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? 

More ideas escape from Wisconsin's Republican brainstorm factory

There is more evidence that Wisconsin GOP legislators are misusing their time and the money we send them work for us.

This abuse begins with a radical legislative gerrymander which they are expanding, and which has provided them with power grabs and access to public money to create a surplus of taxpayer-paid staffers whose role is crafting and distributing party brainstorms - 

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos added two new staffers last month, filling the last of the 14 positions he put under his authority for the session....The speaker’s staff is more than twice the size of Minority Leader Gordon Hintz’s.

- and that brainstorm factory continues to meddle in serious matters that could make a range of issues - many enumerated, here - even worse.

And unlike the phantom Foxconn factory at which Republicans have thrown billions without it having produced a single flat-screen television or airport coffee kiosk - the Republican brainstorm factory has a long work history.

Remember its release of words about everything from the appeal of marinated wolf meat (with a side of grilled sandhill crane) to why a notably voluble white State Senator called for the African-American holiday of Kwanzaa to be shunned and attacked.

But let me direct you to the latest words from suburban GOP State Legislator Joe Sanfelippo which he aimed at the City of Milwaukee: 

Rep. Sanfelippo Calls For National Guard To Patrol City 

Now. to be clear; no one minimizes the impacts that reckless driving and other violent behavior is inflicting on Milwaukee, and communities nationally, that thoughtful people say is related to the economic stresses spun out by the pandemic, but there's no evidence that sending in National Guard soldiers would do anything except waste public dollars and exacerbate problems.

City residents have seen this noisy, Republican do-nothing pander and play to conservative suburban base voters before. 

I recall when Village of Menomonee Falls Republican right-wing State GOP Rep. Janel Brandjten even said Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett bore personal responsibility when suspects crossed municipal borders.

Her regionally-uncooperative and brainstormy solution? 

A proposed cut in Milwaukee's state funding, even though Milwaukee provides her residents with all city services and benefits for free when they play, work or visit in Milwaukee, and supply her village its drinking water, and sends her Village's budget through shared revenue a nice chunk of change every year that lowers her residents' property taxes.

But back to bright-ideas-Sanfelippo and a bit of his history:

* He was the state legislator who sabotaged and delayed the passage of a bi-partisan bill to expeditiously process unexamined rape evidence kits while victims waited for justice and perpetrators remained unpunished.

* And you may also recall that Sanfelippo and other Republican legislators offered nothing but punting through instant adjournments - not once but twice - when they had the chance to legislate on justice and policing matters, but chose to spend most of 2020 on paid vacation while the COVID pandemic raged statewide.

GOP State Rep. Joe Sanfelippo, (R-West Allis)

In fact, Sanfelippo - despite 'serving' as chair of the Assembly Health Committee - had nothing to offer while COVID was killing hundreds of state citizens monthly and hospitalizing many more - when he said in October he couldn't think of anything more the state could do about the pandemic.

State Rep. Joe Sanfelippo argued Tuesday there is nothing more Wisconsin lawmakers can do to address the coronavirus after passing legislation to help hospitals and the unemployed six months ago.

“Beyond that, I think we have to remember that this is a virus. There is nothing that government can do,” Sanfelippo said in an interview with the WisconsinEye Public Affairs Network. “You know, we can’t wave a magic wand and make it go away.”

What, me worry?

Or stop suing to overturn public health orders? 

Or actively promote mask-wearing and, later, fact-based/fear-free vaccination campaigns?

But Sanfelippo isn't the only GOP state legislator vying for worst Idea of the Month, as the aforementioned Menomonee Falls GOP State Rep. - and Assembly Campaigns and Elections Committee chair - Janel Brandjten - just threw out this doozy: 

Brandtjen, Murphy say they’d like to see Arizona-style audit of Wisconsin’s November election

The 'Arizona-style audit' which Brandjten is endorsing now includes the hiring of inexperienced cyber sleuthing ninjas who failed to find traces of bamboo in state paper ballots allegedly smuggled in from China to tip the Arizona outcome to Biden.

And the latest twist in this ridiculous exercise: the removal of Arizona ballot date to a remote cabin - in Montana - for further 'scientific' examination, according to NBC News:

MISSOULA, Mont. — New developments in the latest audit of Arizona’s Maricopa County 2020 general election results reveal a connection to a cabin in the remote Swan Valley of northwest Montana.

Brandjten has been multi-tasking, having worked to rein in transgender athletes among her busy agenda - though when you start off by saying 'this isn't a hate bill' you've pretty much tipped your hand - so we'll keep an eye out in case her office in the GOP ideas factory pumps out a release about moving Wisconsin Elections Commission ballot data for an Arizona-style fly-specking in an equally secure and distance cabin - perhaps in rural West Virginia, on stilts in a Louisiana bayou or in a van down by the river. 

Tiffany casts another vote against minority Americans

To his deliberate misrepresentation of minority Americans in his own district, you can add another blatantly bigoted move by Wisconsin's Northwoods US House Rep. Tom Tiffany -  

Cong. Tom Tiffany, (R-Whites Only)

- a vote against making Juneteenth a national holiday - to his expanding racist record, including:

* Opposing federal aid to African-American farmers after decades of discriminatory official programs and policies; 

* Voting "Nay" on anti-Asian hate legislation;

* And opposing the removal of statues from Congress that honored leading Confederate seditionists;

* A vote that lined up with his vote against accepting legitimate Electoral votes cast for President-elect Joe Biden in a failed effort to throw the election to the defeated former President - - a move which seditionist rioters tried to achieve through an attack on the US Capitol.

As I've noted, gerrymandered Republican bigots, embarrassments and ignorami are going to contaminate the Congress and accelerate Wisconsin's decaying national reputation for years and years.

Side note - Wisconsin's other notably reprehensible members of the state's GOP caucus - including Sen. Ron Johnson, and Reps. Grothman, Gallagher, Fitzgerald and Steil all voted "Yes" on the Juneteenth bill.

Which explains why Tiffany is strongly contending for the title of Worst Wisconsin Member of Congress.

Friday, 6/18 is WI wolf hunt comment deadline

Those of you who were horrified by the shocking, state-sanctioned and quota-busting February wolf slaughter in Wisconsin have until noon on Friday, June 18 to register your objections to more wolf killing scheduled for this fall, and beyond.

Remember that wolves -  

- are among wildlife which belong to all Wisconsin citizens under the Public Trust Doctrine, are not the property of any group or special interest and are to be managed by Department of Natural Resources stewardship.

Also remember that wolves help manage the natural environment, that they are central to the origin story of Wisconsin Native Americans, and should not be subjected to inhumane, motorized-and-GPS assisted-dog-pack pursuing/leg-snaring trophy killing which made a bloody mockery of Wisconsin's reputation, and 'fair-chase' hunting, too.

Here are the comment instructions: 

Submit your written comments via email at: DNRWildlifeWebmail@wisconsin.gov. 

Please include “Fall Wolf Season Comments” in the subject line. Comments will be recorded verbatim with submitter’s name and provided to the committee in advance of the meeting. 

To allow time for the committee to review comments, the deadline to submit comments is Friday, June 18th at noon. More details, here: 

For further information and guidance, I strongly recommend these materials create by the science-based group Wisconsin's Green Fire. 

Download the PDF of A Shared Vision for Wolves in Wisconsin

This report is the first in a series of Opportunities Now 2021-2023 issue reports that Wisconsin’s Green Fire will release in late 2020 and early 2021.

View a recording of the December 1, 2020 on-line briefing held by the team of Wisconsin’s Green Fire experts who developed the report. 

The 40-minute session includes a question and answer session with the press. 

MKE biz group reveals courageous neutrality on voting measures

Props to the always-persistent Erik Gunn and the good folks at Urban Milwaukee for posting this 'goes-to-the-heart-of-the-matter' piece about the pathetic timidity displayed by metro Milwaukee's chamber of commerce on voting rights 

currently under a power-grabbing attack by Republicans in Wisconsin:

MMAC Tightrope Walks on Voting Rights

Milwaukee business group supports voting rights in principle but won’t address barriers in GOP bills.

Milwaukee’s largest business group distributed a declaration and a set of bullet points Tuesday embracing a broad voting rights agenda, but stopped short of either endorsing or opposing recent bills that have drawn sharp criticism from voting rights activists. 

And I'm fascinated by this presumably principled qualification in the MMAC document: 

It also declares that “unreasonable obstacles” for voters “disenfranchises citizens and threatens the right to vote.” 

So which "reasonable obstacles" for voters are OK in the MMAC's estimation? 

Anybody want to walk with the group down that slippery slope?

Meanwhile, I think the documented political activities of the MMAC explain some of the organization's caution, including: 

* This 2017 summary: 

The Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce has spent or funneled more than $2.4 million since 2010 on elections and lobbying activities to push pro-business policies at the expense of workers and consumers.

As with most powerful special interests and business groups, Republican legislative and statewide candidates have been the Milwaukee chamber’s chief beneficiaries, particularly GOP Gov. Scott Walker. The governor has received about $1.5 million in campaign contributions and election backing through the group, which claims 1,800 Milwaukee-area business members.

* This list of campaign-related donations between 2016 and 2020, recorded by the non-profit Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, which tilt heavily towards Republicans and includes $48,000 to the Republican Assembly Campaign Committee Segregated Fund. 

 

WI GOP enjoy de-stressing perks, but stress out everyday people

Most of us had probably seen those lists of stressors and the dangers they pose even before COVID brought higher levels of anxiety into homes, workplaces, daily living and relationships just about everywhere.

So it's infuriating that GOP legislators in Wisconsin whom taxpayers generously compensate continue to intentionally raise the stresses with which everyday people and public service organizations are already burdened.

While at the same time using their offices to minimize stress or worries in their own businesses and daily living. More on that point in a few paragraphs.

But make no mistake about it: GOP legislators routinely implement (with help from conservative funders and allies) an intentionally cruel campaign of trouble-making  from a position of gerrymandered superiority to control people who already have a greater share of problems, but fewer resources with which to fight back.

All the better with which to divide-and-conquer.

This is the latest example:

Leaders of the state's five largest school districts said Tuesday the Legislature's recent budget action has created a situation where school officials are putting off plans to use federal aid intended to help students and teachers recover from the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. 

Superintendents of school districts in Green Bay, Kenosha, Madison, Milwaukee and Racine in a letter to leaders of the Joint Finance Committee said the panel's action on school funding has halted districts' planning efforts because of the potential loss of $2.3 billion in federal aid. The aid is in jeopardy because the level of state spending the committee set in May doesn't meet federal standards. 

On the heels of this deliberate:

Wisconsin has reached a deal with the U.S. Department of Agriculture that will deliver more than $70 million per month in federal food aid just weeks before the state was to begin losing out on the funding because the Wisconsin Supreme Court struck down Gov. Tony Evers’ COVID-19 emergency order.

That order came in response to a lawsuit against Gov. Evers' emergency anti-COVID public health order filed by a conservative businessman and major donor to GOP candidates. 

The use of food aid as a partisan cudgel in Wisconsin had its roots here:

On Wednesday, the Trump administration finalized a rule change that will make it more difficult for people to get food stamps — a change based around a model created by former Gov. Scott Walker and Wisconsin Republicans.

The changes, which will take effect next April, will reduce benefits people can receive food via the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). And while Walker’s cuts four years ago already hit food-stamp recipients hard, this rule stands to take the food benefits away from another 25,000- 27,000 people, according to estimates from the state Department of Human Services. 

The 2015 state Republican cuts took food stamps away from roughly 100,000 Wisconsinites, adding work requirements and other hurdles to the program known also known here as FoodShare.  

And began all the way back to something I discovered in Walker's first budget in 2011: 

It's right there in the budget, on page 65, in the "Health and Human Services" section: 

"To further encourage W-2 recipients to recognize that the goal of W-2 is for participants to secure unsubsidized employment, reduce the monthly benefit check by $20."

Mind you - Walker and his wife at the same wanted to upgrade the Governor's residence kitchens to the tune of $478,000; no contradiction there. 

And raised taxes on the poor to help fund tax cuts for businesses and upper-income earners.

And you can see the same policy and legislating patterns in Republicans' denial of expanded Medicaid care coverage, wage growth, and improved transit services that keeps poor people poor, stressed, and more focused on daily survival than political actions to oust their tormentors.

And yet, these same 'austerity-for-the-masses' GOP lawmakers have their own ways of keeping stress at bay that do not involve meditation, mindfulness and regular yoga by:

* Maintaining and even boosting their own taxpayer-provided benefits, and.... 

* Using their positions to sponsor and adopt laws that keep their personal businesses running smoothly, as the Journal Sentinel had noted in 2019:

A series of sweeping laws promoting the interests of landlords at the expense of renters, local governments and even public safety have been pushed through the state Capitol since 2011 by a group of lawmakers who moonlight as landlords. 

Backed by Assembly Speaker Robin Vos — a college-town landlord with 23 properties worth about $3.8 million — the Republican-controlled Legislature enacted five major bills largely benefiting landlords.  

The measures speed up the eviction process, eliminate some tenant legal defenses, limit the power of cities to police landlords and cap fees tied to building code violations. They also allow landlords to toss renters' belongings on the curb immediately after an eviction, instead of placing the property in storage.

* And now GOP-legislator-tavern owners are playing the same, me-first game, as the Journal Sentinel explains (behind its paywall): 

Bice: Two GOP lawmakers who own taverns push bill to ease credit and give other help to Wisconsin bars

Republicans continue to demonize people who might get some relief from law, or public programs like Medicaid: 

"I think the State of Wisconsin has enough resources to be able to utilize, to make sure we have all of our priorities funded and we're not going to do it by expanding welfare," said Assembly Speaker Robin Vos of Rochester. 

But career politician Vos and his colleagues - when they need it - are always ready to legitimize their behaviors and advantages: 

In an interview in his Capitol office, the Rochester Republican said there was no conflict of interest in his support for bills benefiting landlords, including his own property rental company.

"The idea of having a citizen legislature where people have experience is what everybody says they want, right?" said Vos, who had held elective office since 1994 and owns an array of businesses. "They don't want professional politicians."

 

 

The news gods let us recall Cathy Stepp 'always carries a fake nose.'

As a self-appointed recorder of damage done to Wisconsin by relentless Republicanism - and also as a consumer of news that makes readers flinch - I want to say that this story about a woman posing as a 7th grader to help her daughter navigate high school -

Texas mom arrested after posing as 7th grade daughter in school

- has at least an equally weird antecedent starring Wisconsin's very own designated environmental contaminator and slayer of tiny deer - Cathy Stepp:

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Cathy Stepp wore a fake nose and sunglasses to try to help her daughter [Hannah] pass a 2011 Wisconsin driving test after she failed her initial attempt...the Chicago Tribune reported....

...Hannah said her mother wore the fake nose and sunglasses so she could follow someone taking the Wisconsin driver's test. She said she had failed her first test and her mother wanted to learn the route to help her practice for her second attempt, which she passed.  

She told the newspaper that her mom always carries a fake nose around.

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

For the record, I had noted Stepp's penchant for parties and props, and also her big game hunting, several times, before she went off to run various EPA offices for the previous President.

Wisconsin DNR photo

 

 

Imagining Wisconsin Republicans in a 2020s Q & A

6/13/21 1 p.m., updated. 

If a panel of historians someday held a retrospective 2020s Q & A with Wisconsin GOP officials, I imagine the transcript might read something like this:

Q. 2020 saw high-profile killings of African-Americans by police officers, and Democratic Governor Tony Evers Wisconsin Governor proposed several reforms to address that reality. How did you handle those proposals?

A. We immediately adjourned.

Q. The Governor had also asked you to pass some very popular gun safety measures. How did you deal with his public safety proposals?

A. We adjourned immediately. But we did hold a prayer meeting and news conference first. 

Q. You had complained loudly about the way Gov. Evers managed the state's unemployment compensation system that he inherited after decades of funding neglect. How did you handle his request for an infusion of funds to upgrade the system.

A. We immediately adjourned.

Q. Overall, how long was your 2020 adjournment?

A. About nine months. Maybe ten. Until the pandemic began to abate.

Q. Did you manage to take or facilitate any actions to address the pandemic?

A. We drove out the State Secretary of Health and Human Services. 

A. Actually, she was only the acting Secretary, because we never gave her a confirmation hearing.

A. Remember, we could outright fire anyone we wanted because we set up the Legislature with a permanent Republican majority even though Democrats get more votes statewide. And just because the Governor appointed someone doesn't mean they get the job. 

A. Unless a different Governor made the appointment; then the appointee got to stay as long as he wanted.

A. Or an elected official who might break a promise about stepping back from another term was free to pull a stay-put maneuver, too.

A. Rules: we make 'em and we break 'em. That's how we owned the libs.

Q. Back to public health actions. Did the pandemic help sway you towards extending Medicaid coverage as Gov. Evers' proposed to 90,000 low-income Wisconsinites residents who continue to lack medical care coverage? After all, the federal government was going to supply more than a billion dollars to cover the costs, so all state taxpayers would benefit, too.

A. No. We adjourned immediately.

Q. Any special motivation for that action?

A. No, because we'd been turning down that kind of welfare for several years. We're the party of personal responsibility and consistency. If people want health insurance, they should get off their couches and get a private sector job. Not like ours.

A. Had you made private sector employment more attractive in Wisconsin by increasing the minimum wage from its long-standing level of $7.25 per hour, or funding childcare or transportation costs which often kept low-income people out of the workforce?

A. No. We weren't liberal, Progressive Marxist socialists here, like that Joe Biden.

Q. Did all of you promote or take the highly-effective COVID19 vaccine?

A. No.

Q. Weren't you afraid of getting the virus, or worse, inadvertently passing it on to a neighbor?

A. Excuse me, but you must have me confused with someone who gives a s**t.

A. I actually put up a video on YouTube with important COVID facts of my own. 

A. I publicly advised my kids to refuse the vaccine.

A. We also sued to get the Governor's anti-virus health orders rescinded.

A. Because he was a dictator, and we recognized only one King. 

A. We also told everyone it was "incredibly safe to go outside" as the pandemic gained strength.

Q. And did you go outside?

A. Well, sure, with all the right equipment and protections. Because we're the party of personal responsibility - and good connections, so we got the right gear.

Q. But I read that more than 675,000 Wisconsinites had caught the virus and over actually 8,000 died.

A. Well, those weren't necessarily all "regular folks."

A. Or people who'd taken the time to learn our customs, ways and dedication to personal responsibility.

Q. Switching gears, another big issue at the time was climate change. I'm sure you've noticed the increases in greenhouse gas emissions, reduced snowfall, more heat emergencies and ozone warning days. 

A. We added extra registration fees on electric and hybrid vehicles.

Q. Because?

A. Libs who complained about that were free to switch to a traditional gasoline-powered pickup. It's a free country.

A. And we added more fees to home solar energy hookups.

Q. Because?

A. Even state-approved monopoly utility companies deserve a bonus from time to time. Remember, corporations are people, too, my friends. Homeowners who didn't like the fee were free to stick with natural gas or fuel oil. It's a free country.

A. We also cut bus funding by 50% to Wisconsin's two largest cities. 

Q. Because?

A. Hey, this is America, not France. And screw their roundabouts, too. We like our traffic accidents like we like our steaks: T-boned.

A. And for years we'd fought urban trolleys, killed an Amtrak extension, banned regional transit authorities and blocked a commuter rail line connecting Milwaukee, Racine and Kenosha where a Chicago commuter train makes a stop.

A. We also sued the Federal government to weaken clean air standards.

Q. Why?

A. It better matched up with our weakened clean water policies. You can't have one without the other. Along with certainty and personal responsibility, we're the party of predictability, too.

A. Which is why we got the EPA to relax clean air standards over densely-populated southeastern Wisconsin so a major Taiwanese corporation we picked as a winner, and were subsidizing by the multiple billions could build big-screen TV panels for shipment in a special highway lane built for driverless trucks headed for a new export zone at Milwaukee's airport. 

A. Plus, we'd also weakened Wisconsin wetland protections and gave the company special permission to pipe in Lake Michigan water because big-screen-flat-panel production finishing requires millions of gallons of fresh water every day.

Q. So, you gave them water, wetlands, legal exemptions, air pollution permissions and billions in subsidies in exchange for flat-panel screen production. How did that work out?

A. They never built a single one.

A. And the special highway lane for the special trucks to get to the special export zone.

A. None, never, nada. 

Q. Because?

A. C'mon: no one had a crystal ball!

A. But we had a magic piece of paper, so we figured magic beans jobs would grow on the Mt. Pleasant prime ag lands that got bulldozed.

Q. Anything else I've missed? That you're particularly proud of?

A. We're particularly delighted to have encouraged the feds to strip away education dollars we can do without. Why pay teachers to indoctrinate our kids with Critical Race Theory? I'm telling you, Act 10 didn't far enough.

A. We voted to end a $300 per month Federal payment to people who'd lost their jobs during the pandemic because slackers needed to get off their couches and get a job. 

A. Just in case people didn't get that message when we cut off $70 million a month in Federal food aid money.

Q. But when you were on that long 2020 hiatus you collected your full salaries, correct?

A. Of course.

Q. You even got mileage and meal reimbursements without submitting receipts if you drove to and from the Capitol, correct - so isn't your opposition to that $300 payment even more hypocritical?

A. Not at all. Were we expected to drop everything and drive to the Capitol when we're on vacation to vote and then adjourn on empty stomachs?