Turncoat Tate

By Jeff Simpson

I recently gave my thoughts on what happened during the primary election where Wisconsin elected a homophobic bigot to the Supreme Court.   

Mike McCabe also gave his assessment of what happened.

I know you are frustrated by the outcome of the state Supreme Court election. I am at wit’s end too. I want to spew expletives from the rooftops, but will try to speak my piece as gently and respectfully as I can.
Another election, another round of venting and fuming about stupid, unthinking people voting against their own interests. You ask for the umpteenth time how long will it take for them to wake up and see they are being sold down the river.

The thing is, Mike McCabe is not an insider, which makes him an outsider and according to the insiders in the WISDEMS, that makes him a larger threat to their hold of their small slice of pie than the WISGOP.

Witness this from former Wisconsoin Democratic Party head Mike Tate!

That is a rant for the ages, and aimed at Mr. McCabe but too cowardly to mention him by name,  When there is someone who wants to get money out of politics, it seriously infringes on people who are bloodsuckers in politics and want a piece of that pie.

A quick background on Mike Tate, he was former head of the Wisconsin Democratic Party and when he left last summer, went to work for Milwaukee County Exec Chris Abele, where he was given $5,000,000 to smear his opponent.  

The Ironic thing is while Mr. Tate is talking about winning elections, giving to candidates and driving turnout.  Mike was turning the County Exec race very dirty and smearing his old friend Chris Larson(who supported Tate for party chair) as a Walker clone.   In this race, there was no doubt that Chris Larson was the Progressive candidate next to anti-labor Chris Abele.

 The research shows that the biggest benefit of dirty campaigning is to drive down turnout.   How many people stayed home because of the fiasco that was the county executives race?  

The absolute most ironic thing of the year is this:
"unless you gave whatever you could to the Kloppenburg campaign and not Bernie or Hillary, I just don't think you get to complain.  $5 to Kloppenburg would have gne alot further than to Bernie...."

Checking the records of Mike McCabe's old site, we see exactly how much Mike Tate gave to Kloppenburg so he could be allowed to complain:   

The answer 

Yes Mr. Tate was paid well and given a $5 Million dollar budget and decided to not send a single penny to Ms. Kloppenburg.

With friends like Mike Tate, who needs enemies?

Den of Thieves!

Matthew 21:12

(KJV) And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves,

We all know what happened when the republican party took control of Wisconsin in 2010.  They had a plan to gerrymander the state, to make sure they did not have to worry about running on the issues and facing the voters for the nest ten years.   While we had a pretty good idea what that meant to WI, the fact that the republican party then elected Robin Vos as their leader we knew for sure.   Ethics in Government was now a thing of the past! 

The first (and definitely NOT last) story comes from the very small, dark mind of Robin Vos.   Vos decided that he was sick of lobbyists just buying his loyalty with their clients money, so he decided to implement a pay to play system with the lobbyists themselves:  

For years, Madison pols have been asking lobbyists to hit up their clients and company execs for donations. But starting in June, Vos and the Assembly Republican leaders began calling in and contacting lobbyists one by one to say they were each on the hook for at least $500.
The result: Vos collected $36,000 in personally signed checks from scores of lobbyists in the final months before the November election, money that went into a fund and then was distributed to targeted Assembly races, according to recently filed campaign reports. The maximum donation to a state rep is $500.
Some Madison types contacted No Quarter to complain about what were dubbed "loyalty checks" - though the tactic is perfectly legal.
"Lobbyists were quite upset - most of them saw it as an obnoxious 'loyalty check' by the new leadership and an incredibly arrogant display of partisan power," said one Republican insider. "Who was going to say no to a personal request from the next speaker of the Assembly?"

The best part about Robin Vos is that because he is not the brightest light on the tree, and he knows that because of the gerrymandered districts it will be practically impossible to lose his majority, he is prone to occasional bouts of actual honesty!   He had one here(emphasis mine):

"Lobbyists are in Madison happily raising money from their clients or other individuals to give to legislators," Vos said Friday. "This might have been the first time that many of them were actually asked to give their own money to attend an event, as opposed to spending yours"

Finally someone admits that the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars that companies spent buying legislators, comes right out of the consumers pockets!   Of course Vos does not care or have a fix, he just wants to make sure that when it comes out of our pockets, it goes into his!    

Robin Vos found one way to get more money in his pockets and then once he smelled the money, he needed more.  In order to get more money, Vos decided to change the rules and allow fundraising during the budget process. 

Assembly members will be able to raise money while considering the state budget under a policy approved by paper ballot on Thursday — reversing a ban that had been in place since 2009.
The policy, approved by the Republican-controlled Committee on Assembly Organization on a 5-3 party-line vote, allows most Assembly lawmakers, their campaign committees and support committees to raise funds everywhere in Wisconsin except Dane County. Legislators whose districts include Dane County are exempt.
It is in force during the budget period, beginning the day the biennial budget bill is introduced and ending on the date the bill is presented to the governor. Gov. Scott Walker plans to unveil his 2013-15 spending plan on Wednesday. July 1 begins the new fiscal year.
Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, circulated the ballot and urged adoption of the policy change. He could not be reached for comment Thursday.

What could go wrong with this really? 

Mike McCabe, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, called the move a step in the wrong direction. He pointed to a policy banning all fundraising for Assembly members during the budget period, which was approved when Democrats were in control during the 2009-2010 session.
"We still believe there should be a law banning this," he said. "It definitely weakens the Assembly policy."
He and others other campaign finance reform advocates have long argued that lawmakers raising campaign cash during the budget process creates the appearance that special interests can buy budget provisions.
McCabe and Jay Heck, executive director of Common Cause Wisconsin, both said that lawmakers should go beyond setting just policies and pass a law banning fundraising during the budget process.
"It's going in the wrong direction," Heck said. "We shouldn't have fundraising during the budget and I'm always at a loss to figure out why the Legislature thinks it's a good idea."

Once again the republicans prove that both parties are NOT the same since one party (democrats) enacted the ban and the other party (republicans) lifted the ban - thus turning on the  FOR SALE  sign.   

Look for records amount of fundraising by members of the Assembly and also keep an eye open for those who give the most "miraculously" benefitting tremendously from the new budget!

SKW IS AWOL

Everyone in Wisconsin remembers the protests of 2011. Scott Walker introduced his bill ending collective bargaining rights for public employees, which led to massive protests for weeks in Madison and throughout the state.

The Protests in Madison, at the Capitol were really sparked by MTI mobilizing quickly and other teachers throughout the state then joining in.   In order to be at the Capitol to protest though, that meant that the teachers had to call in sick.  

BOY did that piss off the righties.   All over the state they made sure that teachers were punished for calling in sick to protest.  From right wing leaning school boards, to the crazy righty "press", their main mission was punishing anyone who dared to speak up.   Apparently, no one on the right has ever called in to work sick, when they actually were not sick, to do something other than work.  As this video of a gathering of 100% democrats clearly shows! 

Not to be out crazied by Maciver or out rightied by anyone in the state, the Wisconsin State Journal spent almost a year trying to get personal health care records of the Madison Teachers.   Unfortunately, after a ruling by Judge Colas(remember him), they had to turn over personal medical records and pay $25,000 of taxpayer money so the WSJ to see that the teachers called in sick to protest(which you would have known by spending a day inside the Capitol).  State Journal Editor John Smalley pretended that he was doing the public a service here:

The State Journal filed the lawsuit in June after the district refused a request for the notes, and a revised request for the notes with teachers' names removed.

Smalley said that until the notes are evaluated it remains unknown what story, if any, will be written, but it's part of the newspaper's responsibility as a watchdog to examine government actions and hold officials accountable.

"When school gets shut down for four days, that's a big story," Smalley said.

Yet while the WSJ was wasting their resources attacking the teachers, they were getting scooped on big stories, ignoring people who they agreed with, when they called in sick, and completely ignored the biggest story of them all.   

MADISON – Gov. Scott Walker took 54 personal days, not including weekends, through the first 10 months of 2012, a Wisconsin Reporter analysis shows.

Walker, who earns $144,423 a year plus benefits as governor, has raised record amounts of campaign money in his first two years in office.

And the Wisconsin Reporter review indicates that much of his “personal” time was spent out of state on fundraising or campaign-style trips.

“Governor Walker’s not the first governor to keep up a very ambitious political travel schedule, but I have to say he’s taken it to a level we haven’t seen before,” said Mike McCabe, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, which tracks election-related spending.

But Wait ....There's more.  It turns out Wisconsin reporter is actually being generous!

In determining that Walker had taken 54 personal days through the end of October, Wisconsin Reporter included any day in which the governor worked less than 90 minutes on official state business but marked the rest of the day as “personal.”

For example, several days were marked “personal” except for an early morning staff call.

But not included as a personal day was any day in which the governor worked more than 90 minutes.
That excludes, therefore, multiple days when Walker may have worked as little as two hours on official business, or days when he worked only a half-day.

 So he took off even more time than that!  Well since Scott Walker promised to be the most transparent administration ever,  the explanation for his lack of work ethic should be an easy one right?  

The governor’s calendar gives no details on what Walker does during his “personal” time, and his staff has been mum on the issue.

But comparing his schedule to other information sources, it’s clear that much of Walker’s personal time is spent on more than hanging out at his Wauwatosa home with his wife and sons.

The Sunlight Foundation, for instance, compiles information on political events and invitations on its politicalpartytime.org website.

According to the website, Walker hosted a “Romney Victory Inc.” event on July 11 in Washington, DC.
Walker’s calendar shows he had off July 9-12, except for a few phone calls before the National Governors Association meeting July 13-15 in Williamsburg, Va.

Walker also had “personal” time scheduled at the same time as a June 30 event, called a “reception with Paul Ryan and Scott Walker” at the Lake Geneva home of Vincent and Patricia Kolber.

He attended an event sponsored by the conservative Faith & Freedom Coalition during the Republican National Convention in August in Tampa, Fla., a YouTube interview shows.

And Walker took a personal day also on April 17, the same day he was in St. Louis at the National Rifle Association’s annual meeting, accepting the Harlon B. Carter Award.

Walker also has been criticized for detailing his policy plans outside of Wisconsin, before sharing his goals before people back home, including remarks he made following a speech Nov. 16 at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Library in California.

OOPS.  The difference between Scott Walker taking a personal day and our teachers taking a personal day?  Scott Walker still gets paid!  Now we hold our teachers to  higher standard than our Governor?  I guess lead by example is a thing of the past.  Now we have even redefined "conservatism" to mean get paid lots of taxpayer dollars to campaign!