state power driving the scheme.
Sandy gave us just a taste of what's coming, and points to the tasks ahead, experts write:
As scientists who study sea level change and storm surge, we fear that Hurricane Sandy gave only a modest preview of the dangers to come, as we continue to power our global economy by burning fuels that pollute the air with heat-trapping gases.
This past summer, a disconcerting new scientific study by the climate scientist Michiel Schaeffer and colleagues — published in the journal Nature Climate Change — suggested that no matter how quickly we cut this pollution, we are unlikely to keep the seas from climbing less than five feet.More than six million Americans live on land less than five feet above the local high tide. (Searchable maps and analyses are available at SurgingSeas.org for every low-lying coastal community in the contiguous United States.)...There are two basic ways to protect ourselves from sea level rise: reduce it by cutting pollution, or prepare for it by defense and retreat. To do the job, we must do both. We have lost our chance for complete prevention; and preparation alone, without slowing emissions, would — sooner or later — turn our coastal cities into so many Atlantises.
Today is the last opportunity to speak out about the American Transmission Company’s high-voltage power lines in Wauwatosa radiating from a new substation on the County Grounds. This is the schedule for the PSC's hearings today.
More from Riverkeeper.1:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m.Wauwatosa City Hall Common Council Chambers,7725 West North Ave.
Scott Walker took time off from his perpetual resume-building junket that included a vision speech at the Reagan Library in California and opined on Monday in Wisconsin that he wants to keep all his major highway expansion projects on track- - though the state transportation fund is over-committed and short of money - - but doesn't want to raise the gas tax or create toll lanes to meet the shortfall.
He's sending signals to his transportation financing task force to find alternatives - - other than rethinking the expansions altogether - - like diverting auto sales or general purpose income taxes to subsidize road-building, or setting up a new, per-miles-driven fee, or an increase in vehicle registration or licensing fees.
Walker's Monday comments made up Scene II of Act I in the fake drama begun with the state transportation department trial balloon about the Zoo Interchange - - Mercy! - - perhaps being delayed.
All this political choreography is meant to worry the public into demanding more lanes now - - oh, no: more congestion!!! - - and satisfy the road-building complex - - though the tighter economy, aging boomers and revived urban centers as distant McMansions become cost-prohibitive are tamping down driving while making transit more attractive and necessary.
To say nothing of the lifeline that transit provides to the elderly, students and workers without cars.
Speaking of transit - - don't forget what Walker proposed in his first budget to pay for wider highways and keep his corporate donors smiling - - deleting local transit operations from the transportation fund and letting them fight it out for funding survival with all other general services statewide - - in a transit-hostile Legislature - - to keep buses on the streets.
By Dara Kam and John LantiguaPalm Beach Post Capital Bureau
A new Florida law that contributed to long voter lines and caused some to abandon voting altogether was intentionally designed by Florida GOP staff and consultants to inhibit Democratic voters, former GOP officials and current GOP consultants have told The Palm Beach Post.
Not that he needs this context, but I sure do like reading Dave Zweifel when he doesn't mince words:
Never in all my years writing about politics in Wisconsin’s capital city have I witnessed the leaders of state government so committed to dragging Wisconsin back to mediocrity where special interests rule and the people are relegated to the back of the bus.
And to top it off, we have now been treated to a behind-the-scenes look at just how ethically challenged Gov. Scott Walker is and to what lengths he’ll go to give himself a leg up. The Milwaukee County John Doe investigation has exposed how Walker was involved in the sordid commingling of political and taxpayer-paid business while he was Milwaukee County executive. But it shouldn’t have been surprising. It was foreshadowed all the way back to his college days when he ran for Marquette student president and bent the rules there, too.
Looks like Tim Russell - - former Walker friend, campaign go-fer, installer of the once-secret campaign email system down the hall from Walker's office and top County staffer - - is copping a plea.
Joining Kelly Rindfleisch as Deputy Chiefs of Staff to the Milwaukee County Executive pleading guilty to misconduct whom Walker appointed to his 'I-sure-can-pick-'em'-personal staff.
End of the John Doe, or end of Phase I?
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources chief Cathy Stepp is embroiled in a fight with tribes over their plan to use lights in this year's annual off-reservation deer hunt - - with subtexts from wolf-hunting to spear-fishing to mining and water quality.
Not sure why she wants to go down this road - - even sending all DNR staff a "Dear Colleague" email about it today:
Dear Colleagues,
You may have heard about potential shining – or night hunting of deer – by Tribal members in the Ceded Territory, which is roughly the northern third of Wisconsin. I want to give you an overview from the State’s perspective.
We have been informed the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission today issued an order allowing Chippewa Tribal night hunting for deer in the Ceded Territory starting Nov. 26.
DNR does not approve of this action and the State will file suit today seeking a federal court order requiring the Tribes to comply with the court’s prohibition on deer shining and confirming the State’s right to enforce the state shining law against Tribal hunters in the Ceded Territory.
Why?
We have concerns about the short amount of time to notify the public, the circumvention of court oversight and past rulings on night hunting for deer, and public safety.
We understand that the Tribes contend they should be allowed to hunt deer at night because a recently adopted State law permits the night hunting of wolves.
We believe that this is essentially the same argument the Tribes unsuccessfully asserted in federal court in the 1989 “deer trial” when they argued that State’s provision for night hunting coyotes should allow them to hunt deer at night.
After a week-long trial, the court concluded that deer shining was much more dangerous to public safety than the nighttime hunting of predators like coyotes, and so Judge Barbara Crabb rejected the tribes’ challenge to the State’s deer shining law.
We believe that the State’s legalization of night hunting of wolves, another predator species, changes nothing in this respect.Importantly, even if it were legal for the Tribes to hunt deer at night – which we believe it is not – we believe GLIFWC acted with too little notice and too little consultation with the State.
We have not been able to discuss adequately many safety aspects with the Tribes and believe the current order has inadequate Tribal regulation of hunter conduct to assure safe shooting, ill-defined hunter training requirements, and inadequate review mechanisms of deer shining “safety plans” to assure safety to the public.
Indeed, the department is not aware of any State or Tribe anywhere in this country which authorizes night hunting of deer in the manner proposed by the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission. Among other things, we need time to be sure that people using public lands with no expectation of night deer hunting would be aware of any such change.
Due to your work, DNR has diligently and in good faith implemented numerous enhanced Tribal resource harvesting opportunities, including updating and increasing harvest limits for Tribal harvest of a host of species; honoring self-regulation for gathering forest products on State lands; agreeing to alternative monitoring of walleye harvest to save creel clerk expenses; youth hunt mentoring; improving mapping of the Ceded Territory in Wisconsin; and responsive and flexible state park hunting opportunities mechanism – all of which have operated almost exclusively for the Tribes’ benefit.
I’m proud of that record, and I believe our actions of the past give us strong credibility is addressing this issue.
I contacted GLFWC Executive Administrator Jim Zorn and the Tribal Chairs and respectfully asked the Tribes to not go out shining until the federal court rules on our motion.
I assured Administrator Zorn of our continuing commitment to the court-approved process for negotiating changes to our past agreements on regulatory matters.
I let him know we are hopeful this does not put the Tribes and State with odds with each other.
But I also informed him that it is DNR’s job to honor court decisions and directives and to enforce the laws that are in place at this time, and we will do so. In the meantime, I ask that all of us – Tribal members, governmental agencies, and the public – work together to manage court-affirmed hunting and gathering rights in a safe and legal manner.
Cathy
Here's the latest from the agency, verbatim, unedited:
Air Quality Tip of the Week
For the week of November 25, 2012:
"Check that your vehicle's tires are inflated to the proper pressure. Underinflated tires can lead to lowered fuel economy."The Air Quality Tip of the Week has been updated. Please log on to http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/AirQuality/ItAllAddsUp.html, to view this and other tip
This from One Wisconsin Now today:
Dear Governor Walker,
I write today to urge you to remove Brett Davis as State Medicaid Director, based on his involvement in the use of a public employee under your direct supervision, on public time, as a fundraiser for his unsuccessful campaign for Lieutenant Governor in 2010....
If your words about taking misconduct seriously are to be believed, they must be backed up with concrete actions. Mr. Davis must be removed from state employment immediately.
The Walker campaign a week ago after the DA's presentation - - a link here - - after the Rindfleisch sentencing:
Walker campaign spokesman Tom Evenson said Monday the campaign and county staff were not doing anything improper. Evenson called their work "routine."Walker to the AP today:
"It is not unusual for campaign staff and elected official's staff to routinely discuss the appropriate way to schedule meetings, determine a point of contact for emergencies, or how to address media inquiries directed at both the official office and the campaign office," [Walker campaign spokesman Tom] Evenson said in a statement.
"Balancing the daily calendars, meetings and issues covered by the media for an elected official present challenges in the course of a campaign that requires routine communication by both sets of staff."
Walker on Monday described the contacts as routine.And does "coordination" mean direction? From The Journal Sentinel:
The morning phone calls were about coordinating staffing and scheduling issues between the campaign and county office and discussing how to handle questions from the media, Walker said.
"Often times there's not a distinction between asking a political question in the official office and the campaign office," he said. "All those things are things that need to be coordinated. There's nothing wrong with that."
The Campaign Group vetted news releases that were issued from Walker's county office, [Assistant Milwaukee County District Attorney Bruce] Landgraf said. They included messages about...news reports in the Journal Sentinel in August that year about patient sexual assaults at the county Mental Health Complex...Nothing wrong with that?
In one exchange among members of The Campaign Group, [campaign manager Gilkes admonished Walker's county staff to be more forceful in responding to questions about the patient abuse issue, which included highly critical state and federal inspectors' reports.
"Tell (county Deputy Corporation Counsel Timothy) Schoewe we're getting the crap kicked out of us," one email said. "I would like him to stop being a lawyer and think political," Gilkes wrote...
Walker's campaign staff also vetted the county response to the June 24, 2010, death of 15-year-old Jared Kellner, who was killed by a concrete panel that fell from the side of the O'Donnell Park parking garage at the lakefront.
Gilkes, in an email written the day of the accident, advised Walker's county staff to "make sure there is not a piece of paper anywhere that details any problem at all."
Echoing a week-old campaign talking point, Walker evades any John Doe culpability by telling the AP on Monday his 2010 gubernatorial campaign only coordinated things with Milwaukee County work when he was also the County Executive:
The morning phone calls were about coordinating staffing and scheduling issues between the campaign and county office and discussing how to handle questions from the media, Walker said.
"Often times there's not a distinction between asking a political question in the official office and the campaign office," he said. "All those things are things that need to be coordinated. There's nothing wrong with that."Ask yourself if these examples as reported by the Journal Sentinel from the DA's public presentation last week at the sentencing of one of Walker's former top aides sound like coordination with county staff (the campaign's ho-hum position) or direction to the county staff - - for Walker's partisan advantage and strategic benefit - - from "The Campaign Group."
The Campaign Group vetted news releases that were issued from Walker's county office, [Assistant Milwaukee County District Attorney Bruce] Landgraf said. They included messages about...news reports in the Journal Sentinel in August that year about patient sexual assaults at the county Mental Health Complex..."Nothing wrong with that?" Then why did the Journal Sentinel, after having endorsed Walker twice for Governor and three times for County Exec, describe what the DA revealed as "seamy"?
In one exchange among members of The Campaign Group, [campaign manager Gilkes admonished Walker's county staff to be more forceful in responding to questions about the patient abuse issue, which included highly critical state and federal inspectors' reports.
"Tell (county Deputy Corporation Counsel Timothy) Schoewe we're getting the crap kicked out of us," one email said. "I would like him to stop being a lawyer and think political," Gilkes wrote...
Walker's campaign staff also vetted the county response to the June 24, 2010, death of 15-year-old Jared Kellner, who was killed by a concrete panel that fell from the side of the O'Donnell Park parking garage at the lakefront.
Gilkes, in an email written the day of the accident, advised Walker's county staff to "make sure there is not a piece of paper anywhere that details any problem at all."
The state provides a do-not-call registry so you don't have to be interrupted by unwanted phone solicitations (exceptions for non-profits, campaigns, or #'s you have approved), but there shouldn't be the need for repeated registrations.
You should be need to opt out, once.
And opt back in at your discretion. #justbuttout
How soon will the so-called sportsmen in the Wisconsin Legislature (see Kleefisch, "Rib-Eye," Joel) give the reborn Trumpeter swan population in Wisconsin the same treatment (cleaned up linguistically as a "harvest," like our amber fields of grain) handed the grey wolf and marinating for the Sandhill crane?
The WMC's energy and environmental spokesman Scott Manley wants the GOP to steamroll a mining bill and cites last session's failed Assembly measure as the model:
The Legislature nearly crossed the finish line last session with a bill that would have provided the clarity and certainty needed to attract mining investment to Wisconsin while protecting the environment. Lawmakers need to pick up where they left off and pass the iron mining reform bill in January.State Sen. Tim Cullen, (D-Janesville) is looking for a different kind of measure that might find broader support and provide business certainty - - a tough assignment - - but this is the heart of his case:
Last session's bill attempted to legalize the devastation of Wisconsin's waterways.Manley takes a harder line:
That action would fall in direct violation of the state constitution, which is clear in its language that no individual or company can own our waterways or is entitled to destroy them. AB 426 would only lead to a legal stalemate and fail to create good mining jobs.
Ask the mining industry - mining companies won't invest in a state with a business environment that creates endless legal hurdles.
It has become clear to me that AB 426 was a political document, which is why it failed to receive broader support. Now that the latest round of elections is over, both sides have indicated that they want to work together to pass a mining bill that works for Wisconsin.
Others may advocate for minor tinkering with our mining laws, while promoting the false hope that taking a minimalist approach to reform will attract mining investment and jobs. They are wrong.Manley's troops could win the battle - - the GOP has a big majority in the Assembly and picked up strength in the Senate - - but still could lose the war, I'd argued, through ideological arrogance:
It's always nice to see people get the credit they have earned. so here is the link to a completely-deserved tribute in the Madison Capital Times in which even adversaries give Atty. Lester Pines his due:
Admiration of Pines even extends into the GOP. Remember the lawyer for the Republicans who wanted to forcibly reel in the runaway senators? That was Jim Troupis, who's often on the opposite side of Pines on the issues.
"He's just one of the finest lawyers, period," says Troupis. "There's no question about that. Lester and I have known each other a long time, and it's a real pleasure to deal with somebody that's as high-class and as good, frankly, as Lester is."This blog has followed his unwavering fight for justice in Wisconsin: a 2010 posting of the full text of a public letter Pines wrote about abuses of Legislative power is in the ten most-downloaded items among more than 11,000 items posted here since February, 2007, and a window into how and why he's been so successful was noted here recently, too:
Madison attorney Lester Pines has now beaten the Walker administration on both the Voter ID law (injunction won on behalf of the League of Wisconsin Women Voters) and now on Act 10, so the advice he's offering today free of charge is certainly worth taking:
Gov. Scott Walker - who wrote the collective bargaining limits and withstood a recall this summer largely inspired by them - issued a statement Friday calling [Act 10 case Judge Juan] Colas a "liberal activist..."
[Labor plaintiff Attorney Lester Pines said Walker and others should not be demeaning judges with name calling...
"When a case is before judges, it's really not a good idea to insult the judge. First of all, it's just bad manners. But secondly, from a tactical point of view, when someone still has issues before him or her, why would you insult that person?..."
Among all the GOP election predictions gone awry, don't forget this early one about the goal of Act 10, in March 2011, from Big Fitz, (R-Juneau):
If we win this battle, and the money is not there under the auspices of the unions, certainly what you’re going to find is President Obama is going to have a much difficult, much more difficult time getting elected and winning the state of Wisconsin.”
Leading Republicans and some of their supporters seem to focus their most-frenzied, obsessed and unhinged political and personal attacks on President Barack Obama, Attorney General Eric Holder, EPA administrator Lisa Jackson, and now UN Ambassador and possible Secretary of State appointee Susan Rice.
You can't escape the racial common denominator.
The headline on this Journal Sentinel story says it all:
Oh, woe is us - - and to you - - says WisDOT: there's not enough money to keep the Zoo Interchange and other projects on track.
Delays are threatened.
Think of the congestion!
This is the beginning of the road-builder lobby's PR campaign for higher gas taxes, or new tolls, or boosted registration fees - - the strategic equivalent at the local level from time to time of talk about closing fire stations or swimming pools if local taxes aren't raised.
It's the only alternative!
The road-builders and their friends in the Legislature and the Walker administration probably voted for Romney and wrote checks to the Cut Taxes Stop Spending SuperPAC, but see merit and personal gain in raising our taxes so they can spend more on bigger highways in Wisconsin.
Or look at it this way:
Waiter: Your credit card is declining the charges.Soon the road-builder PR campaign won't be asking questions like, "do you support a gas tax increase," or "do you support road tolls?"
Customer: Ask the other customers to chip in. They have before.
Walker's political posse is revealed as cravenly one-dimensional and cold-hearted in the face of tragedy.
Even the Journal Sentinel, which routinely endorsed his candidacies, now calls some of the recent revelations "seamy."
Ya think?
But laughably two-faced when it came to his sitting atop and managing an ethically-grounded campaign - - a requirement, you'd presume, of public service.
It's hard to keep up with the jokes in this Scott Walker ethics reform plan still decorating a Walker campaign web page - - but as more of his associates and appointees are headed for trial, sentencing and jail, and this is turkey day, here's a little morsel from the Walker files still tasty after all these years.
Match up the disclosure that Walket's campaign staff was directing public employees' work and vetting official communications - - sort of a shadow government with Walker's career as its goal - - with this pledge from a purportedly-reform-minded Scott Walker when he eye the Governor's Office in 2006:
"My plan seeks to restore the public trust, and instill the confidence that our elected leaders are working for the people," Walker added.
- Scott Walker will require every member of his administration to attend ethics training every two years to ensure that all executive staff members are aware of ethics standards and laws.
These two items encapsulate the Scott Walker phenomenon:
* From The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's account of communications disclosed in court Monday among Scott Walker, his partisan, gubernatorial campaign team and public officials in County government - - and on his taxpayer-paid staff - - when he was Milwaukee County Executive:
Walker's campaign staff also vetted the county response to the June 24, 2010, death of 15-year-old Jared Kellner, who was killed by a concrete panel that fell from the side of the O'Donnell Park parking garage at the lakefront.* From an interview with Walker less than three months later during his 2010 Republican gubernatorial campaign published in the Lakeland Times, re-posted on Walker's campaign website and also re-posted in this blog:
[Then-Walker campaign chief of staff Keith] Gilkes, in an email written the day of the accident, advised Walker's county staff to "make sure there is not a piece of paper anywhere that details any problem at all."
When he says he believes in government transparency, it's not just a campaign slogan, Walker said.
"I don't just say that, I've lived it," he said.
The biggest news out of Kelly Rindfleisch's felony misconduct sentencing Monday was the Power Point shown in court by Milwaukee County prosecutor read into the record.
It detailed the political direction coming to County officials from then-County Executive Scott Walker's campaign staff and the political activities taking place by County staffers on the public dime - - all combined to benefit Walker's 2010 gubernatorial run - - by design.
E-mail records cited in the Power Point showed that Walker was among a group of county and campaign officials who talked regularly to coordinate their efforts to advance Walker's campaign, and the paper, editorially, sums it all up with a pertinent question:
But what's clear from the emails is that Walker's campaign staff was helping to manage county government for the benefit of only one citizen - Scott Walker. How is that acceptable conduct?Fat chance getting Walker to answer, or to take any responsibility - - but the Journal Sentinel certainly has a special right and obligation to ask the question, as the paper endorsed Walker and recommended him to voters and readers three times for County Executive and twice for Governor.
Democrats claim the recall election is about far more than Act 10. The most serious of the charges on their bill of particulars is the ongoing John Doe investigation being conducted by the Milwaukee County district attorney's office. The investigation, which has been going on for nearly two years, has looked into a variety of activities during the time Walker was county executive. Prosecutors have charged three ex-Walker aides and two others; more charges may be coming. Walker has set up a legal-defense fund.The level of coordination laid out by the DA's office involving senior campaign and public staffers, plus Walker himself, negates the finger of blame pointed at "overzealous political associates" - - associates, by the way, brought on to Walker's staff or into his campaign by Walker himself, or by people to whom Walker assigned hiring and staffing.
But the governor has insisted that he is not a target of the investigation and that he is cooperating. While the investigation surely is troubling, no evidence revealed so far implicates Walker. Overzealous political associates sometimes get in trouble. The John Doe probe doesn't justify a vote against the governor.
| Current Air Quality for Milwaukee, WI | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
Wednesday, November 21 | ||||
| At 6 AM CST Particle Pollution (2.5 microns) reached 101 AQI - Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups |  | |||
| Start Time: | 8:30AM CT Wednesday, November 21, 2012 |
| End Time: | 2:00PM CT Wednesday, November 21, 2012 |
| Counties: | Brown, Milwaukee |
| Air Quality Index (AQI) Values |
Levels of Health Concern | Colors |
| When the AQI is in this range: |
...air quality conditions are: | ...as symbolized by this color: |
| 0 to 50 | Good | Green |
| 51 to 100 | Moderate | Yellow |
| 101 to 150 | Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups |
Orange |
| 151 to 200 | Unhealthy | Red |
| 201 to 300 | Very Unhealthy | Purple |
| 301 to 500 | Hazardous | Maroon |
This is the presentation that the Milwaukee County DA's office introduced at Kelly Rindfleisch's sentencing Monday.
The Capital Times notes what will not shock any Wisconsin voter or reader with a pulse:
Gov. Scott Walker’s announcement that he turned down the option for a state-run health exchange to protect taxpayers last week has state and national health care experts saying his rationale is misleading and flawed.
While individual states could arguably finance insurance exchanges with taxpayer money, the Affordable Care Act says insurance providers, not individual states or taxpayers, are expected to be responsible for the financial costs associated with running the exchanges.
AM 620 WTMJ radio used Missouri talker Nick Reed as a fill-in for Charlie Sykes this morning.
The portion of the show I heard in my car towards noon was his argument against same-day voter registration.
Reed said that having more of something - - like friends, or cars, or voters - - doesn't mean its necessarily a good thing.
Especially if you don't know who these new voters are, or what they think, or whether 80% of them are morons.
Tomorrow's podcast will offer the full tape.
Gov. Scott Walker proposes further restrictions on voting in Wisconsin to discourage turnout, help his 2014 re-election and further cement GOP legislative majorities.
A day later, a former top aide from Walker's County Executive days is sentenced for felony misconduct in office, and prosecutors disclose that Walker and a slew of former county and 2010 gubernatorial campaign aides, along with Walker himself, were routinely coordinating county business with campaign spin for Walker's partisan benefit.
The pattern is clear: Walker has and will continue to manipulate his control of public resources for his own, partisan advantage.
His undated, detailed ethics reform plan appears to have been rolled out during his short-lived run for the 2006 GOP gubernatorial nomination, is still posted on a Friends of Scott Walker campaign website and sure looks ironic now in light of the John Doe probe charges and disclosures. (full text of the Walker plan is below).
This text taken from another posting on Walker's campaign website attributed to a Republican Party chairman introducing Walker at a 2010 campaign speech should make Walker partisans flinch, too:
"Then, after a lot of persuasion and a lot of guts, Scott decided to get into the race for Milwaukee County executive in 2002 on a platform of fiscal conservatism, and returning honesty and integrity to the office of the county executive."The theft and misconduct charges against former Walker county staffers and the disclosure by John Doe prosecutors of a secret email system for political operatives on set up in the fall of 2009 by a long-time Walker associate and county staffer on county property - - (criminal complaints, here) - - leaves one wondering what the heck happened to this belief that had Walker to announce his big, bold ethics reform plan:
"The culture of government has destroyed the integrity and the idea of public service," said Walker. "My plan seeks to restore the public trust, and instill the confidence that our elected leaders are working for the people," Walker added.
Ron Seely
John Dean