Wednesday, September 5, 2018

The Ideas Lab Is Uninhabited

By Jeff Simpson



For quite some time, the only employed opinion writer of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel was right wing hack and Bradley Foundation gopher, Christian Schneider. 

Recently, JSonline finally showed Schneider the door.  A few years ago, Schneider used his platform, to "break the news" that Congressman Mark Pocans husband, beat up his opponent in the upcoming election.  Of course it was all made up, and the paper just deleted the story (instead of issuing a retraction), like nothing ever happened.

Yes, excellent writer, who was a once a week, free lance opinion writer, credited Schneider with recommending her in her last column.   Schneider also worked to get rid of everyone else who had ever written for JSonline in their opinion pages(including myself).   His fragile ego is only surpassed by The Donalds.

That being said, here is a perfect example of the right wing scam that the Journal has pulled on its readers(2013):|

The Journal Sentinel hired Christian Schneider from the right-wing Bradley Foundation as a columnist and let him keep both jobs until public pressure forced Schneider to leave Bradley. Today, the Walker Administration leaked details of their Medicaid decision through Schneider, who was then cited as a source by the news division of the paper to break the story. Now Schneider's op-ed defending the decision has been placed on the front page of the paper without an opposing editorial.   
A brief history of where the Journal Sentinel came from and while the stain of Schneider is still fresh and does not come out with the first washing, now David Haynes wants to switch the editorial page to an "ideas lab".  In Haynes own words:

In the Ideas Lab, we’ll kick the tires on ideas meant to solve problems. We’ll report on and evaluate these ideas based on independent evidence. We'll search for the best practices out there. 

Giving them the benefit of the doubt, we see that they started their "ideas lab" out with reporting by David Haynes himself, with a cheerleading post for some of the bigger businesses in Milwaukee area.

 That's why Tuesday's announcement that Foxconn is partnering with three of Milwaukee's most prominent corporate citizens to create a venture capital fund has the potential to be a watershed moment for southeastern Wisconsin.
It's a given that Foxconn Technology Group’s massive factory in southern Wisconsin could have a profound impact on the state’s economy. It’s a $10 billion investment, after all, a mammoth plant that could employ as many as 13,000 people.
 Now, Foxconn, Advocate Aurora Health, Johnson Controls Inc. and Northwestern Mutual have raised a $100 million venture capital fund to focus on investments in companies that employ Foxconn’s technology. The Wisconn Valley Fund will be based in the company’s North American headquarters at 611 W. Wisconsin Ave. The announcement came a day after Foxconn announced it had pledged a $100 million matching gift to the University of Wisconsin-Madison to establish a new research center in the College of Engineering.
Let us take a look at:   
 • Expert, solutions-focused essays on issues the community cares about, by people who have shown success in addressing the problem at hand.

* The four companies Foxconn, Aurora, Johnson Controls and Northwestern Mutual are loaded with executives who have donated thousands to Scott Walker and the Republicans.    Their investment at this time in the election process is not uncoincidental. 
     
*  Of the four, Johnson, Northwestern and Foxconn are all known for laying off thousands of employees, and while Aurora has not, they recently took part in a major merger where they will need the support of the Governor. 

- Maybe not the best group to have "shown success" in the problem at hand.   

*  Foxconn.   To say Foxconn "could" create 13,000 jobs is technically true.  It is also technically true that the Milwaukee Bucks could trade for Lebron and dominate the next five years of the NBA.   No one expects it to happen but it most definitely could. 

Foxconn has been handed $4+ trillion dollars of Wisconsin taxpayer money to build their new factory here in Racine.   This money has helped displace Wisconsin citizens from their dream homes, moved around highway funds to help expand roads to access Foxconn, steal 7 million gallons of water from Lake Michigan a day, and also offers up 100 million dollars of our money to the UW-System as long as they can match it and educate students as Foxconn wants them too?

 - Maybe touting the company that has broken many promises, made $149 billion in profits last year and is known for their suicide nets at their factories in China, is not the place to start out looking for successes at hand. 

Now in keeping with the theme at hand, let's look at actual solutions to the problems at hand.   - New Business and Jobs. 
1.  Health Insurance.  The number one reason people go broke in America is for unexpected medical bills.   It takes a supreme amount of confidence and luck, to start a business and have no health insurance for you and your family.

IDEA - Lets expand Medicaid for all, so you are not deciding between eating and going to the Doctor.  We need to make sure that the biggest worry that someone who starts a small business has, is how do I increase my market share, and not I hope this unknown pain goes away. 

2.  Public Education.  The heart and soul of every town, village, city, municipality is the public schools.  School events bring the people together, their favorite teacher is their kids hero, etc...  To have the attack on public education that the Governor and his group have enacted over the last 8 years has done every one, but Scott Walker, a huge disservice and we are starting to pay the piper.   There is a reason Walker is spending millions advertising to millenials trying to get people to move to WI.

Idea - We need to start funding education like we need to and stop the war on teachers.   Understand that a strong public education system is the one thing that attracts people to WI to want to grow their roots. 

3.  Technology.   There is no need, with the ability we have to communicate, that small business start ups, can come from anywhere as long as they have access to high speed internet and the ability to get to the post office.  It is unfortunate Scott Walker gave back 23 million dollars earmarked to increase broadband access to rural Wisconsin

IDEA - make high speed internet access available and affordable for every single Wisconsinite!

2 comments:

  1. Holy cow! I might consider buying that Gannett rag again if they canned Schneider.

    However, let's not shed too many tears for Chrissy. Looks like he's landed on his feet just fine, as this article about new DOT funding features a quote from spokesman...CHRISTIAN SCHNEIDER.

    https://www.fdlreporter.com/story/news/politics/elections/2018/09/06/wisconsin-receives-91-million-roads-amid-fight-over-long-term-plan/1210699002/

    What a wingnut welfare-sucking hack.

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