Testimony

By Jeff Simpson

I recently went to the Capitol to testify against the latest Republican attempt to eliminate local control and control our lives via #ALEC.

This was my first time ever testifying at the Capitol and after some reflection, I have a few thoughts about it.

The committee I testified in front of was the Assembly Committee on Education. The committee consist of:

Representative Thiesfeldt (Chair)

Representative Kitchens (Vice-Chair)

Representative Jagler

Representative Knudson

Representative Rodriguez

Representative R. Brooks

Representative Horlacher

Representative Murphy

Representative Quinn

Representative Hutton

Representative Duchow

Representative Pope

Representative Sinicki

Representative Genrich

Representative Barnes

Representative Considine

The Bill I testified against was AB481:

Relating to: limitations on borrowing by school districts and the use by school districts of resolutions and referenda to authorize bonding for capital projects or increase revenue limits and scheduling of school district referendums to exceed revenue limits.

My thoughts:

1.  By the time I arrived(I was the last to testify) many in the committee were not even there.  The ones who were there were perpetually leaving and coming back, in mid speaker, and talking amongst themselves.  

It seems to me that it defeats the purpose of having "experts" and the public take time out pf their day to testify on a bill, when the committee hearing your testimony is not really interested.    I wonder if they would get up and leave during an ALEC convention or if Scott Jensen was in their office, giving them their to do lists? 

I also find it ironic on a bill where they are claiming to protect the taxpayers, they are not really interested in hearing from taxpayers.   

2.  In the interest of full disclosure, Rep. Sinicki sent me a message apologizing for missing my testimony and the reason why.   While I do not think any rep owes me a personal apology or excuse(although I did appreciate it), I do think that every member of the committee should have a public notice of WHY they are not there during testimony of a bill.   They owe the State of Wisconsin the ability to listen to every aspect of an important bill like this before blindly passing/voting down on partisan lines.  

3.  When I arrived, a staffer had arrived before me handing Rep. Jagler a bag from Subway with a 6nch sandwich and chips.   While it is nice that he uses his taxpayer paid staff to serve him lunch,  what was even more telling was the profit in that sub sandwich.   

A subway 6" value meal is $6.00 at most Subway's.   From John Jagler's home town of Watertown, WI to the State Capitol is 27 miles, which at 20 MPG is approximately a gallon and a half of gas (Approximately $3.00 in gas).    For those scoring at home that is $9.00 and change.

Rep. Jagler after the last election was part of the Assembly that voted themselves a 133% increase in daily pay.   

The Assembly is planning to increase the amount members can collect for overnight stays in Madison from $88 to $138.
It would be the first such increase since 2001, when an Assembly committee set the rate for what is known as a per Diem at $88 for lawmakers outside Dane County and $44 for Dane County lawmakers.
Per Diem's are a fixed amount meant to cover food and lodging costs while lawmakers are in Madison doing state business.

That is a profit of $128  Wisconsin taxpayer dollars to sit and occasionally listen to the taxpayers and citizens of WI give their opinions on major bills.  No wonder they needed a raise, a $78 daily profit just was not cutting it.

3.   I also find it ironic that a group of legislators who continually stick bad policy items in the budget(despite promising they would never do that), now are trying to make it illegal that school spending referendums are allowed to be voted on by the public.  

4.   Has anyone ever changed their mind based on public testimony by someone who was not a major campaign donor?

5.  In my time there. listening to people testify and listening to everyone who signed up for/or against the bill and it was overwhelmingly against.  There was only one person who registered FOR the bill and he did not testify.   It was Eric Bott.  

What were some of your experiences testifying?

Irony Overdose

By Jeff Simpson

On the eve of the next Republican debate, GOP frontrunner and future Republican Presidential Nominee Donald Trump held a rally where there were some Black Lives Matter protesters.

This one was a little different though, because while we are used to the GOP thugs in the audience assaulting protesters, they now feel empowered to take it even further yelling “Light that motherf*cker on fire!” and  “Sieg heil!”

Classy with a capital K !

Since everyone is blindly chasing Trumo we will see if tonights debate will be aired in its original German.

Our friends on the right were so outraged by this....o wait they were not outraged by this at all, they had something else to be "faux outraged" at.

A stupid retweet by Senator Dave Hanson.

It was a stupid tweet and an even dumber retweet and Right Wisconsin, who must pay someone to follow Democrats twitter accounts, was all over it.

While they were "outraged", I have to give them some credit, they blacked out the word that offended them in their story.

However Rep. John Jagler, who has a child with Downs Syndrome, was beside himself with anger.  Jagler was so mad and disgusted with the word used, that he personally tweeted it out twice(which was loved and retweeted by countless others on the right like Eric Bott, John Nygren and Charley Sykes).

You just can not make this stuff up!  Here is one of the actual tweets.

 Eric Bott Retweeted

John Jagler ‏@JohnJagler  2h2 hours ago

John Jagler Retweeted Daniel Miller

It is shameful that anyone, let alone a state senator would retweet this. @SenatorDaveHans this is disgraceful

John Jagler added,

Daniel Miller @dmiller0722

Cause @ScottWalker is a fucktard with no morals or common sense. He & his cronies have destroyed Wisconsin. Nice job https://twitter.com/BadgerStew/status/675393689531899904 …

For my friends on the right who lack an irony gene, let me explain.

It is shameful that anyone, let alone a state senator would retweet this - says the Representative who is actually retweeting this!

As someone who is offended by that word, I call on Rep. Jagler, Sen. Nygren, Charley Sykes, Eric Bott, Nathan Schacht, and whoever else tweeted that out to score political points to apologize!!

That kind of word does not belong in our political discourse, we need to get back to the civil days when Scott Walker compared protesters to ISIS and Christian Schneider called Senator Feingold worse than a child rapist(if you are scoring at home, neither time was there an apology or a word of caution from our friends on teh right). .

Eric Bott Bears False Witness

By Jeff Simpson 

Americans for Prosperity(AFP), the Koch Founded dark money haven and far right wing "think" tank was in my mailbox lately and the email was interesting to say the least.

Apparently their mission is:

Our Mission
Our mission is to mobilize citizens to advocate for policies that cut red tape and increase opportunity, put the brakes on government overspending, and get the economy working for hard workers– not special interests.

Of course, that is a bit like Colonel Sanders wanting to make sure there is room for Beef and Pork in the fast food industry.   But I digress, the interesting folks, led by Scott Fitzgerald protege and fomer lobbyist Eric Bott, to lead the State of Wisconsin Sect of the national AFP cult, sent out this email.

Jeffrey,
Did you know that secret elections in Wisconsin decide where millions of taxpayer dollars are spent? 
Big-government liberals are holding referenda  that decide millions of dollars in new spending, in off-year elections, hoping you won't be paying attention. 
Let's help stop this.   Will you send a letter to your legislators and tell them elections are fairer when everyone has the chance to participate. Let's bring referenda back into the light and move them to general elections when more people vote.For freedom,

Oy Vey.  As Inigo Montoya would say about the term "secret" elections:

se·cret

ˈsēkrit/

adjective

1. 1.

   not known or seen or not meant to be known or seen by others.

   "how did you guess I had a secret plan?"

   synonyms:

   confidential, top secret, classified, undisclosed, unknown, private,under wraps; More

noun

1.

something that is kept or meant to be kept unknown or unseen by others.

"a state secret"

synonyms:

confidential matter, confidence, private affair; skeleton in the closet "he just can't keep a secret"

There are tw 

There are two kinds of elections in Wisconsin, the non partisan held the first Tuesday of every April and the partisan, held the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.    

From the League of Women Voters website:

ELECTION DAYS
Primary Elections are held to nominate candidates to be voted on in the general or spring election.
Spring Primary:  Third Tuesday in February. In presidential election years, presidential preference primaries are also held at this time.
Fall Primary:  Second Tuesday in August.
Spring Election:  First Tuesday in April to elect judicial and nonpartisan municipal, county and education officials.
General Election:  Even-numbered years on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November to elect U.S. Senators, Representatives to Congress, President and Vice-President, and state and county partisan officers.
Special Elections:  Held to fill vacancies or for other designated purposes.

Now that we have established that the Spring elections are NOT "secret elections", they happen every single year, in every single municipality in Wisconsin, we know that Mr. Bott is a bearer of false witness(for those scoring at home, that is breaking the 9th commandment).  

Why would Mr. Bott, outright lie?  The same reason they always do.  Money.  

The Republicans, have spent four years decimating public education budgets and telling us that if schools want to spend more money, go to referendum and have the taxpayers approve it.  That way the "taxpayers have control".  The problem is schools, out of necessity, were doing just that and passing them at a 77% rate.   

This flabbergasted the anti-intellectual republicans who are now doing all they know how to do.  Legislate their troubles away.   They are now coming up with an ALEC inspired referendum "reform".  

Republican state lawmakers are seeking to restrict when and how local school districts can raise money from their local taxpayers at a time when the state is offering few new dollars for public schools.
But critics say the measures are another example of GOP lawmakers making it harder for public schools to pay the rising costs of educating the state’s 870,000 public school students and could hurt school boards’ ability to ensure cash flow.
The bills come during an uptick in referendums — 206 in 2014, the most in at least 10 years, state records show — and the rate at which they pass. One in four in recent years were held outside of the traditional spring or fall elections, according to the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance.
In April, 76 percent of the referendums to exceed revenue limits passed. That compares to a typical rate of about 50 percent in years prior. This represents a changing perception of the state’s support of public schools, said Todd Berry, president of the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance.
“This reflects a shift in public opinion due, I think, to tighter state-imposed restraint on aids and revenue limits in recent years,” Berry said. “There is one instance above all when locals will vote to tax themselves: a fear that they might lose their community’s or neighborhood’s school.”

Of course the right wing echo chamber was all over that:   

The thing about the right wing echo chamber, in the era of Trump, is that they need to be even more outrageous and full of crap before anyone pays attention.  

Hence Mr, Bott's ridiculous claim that a spring election is a "secret" election.    No one is kept from voting(except veterans and college students thanks to the Republican voter ID bill), in the spring election.  

Something to take into account next time AFP puts an op-ed in the paper, emails you their BS or is a guest on a local political show.  

They not only lie, but that have no idea how the Government or our democracy works.