An Open Letter To Senator Chris Larson

Dear Chris,

I purposely waited a few days before writing this.  I wanted to give time for the sharpness of the disappointment from Tuesday's election to wear off.  More importantly, I wanted to give you the time and the privacy to say goodbye and mourn for the loss of your cherished grandmother.  I know all too well that kind of pain.

The purpose of this letter is to say "Thank You!"  I want to thank you for doing what you did.  You knew that you were the David going up against Goliath, running a shoestring-budgeted, grassroots campaign against all of the millions of dollars that your opponent had access to through his daddy's checkbook.  You did what many others would have been too afraid to even contemplate, much less actually attempt.

Despite the result not being what you, I or many, many other Milwaukeeans wanted, you should keep your head up with pride.  You had more support and generated more enthusiasm than any candidate in Milwaukee had done as long as I can remember.  Not only that, you, like the marathon runner you are, kept a steady pace and never faltered from running a positive campaign full of solid and doable ideas to resolve the multitude of worsening problems facing Milwaukee County.

Have no doubt that you were the best man for the job and were widely supported throughout the county.  That was evidenced in the primary where you outright beat your opponent, even though many people didn't recognize your name.  (After Act 10, I don't understand that at all, but there it is.)

Your opponent knew that as well.  Why else would he spend over $5 million just to drag your good name through the mud and throw every imaginable lie - regardless of how ridiculous - out there to see if anything stuck.  I still shake my head in befuddlement that your opponent thought it would be a good idea to try to compare you to his mentor, Scott Walker.

Likewise, no one believes you are a racist.  We all know that the sellout senator, Lena Taylor, got her feelings hurt when you removed her from the Joint Finance Committee, not because she was black, but because she continuously sold out Milwaukee by gleefully going along with Abele and their Republican friends in ruining our community.  It is indicative of how desperate your opponent was when he arranged for his staffer, Michelle Bryant, and Taylor to spend all day Monday and Tuesday trying to besmirch you on WNOPE, er, WNOV.

The simple fact that you were endorsed by people such as Congresswoman Gwen Moore, the Honorable Vel Phillips, State Senator Nikiya Harris and State Representatives David Bowen, LaTonya Johnson and Mandella Barnes is proof enough of the respect you have from and for the African-American community.

No, my friend, you did not really lose the election as much as your opponent used his daddy's checkbook to buy it.  And even then, I don't know that he would have won then if it wasn't the sudden surge by the Republicans to get to the polls because they didn't like Donald Trump.  If their leading presidential candidate had been someone they liked and had a comfortable lead, they wouldn't have turned out nearly in the numbers they did and your opponent would have gone down in defeat, like he did in the primary.

In closing, on behalf of my wife and myself, as well as my union brothers and sisters and most of Milwaukee, thank you again to do what so many others were afraid to try.  You did well and I am proud to have supported you.

Say hi to Jessica and the kids for me.

In warm regards,

Chris "capper" Liebenthal

PS: I still have your yard sign.  If you don't mind, I'd like to hang on to it in hopes that I can proudly plant it in a prominent spot in my yard in 2020.

Gratitude

Thank You, Gentle Readers

I just need to take a moment from my usual programming to say Thank You to all my readers.  Because of you,  my post about the gerrymandering scandal was the most clicked post in the entire nation, according to LeftyBlogs.com:

I truly do appreciate your support and trust in me.

And at the risk of sounding like an political ad, I would just like to point out that the tip jar (located in the sidebar) is always open.

The fewer other jobs I have to do, the more I can do for #wiunion and to help win our state back.

Again, thank you for reading Cog Dis.

Thank You, Veterans!

No matter in what capacity they served, America's finest deserves our thanks, today and everyday.

Thank You For Your Support

As many of you already know, I am the Wisconsin Editor for BlogNetNews.com. The job is really nothing big, simply adding new political blogs as I come across them and removing the dead ones.

One of the big draws for BNN is their influence index. The index is supposed to be based on some mysterious algorithm that takes into account a variety of things, that as far as I can figure out, include the number of posts on a site, the number of hits, the number of comments, the number of links to and from the site, how many "Rs" are in the month, if your check to David Mastio bounced, and if you are getting the recommended daily allowance of Vitamin B-6.

The index, in my humble opinion, is more of a point of interest rather than something to be taken to seriously. It is of questionable accuracy and at best could serve like a bellwether of how one is doing. An analogy of it would be trying to figure out the weather in Fond du Lac based on the weather report in Milwaukee.

All that said, I was pleasantly surprised when I found out that Cognitive Dissidence had somehow slipped into the number one spot in the index:



Trust me when I say that I am sure Mr. Mastio has been having his crack tech people working on it to make sure this doesn't happen again. :)

But just in case it is genuine, I must say a most heartfelt thank you to you, gentle readers. After all, without you, I would be just talking to myself. What makes me even more humbled is when I look at the list of people that signed up to be Friends of the Realm. I've only met six of those people, and some I had to beg and guilt trip into joining. The far majority are people that I've never met and don't know, yet they were kind enough to be willing to be my friends. Publicly even. Everyday, that astonishes me and gives me the energy to carry on.

Equally humbling are the people that I know that come to this site on at least a somewhat semi regular basis. Some because they often agree, some because they often disagree. But the ones that disagree are just as valuable as my friends, if not more so, since that is where genuine dialogue and conversation and progress comes from. And that is what my humble site is all about. To promote the betterment of the world, or at least our little corner of it, through intelligent discourse and hopefully mutual understanding.

Whatever motivates you to come here, whether it is to read and agree with my sage words, to read and get upset when I challenge your worldview, or to see cute pictures of caffeine-addicted squirrels (one of the more common google searches of late), thank you. And keep coming back. I enjoy the company.