Walker Is Still Making Excuses For Presidential Bid Failure

Scott Walker is traveling the state, granting New Year interview in advance of his State of the State speech and laying the ground work for another run for governor. This, in itself, is not surprising or unusual. However, what does stand out is that Walker is only granting interviews only to TV reporters and is passing on any interviews with the reporters from newspapers.

The reason for this is pretty clear. With TV reporters, they don't have the time to fact check anything he says and he is able to get away with his lies, hypocrisy and false spin.

For example, on January 8th, Walker did an interview with Alex Hagan of WGBA:

In this interview, Walker blamed the failure of his presidential bid on the national media and Donald Trump:

Walker hasn't been very outspoken about his campaign since he suspended it, but now he says he's moving past that point and looking towards a possible third term as governor.

Governor Scott Walker says nothing has changed since suspending his campaign in September.

“There just wasn't a pathway to reach the nomination.”

Walker blames his drop out to the obsession over Donald Trump and not paying attention to the real issues.

“Nationally not the local media here in Wisconsin, but nationally the media was consumed with Donald Trump."

The gentle reader should note that there were no follow up questions, such as about his multiple gaffes, his spending money like a drunken Republican lobbyist or that Wisconsin is failing under his leadership.

Nor were there any follow up questions in the interview he gave just the day before with Charles Benson of WTMJ when Walker made the most outrageous excuse yet:

Benson: Do you think Trump's surge doomed your campaign?

Walker: Oh there's so many different factors when you look at a campaign, the bottom line is we didn't see a pathway to the nomination.

Walker: One of the retrospective things is I would advise anyone who is a Governor to know to run for president at the same time they are governor because - I short-changed my campaign. There are things I needed to do to be a better candidate for President that was able to do because of attention and focus on being the governor

Benson: Some might say you short-changed being governor?

Walker: They may say that but they give no example of it.

Benson: The poll numbers might suggest they didn't like you were spending that much time doing it.

Walker: Yeah but I say - our opponent, they said it, but they couldn't give an example of anything.

Did you get that? Walker says his presidential bid failed because he spent too much time being the governor.

But just how much time did he spend governing instead of campaigning? Not a helluva lot:

Gov. Scott Walker spent an average of less than one hour per day doing state business during his short-lived presidential campaign, according to records released to FOX6 News.

Over his 71-day campaign, Walker's official monthly calendars include 57 hours of state business, or an average of 48 minutes per day. Many days, the governor's only Wisconsin-related agenda item was a brief morning teleconference with his staff.

Walker's office released the records to news outlets late Friday afternoon, when few people would be paying attention to them.

In contrast, Walker blocked off 809 hours over the same time period for other purposes, an average of 11 hours and 24 minutes per day. The calendars note it as "hold time" -- often from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. during the presidential campaign.

Walker's office didn't provide details on the governor's schedule during those times, although the times matched up with the governor's campaign schedule.

The report goes on to say that Walker's time governing went from 48 minutes a day to about five hours a day when after dropped out of the race. Not that you could prove it by anyone in Wisconsin.

But I don't know what is more astounding and scary - that Walker is starting to hint at running for a third term or that there are people foolish enough to support him.

Pop Goes The Weasel!

As the gentle reader knows, unless they just woke up from a coma, Scott Walker has ended his campaign. On Monday evening, he boldly gave his preemptive concession speech. (BTW, am I the only one that just died laughing when someone broke out in applause when he said he was quitting?)

When Walker formally announced his campaign a scant ten weeks ago, he said that God told him to run. Now he is saying God is telling him to quit in order to lead the other Republican candidates to also quit so that they can unite behind one "positive" Republican who isn't Donald Trump:

"I was sitting in church yesterday, the pastor's words reminded me that the Bible is full of stories about people who were called to be leaders in unusual ways. Today, I believe that I am being called to lead by helping to clear the field so that a positive conservative message can rise to the top of the field. With this in mind, I will suspend my campaign immediately.

"I encourage other Republican presidential candidates to consider doing the same, so that the voters can focus on a limited number of candidates who can offer a positive conservative alternative to the current front-runner.

"This is fundamentally important to the future of the party, and more importantly to the future of our country.

And yes, the crazies and the postmortem analyses are already coming out of the woodwork.

Some of Walker's cult-like followers are suggesting that Walker is playing rope-a-dope, either angling for a brokered convention or just to come back into the field of play after enough people dropped out.

Liz Mair, who worked for Walker for less than 24 hours, came out firing even before he made the formal announcement, blaming Walker's advisors and a poor campaign strategy. She also alluded to a "big story" that Walker would be tied to that was about to break. One can only guess what this "big story" is, but a good guess would be that rumor about Walker's campaign manager, Rick Wiley, and allegations of his lewd and lascivious behavior.

While all of this is going on, the Koch Boyz have got to be wondering how do they go about getting back all of the money they had invested in Walker. They must be feeling really bitter that all of the Kochs' money and the Kochs' men couldn't put the weaselly Walker campaign back together again.

Now, like the gentle reader, I'm as happy as can be to see Walker fall flat on his weasel face. But I have to keep my joy tempered for a couple of reasons.

One, while the rest of the nation is off the hook for now, we still have to deal with Walker. And he's going to be extra ornery due to his national embarrassment.

Secondly, history has a tendency to repeat itself if we choose to ignore it.

I've mentioned before that Walker had made a run for governor in 2006 because God told him to. Walker pulled out early on in that race because he was getting no support and was getting no traction. Walker then continued to campaign for the next four years, making all his decision based not on what was good for Milwaukee County or anything else but on what would be the most politically advantageous for him. He then went on to win in 2010, with a little help from the Koch Boyz and a secret router.

So, celebrate for now, but hang on because we haven't yet seen the last of Richard Milhouse Walker to kick around any more.

PolitiFact Gives Reince Priebus A Pass

Last week, GOP chief weasel, Reince Priebus, was squawking about Hillary Clinton and how she allegedly gotten all this money from the kings of other countries, which would, of course, be illegal.

The supposedly unbiased PolitiFact decided to look at his claims. Their findings:

Priebus said Clinton took "money from kings of Saudi Arabia and Morocco and Oman and Yemen."

The monarchies of Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Oman have contributed to the Clinton Foundation, but Yemen, which does not have a king, has not.

And although Priebus’ claim was made during a discussion of the foundation as well as contributions to political candidates, his phrasing could have left the impression that Clinton herself, rather than the foundation, received the money.

For a statement that is partially accurate, our rating is Half True.

So, not only did he lie about the King of Yemen, who doesn't exist, but they also found that he lied about whether any of the money went to Clinton. Yet, despite the evidence that they found proving Priebus a liar, they couldn't bring themselves to state it and gave him a half-true rating.

Journalism is dead. All that we have left is the corporate media who is nothing more than an extension of the GOP propaganda machine.

Cross posted from Crooks and Liars

Walker's "Job Creation Agency" Gets A Closer Look

As Scott Walker kicks off his presidential bid (But remember, kids, he's not really a candidate yet! Yeah, right.) , his record is getting a closer, but not necessarily a more honest, look at his record.

One of the things Walker promised when he was running for governor in 2010 was that he would create 250,000 jobs before the end of his first term, when he wasn't busy saying that government doesn't create jobs. That really wasn't a big risk as far as pledges go. Experts said that he could do that by doing nothing if national and global economics picked up enough. But Walker did was worse than doing nothing because he came nowhere near his goal. In fact, depending on how you count it, he didn't even reach the halfway point.

To meet his goal, Walker created the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC), a public-private entity that was the kingpin of his job creation scheme.

Andy Sullivan at Reuters took a look at Walker's WEDC.

At first, Sullivan treated it with kid gloves, feeding into the right wing propaganda that the lack of job creation was due to uncertainty due to the protests. That's a crock. Walker also blamed his recall, Obama's reelection, Obamacare, and, well, everything but himself.

As is usual for these types of articles, Sullivan doesn't get to the meat of the issue until near the bottom of his column, after many readers might stop reading:

Only 25 percent of those who worked at WEDC when it started are still there now, according to a former top state economic development official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

[...]

The turmoil hasn't been confined to the rank and file. Since 2011, the body has had two chief executive officers and is now looking for its third chief operating officer and fourth chief financial officer.

State legislative audits have found that WEDC has mismanaged taxpayer funds and handed out awards to companies that should not have been eligible for them. The agency also didn't follow up to ensure that jobs were actually being created and failed to track whether businesses were paying their loans back on time, according to reviews in 2012 and 2013. Lassa said the agency had improved its performance somewhat since then.

The agency also awarded job-creation grants to companies that have shipped jobs overseas, prompting Walker to promise reforms during his 2014 re-election campaign. Since then, the agency has adopted rules that prohibit companies from using WEDC funds to outsource jobs.

The agency has fallen short of its own goals. In its first fiscal year of operation, which ended on June 30, 2012, WEDC reported that it had backed projects that would create or retain 23,759 jobs, short of its goal of 50,000 jobs.

WEDC fell short again the following year, when it reported that it had signed off on projects that would create 11,058 jobs and retain another 26,255, again short of the 50,000 goal.

Unfortunately, Sullivan also missed a lot of important things.

Things like that

• Walker used the WEDC board as a place to stick his unqualified former campaign workers, even though they had no experience in economic development
• The money they lost track of was in the tens of millions of dollars
• WEDC was involved in bid rigging
• They used taxpayer money to buy iTunes for their iPads and tickets to Badger games
• Many of the companies that received WEDC money were also Walker campaign donors

Another big thing that Sullivan didn't mention is that Walker had a lot of warning that this scheme was a bad idea and was basically designed to fail at its purported goal of creating jobs.

On the bright side, it is excelling at the fraud, corruption and waste that these types of programs create. Maybe Walker can put that in one of his presidential resume bullet points.

Cross posted at Crooks and Liars

Corporate Media Tries To Cover Up Walker's Molotov Gaffe

By now, the gentle reader has probably heard about the gaffe by Scott Walker, found by the good folks at One Wisconsin Now, in which he signed a letter "Thank you again and Molotov."  The story has pretty much gone viral across the nation, including Jeff Simpson's coverage of the story at this here blog.

Unsurprisingly, the corporate media once again steps in to minimize the bad news for Walker.

First look at the coverage by Jessie Opoien from the Cap Times:

Presumably, Walker meant to write "mazel tov" and didn't intend to wish good tidings of incendiary weapons. Perhaps it was a case of AutoCorrect or that pesky Microsoft Word paperclip causing shenanigans.

Opoien then goes on to list other gaffes to show this one wasn't so bad on the grand scheme of things.

Things get ridiculous when one looks at the story by Dan Bice of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

Walker, however, downplayed the mistake on Wednesday. He said that the letter probably dated back a decade and said he couldn’t remember if it went out in that form.

“My guess is it was a typo,” Walker said. “I figured nationally my thumb has healed up and my bald spot is boring now, so they’re going to talk about things like that.”

[...]

Walker's mistake could have been the result of Auto Correct, the program that offers sometimes not-so-helpful edits to misspelled words, even though the note to Gimbel appears to be a formal letter.

Microsoft Word doesn't have an automatic correction function. But if you type mozoltov -- a phonetic spelling of mazel tov -- Microsoft will suggest "molotov" as an alternative spelling.

The truth is that Walker really is that spelling-impaired.

As evidence, I would remind the gentle reader of Walker's tribute to Abraham Lincoln that was so strewn with spelling errors that it would give an English teacher a migraine:

Walker the historian gives us a comment on Lincoln's most famous speech, and misspells a great man's name twice in the process:

"At (sic) his Gettysburg Address, Lincoln famously said, 'Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal' This was not just lip service, as evidenced from the words of contemporaries like Frederick Douglas (sic), former slave and early civil rights leader. Douglas (sic) said Lincoln was 'the first great man that I talked with in the United States freely who in no single instance reminded me of the difference between himself and myself, of the difference of color.'"

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!

Walker's screed against the Democrats, disguised as a tribute to Lincoln, goes on to say, "This sediment (sic) that all men are is equal is evidenced in the Republican Party's current platform of equal taxes on all, and opportunity for all regardless of race, gender, or age ... Contrast that with the tenants (sic) of the (sic) Barack Obama and the Democrat (sic) party ... "

Obviously, Walker isn't the brightest flame on the Menorah.  This wasn't a typo or an errant spell check.  It was just more evidence that Walker's poor cognitive skills.

Sadly, this isn't the first time Bice has done something like this.

Bice also wanted people to think that the reason he had fired Taylor Palmisano wasn't because of the infamous Black Friday fundraising email but because of some racist tweets she had made three years before, but just happened to coincidentally surface at the same time as the story about the email.

Scott Walker Leaves His Political Bubble And Gets Popped

For most of Scott Walker's career, he has lived in a protective political bubble.

Even though he's been in campaign mode for almost the entire span of his political career (which as been all of his entire adult life - and I do used the term 'adult' very loosely), Walker has seldom hit any bumps. The only real time that he had problems was in 1990 when now US Congresswoman Gwen Moore routed him in a race for the state legislature.

And why should he have had many problems?

He has had a lot of support - to the point of collaboration - from the dark money special interest groups, and from his friends like Reince Priebus.

Just as important as the flood of dark money and collaborated campaigns is the fact that he's had the corporate media in his back pocket. The corporate media, especially in Milwaukee, would seldom accurately report the news, especially if it was bad for Walker. They would gloss over the bad news, minimizing its impact, if they reported it at all. They would also bend the truth to make any good news seem better than it really was.

But now that Walker has the White House in his aim, he is forced to leave this protective political bubble and he's finding that it's a cruel world out there.

First, Walker got a history lesson from a fellow Republican, Ohio Governor John Kasich.

During the 1995-96 budget dispute between Clinton and the Republican-controlled Congress, Walker said, “Clinton did not say the Republicans in Congress aren’t going to work with me so I’m going to do an executive order.”

“He sat down with them,” Walker said.

Kasich, who like Walker just won re-election to a second term in a Rust Belt, labor-dominated state, snapped almost matter-of-factly.

“No, he shut the government — the government got shut down first,” Kasich said.

The audience laughed. And then the two men, both of them likely to run for president in 2016, began to talk over each other as NBC’s "Meet the Press" moderator Chuck Todd stroked his red goatee in delight.

“There was tremendous animosity,” Kasich said, almost yelling, to remind the younger Walker that he, Kasich, had been there himself as a member of Congress.

“It wasn’t —” Walker tried to get out before Kasich cut him off.

“Scott, it was!” Kasich said. “I’ll tell you, when you’re sitting around and we’ve got Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole at each other over a shutdown, it wasn’t easy either.”

Then on November 9, 2014, fresh from his reelection, Walker appeared on Meet the Press in which he got slapped around again by host Chuck Todd.

Todd accurately showed that Wisconsin's job numbers and wages are lagging behind that of the national averages even though Walker tried to spin it until everyone's head was spinning.

Ironically, but not surprisingly, the Wisconsin corporate media giant Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, in their version of PolitiFact, also tried to spin things in Walker's favor even as they admitted that Todd was correct:

The quarterly time frames don’t match up precisely with Walker’s time in office because, as we noted, there is a lag of several months in reporting the figures. But when compared March 2011 to March 2014, and December 2010 to December 2013, the results were essentially the same: Wisconsin has lagged the national average on job growth, but was slightly higher on wage growth.

Some people never learn.

Cross posted at Crooks and Liars

Corporate Media Question Of The Day

Early Monday morning, I wrote a post about how Scott Walker is screwing over corrections officers again, this time by withholding a raise that was written into the state budget.

Late Tuesday afternoon, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the corporate media giant, finally got around to covering the story.  Don't worry, they didn't give me any credit for breaking the story.

The question of the day is this: Would the paper have even covered the story if I hadn't made it public in the first place?

Of Charlie Sykes, Right Wisconsin and Walkergate

I have often opined that journalism is a dead - or at least dying - trade.  All too often, it seems like it is nothing more than a regurgitation of political press releases without any questioning or investigation to the veracity of the statements being made.

Dominique Paul Noth, an old school journalist, wrote an eloquent article in which he also laments the changes that have happened in journalism, although he admits it wasn't always so great either back in the day.

While it would well be worth the gentle reader to take a few minutes to read Noth's poignant observations on journalism as a whole, there is a section that I would draw the reader's attention to which outlines what we all know but few are willing to say outright - that the corporate media is in bed with the political operation of Scott Walker and his dark money supporters:

Many readers now wonder aloud why parent company Journal Communications continues to
damages its reputation of journalistic integrity by turning morning TMJ Radio over to the right-wing blathering of Charlie Sykes. But that was a ratings decision, not a news one. The justification remains that Sykes, like Rush Limbaugh, describes himself as an entertainer not a journalist. (Of course, he wants his opinions revered as hard commentary and he comes from a journalist background. In fact, I worked in the Journal newsroom when he was a reporter there, haranguing veterans with his ideas, which they found amusing or just quietly rolled their eyes. The general opinion was that he was likeable but not believable, and his father, the late journalist Jay Sykes, was more respected. So no wonder Charles moved on to pastures that would put him on a higher pedestal.)

Sykes’ ego has now led to a larger error. His Right Wisconsin, a website requiring paid subscription and full of his musings and those of others who claim journalistic credentials, including several right-wing bloggers JS has hired, was started by him to spread his journalism credentials and is actually owned by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Journal Communications, moving from mere employer of an entertainer to conspirator in right-wing journalistic thematics. That has destroyed the JS reputation for objectivity especially right now, as Walker falls into deeper disrepute through his own behavior as county executive.

Just ask Bice himself. In a web chat on jsonline Feb. 26, he was asked to comment on whether Right Wisconsin was an arm of Walker’s political machine, given that its editor, Brian Fraley, has been revealed as email contact in the recent release of John Doe missives. Chatted Bice:

“If you want to understand how closely tied Right Wisconsin is to the Walker team, do this: Go to the email records and do a search for the word Fraley, as in RW managing editor Brian Fraley, who worked with Kelly Rindfleisch back in the legislative caucus days. Then note that Fraley is involved in the email exchange that just led Gov. Walker -- apparently -- to fire DOT legal counsel John Schulze. Then turn on your radio and listen to Charlie Sykes argue against the Schulze's firing. It's a small and deeply intertwined world.”

Part of that deep intertwine is JS ownership of this Right Wisconsin so closely tied to Walker’s camp and Sykes’s disgust when Walker backs away from supporting his own gang.

As of this writing, Bice as columnist has suggested but not flat out said that Walker knew of the secret email network and router set up inside his county exec office. Meanwhile Sykes pretends it’s all old news though Walker’s pettiness in these emails destroys his Eagle Scout image and explains why Republican and Democratic prosecutors and judges continue to investigate him.

Any journalist can smell that Walker was deeply involved but there is a legal concern – and Walker has a deep bench of high-priced lawyers – about what you can say in print. After all, there wasn’t enough back then to charge Walker with corruption, just hints that good lawyers could try to strangle in court action.

As I spelled out to friends who asked: “There is a legal reason that Walker dodges his obvious knowledge and even media reporters who demand he answers. Consider the consequences if he does admit publicly what the emails of others reveal. It would confirm his role in an illegal coordination between campaign and county workers on taxpayer time. That opens him up to criminal action, in effect reopening the first John Doe while he and supporters are scrambling to delay the second John Doe until after the election.”

So while I understand the caution of journalists, I must point out that aggressive reform-minded newspapers – unlike JS -- would say aloud that Walker knew despite the legal implications. They have lawyers, too, and the First Amendment to protect them when they draw obvious conclusions. It’s not a matter of opposing or supporting Walker, it’s just going where the evidence leads good journalists.

For now, Bice in his column can hint, but he won’t say. Maybe that’s unusual caution in practice. But maybe, now that his owners have shown their real stripes, he has little choice.

There is not much that I or anyone else could add to this. But I would point out that the intertwining to which Noth speaks is even deeper than he reported. While it is true that the Journal Sentinel owns the website, it is funded - at least in part - by the Koch-funded Wisconsin Club for Growth.

Thus Sykes and Fraley have forsook all pretenses of being entertainers or journalists.  They are simply marionettes controlled by their corporate puppet masters.

To Err Is Human, But To Really Screw Up, You Need The Corporate Media

It is well known in Fitzwalkerstan that the Teapublicans that are in charge of the state legislature don't write their own laws.  Instead, they rely on their wealthy campaign donors to write the bills for them.

This has been shown to be the sad state of affairs many times.  G-Tac wrote the mining bill.  Chris Abele and his fellow plutocrats at the Greater Milwaukee Committee hired a silk stocking law firm to write the bill consolidating power in Milwaukee County into Abele's particularly inept hands.

Most recently, it was reported that the sleazy Rep. Joel Kleefisch is pushing a bill written by the even sleazier Michael Eisenga to help Eisenga get out of paying a decent amount of child support.

In order to take the heat of their bought and paid for legislators, the corporate media did what it always does in these situations - they tried to distract the people by yelling "Squirrel!"

To be more specific, Adam Tobias of Wisconsin Reporter, a Koch Industry subsidiary, wrote a piece of propaganda claiming that Big Labor wrote the living wage resolution for Milwaukee County Supervisor David Bowen.

Tobias' proof is that SEIU had supported Bowen in his last election and some hearsay:

County Supervisor David Bowen wrote the legislation in collaboration with the Service Employees International Union.

Bowen, endorsed by the SEIU Wisconsin State Council in his 2012 election, worked with labor union representatives on about 15 drafts and met with them several times in his office at the county courthouse, County Supervisor James “Luigi” Schmitt confirmed.

“SEIU, they’ve been lockstep with it,” Schmitt told Wisconsin Reporter.

As one might expect, Tobias' reporting leaves a lot to be desired. And the greatest things desired would be accuracy and honesty.

I contacted Supervisor Bowen after seeing this and asked him if the SEIU had written the resolution. He was quite clear in saying they did not. He said that they did ask to have some input on it, as did about fifteen other groups, including other unions.

He also told me that the person Tobias had specifically referred to wasn't even part of SEIU.  Obviously, Tobias was just making things up by the time he wrote the article.

So why didn't Tobias include some information and then made up other things?

He wasn't completely honest because that would not fit into the corporate agenda of smearing the unions and keeping workers from making a living wage.  Why, if people were allowed to make a living wage, they just might be able to make enough money that they didn't need to work two or three jobs and would be able to see just how much the corporate special interests have been ripping them off.

And who knows where it would go from there! People might be able to make educated choices at the election booth and vote the corporate sponsored Teapublicans out.  They might unionize at the job site and start demanding things like respect and safety.  Then there might be a push for women's rights, voters' rights and who knows what!

Anyway, I digress.

The point is that the corporate shills being funded by the corporate special interests are trying to detract from how badly their puppets like Joel Kleefisch are failing in the public relations department.  And since there is no way to justify this level of greed and corruption, they try to conflate a situation to distract people from what is really going on.

But then there is more.  There is always more.

The granddaddy of all corporate media, Faux News, picked up the propaganda piece.  Unsurprisingly, they did a copy and paste job without a trace of fact checking...not that they would have reported the truth even if they had been aware of it.  But then, for some bizarre reason, they decided to go with this picture and even odder yet, this caption:

Click on image to embiggen

Well, they are still failing geography, but at least they dropped the palm trees.  Or do you suppose they all just died from being uprooted and transplanted 70 miles to the east?

And wait, I thought the capitol of Fitzwalkerstan was in Walkersha...

Really, it is beyond me how anyone can believe these corporate puppets, much less cite them as credible sources.

A tip of the crown to blue cheddar for pointing it out to me.

In The Interest Of Full Disclosure

It's funny how some things work.

Like how every time there is a negative story about Scott Walker, Dan Bice of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel just happens to come up with a story to take the heat off of Walker.

For example, when I broke the story about how Walker sent out a fundraising email telling people to forgo buying Christmas presents for their children and sending him the money instead, Bice came out a few days later - just as my story was getting international attention - to say that Walker threw an aide under the campaign bus for some tweets she sent three years ago, before she was even working for Walker.

Bice's willingness to go along unquestioningly with this damage control story served it's purpose - it effectively distracted people from Walker's misstep.

More recently, a story appeared in Milwaukee Magazine which reported on the many blunders and corporate kowtowing of Walker's DNR Secretary Kathy Stepp.  This, of course, served as an embarrassment to Walker.

So here comes Bice to the rescue, by practicing some McCarthyism and pointing out that the freelance write who penned the article had signed a recall petition. The horror of it all!

Yet among all the topics covered in the the 5,600-word story, Ginsberg-Schutz makes no mention of the fact that she herself had signed the Walker recall petition in late 2011. Walker fended off an effort to remove him from office in a June 2012 election.

Asked why she omitted this detail, the writer -- who dubs herself an "independent journalist" -- referred questions to Kurt Chandler, editor of Milwaukee Magazine.

Bice went on to badger Milwaukee Magazine editor Kurt Chandler, who, to his credit, stuck to his guns and squashed Bice's attempts at getting a gotcha moment:

Chandler raised a number of questions when asked about disclosing the recall signature.

For instance, he asked, should a political writer disclose how he has voted when covering a political contest? Must a reporter make public that she has had an abortion when writing about women's health? And what are the disclosure rules for a Mormon reporting on gay rights issues?

"Reporters are citizens as well as journalists," Chandler wrote. "I don’t believe a reporter’s credibility is compromised by his or her political or moral views. My role as a magazine editor is to weed out bias without tamping down tone, voice, style and, yes, even point of view (which is much different than bias) – ingredients of a well-written and well-balanced story."

Bice ended his article by pointing out that no MJS reporters signed the recall petitions, claiming it was a violation of the "paper's ethics policy."

That surprised the hell out of me. I wasn't aware that the paper even had an ethics policy. I mean, come on, this is the paper owned by Journal Communications which teamed up with the Koch-funded Wisconsin Club for Growth to produce White Wisconsin.

But it also surprised me that Bice would add that since he is guilty himself of not practicing full disclosure.

If full disclosure was truly such a big issue, Bice would have included in his article - and every article he wrote defending Walker - that Steve Smith, CEO and Chairman of the Board for Journal Communications, which owns the paper, is also a member of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC).  He would also disclose that not only did MMAC strongly support Walker directly with hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign donations, but was so zealous in their donations that they broke campaign finance laws by donating more than the allowed amount.

But full disclosure at the paper has never been their strong suit, making Bice's article not only ironic, but rather hypocritical.

And for the purpose of full disclosure - and to head off the McCarthyites - I not only proudly signed the recall petition, I collected signatures for it as well.  So there!

Scott Walker's Mind-Boggling Hypocrisy

I've been writing about Scott Walker for years, pointing out his lies, his corruption and just how bad he was for Milwaukee County and for the State of Wisconsin.  I've written about both Walkergate and the Son of Doe.  I've written about how he wanted people to send him money instead of buying toys for their children on Christmas.

After all these years, although I have feelings of continuous revulsion at what he has done and is doing, there is not much that surprises me about him.

One exception to that might be just how big of a hypocrite he is.  Just when I thought he couldn't top his last example of hypocrisy, he goes and makes it look like nothing.

And he's done it once again.

Bill Lueders, of the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism, wrote a column which was cross posted at Urban Milwaukee, in which he writes about an interview he did with Walker regarding campaign contributions and corruption.  Even the title of it is mind-boggling:

Walker Says Campaign Cash Corrupts

Yes, it does kind of make your head feel like it's about to pop, doesn't it?

Ah, but as the gentle reader could guess, there's more.  There's always more.

Lueders has this in his article:

“Whether it’s a Democrat or Republican, in so many of these cases, folks have a freedom to associate, they have a freedom to choose,” Walker told the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism in a recent interview. “What I fought about with public employee unions is they didn’t have that freedom.”

Before the changes he pushed through, state and local public workers had no choice but to contribute to their unions. “You have money that was forcibly taken from people without them having any say about that,” Walker said. “That’s where I thought the corruption was.”

The book, “Unintimated: A Governor’s Story and a Nation’s Challenge,” is fervent in its denunciation of money as the unions’ master.

Union leaders, charged Walker, “would rather have seen us take the money from the poor, lay off middle class workers, undermine education, and decimate government services — just so long as we did not close the automatic spigot of cash that was filling their union coffers.”

Yikes.

Yet on the cusp of what may be a hugely expensive 2014 governor’s race, Walker sidestepped the question of whether politicians who need to raise large sums might also be led astray.

Despite Walker's accusations and attempts at diversion, it was Walker himself who raised taxes on the poorest of the poor by cutting the homestead and earned income tax credits. It was Walker, through Act 10, that led to the layoffs of tens of thousands of workers in both the public and private sector. It was Walker that cut nearly a billion dollars from education with the predictable cuts in the quality of education the schools could provide due to staff shortages and bigger classes.  And it was Walker who cut such vital services such as Badger Care and unemployment compensation.

Why doesn't his head explode from all that hypocrisy?

Lueders goes on to say that Walker wasn't willing to talk about all the money he got from the Kochs or from the Widow Hendricks.  Lueders also reported on how Walker was caught in lies in his book which have not yet been corrected even though it's going in for its third printing.

But if Lueders thinks he has had a gotcha moment on Walker, he really dropped the ball on two major points.

One is that while he is discussing the influence of money on elections and it's corrupting effect on elections and politics, he made no mention whatsoever about the ongoing John Doe investigations into the dark money of the Kochs, the Bradley Foundation and their various front groups.  How one could not even bring this up in such a discussion is beyond me.

The other issue, which really rankles me, is that he allows Walker to get away with another bold-faced lie.  In the above cited passage, Walker and Lueders falsely claims that "workers had no choice but to contribute to their unions."

That is utter rubbish.

There are federal laws that prohibit closed shops and give workers the ability to opt out of being a member, even in a union shop.

By perpetuating this lie, Lueders is feeding into Walker's false representations and supports the lies he used to attack workers rights.  It had nothing to do with workers rights.  State Senator Scott Fitzgerald went on TV and admitted that the whole thing was to undercut the Democrats, especially President Obama's bid for reelection.

It's bad enough that we have to try to overcome the gerrymandering, the voter suppression and the worker suppression in order to take our state back, but when we have to also take on the supposed watchdogs in the media who aren't doing their jobs, well, it's frustrating.  It's like trying to play a sporting event and the refs are in cahoots with the other team.

More Fundraiser Follies: The Corporate Media Edition

Anyone that has even the least bit of involvement into politics knows that the silly season is upon us.  And right now, it's the fundraising festival season.  For the past several weeks, I have been so inundated with
invitations to fundraising parties and received so many fundraiser emails that I had to keep double checking my checkbook, wondering if all these pols knew something about my financial status that I didn't.  Alas, there wasn't the millions that all these pols thought I must have.

Anyway, Mary Burke has apparently come out with her first fundraising email.  This was enough to cause Dan Bice of the corporate media giant Milwaukee Journal Sentinel to rush to report on it because....well, I'm not really sure why:.  From Bice's article:

In her first fundraising letter, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mary Burke has launched an attack on Gov. Scott Walker, labeling him a "Tea Party hero" who treats women like second-class citizens while currying favor with radicals by slashing public school funding to pay for corporate tax breaks.

And that's just on the first page.

Hmm. Calling Scott Walker is "an attack" now? I guess that means that ABC News and Yahoo News have been attacking him to since they referred to Walker as a "Tea Party hero" in their news stories.

It also means that Walker has been attacking himself, since he referred to himself as the "Original Tea Party in Wisconsin."

Bice goes on to admit that Walker has been attacking Mary Burke for months, although Bice states that Walker never refers to Burke by name.  Well, that might be true for the hard copy fundraiser letter, but it sure isn't true for the fundraising emails he sent out a few weeks ago.

But the article doesn't come without a bit of irony, this time in the form of Joe Fadness, director of WISGOP and former Walker campaign staffer (Walkergate, anyone?):

Republicans were quick to suggest that Burke, a member of the Madison School Board, was trying to shift the focus from herself.

"Burke's divisive rhetoric comes at the same time she runs from her failed record of voting to raise taxes and implementing policies in the Doyle-Burke Administration that left Wisconsin with billion-dollar budget deficits and massive job loss," said Joe Fadness, executive director of the state Republican Party. "Wisconsin deserves better."

The irony of that statement is probably a thousand times the recommended daily allowance.  Given the fact that Walker is Mr. Divide and Conquer, Fadness can't really complain about divisiveness.  Nor does Walker have a very good record on job creation or balancing budgets.

But to be fair to Fadness, I'm sure he is feeling the pressure from the Son of Doe investigations, which is not only targeting Walker's campaign but also WISGOP and their illegal collaboration with the dark money groups.

But the real kicker is how Bice and the paper had to rush this non-story story out.  These are the same people that didn't even mention Walker's Grinch fundraiser email until the day after the story had gone international and four days after I broke the story.  And even when the paper got around to reporting the email, they buried the lede in favor of the cover story on why Walker's campaign fired the staffer who agreed to have her name put on it.

Remind me again how liberal the corporate media is. For some reason, I keep forgetting.

MJS Almost Catches Up To Cog Dis On Nepotism Story

There is yet another story in which the largest newspaper in the state is busy playing catch up.

In June 2013, Lisa Kaiser of the Shepherd Express broke the story about the rampant nepotism and cronyism that has invested the state's Income Maintenance Program in Milwaukee County.

Last month, I did a follow up on this story, pointing out how the nepotism and cronyism was playing a large part of the problem the system was having with fraud:

And just like he did as county executive, Walker is setting up the program for failure. While the county had a unit of people working on investigating fraud, Walker had just one person for the entire county for a long time. When the stories started to break about the fraud that was being allowed, Walker hired a few more workers to do these investigations. Sadly, the people that were hired were hired based on rather than their qualifications. (On top of that, these new hires were paid more than the one existing fraud investigator who has apparently left the job for someplace that will respect him.)

Lo and behold, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is just starting to catch up on this, sort of:

Leadership within MiLES — specifically the alleged favoritism — definitely interferes with the department's work, employees told the Journal Sentinel. Especially when it comes to weeding out fraud.

A Journal Sentinel investigation published last month exposed how federal incentives to boost enrollment in food and medical assistance programs have led to pressure on front-line workers to issue benefits even when they suspect people might not be eligible.

Robertson and Kamin are ultimately responsible for hitting target numbers. As a result, workers say, they are instructed by supervisors to process benefits for people already receiving aid in other states, people in jail — essentially anybody with an ID card.

Workers outside the favored circle who object or question the tactics are considered troublemakers and quickly lose any shot at ever advancing, they said.

"That's the disease of nepotism," said one worker who was hired around the same time as Robertson's son. "It falls into so many categories. And it spreads like cancer."

At least the article gave credit to the Shepherd Express for their part in breaking the story. That is usually something they only do for propagandist organizations like MacIver, Wisconsin Reporter and Media Trackers.

But again, they are a month late - at best - and a dollar short.  Notice how they failed to even mention that the nepotism and cronyism was made possible by Act 10?    They're still unable to hold Scott Walker accountable for anything.

But that's what you get from the corporate media.

MJS Follows Cog Dis' Lead On Walkergate Documents

On September 26, 2013, I wrote the following regarding the release of the Walkergate documents, including the emails that have been under wraps since the investigation started:

Recently there has been a few people raising the hue and cry for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel to push for the release of the Walkergate documents which had been sealed during the John Doe investigation and subsequent trials.

There are two major problems with that course of action.

First, who in their right mind would trust the corporate media to be the holders of this information? There is no reason to believe that they would make all of the transcripts, emails and other documents available to the public. They would pick and choose which ones to release, with their own spin, in order to protect Scott Walker and other key politicos.

Secondly, there ought to be no reason to rely on the corporate media to get the documents released. These documents are property of Milwaukee County and as such, it would be the onus of Milwaukee County Emperor to demand the release of the documents. The fact that he hasn't done so in all of these months should raise eyebrows. Was it because he was simply too busy hanging with his plutocratic pals at the Greater Milwaukee Committee to do his job or maybe was he helping provide cover to Walker as a political favor to get Act 14 - the power grab bill - passed?

Abele's loyalists had a hissy fit about this, angry that I dared bring up Abele's name and that he had nothing to do with the Walkergate investigation.

Clearly that's a false statement. As I explained before, these are the public's property and as County Emperor, it's Abele's onus to get that property back.

Finally, two and a half weeks later, the editorial board found the proverbial acorn and actually got one right.

From their Sunday editorial:

All of them, including emails sent on a secret system set up by aides to then-County Executive Scott Walker, belong to the people of Milwaukee County. And anyone with an interest in this case should join the newspaper in this important fight for transparency and the public's right to know.

That includes Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele, Chisholm — and, of course, Walker, now the governor, whose administration as county executive was subject to the John Doe investigation. Such a proceeding is similar to a federal grand jury investigation, and often is conducted in secret.

[...]

The investigation is long over. The records should be returned to Milwaukee County. The public has a right to know what's in them.

They are the public's records.

Gee, what took them so long?

Can you believe that they are really trying to charge nearly $200 a year for their paper? No wonder they are consistently losing circulation.

Gentle Reader, do us both a favor.

Stop subscribing to that rag and split the savings with us, who gets you the news in a much more timely - and accurate - fashion.

Donations are always gratefully accepted.

The Corporate Media Bias On Public Assistance Fraud

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has been doing an ongoing "investigative reporting" series about public assistance fraud.  The corporate media does occasional stories or series of stories like this to promote the corporate agenda that public assistance is bad and should be cut based on these anecdotal stories.

The paper wrote about how the public assistance system works on the 'honor system,' which can be abused.  They have also written about how it's all the federal government's fault for "pushing bonuses" on states to ease the process of being enrolled and for retaining people on public assistance.

Most recently, they snarked on Scott Walker for saying action would be coming regarding the fraud but not offering any details to use as red meat for the conservative Teapublican base they pander to.

But there are some things that one will not find in all of their reporting, things that somehow eluded their in-depth look at what is going on.

The first overlooked item is that many of the people that are receiving benefits - whether it be food stamps, energy assistance or Badger Care - are the working poor.  They are the people that work at Walmart, Aurora Health Care, fast food restaurants and yes, in some cases, even for the public sector, whose pay is so low that they are eligible for benefits.  If these places paid a living wage, this would cut back on the number of people who need assistance and thus make it easier to make sure fraud doesn't happen.

Another thing that is overlooked in all of this reporting is how the individual systems are being managed.

The gentle reader will not see any mention that while Scott Walker was Milwaukee County Executive, he left the Income Maintenance Program extremely short-handed, expecting five workers to hand the work of thirty.  This was, as one might suspect, a thinly-veiled attempt to manipulate the system so that he could privatize it.

But despite his intentional sabotaging of the program, fraud investigators were able to find fraud and recoup the money.  The glowing example of this by far is a now retired county worker named Cindy Jaeger who had single-handedly recovered $5 million in just three years.

Because of County Executive Walker's maleficent and inept management, the Income Maintenance Program eventually was taken over by the state in order to avoid a costly class action lawsuit.  And now that Walker is governor, he is again in charge of the public assistance system.

And just like he did as county executive, Walker is setting up the program for failure.  While the county had a unit of people working on investigating fraud, Walker had just one person for the entire county for a long time.  When the stories started to break about the fraud that was being allowed, Walker hired a few more workers to do these investigations.  Sadly, the people that were hired were hired based on who they knew and/or to whom they were related rather than their qualifications.  (On top of that, these new hires were paid more than the one existing fraud investigator who has apparently left the job for someplace that will respect him.)

Also like the old days, Walker is still leaving the systems short handed.  In Milwaukee County, the state is still pulling workers from their assigned duties to hand the call center or do walk-ins as well as other duties while their own work is piling up, delaying assistance to the people who have a genuine and desperate need for assistance.

The paper's reporting also includes no mention about how Walker was working with the current County Emperor Chris Abele (Milwaukee's version of Mitt Romney) to kick out the food pantry and as well as oust the Hunger Task Force, who has committed the double infraction of helping people - especially those who speak a foreign language - in getting services as well as reporting infractions by the state.

In summary, while what the paper does report might be true, it is far from the whole truth.  They are only reporting what fits the corporate agenda and nothing else.  Especially not anything that what they don't want the people to know about.

MJS Editorial Board Contradicts Itself To Push Corporate Agenda

As I just discussed, Milwaukee County Emperor Chris Abele is trying to force through a pig in a poke of a transit deal.  The only winner in this deal would be the profiteers in Texas that would drain Milwaukee County's transit system of all its money without providing the services they had promised.

Unsurprisingly, the editorial board at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel are supporting this malfeasance, even though they admit that the whole thing stinks.

What is remarkable is that they use logic so circular that they come around a full 360 and contradict themselves.

When they argue why the current company, Milwaukee Transport Services, shouldn't have their contract renewed, they offer this:

MV's critics argue that a non-profit model is better for transit service because no profits are taken out of the system; dollars saved through efficiencies can be plowed back into service. Except that's not quite the case now — the County Board has a say in how to use those savings.

Now look at what they offer has proof that MV Transportation should get the contract:

Abele's spokesman said a contract with MV would hold the company to performance standards on things such as management and routes, and there would be an incentive to exceed those standards. Any savings would be put back into service. 

That sounds promising, and supervisors should approach this potential deal with open minds. 

Do these people even think before they regurgitate Abele's talking points?!  How in the world would it be that the County Board could interfere with any savings from MTS but not MVT?  Things would have to be the same for either company, unless Abele is planning on trying to slip a special clause in their contract.  \

More likely, Abele is once again lying to try to get his way and the corporate media is gobbling it up and spreading it around like gospel truth.

Is it really any wonder that their circulation is dropping, especially when the want to charge $190 per year for this crap?

The Walker Agenda Is Still Working! Part CXCIV

Scott Walker has had help from the corporate media to push his agenda from the get go.  Sometimes that help is a little more direct than others.

Gannett announced that they were laying off 31 employees from their papers around the state.  One of the biggest blows is the editorial cartoonist, Joe Heller:

A new round of job cuts by the Gannett Co. Inc. includes 31 layoffs at newspapers in Wisconsin, the unofficial Gannett Blog is reporting.

Nine positions are being eliminated at The Post-Crescent in Appleton and seven at the Green Bay Press-Gazette. Among those cut was longtime Press-Gazette editorial cartoonist Joe Heller, sources said.

The layoffs include both journalists and non-newsroom employees.

This isn't just a blow for the 31 people losing their jobs or to the economy. It also means that the voice of truth gets a little quieter as the corporate media continues to tighten down on those who would report the truth, much less oppose their scheming.

It should also be noted that when the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel did the same thing, the quality of their news - and their circulation numbers - dropped like rocks.

The Walker Agenda Is Still Working! Part CXC

It's funny how Scott Walker and the corporate media have such selective memories and tunnel vision in certain areas, such as ratings:

But the new 2013 CNBC ranking which came out last week showing Wisconsin falling back to No. 22 was scarcely mentioned in state media.

There was no press release from Walker’s office, nothing from Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, although the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation did issue a statement noting the state stayed in the top 25.

Of course, most observers take these rankings with a large grain of salt. The scorecards exist mainly to generate some free publicity for the group releasing the report. When the rankings are good, they also provide a nice sound bite for an publicity-hungry Governor or Mayor.

But depending on who is doing the survey, business climate scorecards are usually heavily weighted toward cost of doing business while ignoring other factors, like how much people make or whether they get any benefits with their job.

For example, CEO Magazine has moved Wisconsin from 43rd to 17th over the past two years — a ranking widely touted by Walker. That survey is not based on any actual data — solely on written responses from corporate executives based on their own perceptions, i.e., how much state income tax will I have to pay.

Conservative Forbes magazine has its own business scorecard often cited by the media and elected officials. Walker never mentions that survey, however, since it shows Wisconsin at No. 42.

My father had a plaque on the wall of his den that said "When I did ill, I heard it ever. When I did well, I heard it never."

In Walker's den, besides life-sized posters of the Koch Brothers, Walker would have one that said "When I did ill, we ignored it. When I did well, well, that never happened so we lied about it."

The Penokee Pinkertons

Through the last 150 years of our country's history, some of the worst examples of mercenary violence and mayhem involved the jackboots of the Pinkerton Government Services.  Their "services" ranged from private security guards to private military work.  Their specialty was union busting and intimidating the public.

Over the years, these groups have sadly flourished, with two of the most notorious examples being Blackwater and Wachkenhut (one of Scott Walker's favorites!).

Now we can add the name of Bulletproof Securities of Arizona to that list of shame.

These are the mercenaries that the Florida mining company, Gogebic Taconite, has hired to protect their investment in the mining privileges of the pristine Northwoods area of the Pekonee Hills.

The have recently been seen haunting the woods of Iron County, running around like some wayward members of the Posse Comitatus, intimidating people who even happen to look at them the wrong way.

Besides the obvious harm that these thugs will do to the tourism business - I don't remember the threat of armed jackboots being in the Zucker commercial - there are two other major problems.

First of all, the land that the Penokee Pinkertons are protecting from the public is public land. Apparently the mining company presumed that when they bought the Teapublicans that passed their bill, they got the land included in the sale.

The other issue is that Bulletproof Services might be here illegally.  To do the kind of work that they are doing, they need to hold  Wisconsin licenses and permits first.  I have seen nothing to indicate that this has yet been looked into.

I would add to this that since this is public land, and thus accessible to the public, the gang of thugs needs to go through background checks.  I mean, the type of people these groups hire are in no way considered the most reputable.

This has, as the gentle reader might have suspected, created quite a stir, but not with just the citizenry, but with elected officials as well.  Senator Bob Jauch and Representative Janet Bewley issued a joint press release which was very measured in tone while very firm in meaning:

State Senator Bob Jauch (D-Poplar) and Representative Janet Bewley (D-Ashland) sent a letter to Gogebic Taconite President Bill Williams today calling on him to immediately remove the heavily armed masked commando security unit recently hired to protect the company’s property in the Penokee Hills.

The legislators called the images of the armed guards horrifying and the action by the company to hire this high security Arizona firm appalling. They added that “these kinds of security forces
are common in third world counties but they don’t belong in Northern Wisconsin.”

Jauch and Bewley acknowledged the company’s right to protect their property, but called the decision to hire this new security firm nothing more than an effort to intimidate citizens. “No one
in their right mind can justify the excessive force. These individuals are not deputized, they can’t arrest anyone. What they can do is unjustifiably scare people, and that appears to be your
intention.”

The Northern Lawmakers reminded the company that they do not own the Penokee Hills and urged them to make sure their security detail recognized and reflected that fact.

With only one incident reported at the site in over a month, the lawmakers questioned why the company decided to take such a “confrontational and incendiary step that will clearly do more to
intimidate local citizens and increase local tensions than it will to make you, your staff, or your equipment any safer.”

Jauch and Bewley added that reversing their decision could help improve the company’s relationship with the community. “By rescinding this very misguided decision, you can send a message to Northern Wisconsin citizens that despite the heated rhetoric coming from the company over the last several weeks, you are interested in working with your new neighbors and willing to cooperate rather than relying on intimidation and threats.”

There are two things about this whole affair that are conspicuous by their absence.

One is any reaction from the Teabublicans.

Scott Walker, Robin Vos and Alberta Darling are all publicity hounds. They cannot get enough time in front of the cameras. If they go more than a day or two without being the center of attention, I don't think that they would survive.

Yet on this issue, there is nary a peep from the lot of them.

The other thing missing is any indication that the mainstream media has even bothered to attempt to contact them, much less ask them any questions.  The closest I've seen is Wisconsin State Journal mentioning that it was the Teapublicans who rammed this bill through.

With the corporate media, the corporate-controlled Teapublican legislature and all the other signs of organized greed, is it any wonder why they tried to take the unions out first?

WTMJ-TV Thinks They Are Judge, Jury And Executioner

It's not just the Teapublicans and their corporate sponsors that have us involved in races to the bottom.  Now we see that the corporate media is likewise in their own race to the bottom.  First it was Fox 6's Mike Lowe running a sound bite talk show instead of, y'know, reporting the news.

TMJ4 wasn't about to be outdone in sinking to the bottom.

They are now running people's mugshots, whether they've even been charged or convicted in what is obviously an attempt at public shaming, ridiculing and dehumanizing the arrested people:

I highly doubt that they meant this as real news or to be complementary.

Adding to this is their little caption on each page:

Who is committing the crime in your neighborhood? Tune in to Wisconsin Tonight weekdays at 6:30 p.m. to see.

What they are doing is taking it upon themselves to be judge, jury and executioner in the sense that they have decided that these people need public shaming, just as they did with sandwich boards a couple of decades ago or stockades a couple of centuries ago.

The big problem with that - besides the fact they have no right to inflict punishment, especially on people not convicted of a crime - is that results may vary.

Case in point is from this article pointing out that shaming is not really an optimal solution:

Today, public shaming exercises haphazardly mix the real world with virtual reality. Judge Pinkey Carr sentences you to three hours of public sign-holding, but it’s impossible to predict how many photos and videos the news media and random passersby may produce. Nor can you predict how much notice this imagery will attract. Maybe it will hit the Web but die with little fanfare. Maybe it will become a viral sensation.

Given that the whole point of public humiliation is to turn attention into punishment, an audience of one million is a more severe punishment than an audience of one thousand. What this means, effectively, is that when a judge orders a person to stand with a sign, or even when a police station publishes the mug shot of a prostitution client, they don’t really know what degree of punishment they’re sanctioning. The reason that one photograph goes viral and another does not often has nothing to do with the crime being punished, but rather on what the person being punished looks like, or what kind of news day it is, or which particularly influential blogger or tweeter decides to note the case.

Judges have the power to create their own unique sentences. And courts have ruled that sentences involving public shaming are constitutional as long as they aspire to some other goal, such as deterrence or retribution.

But equal application of the law is a crucial element of our justice system. It’s one of the reasons we have sentencing guidelines. And quirky punishments designed to go viral don’t just fail to meet this standard of the law; they actively subvert it. Their primary goal is to court publicity, and that publicity can’t be accurately anticipated or controlled.

Public shaming may make for good YouTube content. And perhaps it can help end the scourge of restaurant reservation non-compliance. (No studies have been conducted yet measuring its efficacy in this regard.) In the end, though, it’s a tool best left to furious maître d’s and frustrated pet-owners. The allegedly impartial men and women who oversee our courtroom aren’t tasked with meting out novelty and entertainment. They’re tasked with meting out justice, and justice works best when it’s delivered in uniform, predictable fashion.

To which I would add that there is an awful lot of vigilantism out there these days. It would not be a great leap for some kook to see one of the people pictured, or someone resembling them in the lunatic's eye, and then catastrophe occurs.

Don't hold your breath for them to stop this anytime soon.  All of the subsidiaries of Journal Communications have even given up their pretenses of being impartial deliverers of the news.  They have embraced their inner propagandist and have let it blossom for the world to see.

Even as we go about claiming our state from the likes of Scott Walker, Robin Vos, Chris Abele and the other corporately controlled petty tyrants, we are going to reclaim the media from the corporately controlled propaganda machines that can no longer even show respect for people.

In the meantime, I would remind these propagandists and hate-mongers to remember that but for the grace of God, go they.