Nation’s Fyre Festival?

By Steve Caer

When news broke early in 2019 that the Democratic National Committee had shortlisted Milwaukee as a possible site for its 2020 national convention, many wondered aloud if the city had enough hotel rooms to accommodate the expected 50,000 convention attendees. WDJT Milwaukee reporter Mark McPherson noted at the time that Milwaukee has 18,000 hotel rooms, compared to Miami’s 57,000 and Houston’s 91,000, the other two cities that were still under consideration. Hospitality Marketers International President Greg Hanis told McPherson “To be realistic you need more rooms than Milwaukee has “and “I would be scratching my head as far as how they could pull this off.”  In spite of these concerns the DNC announced in March that Milwaukee would host the convention, and a great cheer went up from democrats across Wisconsin.

Now, however, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is reporting that the city’s hotels and restaurants don’t have enough workers to handle the expected DNC convention crowd, making an iffy situation even iffier. With the convention just a little over a year away this seems a bit of a precarious situation. So how did Milwaukee win over the DNC with these kinds of shortages almost certainly known beforehand?

As we’ve reported previously, it appears the inept, though well compensated, folks at Nation Consulting, the ones who brought us State Supreme Court Judge Brian Hagedorn, have played a central role. Over-selling and under-delivering seems to be standard operating procedure over at Nation HQ, so perhaps it’s no surprise it’ll be a race to the finish to see if the convention comes off as planned.

All of this is somewhat ominously reminiscent of the recent Fyre Festival debacle that resulted in a pair of documentary films, Fyre Fraud on Hulu and Netflix’s Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened. The Fyre Festival was primarily the brainchild of bombastic blowhard and consummate bullshitter Billy McFarland ( who bears a slight resemblance to Nation’s Sachin Chheda ).

McFarland lured thousands of unsuspecting fest-goers to a remote island in the Bahamas with promises of a world class music fest replete with top flight accommodations and gourmet chow. Upon arriving at the island, however, attendees abruptly found themselves directed to FEMA tents and cold cheese sandwiches, while a group of local musicians played for a few hours, the only music played during the entire festival. Predictably, lawsuits and criminal charges soon followed and McFarland is currently doing time in Otisville federal prison in upstate New York, the same joint that houses Trump’s former “ fixer “ Michael Cohen.

 We certainly hope the DNC  convention in Milwaukee is a success and that attendees have a good time during their stay here, and we further hope that the event inspires a blue wave that hands Wisconsin to the eventual Democratic nominee in the 2020 November election. But if you’re coming in from out of state, or even out of town, it couldn’t hurt to pack a sleeping bag and a loaf of bread. We have no doubt Nation will supply the cheese.

Dallet Will NOT Be On My Ballot

By Jeff Simpson

This Tuesday is Spring Primary election day. 

In most places, the only race on the ballot will be for the Wisconsin Supreme Court.  There are three names on the Ballot and two will advance. 

The first name is Michael Screnock.  The twice arrested Screnock is running on a platform of being completely impartial, yet has been endorsed by the NRA(the day before the latest school massacre), Scott Walker and (far) Right Wisconsin.   So we know he has no intention of actually being impartial.   

The next name on the Ballot is Rebecca Dallet, who is running on the same platform of impartiality.   She also has as much impartiality credit as Screnock.   Dallet has endorsed and been endorsed(and funded) by Chief Justice Pat Roggensack who is about as hyper partisan as there is sitting on a Court in America. 

Dallet had her crew out attacking, but strangely, the only attacks she has levied have been against her opponent Tim Burns(more info on Mr. Burns shortly).   She has had very little to say about Screnock, apparently not wanting to upset the far right wing of Wisconsin, (IE Roggensack) in case she ends up on the court or against Mr. Burns.   

She has had her crew attack even some not so strong supporters of Tim Burns.    Here are a few examples:

Nation Consulting and high priced consultant Sachin Chheda(who she has paid thousands to):

Sachin K Chheda: Andy O----- yeah, asshole. She gave money in 2014 because she knew that in 2018 Dallet would run against Mike Screnock, who was then Scott Walker’s lawyer, and spend the entire campaign criticizing the Roggensack court. Jesus you people are something else.

Apparently, calling people assholes is a new Consulting strategy that helps bring people together. 

Jessica LoveJoy, employee of a California Consulting firm and Dallet's Campaign Manager responding to my question of why she attacks Tim Burns and not Mike Screnock:

Jessica Lovejoy Jeff Simpson we have absolutely called out Screnock. Are you on our email list? Do you follow the campaign on twitter? 

Re: Burns — it’s funny how a white straight man can spend nine months spewing lies to everyone about a his opponent — a woman candidate — by running negative ads on Facebook, calling her names, manipulating the press, and y’all so easily turn a blind eye... But the minute we put out a FACT proven by Politifact that he’s been misleading voters about his record and legal background you attack our campaign. Interesting how that works.

Apparently straight white males are now unable to have an opinion in politics(although they do vote).   I do agree that straight white males have caused some serious damage to our country (see Ryan, Paul) but so have straight white females and I do not discount all straight white females just because Pat Roggensack and Rebecca Bradley are horrible people. 

I can not bring myself to vote for someone with such poor judgement. 

The third candidate is Tim Burns.

Attorney Tim Burns is a graduate of the University of Missouri-Columbia Law School and is licensed in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Missouri. He is currently a partner at Perkins Coie law firm in Madison, where he specializes in insurance law. Burns also serves on the national board of the American Constitution Society and is former chair of the American Bar Association's committee on Fair and Impartial Courts. To learn more about Tim Burns, visit burnsforwisconsin.com.

I strongly endorse Tim Burns!  

As a progressive, and not a lawyer, I do not want to know what the courts will rule before they even hear the case.  We have that in Wisconsin right now, thanks to the far right extremist that rule the Supreme Court now. 

The Wisgop knows that anything they pass, no matter how many lower courts would rule against them, has an ace in the hole waiting for them at the Wisconsin Supreme Court.   

Tim Burns has let it be known that he has progressive values and will carry them to the court.   To me, that does not mean he will rule for team blue everytime.   Anyone who reads CogDis regularly knows that being a progressive means that you are not on team blue 100% of the time since they are and continually stray from progressive values. 

Tim Burns saying he is a progressive with progressive values, means that he will bring no preconceived notions to the court but that he will look at the law through a lens of compassion, and empathy and neutrality. 

That is something that is sorely missing and we as Wisconsinites, progressives, liberals and independents can add to the Supreme Court in Wisconsin and it starts on Tuesday. 

Please Vote for Tim Burns for Wisconsin Supreme Court!  

 

Milwaukee "Democrats" Are Sabotaging the Blue Wave

By Jeff Simpson 

 As we are on the verge of a blue wave, as we have seen all over the country, and shortly that will start ramping up towards the November election.   

In Wisconsin, before we can even start to concentrate on getting some of the hard care right wing extremists out of office, there is a major obstacle to overcome first.  

Milwaukee Democrats.  

First there is the Supreme Court race, where there are three candidates(Burns, Screnock and Dallet).  Tim Burns proudly wears his progressive values on his sleeve and that does not sit well with the right wing.  It also does not sit well with Dallet, who has decided to spend her time attacking Burns.   

While campaigning throughout the state and at many Democratic events, Dallet, (with a team run by "Democratic" consultant and former Hillary top staffer and also working with Nation Consulting) takes every chance she can to run down the Progressive name and values.   

"He'll do whatever he thinks democracy dictates," she said, "But we as courts are limited." 

Dallet contended that despite Burns' claim of candor, he hasn't fully identified his clients, or how many cases he's handled in Wisconsin courts. She's dubious he would follow the law when it would direct an outcome he doesn't like.

Yes, she is trying to get elected and needs to discredit her opponent, the thing is the opponent she gives a pass to, is a twice arrested hard core right wing Walker apologist.    

Staying in Milwaukee, we see that Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele, has started his own attack on Democrats.   

Abele wrote a check to start a PAC which is poorly called Leadership MKE.   Abele launched his new PAC to attack local leaders and stack the deck with Abele supporters in the spring election.   

 Leadership MKE will focus on numerous elections this Spring, including several Milwaukee County Board campaigns, local mayor races, and potentially some suburban school board and trustee elections.       
The organization’s platform is focused on continuing Milwaukee County’s growth through sustainable investments in social services, including investing in public safety services to make our communities safer, County Parks to ensure a high quality of life for all residents, public transit to connect workers to jobs, and local infrastructure projects to grow and attract new businesses across Milwaukee.  

The reality is that Abele, who has put hundreds of thousands of dollars into this PAC, is using it to target anyone that dares criticize his budget.   

It is incredibly interesting that Chris Abele has to charge people to park in public parks, but has an extra half million to attack the county board, laying around. 

Edit note: At some point the public needs to say no more of politicians spending millions of dollars attacking each other while children starve on the streets. 

As above, who is running this dark money attack on good people? 

Why long time Democratic insiders of course.   

George Aldrich, former chief of staff for Peter Barca, and Chris Abele and head of the Assembly Democratic Campaign Committee(which oversaw the Democratic drubbing in 2016) is executive director.  Andy Suchorski, former Nation employee, who also had a hand in the ADCC drubbing is Abele's and Leadership MKE's political director. 

With so many Democratic insider mercenaries working so hard to taint the Progressive and Liberal name in WI, all for a paycheck, that could be the biggest roadblock to the blue wave that Wisconsin so desperately needs. 

With friends like these, who needs enemies! 

If November does not go well, remember these people!

 

Nation Consulting Shags NARAL

By Jeff Simpson

It was announced recently that in WI 1st district, NARAL has endorsed Randy Bryce .  It is a fine endorsement to the recently fully pro-choice Bryce,  except of course for the massive conflict of interest.

Bryce's local campaign consultant is Sachin Chheda with Nation Consulting.   As we see from his profile:

Sachin is active in nonprofit leadership, recently completing two terms as Chair of the Board of Directors for NARAL Pro-Choice America. He serves as a member of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra Board of Directors, previously served as an officer of the Wisconsin Coalition of Asian Indian Organizations; and is Chairman Emeritus of the Democratic Party of Milwaukee County.

Chheda, fresh off two terms as Chair of the Board, was amazingly able to get his candidate endorsed without so much as an email to Bryce's opponent.  
It sure makes it good for business, when you can guarantee a NARAL endorsement.

Does anyone think that if Cathy had ponied up for Sachin's services that she would have been the one with the endorsement and Randy would have been left out in the cold?  

So much for pro-choice!  It has now become Sachin's choice.

To be clear, Randy is a fine candidate and would make a much better rep than Paul Ryan ever has, but when an organization this visible and this important, they need to make sure they have covered all candidates, and given all candidates a fair shake, before making such an important endorsement.

For those scoring at home, a male political consultant in Milwaukee, uses one of the most important female driven Democratic organizations for his own purposes and pocketbook.  

It really diminishes the organization and their endorsements!

The rest of us in Wisconsin, are collateral damage, to making sure Sachin can use his non profit leadership" to lead people to hiring him and his consulting firm.  

Conflicts of interest are only for the little people!

We wonder why we continually lose elections?