Purple Vindication!

By Jeff Simpson

It has been an interesting week, first I posted this one Purple Wisconsin. 

Jim Bender is the President of the poorly named "school choice" Wisconsin.  Mr. Bender is also the face of the "For-Profit" School movement.   While Scott Jensen actually calls the shots, Jensen's tarred history makes it impossible for him to be the face of anything.   

Mr. Bender has decided to make the public schools, and public money continue to work for him.  Mr, Bender is paid a King's ransom to take as much Wisconsin taxpayer public education dollars as he can get his hands on, and funnel to the private/voucher schools.  A parasite is someone that exists to take from another. 

Mr.  Bender however, has reached a new low.   He wants to know everything about YOUR children.  

School choice advocates have requested the names, addresses, phone numbers and grade levels of every student enrolled in 30 different public school districts, gearing up for a marketing campaign should lawmakers lift the enrollment cap on Wisconsin's statewide voucher program.

Directory information includes information such as students' names, addresses, telephone numbers, date and place of birth, major field of study, height, weight, athletic team participation, awards achieved and schools attended.

The information is key to rounding out important school items such as yearbooks, playbills, sports rosters, announcements to the media about student accomplishments and contact lists that help families communicate with each other.

Being exposed to the light is not something that plays particularly well, it led to incredible faux outrage by Mr. Bender, a hissy fit a 12 year old could be proud of by Charley Sykes and Jimmy Wigderson spinning it in an incomprehensible garble of words that we have come to expect from him.     

The Faux outrage was strong in these ones.  

However, Simpson's post at Purple Wisconsin was enough to send Bender on a bender.  Bender went whining and crying to Ernst-Ulrich Franzen, a member of the paper's editorial board, complaining that Simpson compared him to a pedophile.  Even though Simpson went to great pains to do just the opposite, Franzen jumped on the chance to stifle the truth and took down the blog site.

On Monday, squawk show host and adulterer Charlie Sykes went on a rampage against Simpson.  With the sound of his spittle hitting the microphone, Sykes said that Simpson lived in a "fever swamp" and called him "demented," "sick," and "a liar."

Sykes went on to say how MJS was wrong for ever giving Simpson their format to use and that he should be banned from the site.

 Then this happened:

 Green Bay, Wisconsin, February 18, 2015 - School Choice Wisconsin has revised its original open records request made on February 9, 2015 to the Green Bay Area Public School District for student directory data in order to address concerns that were raised by parents, legislators(progressive bloggers) and the Green Bay Area Public School District.

If Mr. Bender can release a press statement, so can I:

This doesnt happen without public pressure.  I am proud that I had a hand in this,even if it meant that Jim Bender & Wisconsin School choice got me kicked off of JSOnline, because Charles Sykes and Jimmy Wigderson had a hissy fit.
I will stand up for the kids every single time. It is unfortunate that standing up for the privacy rights of our children, and against the privatizing of our public education, is something that comes with consequences. EVERY word I wrote was the truth, and the truth was too much for them.

Make sure and ask David D. Haynes, who in our media will now stand for the truth and the kids, regardless of the consequences. It sure isnt Christian Schneider or Rick Esenberg .

I get that Purple Wisconsin wants to promote a nicer agenda, and my passion comes through too strong at times, but I think they should make truth and facts equal to niceties.

Thanks to Cognitive Dissidence & Chris Capper Liebenthal and John 'Sly' Sylvester for allowing me to have a forum to get the real truth out there!

Now lets help Dave Hansen and Eric Genrich pass legislation to stop this from happening in the future.

Vindication and Onward!

 So thanks to Charley Sykes and Jim Wigderson also for helping put the spotlight on the despicable acts School Choice WI was attempting to get away with.  If this ever happens in your district in the future, let us know and here is Mr. Bender's contact information:

No media interviews will be granted by GBAPS or School Choice Wisconsin. Clarifying questions should be directed to GBAPS Director of Communications Lori Blakeslee at 920-448-2025 or School Choice Wisconsin President Jim Bender at 414.319.9160.

MJS Continues To Mislead Readers

Here we go again.

Ernst-Ulrich Franzen, a member of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's propagandists editorial board members has come out in favor of hamstringing the Milwaukee County Board. I know, what a surprise that the corporate media supports the plutocratic takeover of Milwaukee County, eh?

In his fantasy piece, Franzen pulls out all of the usual talking points with complete disregard to whether they are even accurate, much less honest.

After the lead in to the story and the unsurprising anti-Milwaukee stance, Franzen tries - and miserably fails - to justify his hateful stance:

The proposal to reduce the size of the board and its budget was blasted as a distraction by Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele, and he's probably right. The reality is that downsizing the board - which we have supported - without reducing pay leaves supervisors with plenty of time to micromanage county operations as they do currently. Paying them on the basis of a part-time job - as is the case in every other county in Wisconsin - is the way to go. They still can exercise the appropriate check on the administration.

As I and many other people have repeatedly pointed out, Milwaukee County supervisors are paid at the same rate that the supervisors are paid - about a dollar per constituent. Furthermore, Milwaukee County has so much more than any other county that such a comparison is ridiculous. No other county even close to a million people, nor all of the amenities that Milwaukee County has. Such things as world class museums, a correctional facility outside of the county jail, a mental health complex, a transit and paratransit system of our caliber, an international airport and over a hundred parks. One also won't be able to find another county in the state with supervisory districts equivalent to a state representative's.

When the salaries of Milwaukee County Board supervisors were compared to other counties of a similar size, it was found that Milwaukee County supervisors were making about $20,000 a year less than the others.

The facts show that we are getting one helluva bargain with the county board just as it is.

As for Franzen's blatantly ludicrous notion that supervisors are "micromanaging" the county departments, I would point out what Kieth Crum, Treasurer for the Milwaukee Transit Riders Union, eloquently pointed out:

This is perhaps the most outrageous assertion made by the largely conservative, big business backers of downsizing. It’s also flatly untrue. On the contrary, the board has acted on its responsibility to look out for the best interests of Milwaukee County residents, even when that has meant going against the interests of the wealthy corporate elite that run Milwaukee. This includes standing up to the county executive when he proposes unsound ideas. The county board has a history of doing just that; making common sense budget adjustments and saving vital public services from the chopping block in the process.

Franzen isn't done though. He continued with his nonsense:

If the board is to be downsized, we'd favor a smaller number - nine strikes us as about right. Furthermore, cutting the budget by 40% also probably doesn't go far enough: The board currently has far more staffers than it needs.

So Franzen is saying that nine strikes him as about right. As I pointed out when Sheldon Lubar uttered the same inanity:

His idea of a perfect world is one where the Voter Fairness Act does not apply. His utopia is where minorities and poor people don't have equal or effective representation in government. After all, why should the pissant common person be allowed to have representation when it only serves to get in the way of their superiors, like Lubar.

Apparently Franzen is stricken with the same affliction where he thinks that minorities - or most people in general - deserve representative government. He'd rather see a government that only represents the plutocrats, the corporations and other special interests.

As for his claim that the board has "far more staffers than it needs," well, I have no clue what he is basing that on. I suspect he has no clue either.

But I do know that if he had his way, there would be no analysts to allow the board to make informed decisions. There would also be no clerks to record meetings or votes, so there would be no way to know if one's supervisor is representing them well or not.

Perhaps that is what Chris Abele and people like Franzen want. They saw two years ago that when people know the facts and know how they're getting screwed over, they get pretty mad. It's better to keep the people in the dark, including the supervisors, so they can go on with their profiteering in peace.

To sum it all up, I again point the gentle reader to Crum, who wrote:

With the crises that Milwaukee County is facing right now, including the potential for a 30% cut to transit, decrepit parks, unemployment, poverty, homelessness and racial inequality, what we need from state level is a fair shake financially not attacks on our ability to govern ourselves. As Milwaukee County residents and bus riders, we believe that it’s time for the state government to take its hands off our county board and collaborate to help us start improving Milwaukee for everyone before it’s too late.

Indeed.

I would add only that Franzen is as pitiful as his boss, David Haynes, who also has trouble being honest with the readers. I'd question why anyone would buy that paper anymore, but that's like asking why anyone watches Fox News.

Life is much easier for some when they live in an echo chamber that only supports their bigotry and hatred rather than be a member of society.

Will Ernst-Ulrich Franzen Apologize To Supervisor John Weishan?

A couple of years ago, Supervisor John Weishan, in light of Darlene Wink's illegal activity, filed an Open Records Request against Scott Walker's office.  After being grossly overcharged, all Weishan got was a few lousy sheets of paper, which we now see were grossly in violation of the law regarding ORRs.

At the time, Ernst-Ulrich Franzen, part of the distinctly conservative editorial board at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel agreed that Weishan was overcharged and underserved, but then added this snide comment:

Weishan should remember that not every fishing trip pays off.

Recent events, that Franzen's paper has documented surprisingly well, goes to show that the record given to Weishan isn't accurate at all, nor is it complete.

Methinks that Franzen owes Weishan an apology for that off-hand and off-target comment.

Then he can apologize to the paper's readers, if they have any left, for carrying water for the corrupt Walker.