Two more WI Republicans extend GOP's COVID coddling

Polling data show a stark division between Wisconsin Republicans and Democrats on many matters pandemic:

A new statewide poll shows a partisan divide in vaccinations and more negative perceptions toward last year's shutdown

Here's up-to-date-data highlighting another straight line to follow in COVID-slammed Wisconsin - 

Cases	1,391	+45%	709,504
Tests	10,357	–14%	—
Hospitalized	671	+124%	—
Deaths	4	–34%	8,336

- that you can trace from this ideological insanity - 

Congressman Tom Tiffany (R-Minocqua) spoke against masks at the (Monday night Rhinelander School Board) meeting, equating the CDC guideline on masks to its one on eating raw cookie dough.

* To this even more serious and unfolding story:

GOP Senator Railed Against Vax, Caught COVID, Then Hid It From Dem Colleagues

A Republican state senator who has proven to be one of Wisconsin’s most virulent critics of mask and vaccine mandates became sick enough to be hospitalized last week after contracting COVID-19, his office confirmed to The Daily Beast.  

What’s more, a possibly infectious Sen. André Jacque, who testified maskless during a Joint Senate and Assembly Education Committee meeting last Wednesday at the statehouse in Madison, neglected to inform his colleagues about their potential exposure—and they’re not happy. 

I wish State Sen. Jacque - 

- and his family full and speedy recoveries; let's also hope COVID19 and its super-infectious Delta variant was not spread to constituents, other legislators, Capitol staffers, medical workers and random contacts.

No more suffering!

But let's be honest: 

* The seeds of this dangerous resistance to science and common sense were planted last October, for example, by Sen. Jacque's Racine County GOP colleague Sen. Van Wanggaard - 

...three weeks-and-a-day-ago on October 8th, Racine's GOP State Senator and unofficial lead state COVID shoulder shrugger Van Wanggaard said Wisconsin's cases could multiply ten-fold and he still wouldn't support a statewide making order.

* And to an even earlier display by WI GOP Assembly Speaker Robin Vos - 

Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, a Republican, wore a mask, gloves and other protective gear as he sought to assure voters it was "incredibly safe" to vote in person for Tuesday's election amid the coronavirus pandemic. 

"You are incredibly safe to go out," Vos told The Journal Times in a Facebook livestream. Vos said he was serving as an election inspector and that wearing the personal protective equipment, or PPE, was mandatory. 

Standing in front of cars lined up for curbside voting, Vos said people working at polling locations and those voting in person face "very minimal exposure."

To others: 

* On May 5th, 2020, The Wisconsin Supreme Court - meeting virtually and respecting COVID19 distancing guidelines -  heard arguments in a case brought by GOP Legislative leaders to overturn Democratic Gov. Tony Evers 'Safer-at-Home' order extension. The Justices overturned the Evers order several days later by a 4-3 vote.

During the May 5th argument, Chief Justice Patience Roggensack (the Court is officially non-partisan, but has a 4-3 majority which usually supports conservative and GOP positions) opined that a highly-publicized outbreak of COVID19 in Brown County (the Green Bay-area) meatpacking plants which employed large numbers of migrant workers in close quarters had not hit "regular folks."

The food and commercial workers union called it "shocking and deeply offensive that Roggensack would suggest that workers in meatpacking plants aren't 'regular folks' who deserve protection."

On May 5th, state data showed a total of 1,966 confirmed COVID19 cases and 13 confirmed deaths in Brown County. Using the latest, December 18 data, those Brown County numbers had soared to 25,042 confirmed cases and 155 confirmed deaths, with both categories having jumped by more than by a factor of 10....

* On August 3rd, 2020, GOP Senate Majority Leader [and now-US Rep.] Scott Fitzgerald urged the Senate to overturn a statewide mask-wearing order issued by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. 

“I just said I think it’s a mistake,” Fitzgerald said of the mask order. “I think things are going well right now. People are complying if they want to.” 

On August 3rd, the confirmed COVID19 case number in Wisconsin was 55,328 and the death toll was 949. By December 18, the confirmed case number had soared to 451,676 and the death toll to 4,345....

Which brings us to Wisconsin's senior GOP US Senator and all-in Trump enabler Ron Johnson. 

* In fact, in the very early days of the pandemic on March 18, 2020 - note that Wisconsin did not report deaths until March 20th, state data show - Johnson was sugarcoating COVID19's risks and framing them in business-like/balance-sheet statistics, as The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported:

"...97 to 99 percent will get through this and develop immunities and will be able to move beyond this. But we don’t shut down our economy because tens of thousands of people die on the highways. It’s a risk we accept so we can move about. We don’t shut down our economies because tens of thousands of people die from the common flu,” Johnson said.

Johnson acknowledged that coronavirus has a far higher fatality rate than the seasonal flu, but said, “getting coronavirus is not a death sentence except for maybe no more than 3.4 percent of our population (and) I think probably far less,” he said...

By the way, 3.4 percent of the US population is more than 11 million people. 

WI GOP keeps expanding 'governing' by cop-out/opt-out

Republicans hold majorities in both Wisconsin Legislative chambers where the GOP 'style' of governance these days is all about ducking accountability, living by laziness and evading even the pretense of responsibility.

You may remember that former GOP Governor Scott Walker got caught trying to quietly remove the state's commitments to truth and public service from the "Wisconsin Idea," but GOP legislators have taken that assault on Wisconsin fundamentals to what seems like a bottomless low.

How else to describe GOP-led Legislature's nine-month, fully-paid vacation during the pandemic's 2020 rampage and nearly year-long focus on further diminishing of Gov. Evers' administrative powers rather than writing or promoting or cooperating on a pandemic-fighting plan? 

A thoughtless contempt for public health and life itself summed up in August, when despite exploding COVID19 caseloads and deaths - official data, here - then-Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald approvingly said people were 'complying if they want to' with Governor Evers' statewide masking mandate, and that was OK because things on the pandemic front were "going pretty well." 

We've had about a half-million COVID19 cases since Fitzgerald all but dismissed it as freedom's price for spreading the virus as you please - a sick scenario just now expanded because Legislative Republicans have wiped out Evers' masking mandate.

Though Republican legislators' last-minute cover-your-a** amending may fail to prevent the loss of almost $50 million a month in federal emergency food aid related to pandemic unemployment in Wisconsin - a risk Republicans are willing to take with people's most basic needs.

Your new Wisconsin Idea in action. Not by inaction, but by deliberate, calculated, calibrated malfeasance.

But while we're focused on this poisonously-partisan power-grab, please note the bonus bit of breezy, take-it-or-leave-it nonchalance on another important front that WI GOP Assembly Speaker Robin Vos has added to his party's retreat from the hard work of leadership.

Not content to rest on the word-smithing chops he displayed in April when decked out in heavy-duty pandemic-protective gear declared it "incredibly safe to go out" - 

- Vos has now laid down a new do-as-you-please marker for contractors doing business with the taxpayer-funded State of Wisconsin.

CEO's and their bean counters haven't been given news this good since Ron Johnson sent them an even bigger dollop of dollars through the 2017 Federal tax 'reform' bill.

Vos's latest step away from accountability was an excuse he opted to confer on the Republican-championed Foxconn fiasco bulldozed into the Village of Mt. Pleasant which, according to state auditors, has yet to hit - and won't hit for three more years - its hiring targets at the radically reduced and redefined project in Mt Pleasant. 

No matter to Assembly Speaker Shoulder-Shrug who explained that he'd put himself on the state development commission to make sure Foxconn is allowed the contracting equivalent of Fitzgerald's 'comply if you want' - more or less. 

"I wanted to make sure that Foxconn and the people of Racine County are treated fairly and that we had a deal that, more or less, stuck to the original goals that we set."

Now I'm not recommending you offer the GOP-defining 'more or less' standard or the party's 'comply if you want' option when discussing things with an IRS agent or a State Trooper with a radar gun, but I do recommend the statement below issued Wednesday by some of Vos's constituents about what contract compliance by Foxconn in Mt. Pleasant looks like to them, more or less:

------------------------------------------

For Immediate Release

Contact: Kim Mahoney

262/721-8248

abettermtpleasant@gmail.com

VOS AND WANGGAARD CONTINUE TO GASLIGHT PUBLIC 

ON FOXCONN DEVELOPMENT 

“Foxconn is failing to fulfill financial obligations in Mount Pleasant while local spending continues in preparation for a factory that is not happening.” 

MOUNT PLEASANT, WI FEBRUARY 3, 2021 - A recent article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel regarding the ongoing contract renegotiations between the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) and Foxconn related to the controversial LCD factory which Foxconn promised to build in Mount Pleasant featured several statements offered by state representatives, Robin Vos and Van Wanggaard, about the project that were not just misleading, but factually incorrect. 

In response to a question on whether new state legislation would be needed to renegotiate the contract that WEDC has determined to be broken, Senator Wanggaard claimed “Foxconn is in substantial compliance with their existing contract...” This is false.

According to the written agreements, Foxconn is required to (1) build a 10.5 Generation LCD factory, (2) create and maintain approximately 13,000 full-time jobs, with an average salary of at least $53,875 plus benefits, and (3) invest approximately $10 Billion, mostly Area I in Mount Pleasant. There is no ambiguity about those terms in either the State contract or the local Development Agreement.

Further, Foxconn was required to have improved Area I by a minimum of $685 Million by December 31, 2019, but in its Performance Report submitted to WEDC, Foxconn reported that it had spent only $208.3 Million.

Foxconn is also required to add a value of $347.3 Million in 2020, and another $358.2 Million in 2021 in order to reach a total minimum assessed value of $1.4 Billion by January 1, 2022, and a minimum tax bill of $31.1 Million for the next 26 years. Having submitted no new development plans since 2019, and with the absence of any open bid packages for work to be performed in Area I, it is difficult to imagine how they will achieve that valuation. Indeed, Foxconn has not come even close to fulfilling their financial obligations in the State and local contract. 

Representative Vos would have the public believe it doesn’t matter what Foxconn makes, stating the decision to withhold tax credit payments to Foxconn is "a bunch of B.S" and “Do you care or does the taxpayer care if they’re making a TV or a circuit board? It doesn’t really matter.” Actually, what Foxconn makes does matter in order for it to meet its contract obligations.

The Generation 10.5 LCD factory Foxconn promised to build is beyond massive. It would have required at least 10,000 full-time jobs to operate and a $10 Billion investment to construct. The supply chain of manufacturing would have employed thousands more, and it would have required 10,000 construction workers each year for several years. 

In the last three years, Foxconn has constructed only two buildings in Area I - the “Multi-Purpose Building,” a 120,000 square foot warehouse in which there are a small number of employees reportedly assembling circuit boards; and a 1 Million square foot building that was supposed to house the LCD factory. Instead, a small number of employees are assembling coffee kiosks and a portion of the building is being used for storage. Foxconn’s disappointing efforts netted a total of 281 jobs in 2019, far less than their goal of 2080 full-time jobs.

According to the Wisconsin Division of Executive Budget and Finance, Foxconn’s LCD factory building is not even equipped to fabricate glass substrates but rather, “it appears to be a place equipped to perform assembly operations, and may be better suited for demonstration purposes rather than as a viable commercial glass fabrication facility.” 

It is unlikely that Foxconn will ever employ more than 1,500 full-time employees, which will be relegated mainly to low-level assembly work. A far cry from a technology hub that was promised to be the “eighth wonder of the world.” 

According to the Journal Sentinel article, Representative Vos claims “the agreement was centered around jobs, wages and the company building facilities,” but then he turns around and says “...All that really matters is how many people they employ and what they pay them.” 

Mr. Vos conveniently leaves out two key components of the contract - the building facilities and the investment necessary to build them. 13,000 full-time jobs, at least $53,875 per year plus benefits, a 20 Million square foot manufacturing facility, and a $10 Billion investment. 

Those components are the only reason the State agreed to offer nearly $3 Billion in tax credits and why Mount Pleasant agreed to spend approximately $1 Billion in infrastructure and land acquisitions. 

Senator Wanggaard and Representative Vos point out that Wisconsin has not paid any tax credits to Foxconn, but conveniently fail to recognize the hundreds of millions of dollars the Village of Mount Pleasant and Racine County have already spent on property acquisitions, infrastructure and financing. 

They want you to forget about the 80 homes demolished for the project, many of which were unnecessary, and 2,500 acres acquired for the project, most of which sits vacant. Nevermind the $113 Million spent on an electric substation and power lines that will be paid for entirely by ATC’s ratepayers, and millions owed by Mount Pleasant to the Racine Water Utility for water Foxconn isn’t using. 

Our local and state leaders, like Senator Wanggaard and Representative Vos, have known for years that Foxconn was not going to build what they promised. That knowledge did not prevent them from sinking our Village into unprecedented debt. Nearly $1 Billion of debt that is guaranteed, in part, by Wisconsin taxpayers if Foxconn defaults.

WEDC has declared the original deal with Foxconn to be broken and requires renegotiation,  while our local politicians tell us that the local agreement, which calls for the same factory, jobs and investment, is intact and operational. It is not.

Mr Wanggaard and Mr. Vos aren’t just gaslighting their own constituents into thinking everything is fine. They are covering for the colossally irresponsible deal they struck three years ago that is turning out exactly as many experts anticipated. 

####

A Better Mt. Pleasant is a nonpartisan, community organization dedicated to advancing a fair,

accountable and transparent local government in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin.

WI GOP's too-little-too-late COVID plan is Power Grab 2.0

After nine months of paid vacation while thousands of Wisconsinites were killed by the coronavirus, Wisconsin GOP legislators are fast-tracking (har!) a package that purportedly seeks to confront the already-rampant virus but in actuality grabs the executive branch's emergency and public health functions - as well as some local jurisdictions' powers, too - - from the incoming Governor Evers whose powers Legislative Republicans with defeated Gov. Walker's assistance began seizing in late 2018 even before Evers was sworn in.

Let's be clear: The GOP package is not made up of science-based-best-practices-disease-fighting-public-policy-buttressing measures.

It is a purely partisan power move to puff up the gerrymandered GOP caucus while mocking people who have contracted the virus, or who lost their jobs to it or watched over a video hookup as relatives took a last, COVID19 choked breath in the presence of overworked frontline medical staffers whose well-being has been also been disregarded by GOP malfeasance, too.

All you need to know about these Republican charlatans is that Speaker Vos told the public it was "incredibly safe" to go stand in line for April in-person voting while he was draped in protective gear - 

- and GOP State Senator Van Wanggaard said in October that he opposed the kind of science-backed virus-restraining masking order which Republicans had been opposing for months even if the Wisconsin coronavirus caseload increased ten-fold.

You've heard of virus super-spreaders. Meet a Wisconsin stupid-spreader.

Does he sound like the kind of 'leader' you want in charge of safe schooling, medical supply funding, vaccination distribution and other elements of the so-called GOP virus-fighting package?

I'm glad to see organizing against the GOP move by the League of Progressive Seniors :

Urgent Message: Stop Assembly Speaker Robin Vos from taking control of COVID policies, federal money and vaccine distribution!

During 2020, Vos closed down the legislature and did nothing to protect the state while almost 5,000 people died. He filed a series of lawsuits to stop the Governor from preventing the spread of COVID. In December, Governor Evers and the State Assembly developed a joint plan to fight COVID using new federal aid and the vaccine supplies. Now, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos dumped the joint plan and introduced his own bill, taking power over the whole process of fighting the pandemic. He is pushing it through the legislature as fast as possible.   Today is the “public“ hearing for the Vos bill, and the vote in the Assembly is Thursday. His bill gives the Assembly – where Vos has maximum power – control over: local governments efforts to address the pandemic. school districts ability to respond to COVID. how to spend funds coming from the federal government. how to distribute the vaccine.

Click here to download a Report on the Vos's Failure to fight Covid in 2020 and the details of his plan.

Look to Gov. Evers to veto this do-nothing-but-grab-power package that has been belatedly cobbled together by the state's leading AWOL COVID coddlers.

Links to Van Wanggaard's remarks and other WI GOP intentional public health obstruction during the pandemic are in a December post, here.

A guide to WI's right-wing COVID-coddling

Soon this singularly awful year will be over and optimism about COVID19 vaccines - along with flat-out, coast-to-coast exhaustion - could dull the memory of what we've gone through.

So I want to gather examples of what some Wisconsin right-wing politicians and officials actually did and said while everyday citizens with less power and fewer resources were - and continue to be - overwhelmed, sickened, impoverished and killed by COVID19.

This updates a similar item posted November 9th.

A guide to WI's right-wing COVID-coddling

Soon this singularly awful year will be over and optimism about COVID19 vaccines - along with flat-out, coast-to-coast exhaustion - could dull the memory of what we've gone through.

So I want to gather examples of what some Wisconsin right-wing politicians and officials actually did and said while everyday citizens with less power and fewer resources were - and continue to be - overwhelmed, sickened, impoverished and killed by COVID19.

This updates a similar item posted November 9th.

Note that the COVID19 data cited below is taken from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services' COVID19 dashboard website.(Also note that COVID19 for Wisconsin published daily by The New York Times is gathered differently and consistently shows higher numbers.)

-----------------------------------

* Wisconsin GOP Assembly Speaker Robin Vos - on the eve of what would be the Legislature's fully-paid eight-month-plus vacation - said on April 7th "you are incredibly safe to go out," and headed outside swathed in personal protective equipment. 

Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, a Republican, wore a mask, gloves and other protective gear as he sought to assure voters it was "incredibly safe" to vote in person for Tuesday's election amid the coronavirus pandemic.... 

Vos' message was strikingly disconnected from his PPE-heavy outfit, in which the speaker looked more like a surgeon than one of the state's most powerful politicians. Vos did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

By that day, April 7th, there had been 2,578 confirmed cases of COVID19 in Wisconsin and 92 deaths. On Friday, December 18, the confirmed cumulative case number in Wisconsin had soared to 451,676 and the confirmed death toll to 4,345.

* On May 5th, The Wisconsin Supreme Court - meeting virtually and respecting COVID19 distancing guidelines -  heard arguments in a case brought by GOP Legislative leaders to overturn Democratic Gov. Tony Evers 'Safer-at-Home' order extension. The Justices overturned the Evers order several days later by a 4-3 vote.

During the May 5th argument, Chief Justice Patience Roggensack (the Court is officially non-partisan, but has a 4-3 majority which usually supports conservative and GOP positions) opined that a highly-publicized outbreak of COVID19 in Brown County (the Green Bay-area) meatpacking plants which employed large numbers of migrant workers in close quarters had not hit "regular folks."

The food and commercial workers union called it "shocking and deeply offensive that Roggensack would suggest that workers in meatpacking plants aren't 'regular folks' who deserve protection."

On May 5th, state data showed a total of 1,966 confirmed COVID19 cases and 13 confirmed deaths in Brown County. Using the latest, December 18 data, those Brown County numbers had soared to 25,042 confirmed cases and 155 confirmed deaths, with both categories having jumped by more than by a factor of 10.

* Speaking of factors of 10 and other COVID multipliers,  Racine GOP State Senator Van Wanggaard, an opponent of state masking orders, explained on October 8th to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel why he wouldn't budge off that position.

He said he wouldn't back a mask requirement even if COVID-19 becomes 10 times worse than it is now. Wisconsin now has an average of 2,300 new cases per day — an increase of 180% over a month ago, according to the state Department of Health Services....“Nobody should be dictating to me when I have to wear a mask.”

On October 8th, state data showed Racine County had a total of 3,611 confirmed COVID19 cases and 78 confirmed deaths. On December 18, those numbers had soared to 16,452 confirmed cases and 236 confirmed deaths. 

So not a ten-fold increase, thank goodness, but substantial increases nonetheless.

* On August 3rd, GOP Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald urged the Senate to overturn a statewide mask-wearing order issued by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. 

“I just said I think it’s a mistake,” Fitzgerald said of the mask order. “I think things are going well right now. People are complying if they want to.” 

On August 3rd, the confirmed COVID19 case number in Wisconsin was 55,328 and the death toll was 949. By December 18, the confirmed case number had soared to 451,676 and the death toll to 4,345.

The State Senate never took up the measure, has remained on hiatus since mid-April and Fitzgerald has since been elected to Congressional seat safely gerrymandered for Republicans by the GOP-led Legislature. 

Which brings us to Wisconsin's senior GOP US Senator and all-in Trump enabler Ron Johnson. 

* In the very early days of the pandemic on March 18 - note that Wisconsin did not report deaths until March 20th, state data show - Johnson was sugarcoating COVID19 risks and framing the issues in business-like/balance-sheet statistics, as The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported:

"...97 to 99 percent will get through this and develop immunities and will be able to move beyond this. But we don’t shut down our economy because tens of thousands of people die on the highways. It’s a risk we accept so we can move about. We don’t shut down our economies because tens of thousands of people die from the common flu,” Johnson said.

Johnson acknowledged that coronavirus has a far higher fatality rate than the seasonal flu, but said, “getting coronavirus is not a death sentence except for maybe no more than 3.4 percent of our population (and) I think probably far less,” he said...

By the way, 3.4 percent of the US population is more than 11 million people. 

* Months later on Monday, October 13 and having personally recovered from the virus, Johnson said he still opposed masking orders and repeated his position that COVID19 "is not a death sentence." 

The Associated Press provided some context: 

As of Monday, more than 152,000 people in Wisconsin had tested positive for the virus, with 1,474 deaths, according to the state Department of Health Services...Wisconsin has seen a surge in cases in recent months, and has been one of the top five states in the country for new cases per capita.

The number of people hospitalized due to COVID-19 in Wisconsin also hit a record high on Monday at 950, according to the Wisconsin Hospital Association.... 

Johnson reiterated his opposition to Wisconsin’s mask mandate, issued by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. A judge on Monday upheld the order, rejecting attempts by the Republican-controlled Legislature and a conservative law firm to overturn it.  

* And if you think Johnson's affinity for statistics right now is, empathy-free and cold-blooded, rest assured that he volunteered an answer for that just yesterday on October 18. 

That's when media nationwide, including Newsweek, reported Johnson had twice last week killed $1,200 federal government support checks aimed at alleviating some of the damage that COVID19 has done to people, families, business owners and the country, writ large: 

'I'm Not Heartless': GOP Senator Defends Blocking Stimulus Checks Twice in One Day

 

 

WI GOP's tardy virus 'plan' coddles COVID, pumps up Republican power

So the GOP-led WI State Assembly, still on vacation since mid-April during the killer COVID19 pandemic which has sickened more than 400,000 Wisconsinites and killed more than 3,600 - and is surging again - has finally released a list here of so-called pandemic-fighting measures that differs from Donald Trump throwing rolls of paper towels to hurricane-traumatized Puerto Ricans only in the number of words involved.

And let's be clear: The list - nicely-bulleted here by the RacineJournalTimes - is not a disease-fighting, lead-from-the-front public health plan, in my opinion. 

It's got some of the feel of a flunking freshman's kitchen-sink, many-sentenced and desperate blue book -   

• Create business grants for the hospitality industry
• Allow health service providers from other states to practice in Wisconsin.
• Allow pharmacists to extend prescriptions of up to 30 days "without obtaining an extension of the prescription order from the healthcare professional who wrote the prescription."

- that hangs together if you understand that has everything to do with gaining more partisan power and leverage in the State Capitol and less about sincerely dealing with a virus GOP legislators bailed on more than eight months ago.

Again, from the RacineJournalTimes compilation:

• Require governor to submit plans to Joint Committee on Finance for spending federal COVID-19 funds, and require committee to approve that spending
• Call on all executive branch employees excluding UW System employees to return to work in person by Jan. 31
• Prohibit local health officers from ordering closures and/or capacity restrictions on specific types of business unless restriction "applies to all types of businesses"
• Reopen state buildings for public access
• Double the number of local public health staff working on the COVID-19 response via a requirement of the Department of Health Services
• Offer weekly rapid antigen tests for home use by requiring DHS "to work with private vendors"
• Requiring the Department of Health Services to get approval from the state's Joint Committee on Finance before the end of 2020 on its "Vaccine Distribution Plan"

The Legislature could have come into session months ago and passed any of their measures if they were serious about stemming the spread of the pandemic and backing up treatment with actual dollars and intent.

And remember when Republican legislators begged the State Supreme Court in May to void Gov. Evers' effective 'Safer-at-Home' order extension because all they wanted (wink, wink) was a seat at the table to work collaboratively with Evers.

As in, C'mon, mom and dad, please don't make us sit at the kids table. We've got grown-up ideas about how to spend some money and save lives and we can't wait to show you our plans!!

But all year the Legislators have been more concerned with some different dollars - the ones they were raising during call time with donors to fund election campaigns and committee war chests.

The GOP legislators' laundry list proves again that they are consumed with grabbing power from Evers and the executive branch, as well as taking away local government and school boards' authorities - a further extension of one-party consolidation which GOP legislators have carrying out in partnership with the enthusiastic assistance of a rightist Stte Supreme Court majority who have all allowed their previous 'principles' of balanced government and local control to expire. 

It's the hypocrisy the right has used to kneecap Evers since he defeated Gov. Walker in November, 2018.

The Wisconsin GOP's long-awaited legislative COVID19 fighting 'plan' is just another grab for executive branch power.

An additional goal of these GOP power brokers is the further demeaning and sidelining of Andrea Palm, Evers' eminently-qualified Secretary-nominee who is managing the Department of Health and Social Services, and whom the GOP-led State Senate has declined to confirm since she was appointed on January 4, 2019.

GOP legislators have repeatedly attacked Palm and called for her firing. 

During a pandemic. 

Where's the rationale there, except as a feel-good partisan power move? 

Remember then-GOP State Sen. Tom Tiffany - since promoted to the US Congress - even said Palm had no business being health secretary because she wasn't from Wisconsin - a blatant irrelevancy and double-standard because no such objection was raised when Walker appointed the promptly-confirmed and-DC-based Obamacare opponent Dennis Smith to the position Palm now holds.

Let's just say Palm has run a steadier ship in far more turbulent waters than did Smith, but is being treated shabbily with intent by public officials who have sworn oaths to protect the people.

But back to the notion that we'd be in better hands if we turned the administration of COVID19 prevention measures over to the same GOP legislators who ran in April for the hills so they could run for office when the pandemic was been killing people stateside, including many of their own constituents.

* You've seen outgoing GOP State Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald defend masking avoidance as an OK personal choice (translation: we're not all in this together), campaign without wearing one and opine that things were "going well" with voluntary masking-wearing even as COVID19 was running wild.

And has gotten more deadly since.

Wisconsin's COVID19 positive case count now exceeds 409,000.

* And let's not forget Racine's GOP State Senator Van Wanggaard.

He said several weeks and tens of thousands of COVID19 cases ago that he wouldn't support a statewide masking ban like the one which the State Supreme Court could soon overturn even if the cases multiplied ten-fold (see video).

For the record: Wanggard made his 'at-your-expense' remark on October 3rd, when the COVID19 positive case tally was 141,830.

At current rates and a count now over 400,000, that total will triple its October 3rd number within a week to ten days, data show.

Be careful what you wish for, Senator.

And since we're speaking about lists, I included Van Wanggaard's morbid math in a Top Ten compilation of the worst things Wisconsin Republicans and their allies have said and done to align themselves with Trump's self-serving COVID19 minimizing that also kept Wisconsin among the hottest of disease hotspots during the pandemic:

* And let's not forget GOP State Senator and big thinker Van Wanggaard, (Racine). He's the one who said on October 8th that COVID-19 cases could increase by a factor of ten and he would still fight any statewide masking order.

The NY Times chart showed 3,237 new cases on October 8th - which is a big number on what should be called Van Wanggaard Covidometer Day - but, alas (?) is less than half of Saturday's 7,494.

By the way, if ten is the number Republicans want to stick with, there have been more than ten times the COVID19 deaths - from 353 to - 3,628 - that have taken place since WI GOP legislative leaders went to the State Supreme Court in May and successfully convinced the friendly rightist majority there to throw out the Evers' 'Safer-at-Home order.

* In fact, the same Wisconsin GOP Assembly leadership that finally cobbled together its COVID19 mish-mash couldn't even protect its own staffers from a COVID outbreak in their suite of offices apparently traced to reckless behaviors. 

And then wouldn't talk about it.

Wisconsin Republicans have been facing an outbreak among lawmakers and aides. But they don't want to talk about it.

Wisconsin Republican lawmakers and top GOP aides have been facing a coronavirus outbreak in recent weeks following a series of in-person events, including a retirement party for a longtime Capitol staffer, a dozen sources told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel....  

Those affected by the COVID-19 outbreak include Jenny Toftness, chief of staff for Speaker Robin Vos, who got sick after attending the retirement party in September.

You know who also likes a cap on information and a no-transparency policy?

COVID19. 

Because what you don't know about a pandemic keeps it rolling.

Seriously - do you want these one-dimensional, power-attuned and empathy-deficient ideologues taking charge of things like pandemic management and even vaccine distribution policy? 

I wouldn't trust any of them to drive a vaccine supply truck or help unload it.

Why? Because we have experienced and responsible people for all these tasks which need coordination for success - including doctors, nurses, hospital administrators, warehouse managers and delivery workers who have been trained and know what they're doing.

The best thing this current class of absentee and self-absorbed legislators could do to fight COVID19 now is quickly and rationally approve public funding and uncluttered non-partisan procedures that can stop the disease and the killing.

We elected a Governor. Let him govern.

We have experts in administration. Let them do the work for which they've been trained. 

Anything less than that only fuels COVID19's appetite, and we've had far too much of that.

WI Sup. Ct. grabs The COVID Express wheel from vacationing GOP legislators

You would think that rational people holding the title of "Justice" on a deliberative body with the word "Supreme" in its title would make sure they played no role in enabling the spread of a deadly contagion among the citizens who pay those justices' salaries.

And who every year or two get to vote the Justices in or out.

But the Wisconsin Supreme Court's so-called 'conservative' majority continues to do just that.

These Justices didn't let the most inert Republican state legislative leaders in America who lollygagged around their home districts for the last eight months absorb their pivotal, earned share of responsibility for COVID19's rampage which continues to flood hospitals and morgues with unimaginable numbers of Wisconsin citizen victims.

Regardless, the 'conservative' Justices were willing to say, Hey, we got this, they said to the GOP legislative leaders: go ahead, partners, and play your games and feather your nests - and we'll break the Democratic Governor for you while you're at it.

Because, what are friends for if not giving cover during COVID?

Note, for example, that the GOP-run Legislature has not had the political courage to come into session since mid-April and do anything, including voting up or down on the Governor's statewide masking order - a reality noted by an actual local judge in a Republican County - 

Judge to Republican GOP legislators: If you want to end the Governor's mask mandate, do it yourself

Why did the GOP-run Legislature sit that one out?

Because they knew the public supported masking orders by a 40-point polling margin, so these self-preservationist - not 'conservative' -  legislators preferred not to lug baggage stuffed with so much dirty laundry into the November election, or the court of public opinion.

So the Wisconsin Supreme Court's supremely callous 'conservatives' who are beholden to the same monied special interests which help gerrymander-protected legislative leaders maintain their power stepped in and have taken the lead since May to shut down Gov. Evers' 'Safer-at-Home' COVID19 mitigating order. 

Not surprisingly, Wisconsin's COVID19 cases have exploded since then  by a factor of more than 33.

Of course killing statewide COVID-controls can be made - if one is creative - to dovetail with the WI GOP legislators' phony preference for local controls:

Top GOP lawmakers now want to leave virus plan in the hands of local officials

"As a Republican, I believe in local control," [GOP Assembly Speaker] Vos said Thursday.

Two things about that b.s. 

1. Republican legislators had been doing the opposite for eight years when Walker was there to rubber-stamp their power grabs:

GOP lawmakers passed 128 measures limiting local control since 2011  

2. The so-called conservative Justices aligned with Republicans just blocked Racine's local orders that suspended in-person classroom education because of spiking COVID tallies.

Remember when Speaker Vos said he preferred local officials set local COVID-related policies?

In case you forgot, here's that link and his sanctimonious verbiage, again:

As Wisconsinites try to understand what daily life is supposed to look like now that the state Supreme Court has eliminated the Evers administration's stay-at-home order, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said local officials should be able to largely handle the situation on their own. 

"As a Republican, I believe in local control," he said Thursday.

And do you remember that Speaker Vos represents people in Racine County? Never the less, you won't hear a peep out of Vos about the Supreme Court's obstruction of that local order and the larger diminution there of local control.

Sidebar: Can someone point me to the State Supreme Court's science advisers? They must have some, since the Justices continue to hold their meetings via Zoom conferencing that 'masks' the from the pandemic.

Masking order ruling expected soon

So the Court's so-called 'conservative' majority will continue to do the GOP Legislative leaders' dirty work for them, regardless of irony and respect for principles - from local control to putting everyday people over the narrowest of politics to true separation of powers.

Why? 

Because hacking away at Gov. Evers' credibility, the role of science, and the value of public health brought about by public officials is boilerplate Wisconsin GOP gospel.

That partisan playbook also allows Assembly Leader Vos to masquerade as a believer in bi-partisan give-and-take and phony-up a more marketable persona for future campaigns.

Just like it helped outgoing GOP Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald spend the last eight months collecting full state legislators' public pay while campaigning and 'winning' an election to Congress in a district his own party had safely gerrymandered for Republican Party candidates.

That's the WI GOP and State Supreme Court's 'conservative' majority's joint agenda working well, writ large: hold onto power, keep the line moving, elevate ideology over common ground, undermine Democrats and devalue the public sphere through the 2022 elections, and beyond.

And if there are a lot more collateral casualties, and even regular people get sick, Republicans like Racine (again, Racine!) State Sen. Van Wanggaard have said: bring it on:

Leading WI GOP State Senator says 10x COVID cases not worth mask order

So when the final disease and mortality tolls are tallied, the failed businesses and their unemployed workers are toted up, and some value is attached to the damage done to children's educations and their earning potential by the pandemic made worse by partisan inaction and abject stupidity, let's in the name of truth-in-advertising add “Official Death Panel” to the State Supreme Court mission statement.

And require COVID-coddling justices to trade their black robes for gravediggers' coveralls.