Sen. Bamboozled echoes an ex-Charlatan-in-Chief

It is possible that people following GOP Sen. Ron Johnson's relentless obstruction of science along with his his boundless allegiance 

to a President who sought to overthrow the 2020 election might have missed his weekend swerve into science fiction.

No, it was not the first time he looked to the stars and reached a bizarre conclusion: 

Sunspots are behind climate change, Johnson says

Also, there's no evidence that Johnson showed up at his party's Wisconsin Dells convention after watching videos of UFOs which is suddenly a thing to do on Capitol Hill.

It seems Johnson decided to dress-and-sum up an attack on his critics with an homage to the 1997 sci-fi film "Contact" - a book by scientist and philosopher Carl Sagan.

The Capital Times reported it this way:  

At WI convention, Ron Johnson calls for GOP to 'take back our culture'

"Our little democracy here, this marvel we call America, is but a blip in time. It’s kind of tiny, it’s kind of insignificant on that scale. But man, is it rare and is it ever precious," he said, alluding to the 1997 film "Contact."

The film was thought-provoking, and lead actor Jodie Foster who played a scientist amid other scientists, was terrific. 

I did a modest search on Google for lines from the film or elsewhere from Sagan which approached Johnson's appropriation; perhaps Team Johnson was referencing Sagan's famous tiny "Pale Blue Dot."

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

— Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot, 1994

Or not.

But it's brutally paradoxical that a politician as contemptuous of science as is Johnson - remember that after his convention speech he made this news - 

Fact check: Sen. Ron Johnson (again) misleads on vaccines and reported deaths

- would try and align himself with a thinker like Carl Sagan who understood precisely why science is valuable and how it should be applied in the public sphere: 

“Science is a way to call the bluff of those who only pretend to knowledge… It can tell us when we’re being lied to. It provides a mid-course correction to our mistakes.”

And I did find in my Google search a link to something Sagan wrote which points to the place in contemporary politics which Johnson has carved out for himself, to Wisconsin's shame:

“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.” 

― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark 

WI Assembly wants 'truth in meat' labeling; must 'hamburgers' be all-pork?

WI GOP Assembly Speaker Robin Vos allowed a 'truth in meat' labeling bill to reach the floor where it passed last week.

 

A related measure promoted by the Wisconsin dairy industry aims to stop soy or almond products from being labeled "milk."

Set aside the fact that consumers with commonsense understand that you can't milk an almond.

Or that shrimp are 'jumbo' mostly in the eye of the buffet operator, and that there's no ham in a "hamburger," and take on faith that there's no Buffy or Bowser in a hot dog.

(Though I'm not sure how many people know that the ubiquitous "Ice Mountain" bottled water comes from groundwater in rather not-so-mountainous Michigan, but I digress).

Anyway, while we'll see if Wisconsin's State Senators fall in line, do Assembly members in the cheese and dairy state who believe their bills stand up for Wisconsin agriculture understand they are undermining it by validating claims by Italian cheesemakers that no one but producers in a specific region there should be allowed to say they are making Parmesan cheese? 

Parmesan from Wisconsin? How dairy you?! Italy wants to reclaim its cheese. 

How far down this road will Assembly Republicans take us?

Will Wisconsin producers or sellers be able to advertise and provide Peking duck, Kielbasa or Roquefort cheese not directly imported from their countries of origin?

Wouldn't the Legislature better spend its time and our money addressing actual dairy and rural issues, such as manure run-off, or over-pumping, and persistently polluted wells, or on public health issues raised by the so-called traditional American diet?

 

Surprise! (not). Vos hires divisive partisan as voting 'probe' chief

WI GOP Assembly Speaker Robin Vos announced at the state GOP convention that he'd hired with taxpayer funds ex-Wi Supreme Court Associate Justice Michael Gableman to oversee retired police officers Vos 

had already hired to chase after alleged 2020 election fraud.

That Vos announced Gableman's hiring at the GOP convention further exposes the blatantly partisan nature of the 'probe'.

After all, Gableman had already aligned himself with people who were recklessly claiming the 2020 election was stolen by Democrats. 

Hundreds gather to support President Trump at Serb Hall

The crowd waved flags, held up signs, chanted and listened to speakers, which included former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman. 

Many of the people in the crowd said they agree with President Trump's false and baseless claims about election fraud or voter irregularities.... 

"I don't think anyone would be here if we all had confidence that this was an honest election," Gableman said. 

But there had long been plenty of evidence which suggested putting Gableman is absolutely the wrong person to examine the integrity of an election. 

* You may remember that Gableman won a State Supreme Court election in 2008 through a campaign which one veteran watchdog journalist labeled "vile."

Gableman -- unfit for any office 

 * And in case you have forgotten it, please watch the video of Gableman's speech while a sitting Justice at a Republican gathering in Green Lake in which he projects partisanship and biases onto Democrats and then-Assistant Attorney General JoAnne Kloppenberg who was running at the time against Gableman ally Justice David Prosser.

His dog whistle fear-mongering about Jesse Jackson and outsider "Illinois license" influences riding into Wisconsin should make any observer gag.

* I'd noted that Gableman appearance in a 2011 blog post (but the video link had since died, so access it in the paragraph, above), and I later wrote up a Gableman speaking role scheduled at another GOP, partisan event: 

Wisconsin's far rightwing, often-conflicted and corporately-beholden conservative majority had been correctly given a failing grade for ethics - details, here - - but we learned today via the indispensable Wisconsin Democracy Campaign that Associate Justice Michael Gableman has lowered the bar, broken it into splinters and tossed them into the judicial dumpster:

Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, who penned the court opinion that ended the controversial John Doe probe of Scott Walker’s campaign activities, is one of the featured speakers at a Republican Party fundraiser – along with the head of a shadowy rightwing group that the John Doe prosecutor was reportedly looking into. That group, Wisconsin Club for Growth, spent more than half a million dollars to get Gableman elected in 2008.

Gableman, who is among the court’s 5-2 conservative majority and faces reelection next year to a second 10-year term on the court, is scheduled to appear March 11 at the Barron County Republican Party’s Lincoln Day dinner in Rice Lake.

In addition to Gableman, the director of the Wisconsin Club for Growth, Eric O’Keefe, will also be a keynote speaker at the event.

Vos is just wasting more taxpayer money with Gableman's hiring and hoping to use a rigged investigation to rig future elections.

Sounds vile to me. 

Wolves as deer disease fighters can be DNR science, education tool

You hear it all the time:"Follow the science."

We constantly say that science needs to be at the heart of public policy. 

Which makes total ethical and practical sense when it comes to fighting climate change, or ensuring clean air and safe drinking water.

Because our health, our very survival is at stake.

But making science the core of state-sanctioned wolf-killing is a really big, contradictory ask.

Because special 'sporting' interests have long had the inside track that makes snared legs, head shots, wolf trophy collection and their packs' decimation the science-obliterating public policy outcome.

And in no way conserves the species, let alone suggests wolves have any larger value to people beyond Wisconsin's indigenous tribes:

We understand wolves to be our educators, teaching us about hunting and working together in extended family units. Wolves exemplify perseverance, guardianship, intelligence, and wisdom. 

Moreover, in the Anishinaabe creation story, we are taught that Ma’iingan is a brother to the Original Man. The two traveled together throughout the earth naming everything. Once this task was completed, the Creator said that the two had to take separate paths, but indicated that whatever happened to one would happen to the other. Each would be feared, respected, and misunderstood by the people who would later join them on earth. 

Thus the health and survival of Anishinaabe people is tied to that of Ma’iingan. We can do no less than to fully support efforts to protect and promote acceptance and to ensure healthy and abundant populations of wolves–it is our future we are also considering…”

The ugly reality of Wisconsin's official wolf policy was plainly shown to the world during the cavalier, bloody and politicized 2020 'hunt' when Wisconsin authorities threw science, their own kill quotas, fair chase standards and other best practices out the door as they also did in earlier wolf killing seasons, too.

So here is a simple, doable baby step that the DNR could take to bring science and public service back into the matter by incorporating wolves as part of solutions, and not defining and treating them solely as the problem.

How?

By inserting into the discussion and policy-making intentional myth-busting education that explains and implements the positive, natural role wolves can play in culling diseased deer from the state's herd.

Who would oppose the state more effectively confronting the continuing spread of chronic wasting deer disease (CWD) by using wolves as "nature's first responders" to the deadly deer disease?

Focusing on wolves' value as natural CWD fighters and and also as a key contributor to the overall health of the forest would give the DNR reason to reiterate its own findings - I'd enumerated them in a 2013 web posting here - that showed wolves do not markedly reduce the overall integrity of the herd, as some hunters mistakenly believe: 

According to the Wisconsin DNR, "Each wolf kills about 20 deer per year. Multiply this by the number of wolves found in Wisconsin in recent years (630), and approximately 13,000 deer may be consumed by wolves annually. 

This compares to over 40,000 deer hit by cars each year, and about 450,000 deer shot annually by hunters statewide. 

Within the northern and central forests where most wolves live, wolves kill similar numbers of deer as are killed by vehicles (about 13,000), and about 1/10 of those killed by hunters (127,000 in 2008). 

Wolves are a factor in the deer herd, but only one of many factors that affects the total number of deer on the landscape." 

And a DNR publication discussing research to begin in 2010 also threw cold water on the notion that wolves take deer from hunters:

Some hunters argue an expanded wolf population, in particular, has resulted in fewer deer in the northern and central forests.  

Review of published research and preliminary data analysis suggests bears are having a small but measurable impact on fawn mortality and that wolves have a small impact on the mortality rate of adult does.

And you will see the same belief again debunked during a discussion of DNR research recorded at the agency's Wolf Management advisory committee's most recent meeting in Wausau, on July 18.

This is important because many hunters miss that point.

Among hunters who applied for 2020 Wisconsin wolf killing permits, 42.4% - the largest number by far - chose this statement as their top reason among 10 choices for their permit application:

"I wanted to reduce the wolf population impact on deer and other animals," according to survey data shared by the DNR at its Wednesday wolf advisory committee meeting.

So the DNR can focus research on the deer-wolf relationship and also expand and sharpen its brief, repeatedly-qualified and cautious language on the matter which the agency has included in a web-based wolf information Q & A: 

The relationship between wolves and deer is complex. Generally, winter weather and human harvest, especially antlerless harvest, have greater impacts on deer populations than predation over the long term. Deer herds in northern Wisconsin have increased significantly in recent years, even with an established wolf population, suggesting that wolves do not limit deer population growth. However, deer may alter their behavior, movements and/or habitat use in response to the presence of wolves.

Wolves are skilled at identifying vulnerable prey, and tend to target individuals that are old, young, sick or otherwise weakened. Hence, deer removed by wolves are less likely to survive and less likely to produce offspring than the deer that remain. The average age of white-tailed deer killed by wolves was 6.5 years in Minnesota, for example, whereas the average age of does taken by hunters was 2.5 years in this same area. This targeting of vulnerable animals serves to reduce the impact of wolves on long-term deer population dynamics. It has also been suggested that wolves might reduce CWD transmission rates and prevalence by removing sick individuals.

An interesting and more detailed article on the relationship between deer hunting and wolves was published by a Minnesota biologist in 2009.

In other words, the DNR can strengthen its commitment to good science, and to useful, accurate public education and perception.

Luckily, the agency can make use of the work of Wisconsin Greenfire, the non-partisan group of Wisconsin experts and scientists, which recently released a report - 

Creating A Shared Vision for Wolves in Wisconsin 

- that provides facts and directions that can be integrated into state wolf policy.

There are ways to actively bring science into DNR policy-making. 

We'll see if the agency has the will to do it.

Latest WI Lake MI diversion project began w/out authorization

The cascade of ill-advised and boldly bogus Great Lakes diversion plans by Wisconsin communities is getting stronger, and this bulldozing trend needs replacement by a more credible level of scrutiny and enforcement if the state is going to be a trustworthy Great Lakes regional resource partner.

I'd noted a couple of months ago the regrettably unsurprising news that the Village of Somers in Kenosha County had become just latest Wisconsin community to seek a diversion of water from Lake Michigan. 

Lake Michigan

I say 'unsurprising' given the way various Wisconsin state officials and localities continue to treat the Great Lakes' finite water volume and its purportedly-controlling water management compact of 2008 as more of a proprietary Badger state open faucet than a last-ditch source and solution to public health or water supply emergencies, with the Foxconn diversion being the most ill-advised and egregiously bogus.

A document filed by the Village with the Department of Natural Resources in support of a diversion application makes clear the diverted water will serve existing customers and anticipated commercial, residential and industrial users as the Village expands through annexations into land that is "primarily commercial and farmland" to reach "full buildout."

So, this is basically a sprawl-enabling plan. Which the Compact was not intended to fuel because if one jurisdiction is allowed to use diverted water for economic advantage, others will follow.

Again, see the Foxconn diversion/debacle, as litigants noted and warned after a state judge waived it though :

From the beginning, this case was about ensuring that diversions of Great Lakes water meet the letter and spirit of the Compact. The unfortunate outcome of this case underscores both the importance of monitoring the implementation of existing diversions and the need to prepare for future diversion requests.

But it turns out that Wisconsin's now routinized contempt water conservation has produced an actual new fact that underscores just how lightly and carelessly some officials here are treating the Compact, its water conservation goal and normal process transparency:

Somers officials have already spent millions of public dollars to complete 40% of the proposed diversion's construction without legal authorization from Wisconsin officials. 

State regulators have ordered the Village of Somers in Kenosha County to halt construction on its project to draw water from Lake Michigan. The village began work before receiving all the necessary approvals to move forward. 

Somers wants to divert an average of 1.2 million gallons of water per day from Lake Michigan as the village is seeing new development. The Public Service Commission launched an investigation Thursday after regulators discovered construction was underway on a water transfer station and about 5 miles of pipe that would bring water outside the Great Lakes basin. 

Midwest Environmental Advocates, a nonprofit law center, wants to ensure any proposal to divert Great Lakes water is subject to the highest scrutiny, according to staff attorney Rob Lee.... 

This is the first time unauthorized work has occurred on a project that must meet requirements under the Great Lakes Compact, according to a PSC spokesperson....The DNR plans to hold a public hearing on the proposed water diversion once the agency has obtained all necessary information as part of its review. 

We've got say more than 'oops' here. 

The diversion application should be rejected, the relevant agencies must explain publicly how they managed to overlook the work until it was 40% done, and people who failed to do their jobs or, worse, looked the other way should be held accountable.

And props to Midwest Environmental Advocates for doing watchdog duty which relevant state and local officials had abandoned.

Yet another health alert about cow feces in Kewaunee Co. wells

For the umpteenth time, science shows that cow manure in rural drinking water has been pinpointed as the cause of human illness. 

The No. 1 factor for acute gastrointestinal illness in Kewaunee County’s private drinking water wells is cow manure, according to a federal study released today. The findings raise questions about the effectiveness of existing regulations aimed at protecting residents from tainted drinking water.

And while you are digesting that disgusting reality, remember that the same GOP politicians who are OK with brown water in rural taps are also walking away from active regulation of contaminating, 'forever chemical' industrial water pollution statewide as well as lead poisoning that is damaging the brains of young urban children.

Whether it's promoting bad water in rural wells or big-city water systems, the Wisconsin GOP, as I said last week, is the equal pollution opportunity party.

WI GOP budget cuts flush out possible new party logo 

The bad news is that WI's gerrymandered GOP legislators say they will delete funding to replace lead water pipes; they did the same thing two years ago because too many kids in Milwaukee might have gotten the benefit. 

And to stay consistent with that embrace of lead-laden household water pipes and their long-standing support of animal waste in well water, Republican legislators are refusing to write statewide standards into the budget that would speed the removal of toxic "forever chemicals" from state waters.

Like I said in 2016:

The Wisconsin GOP chooses to be The Pollution Party

* Back to the manure report; maybe that reminds you of this 2017 report: 

Up to 60 percent of sampled wells in a Kewaunee County study contained fecal microbes, many of which are capable of making people and calves sick, two scientists told hundreds of local residents gathered at a public meeting Wednesday night.

The microorganisms included Cryptosporidium, a parasite that comes from both people and animals. Researchers estimated Crypto in drinking water is likely infecting 140 of the county’s 20,000 residents each year.

Or echoes earlier media, like this 2019 blog post:

Following Kewaunee Co. manure runoffs. And the followups

 

Yes, that's "runoffs," plural, which helps explain why Kewaunee County clean water activist Nancy Utesch - - and others - - have said - for years - 'enough of this, already.'

Data show what people in Kewaunee County and the Central Sands region who live near the industrial-scale Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, or CAFOs, already know:

Their drinking water is contaminated:

WI Central Sands the next Flint? Kewaunee County already soaks up that honor.

And, yes, new litigation has been filed by dozens of residents in Juneau County - - but did you know that a delayed and diverted 2012 case brought against a Kewaunee County CAFO was successfully re-routed by former Attorney General Brad Schimel through the conservative-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court to Waukesha County?

* I even ran a guest blog about this by a Kewaunee County resident in 2014. 

Wells, cooler temperatures and a government that is encouraging industry to move in with a "no holds barred" culture is already increasing the number of Dairy CAFOs along with the numbers of cows.

For example, here in Kewaunee County we now have 76,000+ cows with another estimated 30,000+ by 2016! 

It is becoming a common belief system that Citizens United/ALEC/Americans for Prosperity are the present administration's puppet masters. Big vertically integrated industrialized agriculture (with $$ billions under their control) have this administration's complete attention and obedience. 

The environment and human citizens are no more than "collateral damage" getting in the way of massive greed-driven profits that benefit only a few (and who are very likely carefully out-sourcing their ill-begotten profits far away from any governmental oversight) 

The next few years may be very dramatic and traumatic...time will tell what the "big boyz" and our "government" are up to!

* In the GOP-led Walker era, politicians routinely ignored the warnings, like this one in 2015:

One-third of wells in Kewaunee County unsafe for drinking water

And if the rotten relationship between GOP politics and rotten drinking water everyday Wisconsinites, this 2020 posting proves you are right, again: 

WI GOP leaders go to bat for CAFOs. Again

Wisconsin GOP legislators, bellhops to corporate agriculture, will continue to serve brown tap water to rural constituents and the back of the hand to residents statewide....

Because the GOP is politically-attached to CAFO proliferation.

Vos, Fitzgerald go to bat for 'existing and expanding CAFO operations'

As an addendum to posts on this blog about GOP objections to WI livestock siting rules which have stalled and cost Gov. Evers his Ag department secretary nominee, I want to add some relevant correspondence, below.

It's a letter signed by WI GOP Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and WI GOP Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald....

Remember that major ag special interests, regardless of what runs off on to the land and into the water, have enjoyed special relationships with Walker, the DNR, and legislators (see the hand-delivered marching orders Big Ag handed them, here (bold-facing and color-coding in the original hand-delivered October 15, 2015 communication:

An urgent communication to all Wisconsin legislators

We are at a crossroads. It is imperative that the legislature assert its authority and bring certainty and sanity to the regulation of new and existing high capacity wells in Wisconsin.... 

If this sounds like an urgent plea, that is because this is. We cannot wait any longer for the legislation described above.

However, we cannot accept any legislation that would create new, stifling regulations or establish regulatory uncertainty as to how DNR and the state will approach new well applications moving forward 

Senator Snowflake had a hard Juneteenth down there

Having blocked a bill in 2020 to make Juneteenth a national holiday, Wisconsin GOP Senator and man who feared Black Lives Matter supporters more than the violent Capitol mob - Ron Johnson - 

- showed up at Milwaukee's Juneteenth celebration Saturday and got exactly what he hoped for:

He got booed.

Johnson immediately played his Juneteenth victim card to make sure his base voters understood how badly he'd been treated after having come all the way 'down here' just to get disrespected.

"You come down here and try to interact with people and be nice to people. But this isn't very nice, is it?"?

And, really: 'down here'?

Can't he suspend that elitist tone for one afternoon? 

I assume he meant 'down here from Oshkosh,' but people don't want their community characterized by someone - especially someone rich and powerful and previously unsympathetic - as down, or below.

Why not 'I came here to Milwaukee...'

Johnson even made sure to tell media he heard one 'nasty' comment  - oh, poor baby snowflake - no other politician has ever endured that calamity - but it reminded me that a) the former President often whimpered that he, too, had to suffer nasty questions or had 'nasty' things said about him, so credit Johnson with sending another signal sent to his base, and b) Johnson has had plenty of experience embracing and dishing out some pretty nasty disrespect, pain and suffering, too:

* When Johnson did not stand with abuse victims

* Republican Senator calls health care, food, and shelter care a 'privilege'

* GOP Senator Upbeat Coronavirus May Kill ‘No More Than 3.4 Percent of Our Population’

Tiffany newsletter converts fraud estimates into facts

Having noted in previous blog posts some misleading, demagoguing and denigrating information which far-right WI GOP Cong. Tom Tiffany has included in his weekly 'Telegram' newsletter, I'm duty-bound to pass along that in this week's edition he

'may' have done it again.

I get my edition by email. It will eventually be posted on his office website, and it circulates in newspapers in his district as op-eds.

Begin with these alarmist paragraphs:

We shared some troubling data with you recently about the sheer size and scope of fraud in government pandemic spending. Readers may recall some of the most ridiculous examples – con-artists buying Bentleys, Lamborghinis, Maseratis and swimming pools with your money, prison inmates cashing in from behind bars and even one brazen scammer who was so proud of defrauding American taxpayers that he made a rap video about it...

A bombshell report this week revealed that fully half of those generous unemployment benefits that the government has been pumping out – the ones encouraging many people to stay on public assistance rather than returning to work – have actually been stolen.

Now's let's stop right there, because the report did not say the funds "have actually been stolen." Read on. 

And that’s not all: It seems that more than two-thirds of the loot wound up in the pockets of street gangs and state-supported thieves as far away as China, Russia and Nigeria.... 

OK - two points: 

1. Stealing public funds is bad, criminal and wrong, but...

2. The "bombshell report" which was posted by the Axios news site that Tiffany is citing does not say "fully half of those generous unemployment benefits...have actually been stolen."

The report is titled:

Half of the pandemic's unemployment money may have been stolen

Swapping "may have been stolen" for "have actually been stolen" misstates the story, but would amp up its impact on unaware readers.

Note also that the story further restrains its reporting when its sources use qualifying wording like "estimates," or "might have been stolen."

By the numbers: Blake Hall, CEO of ID.me, a service that tries to prevent this kind of fraud, tells Axios that America has lost more than $400 billion to fraudulent claims. As much as 50% of all unemployment monies might have been stolen, he says.

Haywood Talcove, the CEO of LexisNexis Risk Solutions, estimates that at least 70% of the money stolen by impostors ultimately left the country, much of it ending up in the hands of criminal syndicates in China, Nigeria, Russia and elsewhere.

Again, those numbers are really big estimates - but Tiffany did not wait for official sources to verify them.

Yet this is no small matter: the difference is equivalent to what separates ‘you may have won the lottery’ from ‘you have actually won the lottery,’ or between ‘you may have exceeded the speed limit’ and ‘you have actually exceeded the speed limit - by 50%.’ 

But that’s what will happen when communications are allowed to morph into partisan vapidity.

Was his goal to boost the ideological, partisan narratives he regularly 'telegraphs' to his conservative electoral base?

Or was this just a mistake - or perhaps another  'drafting error'?

Note also that his current newsletter applies tougher word-smithing when explaining his vote against making Juneteenth a Federal holiday:

Does America need a second “National Independence Day”?  

That’s a question some of us asked when Democrats brought a bill to the House floor this week creating a new federal holiday called “Juneteenth National Independence Day” – legislation they passed with little debate, and no opportunity for lawmakers to offer amendments or alternatives. 

Many lawmakers went along with the bill, but I voted against it because I believe there is only one Independence Day in America – just as there is only one National Anthem, one American flag and one America – under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. 

To be clear, Juneteenth is one of many important milestones in America’s shared journey that began in 1776 to create a more perfect union – a commemoration of slaves in the American southwest learning that they had been emancipated. 

Unfortunately, by labeling this new holiday as a second, race-based “National Independence Day” instead of a “National Emancipation Day,” the bill represents yet another effort by Democrats to turn Americans against one another, and foment division based on skin color instead of uniting us.

Tiffany used the same kind of soaring rhetoric to explain why he opposed anti-Asian hate crime legislation.

“All violent and bias-motivated crimes are abhorrent, should be condemned, and the perpetrators prosecuted -- but politicizing the issue in an effort to pit Americans against one another based on race to score partisan political points is just plain wrong. We are all Americans, and we should denounce all crimes – regardless of the skin color of the offender or the victim.”

Again, two things:

1. Denouncing crimes is not the same as pro-actively implementing a solution to prevent them.

2. I cannot imagine that minority Americans living in his district believe they get fair representation from the Congressman to whom they contribute a share of his taxpayer-supplied salary and benefits.

Wolves can 'pick off' diseased deer - yet WI plans more wolf killing

It is beyond mere irony that despite wolves being called nature's 'first responders' to the chronic wasting disease that threatens the state's herd and an annual hunt the DNR values statewide at $1.4 billion, the agency on Friday, a) closed the comment period on its plans for upcoming wolf killing seasons mandated by the state legislature, and, b) separately announced by email, below, that it has added another Wisconsin county to those where deer chronic wasting disease has already spread.

Q. Why can't this contradiction be fixed?

A. Because despite sloppy management and a history of wolf killing-quota disregard, and  recent polling data and pleas from scientists and experts to the contrary, special interests have been given excessive control over Wisconsin wolf hunting policy. 

Opinion: Wisconsin’s brutal wolf hunt shows hunters have too much sway over conservation policy

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

Here is today's DNR deer wasting disease release:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 18, 2021 Contact: Dan Lekie, DNR Wildlife Supervisor Daniel.Lekie@wisconsin.gov or 920-838-1527 DNR Confirms CWD In Green Lake County Wild Deer; New Baiting And Feeding Ban In Effect BROOKLYN, Wis. – The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has confirmed a wild deer tested positive for chronic wasting disease (CWD) in Green Lake County. The CWD-positive deer was an adult deer found dead in the Town of Brooklyn in early May 2021. This is the first wild deer that has tested positive for CWD in Green Lake County, and its location is also within ten miles of adjacent Fond du Lac, Winnebago and Waushara counties. With this new CWD-detection, Winnebago County is now considered a CWD-affected county. As required by state law, the DNR will enact a new two-year ban on baiting and feeding of deer in Winnebago County effective July 1, 2021. State law requires the DNR to enact a ban on feeding and baiting deer in counties or portions of counties within a ten-mile radius of a wild or farm-raised deer that tests positive for CWD or tuberculosis. Green Lake, Fond du Lac and Waushara counties are already identified as CWD-affected counties and already have baiting and feeding bans in place. This new CWD-positive detection will renew a three-year baiting and feeding ban in Green Lake County and two-year bans in Fond du Lac and Waushara counties. "We are committed to working closely with local communities, including the citizen-based County Deer Advisory Councils as we explore future management options for this disease in Green Lake and the surrounding counties,” said Daniel Lekie, DNR Wildlife Supervisor. In response to the detection of this CWD-positive wild deer, the DNR will: Coordinate swiftly with County Deer Advisory Council members from the counties impacted by this detection to discuss response actions, including issuance of CWD surveillance permits this winter. Determine surveillance activities to assess disease distribution and prevalence to also include: Encouraging reporting of sick deer Sampling vehicle-killed adult deer when feasible Sampling adult deer harvested under agricultural damage permits Encourage hunters to follow recommendations to help prevent the spread of CWD. More information regarding baiting and feeding regulations and CWD in Wisconsin is available on the DNR’s baiting and feeding regulations webpage. More information on how to have deer tested during the upcoming 2021-22 Wisconsin hunting seasons is available on the DNR’s sampling for chronic wasting disease webpage. More information in this piece by noted Wisconsin outdoors writer Patrick Durkin -  Wisconsin Hunters Receive Little Help Controlling CWD - and from my blog, here:  CWD remedies chronically wasted

Shorewood roadwork echoes earlier Shorewood, Milwaukee tree-cutting plans

Shorewood could cut numerous trees to make way for roadwork. 

Lake Drive reconstruction in Shorewood could involve widening roads and removing trees

I blogged 13 years ago about a similar plan there, and a separate scheme along the same lines on Milwaukee's south side, so I am reposting that content below because history seems to be repeating itself:

From June 2, 2008:

Road-Widening Ticketed For Shorewood: Good-Bye Trees, Hello Traffic

The Wisconsin Department of Transportation department (WisDOT) wants to widen E. Capitol Drive. through the Village of Shorewood, at the expense of more than 40 trees and a whole lot of peace of mind, reports the Daily Reporter.

This single sentence high in reporter Sean Ryan's story sums it up:

"The village and WisDOT are bound to have conflicting priorities, said Chris Swartz, village manager, because the state’s priority is to rapidly move vehicles through the village."

I can't decide if WisDOT is run on masochism, pure arrogance, or complete disconnection from the good people of the state who pay the taxes and fees that keep WisDOT staffers employed.

You want to stir up a hornet's nest?

Shorewood is a fine place in southeastern Wisconsin to do it.

This reminds me of an ugly plan that WisDOT sprung on a mile or so of tree-lined S. 27th St. (Layton Blvd.) in Milwaukee in 1999.

S. 27th St. was listed as a state highway (41), as is E. Capitol Dr. (190), which gave WisDOT the authority to try and rebuild it to move traffic faster, with easier access for trucks, through what was and remains an historic Milwaukee residential area.

The south side corridor, including the famous "Doctor's Row" of lovely homes and churches, has sidewalks filled with kids and seniors, shoppers, renters and homeowners.

The section of s. 27th St. targeted for widening by WisDOT contained 280 mature trees.

E. Capitol Dr. is the main east-west road through Shorewood - - a community of one-square-mile just north of the City of Milwaukee line - - that also has that same mix of old and young, shops, schools, churches and residents right on and close to E. Capitol Dr.

Long story short: The S. 27th St. expansion didn't happen.

Then-Milwaukee Mayor John Norquist (yes, I was working for him at the time) and his south side neighbors (yes, WisDOT picked highway-fighter Norquist's backyard for expansion) in the Historic Layton Boulevard Neighborhood Association gave WisDOT officials a deservedly-outraged thrashing, and now-retired Journal Sentinel columnist Whitney Gould raised a substantial alarm, too.

That was quite the anti-expansion trifecta, let me tell you.

So S. 27th St. got rebuilt and repaved only within its existing configuration, and maps and signage got changed to tell out-of-state truckers that their best route in, out and around the city was I-94, and did not include a trip on S. 27th St. (details here).

It was a simple solution to a really bad idea, but it took work.

Shorewood needs to gather its allies and raise its voice to achieve the same outcome, or residents there will find themselves on a more-intentioned truck-and-commuter route that is totally out-of-character with their community.

People: look no further than the 2019 debacle along State Highway 23:

I've written about it before, but I want to showcase the group's focus [by 1000 Friends of Wisconsin] on the bigger picture as well as its comprehensive update to the damage being done right now to widen a stretch of State Highway 23:

The big question is: Why does Wisconsin keep threatening or destroying its strong, surviving trees - 

Outraged citizens fought with Milwaukee County officials and saved these mighty oaks along the Milwaukee River in Kletzsch Park

- even for a private gold course development in popular Kohler Andrae State Park! -  at the very time the atmosphere is heating up with pollutants that trees absorb and filter.

So I've got to ask the bigger questions:

What is our problem, and have we learned nothing?