Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Here Come The Mad Hatters!

Just one week ago, the MacIver Institute issued a propaganda piece trying to scare the good people of Wisconsin from signing recall petitions, even though they are technically legal documents.  The rationale that they used for their fear campaign was that the signer's information could become public knowledge.

I pointed out that this was a simply ridiculous argument, since the same could be held true, and even more so, for anyone who donated to Scott Walker.

Even the Republican's Apologist General, Professor Rick Esenberg, who is often trying to make excuses for the inexcusable, pointed out that in this age of high technology, keeping some information private was not a reasonable expectation.

In the same propaganda piece, they tried to instill the fear that people were signing multiple times and that they were going to get away with it because the Government Accountability Board would certify each signature.  They tried to raise the specter that the recall's integrity was in danger.  Again, I countered that by speaking with Mike Maistelman, an attorney whose expertise is in election law, who confirmed that the GAB never certifies signatures and that it's always been the responsibility of the opposing party to do the research.

Ironically, the MacIver Institute, the same ones who said people shouldn't sign a legal document because of security risks, came out with another press release* on Monday.  This time they were promoting a newly crafted website (which, by the way, will give you tracking cookies if you go there) for people to sign up and volunteer to help "verify the signatures," or in other words, to do their data entry for them.

The site is operated by two Teahadist organizations, We the People of the Republic and The Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty, who hilariously claim that they are concerned with ensuring the elections are "clean and fair."

It was The Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty who claimed that they hosted a tea rally (even though the banners said it was Americans for Prosperity)** on Milwaukee's lake front two years ago.  A rally that included banners in which then Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker proudly endorsed with the Milwaukee County Parks logo.

It was also these teahadists who were shown by One Wisconsin Now to be in collusion with the AFP and the Republican Party to engage in voter caging.  Voter caging is a particularly despicable method of voter suppression in which the malefactors mail an official looking letter to registered voters.  They compile a list of names of those whose envelopes are returned as non-deliverable.  They then challenge and try to prevent the voter from exercising their rights and participating in democracy.

It is not a great leap of imagination to think that these groups would use the data collected to pull a similar stunt in an effort to disenfranchise people who would vote against Walker.

In summary, the Koch-sponsored propaganda agency, MacIver Institute, is afraid that your information and the elections may come in harm's way if you sign a legal document declaring your desire that Wisconsin be returned to its rightful owners.  But practically in the same breath, they encourage people to go to a shady, cookie-laden website, and give your personal information to the Koch-sponsored, corrupt groups running it.

The sad part is that there will be people gullible enough to believe that these miscreants and reprobates have their best interest in heart and will do just that.

What is remarkable to me is that only three weeks into the signature collecting phase of the recall, Walker's supporters are in such a panic that they are already resorting to such insipid and desperate stunts.


*Who has ever heard of a legitimate news service that has to issue press releases?

**It's getting bad when the Koch-sponsored front groups can't tell themselves from each other.

3 comments:

  1. Great job of spouting off without any facts. One phone call and a quick internet check later and your blog piece is discredited.

    You are so quick to dis the lake front rally as being only AFP; if you did any real investigating, a quick check of the park permit would show that AFP did not pull that permit. AFP might have been the visible organization but getting the permit was pretty important unless you advocate disregarding public law and ordinances.

    As for the unfounded allegation of voter caging that you are so quick to blindly parrot, the GAB unanimously cleared Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty of any wrong doing. They have a letter on their website from the GAB exonerating them.

    -Hack

    ReplyDelete
  2. "You are so quick to dis the lake front rally as being only AFP" - idiot

    "It was The Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty who claimed that they hosted a tea rally ..."

    Duh.

    ReplyDelete