Is Eric O'Keefe Russian?

By Jeff Simpson 

Information has come out that Russian linked Facebook ads, targeting Michigan and Wisconsin were used to help the GOP win last November. 

A number of Russian-linked Facebook ads specifically targeted Michigan and Wisconsin, two states crucial to Donald Trump's victory last November, according to four sources with direct knowledge of the situation.
Some of the Russian ads appeared highly sophisticated in their targeting of key demographic groups in areas of the states that turned out to be pivotal, two of the sources said. The ads employed a series of divisive messages aimed at breaking through the clutter of campaign ads online, including promoting anti-Muslim messages, sources said.

Dark money, originated in Russia, was used to make sure that in Wisconsin, The Donald, RoJo, Paul Ryan, Sean Duffy, Mike Gallagher, etc...were elected to populate the swamp. 

We in WI had no idea that the Russians were trying to get our friends on the right elected.

How could we not know? 

The Answer is simple really, because Freedom.

See the right wing has amazingly turned money into free speech and have millions of dollars of free speech to blow. 

It was hard to distinguish between Russian backed propaganda and Eric O'Keefe or Bradley Foundation backed propaganda.   Between the Putins flunkies, Wisconsin Club for Growth, Americas PAC , Maciver Institute,  Right Wisconsin, Media Trackkkers, Bradley Foundation, etc..

It is hard to distinguish, because they all have the same agenda and want the same ending.

Republican control of our country. 

Maybe when you have the same exact agenda as Vladimir Putin, It sure is not to Make America Great Again!

Dale Kooyenga - Prince of Thieves

By Jeff Simpson

Photo courtesy of Wisconsin Media Coop.  

We have written about Dale Kooyenga before, from the time where he was drunk on the Assembly floor to where he thought he knew more than Bernie Sanders!

What happens when you are allowed to get away with ridiculousness with no consequences?  You continually up the ante because you feel invincible.

Kooyenga considerably upped the ante recently and committed a crime.

Dale Kooyenga went to work at the Capitol one day and saw a permitted sign, that he did not like displayed, so he stole it.

State Rep. Dale Kooyenga, a Republican from Brookfield, was caught on Capitol surveillance footage removing the 80-year-old Donald E. Johnson's legally permitted sign in May.
Kooyenga went public with the heist by releasing the police report to the public — but said he only did so because Democrats were "trying to obtain the [same] report and he wanted to get out ahead of them."

For those of you scoring at home, lets summarize.   Dale Kooyenga, the towering pillar of virtue, saw a display in the Capitol he did not like so he stole it.  The Capitol police(paid by the taxpayer), took a look at the video of the theft(paid by the taxpayer), and realized the thief was Dale Kooyenga and did not issue any ticket, arrest or even a slap on the wrist.  Not  only that, they have refused to release the video and told no one of this crime or the perpetrator(, despite the fact that they are  beholden to us.  
Kooyenga, who bills himself as a "proven leader we can trust",  and points out that if you send him money:

Together, we can advance the cause of individual liberty, economic freedom and personal responsibility.

Except we know from his actions, he does not believe in Individual liberty, economic freedom and believes in personal responsibility for everyone but Dale Kooyenga.  We also know from his actions that trust is one thing that we can not do with him.

But wait there is more:

Kooyenga, one of the sponsors of the bill, that punishes students who protest white supremacists on UW Campus.

The bill reads in part: "An institution must strive to ensure the fullest degree of intellectual freedom and free expression. 2. [It] is not the proper role of an institution to shield individuals from speech protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, including ideas and opinions they find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive."

 You can now add hypocrite to untrustworthy, drunk and thief on to Kooyenga's resume.

But wait there is more:   Kooyenga did not commit a crime, he was just looking out for the children.  

“In my view, the sign was inappropriate in several ways and I felt it should not be in plain view of the scores of schoolchildren who were touring the Capitol at that time,” Kooyenga said in a statement. “It was not my intention to cause harm to the owner of the sign and I returned it immediately when I was asked for its return.”"I am sorry I took the sign without permission," the statement continued. "However I am not sorry for trying to uphold appropriate decorum in our State Capitol."

Apparently we should thank Kooyenga for committing theft.   Here is part of the interview he gave to the Chicago Trubune.

The report said the sign was "very critical of President Trump, U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan, Governor Scott Walker and the GOP in general." Kooyenga said in the telephone interview with AP that the sign called all the Republicans "gropers" and said "Damn All Republicans."

What did the offending sign say that Capt. Kooyenga saved the children from?

Never Forget: Scott Walker, Paul Ryan and many WI republican legislators support a corrupt, treasonous health care wrecking, lying incompetent, unethical, narcissistic, immoral tax and draft-dodging, sadistic, racist and confessed serial groper who thinks nothing about spending millions of taxpayer dollars for his golfing and luxury family vacations and even more billions for a senseless wall, a bogus voter fraud study and excessive military buildup all while cutting taxes for giant corporations, himself, his family and his billionaire buddies at the expense of millions of people on ObamaCare, veterans, veteran's children, education, the elderly, the poor, school lunches, environmental protections, national parks, wildlife, scientific research and so on and We the people be damned!

Now we can add poor reader onto Kooyengas resume.  

Bragging about "grabbing women by the pussy" is ok, calling someone who does it a "groper" needs to be shielded from our children.  

Why all of the hullaballoo about just a sign?  Let us take a walk down memory lane.

In the summer of 2014, Kindergarten teacher April Kay Smith from Germantown, had a couple drinks at the Jefferson County Fair and when walking by the closed GOP tent, pulled a couple Scott Walker signs off of their metal stand.

A woman named Roxane Stillman, saw this happen  and followed Ms. Smith all around the fair(what an amazing citizen she is), yelling for police along the way until an officer finally came over.   Ms. Smith was eventually issued a disorderly conduct ticket(imagine that) and the case should have been closed.  After all, it was just a sign and (previously unreported in the incident report)

"Upon the arrival at the Jefferson County Republican tent, I observed the signs lying on the grass:  some of them were pulled off their metal frames.  Some of the signs looked dented as if they had been stepped on.  I asked April Smith to pick up the signs and together we placed them in a neat pile."   

 Should be the end of the story but for the right wing smear machine.    See once the WISGOP echo chamber got wind of the story, they sent their lapdog Matt Kittle after it and he was relentless in the attack of this public servant.

Kittle, using his platform at Wisconsin Watchdog (which he was fired from because of this kind of bush league "reporting")  had multiple stories of this incident using the words like "Teacher who went on Rampage" , since the are all interchangeable,  this story made Right Wisconsin, right wing hate talkers Charley Sykes, Vicky Mckenna and Mark Belling amongst other Bradley funded mouthpieces.    

It was so relentless that they were able to get Ms. Smith suspended for the whole first semester, drug her name through the mud and eventually forced her to resign her profession and hurt the children of Germantown.     Numerous righties all over Wisconsin, were posting "fire her" notes all over social media, emails to the school and snail mail to the school (for the technologically challenged but still full of hate crew), pressure on someone making $40,000/yr trying to teach a class full of 5 year olds was too much for anyone to handle.....all for taking a couple signs off their metal stand and stepping on them.  

Hopefully, now that MacIver has used their wingnut welfare and hired Kittle, I hope that they have taught him what the word - Rampage - means:

.

 ram·pageˈramˌpāj/
verb1.
(especially of a large group of people) rush around in a violent and uncontrollable manner.
"several thousand demonstrators rampaged through the city"

synonyms:

riot, run riot, go on the rampage, run amok, go berserk; More

noun1.
a period of violent and uncontrollable behavior, typically involving a large group of people.
"thugs went on a rampage and wrecked a classroom"

Finally, in the  least surprising news of the century.....the number of stories that Kittle has written about Dale Kooyenga stealing the sign from the Capitol - 0! 

The watchdog has now become a puppy dog....at least he is trained!

For your listening pleasure:






PS:  Another story that the Watchdog of Wisconsin has missed - Dale Kooyenga was arrested years ago for beating up a minor.  Apparently the minor did not want to stay at Kooyengas party and smoke pot, and Dale felt he should be heading to a religious retreat.

Truth is stranger than fiction.  

Sorry, Charlie!

By Jeff Simpson 

Today, for some reason I have not fathomed, Charlie Sykes was allowed column inches in the New York Times)I would offer a link but he has had enough attention, but we will dissect it).  Sykes is on a "mea culpa" tour where he is trying to rewrite history, where he does not play a part.

*  MILWAUKEE — If President Trump’s first tumultuous weeks have done nothing else, at least they have again made us a nation of readers.

As Americans grapple with the unreality of the new administration, George Orwell’s “1984” has enjoyed a resurgence of interest, becoming a surprise best seller and an invaluable guide to our post-factual world.

Says the guy who has written numerous books(most you can getfor a penny) ripping on our education system and propping up anti-intellectualism!

  *  On his first full day in office Mr. Trump insisted that his inaugural crowd was the largest ever, a baseless boast that will likely set a pattern for his relationship both to the media and to the truth.

The week before he was elected, Scott Walker(Charlies goodfriend) sat down with a local paper in Oshkosh and explained how he planned on negotiating with unions, the day after his election, he had the Legislative Fiscal Bureau start drafting ACT10.   Apparently some first day lies are better than others.  

*  Mr. Trump understands that attacking the media is the reddest of meat for his base, which has been conditioned to reject reporting from news sites outside of the conservative media ecosystem.

Of course, Sykes has spent his career attacking mainstreammedia as perpetually being the victim of unfair coverage(as Pat Small pointedout). 

For years, I observed with dismay as employees of one division of the former Journal Communications—WTMJ-AM—savaged another division, the Journal Sentinel. Weekday-radio Republican frontmen Charlie Sykes and Jeff Wagner relentlessly assaulted the politically moderate newspaper for its alleged liberal bias. More damaging, they repeatedly suggested the newspaper was out of touch or outmoded, assailing it as “The Dead Tree.”Sykes and Wagner mocked the Journal Sentinel’s news coverage and frequently personally attacked members of the editorial staff and top management. It’s incomprehensible that Journal Communications management condoned this daily trashing while signing the verbal-snipers’ paychecks.

But hey, Charlie has an excuse:

*  We thought we were creating a savvier, more skeptical audience.

As Capper correctly points out, when Chuck was falselyaccusing Governor Doyle of corruption, he blatantly admitted:

 Sykes' response to the reporter who had asked what he based his allegations on was absolutely breathtaking in its arrogance and revealed Sykes' true character:
Sykes went on to label his remark "an off-hand wisecrack" -- "You know, humor, hyperbole, joke."
Hilarious, huh?
And Sykes, like his counterpart Mark Belling did awhile back, cheerfully admits he made it up, as though that is perfectly OK:
"My ‘evidence’? Absolutely none."
Nothing makes his audience more savvy than giving them made up facts on a daily basis!

*  The news media’s spectacular failure to get the election right has made it only easier for many conservatives to ignore anything that happens outside the right’s bubble and for the Trump White House to fabricate facts with little fear of alienating its base.

Unfortunately, that also means that the more the fact-based media tries to debunk the president’s falsehoods, the further it will entrench the battle lines.

 While Charlie excoriates the Trump team for perpetually "debunking" the fact based media, he is strangely silent about his employers, the Bradley Foundation team in Wisconsin that do the exact same thing. 

For instance, here, here, here, here, here,and here for starters,

Find me a place where Sykes has even remotely criticized, Jimmy Wigderson, Kevin Binversie, Rick Esenberg, Maciver, Wisconsin Watchdog, Right WIsconsin etc....then I will know that he cares about alternative facts and entrenching the battle lines.

*  During his first week in office, Mr. Trump reiterated the unfounded charge that millions of people had voted illegally. When challenged on the evident falsehood, Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, seemed to argue that Mr. Trump’s belief that something was true qualified as evidence. The press secretary also declined to answer a straightforward question about the unemployment rate, suggesting that the number will henceforth be whatever the Trump administration wants it to be.

He can do this because members of the Trump administration feel confident that the alternative-reality media will provide air cover, even if they are caught fabricating facts or twisting words (like claiming that the “ban” on Muslim immigrants wasn’t really a “ban”).

Let me take you back to the Supreme Court race between David "Ike Turner" Prosser and Judge JoAnne Kloppenburg.   The election night ended with the race to close to call and our friends on the right thought at the time they were going to lose.  

What did they do?  Whythey ginned up a story about voter fraud in the election. 

Q.  The right wing network of propaganda hate talk radio of which Charlie Sykes was one of the leaders.  If you answered A,  How did they disseminate the phony claim of voter fraud?   You win double  Jeopardy and we all lose!

"Do we need to start messaging 'widespread reports of election fraud' so we are positively set up for the recount regardless of the final number? I obviously think we should," wrote Steve Baas, a senior vice president with the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, to a group of conservative operatives on April 6, 2011, a day after the Prosser-Kloppenburg contest.
"Yes. Anything fishy should be highlighted," wrote former Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen, a Republican. "Stories should be solicited by talk show hosts."

Way back when The Donald was cheating on his second wife,  before he had any interest in politics, Charlie was hosting these guys, who you might have heard of, telling us about the (unsubstantiated) cases of rampant Democratic voter fraud.

Madison - The chairman of the Republican National  Committee claimed Wednesday that voter fraud in Wisconsin is far more pervasive than official reports have shown, and said GOP candidates need to perform 1 or 2 percentage points better than they otherwise would in order to overcome it.
"I'm always concerned about voter fraud, you know, being from Kenosha, and quite frankly having lived through seeing some of it happen," Reince Priebus said. "Certainly in Milwaukee we have seen some of it, and I think it's been documented. Any notion that's not the case, it certainly is in Wisconsin. I'm always concerned about it, which is why I think we need to do a point or two better than where we think we need to be, to overcome it.

Then there was this guy:

U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) believes voter fraud was committed by the busload during the recall elections on June 5th. At Mitt Romney's campaign event in Janesville this week, Johnson claimed that recent abuses at the polls illustrate why Wisconsin should require voters to verify their identity with a photo ID before casting a ballot.
"There have been a number of incidents documented," said Johnson, "of busloads or van loads of people voting multiple times at different voting booths with pretty flimsy IDs."

 Don't waste your time googling Charlie being upset about this.

*   Mr. Trump and company seem to be betting that much of the electorate will not care if the president tells demonstrable lies, and will pick and choose whatever “alternative facts” confirm their views.

The next few years will be a test of that thesis.  

Here, let me fix that for you Mr. Sykes: 

 Mr. Trump  Walker and company seem to be betting that much of the electorate will not care if the president  governor tells demonstrable lies, and will pick and choose whatever “alternative facts” confirm their views.

The next last few years will be was a test of that thesis.

You can source that here. 

*   There may be short-term advantages to running headlines about millions of illegal immigrants voting or secret United Nations plots to steal your guns, but the longer the right enables such fabrications, the weaker it will be in the long run.

Charlie, Charlie, Charlie, are you that old that your memory has failed you?  Do you not remember this? 

Dems need to realize how badly their embrace of gun control is hurting them in rural/blue collar areas.
— Charlie Sykes (@SykesCharlie) November 9, 2016

Or this:

SYKES: In the city of Milwaukee, we have the mayor of Milwaukee, who's running for governor, who's made it absolutely clear how seriously he takes voter fraud.
TOM BARRETT [audio clip]: Well, name the name. Name the name. I'm waiting for the first name.
SYKES: There is a group that in fact would provide that name. You might remember the "Verify the Recall" folks -- this was a group, the headquarters is in Texas. They did an absolutely outstanding job of coming up and making a database that allowed people to find out who signed the Walker recall petitions. Right, remember all of that? Well, they're affiliated with a group called the King Street Patriots.
This letter, this came out yesterday. What shocked me the most, I think, about this, is that it came from Phil Walzak, Barrett for Wisconsin. It's the kind of thing that you would expect from some demented extremist like Graeme Zielinski.
"Steve, the King Street Patriots, a group of Texas extremists" -- they are, they are Americans who are concerned about voter fraud.
"Have arrived in Wisconsin. They believe that voter registration for the poor is un-American" -- flat-out lie -- "and would destroy the country." Flat-out lie.
"They have already come to Wisconsin once and intimidated recall petition signers" -- lie -- "and now they've dropped so-called election observers into poll locations across the state."
Yes, Mayor Barrett, because they are doing the job that you refuse to do. And the mayor of Milwaukee, instead of saying, "Hey, we've got nothing to hide, come in and observe," puts out a letter on his own campaign stationery smearing this citizen group.
"Our voter protection team is on alert. We need an additional $100,000 before tomorrow to make sure every last vote is counted. After emailing threats and racial slurs ahead of the 2010 election failed to stop courageous voters from turning out to vote in Houston, the King Street Patriots showed up at the polls and intimidated voters directly."
Tom Barrett is lying.

Bradley Foundation Gives $250,000 To Racist Charles Murray

Back in the 1980s and 1990s, the Bradley Foundation gave a million dollars to Charles Murray to research and write "The Bell Curve." This book argued that African Americans are genetically inferior to whites and thus are not as smart. It further argued that for this reason, it didn't pay to spend a lot of money to try to educate black children:

The explosive conclusions of The Bell Curve are now common knowledge. What is less well known is that the country's leading conservative foundation paid co-author Charles Murray $1 million to write the book. Foundation funding of research is nothing new. But Murray's support from the Milwaukee-based Bradley Foundation is an example of the highly ideological research that conservative foundations favor as they seek to mold public policy. Even in the marketplace of ideas, it takes money to compete.

The Bell Curve's key educational policy recommendation dovetails with the Bradley Foundation's top education priority: support for school choice, including public funds for private and religious schools. This bolsters the case of those who argue that despite the rhetoric of choice, many voucher advocates have abandoned the vision of a quality education for all children. Says Robert Lowe, associate professor at National Louis University and an editor of the journal Rethinking Schools:

The Bell Curve is a smoking gun. It maintains that the poor—including the majority of African Americans—are generally incapable of benefiting from education..

..

C.J. Prentiss, an Ohio legislator (Independent/Democrat) who has been active in the African-American community opposing vouchers, also notes that voucher advocates have tried to win converts by arguing that vouchers would improve educational opportunities for the poor:

You have to be suspicious of someone who argues that on the one hand, African Americans are dumber than whites, and then, on the other, comes into the Black community and says, `We are going to make you as bright as you can be, here are some vouchers.... I believe vouchers are simply a way to dismantle public schools and use tax dollars to fund an elitist private school system. But voucher advocates know it would be suicide to say that openly.

They've used this to argue for school privatization and education cuts for decades.

This weekend, the Bradley Foundation announced that they just gifted $250,000 to Murray for work that is "consistent with our mission":

The Milwaukee-based Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation helped propel the career of conservative scholar Charles Murray, who famously argued in a 1994 book that genetic differences between white and black people were a partial cause for differences in IQ.

Now Murray, 73, is getting another prize from the Bradley Foundation — a $250,000 check.

Michael Grebe, president and CEO of the Bradley Foundation, said the $850 million nonprofit group honored Murray with the money to "recognize distinguished conservatives that we feel have made outstanding achievements that are consistent with our mission."

The foundation gives Bradley Prizes — the conservative equivalent of genius grants — to up to four individuals annually. Recipients of the awards can spend the $250,000 as they want.

I bet that a quarter million dollars would buy a lot of white robes.

The Law Bores The GOP

By Jeff Simpson


If you remember, the Bradley Foundations, latest employee to be given the power of elected office Rebecca Bradley.  

Also rememeber that Ms. Bradley was the appointed member of the Walker Crony squad and one of the first things she did as a Supreme Court Justice, and member of the highest court in the state, was to leave the court in the middle of oral arguments to run to a fund raiser put on by her bosses.  

Well disrespect for the law and their position goes even higher than the Wisconsin Supreme Court, all the way up to Supreme Court of the US.  Justice Clarence Thomas, he of the wife who is crazy tea party fame, apparently is up too late at night trying to think of an actual question to ask, that he can not stay awake during his day job.  

A recent Supreme Court Sketch artist released a drawing of inside the courtroom:



Notice anything there?  Yes that is a sketch artists drawing of Justice Thomas sleeping.   I guess the case was boring him, and since he is a far right ideologue and joke on the court, and like Bradley, he knows how he is told to vote, so who needs to listen to the details?

Whats next?  If I did not know better,  I would think that the GOP would have such a lack of respect for the law that Scott Walker will appoint David " Ike Turner" Prossers appointment as someone who did a barnstorming tour in local bars speaking with hate talker Vicki Mckenna on a perverted version of freedom.  

Nah!  Nat even Scott Walker is that brazen with that little respect for the law?

Right?

Christian Schneider - Stupid M@th@rf$ck$r

By Jeff Simpson

For a time everyone respected and was sad to hear the news that Prince had passed.

Scott WalkerVerified account ‏@ScottWalker  Apr 21Wow. Growing up in the 80s, the music of Prince was a big deal. What a shock!

Then in typical right wing media fashion, Scott Walker was also praised as having the tweet of the day:

Politicians went crazy with tweets after Prince's untimely death Thursday, but Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker did it best.

Scott WalkerVerified account ‏@ScottWalker  Apr 21Dearly beloved. We are gathered here today. To get through this thing called life...

Seriously, USA Today called out Scott Walker as being brilliant for plagiarizing Prince's lyrics on the day Prince died.   Not to mention that a quick search of twitter and you see too many tweets to count with the same thing.

Randi Rhodes ‏@randiradio  Apr 21Dearly beloved, we are gathered here to get through this thing called life. And if the elevator ever brings you down

Apparently Scott Walker says the same things everyone else is saying but he says it best!    I wonder if Paul Singer has ordered his fathead of Scott Walker for his office wall yet or not?

Speaking of fatheads. Christian Schneider has had enough.

See while everyone jumped on the bandwagon of a private phenom who kept to himself, a funny thing happened along the way.  We found out that Prince was such a private person, that he had actually been giving to and supporting many causes without feeling the need to broadcast it.

Prince supported Black Lives Matter.  He also forced InStyle Magazine to hire a black woman to interview him in 2000. sent money to the family of Trayvon Martin, paid for solar panels for people tp put on their houses in the poorer areas of Oakland(double whammy, minorities and alternative energy), helped start the #Yeswecode, was a forty year Union member and strong supporter of the working class, made a point to elevate and mentor women in music.

The stories are endless and still trickling out, including one more I want to share.  A few years ago, the great drummer from Madison, Clyde Stubblefield, was diagnosed with bladder cancer and like most musicians was without insurance.  While his friends held some fundraisers for him(remember we have a coffee can healthcare system in America), it was Prince who heard about it and stepped up and paid the $80,000 bill that Mr. Stubblefield still owed.   Most of these stories being told now were done with the condition of anonymity.    That is who Prince Rogers Nelsen was.  

All of these stories coming out has made our friends on the far right very uncomfortable.  How can someone with Prince's resources dedicate his life to helping the poor, the working class, women and minorites instead of chasing every single dollar he could?   How could he do acts of kindness and not brag about it?   How could there be more to the person than the tiny talented recluse we see pop up on rare occassions?

That kind of human spirit and giving character is what leads to stories like this from Christian Schneider.    Schneider is employed by the Bradley Foundation and on loan to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, as the person they call when they need to get ahead of a stroy or change a narrative.   Mr. Schneider desperately tries here and fails as miserably as New Coke.

Good grief. First of all, there's a 95% chance none of you mourning Prince's death had listened to anything he recorded in the past quarter of a century. When he played at halftime of the Super Bowl in 2007, you said to yourself, "Hey, he used to be great!"
 And no, Prince did not make you the person you are today. You know no more about sex or life or the color purple than if he had never existed. If you learned about "compassion" from a guy who reportedly didn't allow employees to look at him in the eyes, perhaps some counseling is in order. (The only lasting effect Prince had on preteen boys in 1984 was forcing them to daydream about the feminine wonders to be found in Lake Minnetonka.)
 But the compulsion to grieve so publicly is simply too much for people today to resist. It's almost as if there is some government bureau taking note of who expressed sadness over Prince's passing and who didn't. It's not like saying "so sad Prince died!" on Twitter goes into your compassion bank, to be cashed in at a later date. You won't be on trial, and the judge says, "Well, he did steal that car and ram it into that hospital for puppies, but then again, he also seemed pretty shaken up about Bowie's death."

I could point out that social media is part of community and when some people grieve, they need community to help them.  However I am certain that it would go right over Mr. Schneiders head(unless it had a check attached).

 “Supporting people in grief means being with them in their pain and sorrow and taking our cues from them and what they need. It’s not helpful, logical or useful to pass judgment, and in fact, I think it’s precisely that judgment that often causes grievers the most pain.”

The reality is Schneider does not care of you grieve, how you grieve or that the great and talented Prince is no longer with us. Schneider's task was to try and diminish his legacy and get you to not look under the surface to who Prince was.  

The more we admire and hold up people who use their celebrity and gifts to help mankind, the more their silly version of "I built this and no one helped me" or the "drag yourself up by your bootstraps" and other just as ridiculous memes of the far right wing are becoming.  

In the age of information, the goal of certain people is to make sure you are not privy to certain information.  It is unfortunate that the largest newspaper/media outlet in our state allows that to happen and gives him a forum of faux credibility.

If you want to read a truly great and comprehensive eulogy of Prince I recommend this one.

Here is Prince's iconic performance at the half time of the 2007 Super Bowl! 

Jesus Trojan Lunch

By Jeff Simpson 

In Middleton, WI, a select group of parents have turned the local high school into a modern day City of Troy.  

Despite the seperation of church and state being the law of the land, since a January 1, 1802 letter by Thomas Jefferson, addressed to the Danbury Baptist Association inConnecticut, and published in a Massachusetts newspaper. Jefferson wrote,

“

"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between Church & State."[1]

”

Jefferson was echoing the language of the founder of the first Baptist church in America, Roger Williams who had written in 1644 of "[A] hedge or wall of separation between the garden of the church and the wilderness of the world."Article Six of the United States Constitution also specifies that "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."

Jefferson's metaphor of a wall of separation has been cited repeatedly by the U.S. Supreme Court. In Reynolds v. United States (1879) the Court wrote that Jefferson's comments "may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the [First] Amendment." In Everson v. Board of Education (1947), JusticeHugo Black wrote: "In the words of Thomas Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect a wall of separation between church and state."^[2]

In the Middleton, WI school district just outside of Madison, WI, these parents have started baking brownies and bringing in food to entice young children to listen to their version of the Bible over the lunch hour.  

On one side is a group of Christian moms armed with Chick-fil-A sandwiches and 400 homemade brownies. On the other side are public school administrators who believe that Jesus and plump juicy chicken breasts are “divisive.”
The controversy surrounds an off-campus lunch event involving students at Middleton High School known as “Jesus Lunch.”  

The public park, across the street from the school is leased by the school district and the school correctly feels that these lunches should not be on campus and should stop immediately.

The school district leases the park during school hours, the email said, so policies that apply to the school campus extend to the park during that time. Those include rules about food safety and food preparation, food allergy procedures and visitor policies.
“We believe that religious or political events do not have a place in our school or on our campus, except when sponsored by a student group in accordance with our rules, which require prior approval,” the email said. “In addition, many students have conveyed to us their concern about a group offering free food to incentivize participation in a religious event on campus.”

Setting aside that it is creepy for a few parents to use brownies to lure kids into your trap, it is blatant illegal and goes against everything that we stand for in this country.  

This story has been getting some coverage locally and even nationally, but no one sees it for what it is.   There was a clue though that does(emphasis mine).

A statement from the organizers provided by parent Beth Williams asserted the group is legally allowed to hold the lunch at the park and said students aren’t required to participate in the religious message portion to partake in the food. “Fireman’s Park — a public park owned by the city of Middleton — remains accessible to everyone in the public for the purposes of assembly and free speech,” the statement said. “By law, the lease agreement between the city and the school district of Middleton does not privatize the park.”

Plank and Johnson said in the email to parents that the organizers have threatened legal action against the school district.

If you do not think that the dark money of Michael Grebe and the Bradley Foundation are not controlling every move of these "Christian" parents, just waiting for the School District to stop this so they can sue, then I have a Governor who cares about creating jobs to sell you.   

Here is what is planned.  They want these parents to be kicked off the school grounds so they can sue.  It will cost the Middleton Cross Plains School District tenss of thousands of dollars, to defend, while Mike G will send his gopher Rick Esenberg to defend these parents pro bono.   Esenberg will get shot down in all of the lower courts, but contnue appealing until he can get it in front of the Wisconsin Supreme Court. 

Then his cowaorkers on the Supreme Court of Wisconsin, will rule in his favor and open the floodgates for "Christianity" to take over our public schools.  

You heard it here first, watch and see how this plays out!  

"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. - Matthew 6:5. 

Bradley Foundation Behind Latest Attack on Unions, Public Education

On Monday, the Supreme Court of the United States heard oral arguments on Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, a case that could devastate unions across the country. Sadly, it appears that the conservative court is leaning towards ending mandatory dues collections, which mean that union members could reap the benefits of union representation without paying their fair share. In other words, if the court rules against the unions, it would legalize freeloading nationally and set up the country for a complete return to Right to Work.

Brian Mahoney, writing at Politico, found that the whole lawsuit is being funded by the Milwaukee-based dark money funding group, the Bradley Foundation:

The conservative Bradley Foundation has spent millions over three decades to smash labor unions. Now an investment that could barely buy a house in Washington may bring it closer to that goal than ever before.

The vehicle is a Supreme Court case, Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, to bar public employee unions from compelling payments from nonmembers. The lawsuit, about which the high court will hear arguments Monday, was brought by Rebecca Friedrichs and eight other California public school teachers who declined to join the union that represents them in collective bargaining. But the lawsuit's true author looks to be the Milwaukee-based Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation.

The Bradley Foundation funds the Center for Individual Rights, the conservative D.C. nonprofit law firm that brought the case; it funds (or has funded) at least 11 organizations that submitted amicus briefs for the plaintiffs; and it's funded a score of conservative organizations that support the lawsuit's claim that the "fair-share fees" nonmembers must pay are unconstitutional. When CIR first filed the case in a California federal court in 2013, the Bradley Foundation posted the news on its website under the tab, "What We Do."

Bradley isn't the sole conservative philanthropy to bankroll CIR. Others have included Donors Capital Fund and Donor's Trust, two vehicles frequently used by the Koch brothers; the Dunn's Foundation for the Advancement of Right Thinking; the F.M. Kirby Foundation; the Lillian Wells Foundation; and the Carthage Foundation, according to Conservative Transparency, a project of the liberal opposition research nonprofit American Bridge.

But it's Bradley - with an endowment estimated at $800 million - that's provided the most conspicuously extensive support to Friedrichs. Since 1989, CIR (which bills itself as the conservative alternative to the American Civil Liberties Union) has received more than $2 million from the Bradley Foundation, according to data compiled by Conservative Transparency. Bradley continues to fund CIR through a general operating grant, CIR President Terry Pell told POLITICO.

The Bradley Foundation has a long history of wanting to smash unions and had bankrolled Scott Walker's gubernatorial campaigns in order to bust the unions in Wisconsin. They were so invested in making sure that Walker won and did what they hired him to do that Michael Grebe, then head of the Foundation, became Walker's campaign chair.

But the Bradley Foundation's goal isn't just to bust the unions. In fact, busting the unions - especially the teachers' unions and other public sector unions - was just a step in their bigger agenda. The Bradley Foundation wants to get rid of unions in order to get even more money and more power.

With the teachers' unions out of the way, it would make it easier for them to accomplish another goal - privatizing the public education system. Three years ago, the liberal watchdog group One Wisconsin Now, reported that the Bradley Foundation had already spent $31 million to support groups that wanted to privatize from public education. I'm sure that they consider that money well spent since Walker has already spent nearly $2 billion in tax dollars for private schools.

As the gentle reader already knows, these private schools have already shown themselves to be utter failures. They not only perform worse than public schools, but the education profiteers are already complaining that they need even more money.

But the failure of privatized schools are not necessarily unintentional.

Decades ago, the Bradley Foundation paid $1 million to Charles Murray to write The Bell Curve. In that book, Murray basically says that the poor - especially African Americans - aren't worth spending a lot of money on so that they could receive a quality education:

The explosive conclusions of The Bell Curve are now common knowledge. What is less well known is that the country's leading conservative foundation paid co-author Charles Murray $1 million to write the book. Foundation funding of research is nothing new. But Murray's support from the Milwaukee-based Bradley Foundation is an example of the highly ideological research that conservative foundations favor as they seek to mold public policy. Even in the marketplace of ideas, it takes money to compete.

The Bell Curve's key educational policy recommendation dovetails with the Bradley Foundation's top education priority: support for school choice, including public funds for private and religious schools. This bolsters the case of those who argue that despite the rhetoric of choice, many voucher advocates have abandoned the vision of a quality education for all children. Says Robert Lowe, associate professor at National Louis University and an editor of the journal Rethinking Schools:

The Bell Curve is a smoking gun. It maintains that the poor—including the majority of African Americans—are generally incapable of benefiting from education....

C.J. Prentiss, an Ohio legislator (Independent/Democrat) who has been active in the African-American community opposing vouchers, also notes that voucher advocates have tried to win converts by arguing that vouchers would improve educational opportunities for the poor:

You have to be suspicious of someone who argues that on the one hand, African Americans are dumber than whites, and then, on the other, comes into the Black community and says, `We are going to make you as bright as you can be, here are some vouchers.... I believe vouchers are simply a way to dismantle public schools and use tax dollars to fund an elitist private school system. But voucher advocates know it would be suicide to say that openly.

So there you have it with all the dots connected.

The Bradley Foundation and other groups like them want to do away with the unions to make it easier to privatize and profiteer from public education. To increase their profit margins even more, they will not provide a quality education because poor people - especially the minority ones - well, they're just not worth it.

Is it any wonder that Wisconsin and other states under the influence of dark money are in an economic and social free fall?

Wild, Wild, West

By Jeff Simpson 

Recently in Houston, a man was carjacked, and (un)luckily for him, a "good guy with a gun" was handy to help him out.  However, as the saying goes, "with friends like this, who needs carjackers?". 

According to police, a carjacking at a gas station in Valero Saturday night left one man injured, but it wasn’t the intended target when an ammosexual attempted to go “full-Rambo” and stop the crime-in-progress. Rather than call police, the unnamed GGWAG leaped into action and opened fire on two men who jumped another man at the gas station. He didn’t manage to quite hit his targets, but the unnamed shooter managed to land one blow — to the victim’s head. The carjackers managed to escape with the unnamed victim’s pickup truck.
The  shooting (and carjacking) victim was taken to a nearby hospital, where he remains in stable condition. The stolen truck was located a mile away, but the suspects managed to escape and are still on the loose. In true “Good Guy With a Gun” fashion, the shooter did not wait around for police to arrive, and is being sought for questioning.

Now in Michigan, at a Home Depot store, someone allegedly was shop lifting, and we all know the punishment for possibly shoplifting is death.  That is if we are lucky enough to have "good girl with gun" handy to mete out the deserved punishment.

   Police say a customer witnessed two suspected shoplifters leaving the store and fired shot at their SUV.Police say the customer does have a concealed weapons license. Officers say she did shoot out one of the tires on the SUV.
It is not known if she will face charges in the incident.

How she does not get charged with two counts of attempted murder is beyond me,

In Portland, days after a mass shooting at a community college that left 9 dead, two men were walking around schools with assault rifles over their shoulders.  

The list goes on and on and on.

As the righty sooth sayer, Bradley Foundations own Christian Schneider says:

When Wisconsin passed concealed-carry, it became the 49th state to do so. And upon passage of similar laws in other states,exactly none of them became the open firing ranges concealed carry opponents feared.

Nope never happens.  As Schneider says:

The question is, how wrong do these people have to be before we stop believing them?

Bradley Foundation Boss Calls Walker's Campaign "Grassroots"

Among the dozen press releases that Scott Walker's campaign sent out on Friday in an effort to control the damage done in Thursday night's debate, the biggest doozy of them all is the one that was issued by Walker's campaign manager, Michael Grebe.

After pretending that Walker hasn't been dropping in the polls since he first announced, Grebe, who just so happens to also be the President and CEO of the right wing, dark money group, the Bradley Foundation, spews this spit-take inducing line:

Our goal by August was to introduce Governor Walker and his big, bold reforms to America and show the country it isn't too late to turn things around. Scott Walker didn't win three elections in four years with luck. He did it by unapologetically making the case for his brand of bold and successful conservative reforms one voter at a time and out-working everyone.

This campaign is no exception. We are running a retail-style grassroots campaign unlike any other 2016 hopeful, and voters are responding. Our three-week campaign rollout, which kicked off July 13 in Waukesha, WI, was among the most aggressive of any 2016 candidate.

In the first week alone, we visited 16 cities in six states and traveled nearly 900 miles across Iowa on the campaign's Winnebago. We've pledged to complete the "Full Grassley" in the Hawkeye state and have already visited 16 of the 99 counties. We'll be campaigning in all 10 New Hampshire counties on a Harley and have impressive organizations we're building in South Carolina, Nevada and the rest of the early contest states.

[...]

The task at hand for us is building on this groundswell of grassroots and grasstops support, and we will do so with a simple strategy: We are going to outwork every other campaign and candidate in the race.

Meh, Grassroots, astroturf, what's the difference when you're filthy rich.

Grebe then goes on to brag about all of the Republicans that are signing up to Walker's campaign. But one does have to question whether they are signing on because they genuinely like Walker and his failed agenda or if they are doing it because they really like all of the dark money that Grebe and the Bradley Foundation are known to throw around to their lackeys.

The laughable part - especially when one considers Walker's horribly weak and timid performance at the debate - comes with this:

On the stump and in the spotlight, Gov. Walker has earned a reputation for being unflappable, always focused on what's important in order to get the job done. Not surprisingly, our campaign has a similar approach. This is a marathon, not a sprint, and while many in the chattering class obsess over the news of the day, we will keep our eye on the ball and concentrate on the fundamentals that win campaigns. This primary will be fought and won one precinct, ward, county and state at a time, and next year the country and the Republican Party will be better off for it.

In other words, ignore the news you hear about Walker and let us go about buying this election. We 1%ers will be much better off if you voters would just stop thinking and do what we tell you.

Bradley Foundation's Grebe Named Walker's Campaign Chair

One of the most recent fairy tales to come out of Scott Walker's campaign is that he is own political strategist.

For anyone who has followed Scott Walker's lifelong political career for more than five minutes knows that this is laughable unless you count kowtowing to his dark money benefactors as a political strategy.

One of Walker's biggest and oldest dark money masters is the Bradley Foundation and its CEO Michael Grebe. So it should come as no surprise when Walker named Grebe as his campaign chair again:

When Scott Walker formalizes his presidential run Monday with a long-anticipated announcement, he will have at his side a seasoned veteran of Republican politics and an architect of the modern conservative movement. THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned that Walker is expected to name Michael Grebe as campaign chairman as early as Friday.

Grebe’s role, while not unexpected, is nonetheless a coup for Walker, who has firmly established himself as a first-tier candidate for the 2016 Republican nomination. Grebe served as chairman of both of Walker’s bids for governor, as well as Walker’s 2012 recall election – so he knows the candidate well.

I'm not sure how this is a coup for Walker. The Bradley Foundation has invested tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions, of dollars into Walker's political career. Any good, greedy investor is going to keep a close eye on their investment to make sure it's not money wasted.

To show you how good of an idea this is, Sith Lord Karl Rove approves of the move:

“He has this unique combination of talent and experience in politics and policy that makes him one of the most respected people I’ve known,” says Karl Rove, former top adviser to George W. Bush.

Those who have worked with Grebe say his equanimity will help bring a steady hand to the Walker campaign team. “He’s bright, low-key, unflappable,” says Rove. “He has the demeanor of the lawyer that your family has depended on for years.”

In other words, Grebe is going to keep a tight rein on Walker in the hopes of getting him to stop shooting himself in the foot.

To further show how the corporate media is in lockstep with Walker's campaign, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel had this to say about the appointment:

Grebe told the Journal Sentinel in 2011 there was nothing secretive about what the foundation does.

"We're going to run off tackle, right over there, and we're telling you we're going to run there and we're going to knock you on your butt and carry the ball down the field," Grebe said then. "There are no surprises."

Either the corporate media giant forgot or hoped that we forgot that the Bradley Foundation laundered money through another right wing foundation in order to put up a lot of racist billboards aimed at suppressing the vote during Walker's first election and the recall.

The media also failed to mention that Walker and Grebe's relation is so symbiotic that Walker appointed Grebe's son to the University of Wisconsin's Board of Regents.

Regardless of the corporate media's failings, this does confirm what we already known...that Walker is completely beholden to his dark money benefactors like the Bradley Foundation and just like Grebe, the Money Badger, he doesn't give a damn about the people.