The $200.009.75 Wisconsin Fish Fry

By Jeff Simpson




On the heels of a devastating $250 million dollar cut to the UW system, Scott Walker, working with the Wisconsin Department of Tourism(our tax dollars), the University of Wisconsin Athletic department(our tax dollars), Levy restaurants (winner of the Scott Walker pick a private company winner) and JP Cullen (winner also of the Scott Walker pick a private company winner) have teamed up to build and operate a new food stand, available for people lucky enough to attend an event at the Kohl Center.

The stand, which underwent a $90,000 remodel, is located outside of Section 112 at Gate C and includes a neon sign outlined in small light bulbs. Another $110,000 is being spent on radio, social media and other advertising associated with the venue, said Lisa Marshall, a tourism spokeswoman.

No mention of royalties coming back to the tourism department with food sales, were there RFP's other sites considered or how I can get the WI Department of Tourism to spend $200,000 taxpayer dollars marketing my business.

I am sure the donations to Scott Walker and his friends by Compass Group(Levy Restaurants) and JP Cullen, sure did not hurt.

Even though this "partnership" seems to have caused Scott Walker to through free market principles out the door,and shows that Mr. Walker is a strong supporter of socialism by using the Government to compete against private business, the worst part is WHY we have to spend this kind of money advertising locally.

“It’s really about our brand, and our brand is fun,” said Tourism Secretary Stephanie Klett as she chewed on a deep-fried cheese curd. “In advertising, we can’t forget to advertise to our own folks. Fifty-one percent of our (tourists) are from Wisconsin, so we want to keep them here. It’s important that we advertise in our own state.”

In a state that is ranked the worst state for a black people to live in, that is widely know for slashing education budgets, an inept partisan Supreme Court, one the biggest declining middle classes in the country along with massive layoffs almost daily, lakes that are contaminated and a Governor who thinks building a wall around Canada is a good idea, it is no wonder, we have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get Wisconsinites to stay in Wisconsin.  

At least it beats bringing in B-list stars,and a blow up doll, from an 80's movie that has not been relevant in 25 years to try and reach the younger generation of tourists!

I am sure that the people who head to the Kohl Center to watch the Alaska Nanooks play Hockey V the Wisconsin Badgers, will be swayed by $8.50 pot roast, to spend their hard earned vacation dollars on Lake Namakagon!

It all smells a little fishy to me!  

Don't Call Him Shirley

By Jeff Simpson

We have been here once before, but as the "great spender" once said - "There you go again".

Earlier in the year the Wisconsin Tourism Department gave big money to the Zucker brothers who hail from Wisconsin to produce a tourism ad for Wisconsin.   Since the Zucker's are well known for making spoof films in the 80's, it is only fitting since Scott Walker's version of government is also a spoof from another era.   

While we have made record cuts in public education, the one area that has made out like bandits is the Tourism budget.  The Walkerites raised it from $9.9 million to $12.3 million in Walker's first two years alone!

Walker and Department of Tourism Secretary Stephanie Klett said it's important to increase the tourism budget, even while other departments are seeing cuts, because tourism creates jobs. Tourism is Wisconsin's third-largest industry, drawing $12.3 billion in spending in 2010.

Yes, tourism "creates jobs", unless of course you have no idea what your doing, then it turns into a big waste.  See when looking for someone to give our hard earned money too - the one criteria apparently was they had to be republicans.   So the Zucker's fit the bill!   Now that we found someone who fit the bill, let the silliness begin. 

First off the produced this little fishing video that showed the wold that Wisconsinites are imbeciles:

 Then reality hit and as so often is the case under Walker, the people were leading the way. While we were paying big money in wing nut welfare to the Zucker's to produce "tourism" video's that no one saw, Scott Walker was directing his own video's right in the Capitol that the whole world was able to see

Strike one ....so the Zucker's took another swing at it:

 

 

When trying to persuade people from IL and MN to come visit WI who better to use than a Packer....o wait.  The Viking and Bears fans hate the Packers!   Strike 2!  

Meanwhile back at the ranch, Mike Huebsch was producing and Chief Erwin directing their own WI tourism ad that the world was able to watch:

With two strikes against them and lots of our money in their pockets, the Zucker's tried again.   This time Scott Walker used it as a nice vacation get away (on our tax dollars) to CA to play in Hollywood.   The Governor tweeted this pic today:

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Robert Hayes recreate their Airplane! scene with help of WI natives David and Jerry Zucker and Jim Abrahams to promote tourism in Wisconsin. Nice cheesehead!

Because what shows the true beauty of Wisconsin better than a blow up doll with a cheesehead hat on?  

This from Stephanie Klett our Director of Tourism:



 

On cloud nine! The Wisconsin Department of Tourism just hosted a press conference in Hollywood that is making pop-culture history. We are reuniting two of the stars of the movie Airplane, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Robert Hays (Ted Striker,) with the three writers/producers and directors David Zucker, Jerry Zucker and Jim Abrahams for our next 3 Wisconsin Tourism commercials. The press was insane, with CBS, TMZ, Getty Images, Yahoo Travel and Splash to name a few. We are filming on the original airplane Cockpit set now!

 O great, as if we did not have a bad enough stereotype of the people in WI, we just handed them one of us all wearing cheeseheads, while watching 80's movies and pretending they are new and relevant today.  Next thing you know they will have our most recognizable athlete do an a with the Chicago Bear superfans, who ceased to be funny or relevant the day Ditka left the Bears(1993 for those scoring at home).  

Instead of focusing on our world class educational institutions, our beautiful lakes and wildlife.  The fact that Madison is perpetually in the top 10 places to live rankings.  The beauty of Milwaukee in the summer,  the growth of the Fox valley, etc....

Our Governor and his staff go with this:

 

Yes you can just see the line of people rushing to Wisconsin to spend their money after this one:

Here is a free tip, maybe for the next round of ads, they can reunite another old movie and really promote the Wisconsin music scene:

Tourism Ad Is Perfect Example Of Waste And Fraud

Scott Walker's DNR paid an exorbitant amount of money to have David Zucker and Robert Hays make a series of commercials that are supposed to be promoting tourism in Wisconsin.

The business community and Walker's propagandists have been hyping it beyond belief, and to be honest, undeservedly so.

Here is the latest ad:



While the ad is slightly humorous, it is far from being memorable. Furthermore, it really doesn't do anything to make it uniquely Wisconsin. Change the wording at the end and it could be for any state with lakes, such as Minnesota which as more lakes (and jobs) than Wisconsin.

But not only is it a waste of time, money and talent, it is also fraudulent.

First of all, Walker and his Republican cohorts in crime against the environment just rammed through the mining law that will allow the mining companies to pump poison into a number of the lakes in Northern Wisconsin, despite the overwhelming opposition to this ceding of our land to out of state special interests.

If this law isn't defeated in court - as it probably will be - the fish in these lakes will be inedible due to the poison.

Then there is the fact that there won't be much in the way of walleye fishing this year at least:

The tribes Friday submitted their declaration to spear 59,399 walleyes in off-reservation lakes. The declarations by band were Bad River 5,609 walleyes; Lac Courte Oreilles 5,879; Lac du Flambeau 24,283; Mole Lake 15,060; Red Cliff 2,194; and St. Croix 6,374.

After calculating the potential impact to the lakes' walleye populations, the Department of Natural Resources on Monday announced the sport bag limits would be reduced to one fish on 197 lakes, two fish on 331 lakes and three fish on seven lakes.

The tribes are well within their legal rights to do this. The reasoning for these high declarations is also pretty clear, as blue cheddar succinctly points out:

Officially, the expanded spearing has nothing to do with mining next to somebody’s sacred rice beds.

Officially the expanded spearing has nothing to do with the law to allow hunting of Wisconsin wolves with dog packs (the only bloodsport wolf hunt of that nature in the U.S.)

Officially the spearfishing has zero to do with disrespectful treatment of native tribes by a certain bullheaded Governor.

Unofficially we know it has everything to do with those things.

Listening to talk radio, you could hear them already ripping out a page from Tommy Thompson's playbook, stirring up the racism that is innate to their base. They already had callers ranting about those "Damn Injuns."

I have also heard reports from my friends in Northern Wisconsin that the usual suspects up there are really starting to grumble about the fact that their white supremacy isn't being observed.

Not once have I heard a conservative make the connection between their own actions and these consequences for their poor behaviors. And no, that doesn't surprise me one bit.

If they had really wanted to make a commercial about tourism in Northern Wisconsin, they would have to show white supremacists fighting against the native tribes over fishing rights, by a lake with corporate special interests preparing to dump toxins into the lake, making the whole fishing argument moot anyway.

That would properly represent what people would find when they come to Fitzwalkerstan.

But we know that Walker and his ilk have such a strong abhorrence of honesty and reality that we won't be seeing that commercial coming any time soon.

The Walker Budget Is Already Working! Part X

AAA is reporting that there will be a 2.6% drop in travel for the Labor Day weekend.  They accurately point out that as money gets tight, discretionary spending, like travel and tourism, take the hit first, which is what I've been saying all along.

With Scott Walker taking away millions of dollars away from tens of thousands of workers across the state, I would not be surprised to find that the travel numbers actually end up lower.  It's hard to justify spending a couple hundred dollars going camping or to the Dells knowing that your paycheck is cut by a couple of hundred dollars, but your bills aren't.

That in turn hurts the businesses that are relying on our money, not to mention the people that work for these places.

That Walker - what an economic genius!

Picture The Fun: Part Deux

The other day, I noted that Walker's administration came up with their new tourism slogan of "Picture the Fun." (Believe it or not, that cost tax payers more than three million dollars - but remember, the state's broke.)  This is what we got so far to show for our money:



Apparently, the only things to do or see in Wisconsin are within a mile of the lake front in Milwaukee.

But it is somehow quite appropriate to include Henry Winkler and the Bronze Fonz in the ad.

Winkler the person, by all accounts that I've seen, is a really nice person, like a true Wisconsinite.

And the Fonz can represent the Walker administration, as they are both known for jumping the shark.

Picture The Fun

Scott Walker's administration announced their new marketing campaign that is supposed to draw visitors to Wisconsin.  They're calling this tourism drive "Picture the Fun."

Well, let's see here. In the few months of his reign of terror, he's attacked the working men and women, attacked the poor, attacked the children, attacked the teachers, attacked the GLBT community, and has attacked just about every civil right in this state. The one thing he has not done but had promised to do during his campaign is to create jobs.

In light of that, do you reckon that this is the picture  that they should probably be using in their "Picture the Fun" campaign?

Well, if Walker had his way, that would be the most accurate to be sure.  But, there is one thing Walker and the Fitz Boyzzz had counted on, and that is the Wisconsin spirit.  Walker may want the state to look like the above, but #wiunion will make it look more like this picture until things are again put to rights:

The Milwaukee County Pass

Introducing a new way to promote tourism in Milwaukee County, bring in more people and more revenue:

The Milwaukee County Pass