Legislative Accountability

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Dear Senator Vos,

I just finished reading your interview in the Journal Times. There is a lot to comment on but let me just focus where my expertise allows me some ability. I know this concept might be hard for you to understand but I typically try to only offer commentary on the things I actually know about and have a significant experiential base to help make my remarks relevant and maybe even useful.

For example, I will not comment on “right to work for less” legislation—not my expertise. However, I do think that creating an atmosphere that is hostile towards the working people of the state—labor—might be short sighted considering that employment and wages in “right to work for less” states seems to be no better than in states that allow workers and employers the freedom to bargain without government interference. Just a feeling I have.

But now let’s talk about your intense desire to dismantle the education system of the state of Wisconsin.

WHY, WHY, WHY would you even be thinking about implementing “accountability?” Accountability has a 30-year record of failing children, parents, teachers, and communities. And the disaster of No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top over the last 14 years has literally denied a generation of children access to their fundamental right of a powerful and critical education! The only beneficiaries of “accountability” have been you and your friends in the legislature and the companies that have made millions on the sale of tests and data systems to schools. Schools that have simultaneously been drained of money that could have gone towards the only things proven by research to help create an atmosphere in which real learning can occur—health care, basic nutrition, and access to books.

This leads me to ask again, why? Why engage in behavior that actually damages children, families, and communities? Is the money being offered by lobbyists really worth purposely harming Wisconsin’s kids, families and communities? If you and your colleagues in the legislature really want to help make sure Wisconsin is delivering on its promise to the children of the state, why not simply start by asking for help from people that actually know what they’re talking about. Why not ask a classroom teacher what they need to help educate the children of Wisconsin?

In addition to wanting to disrupt K-12 education, now, according to the article you want to screw up the University of Wisconsin system of higher education all because of some silly idea that professors are not working enough.

I have a better idea. Before you start screwing up one of the best systems of higher education in the world all over your perceived issue with faculty workloads, please first implement a transparent system of accountability for you and your legislative colleagues. Provide us with detailed daily workloads—the taxpayers— so we know where and when you are actually working for us. We—the taxpayers— need to be sure that all of you are not “working on administrative and other nonproductive activities.” We—the taxpayers—want efficient legislators. We don’t really have time for you and your colleagues to engage in inefficient legislative practices.

Also, it would be really helpful if you and your colleagues designed a legislative report card. We—the taxpayers—would like to know if you and your colleagues are actually building Wisconsin’s infrastructure, creating life sustaining jobs, and helping to promote a civil society free of racism, segregation and poverty. Right? I mean we are paying you good money. Shouldn’t we—the taxpayers— know if you and your colleagues really are effective civil servants?

Or better yet, shouldn’t we—the taxpayers—know who the failed legislators are? Oh and along with that how about a merit based system of pay for legislators and a transparent system for the removal of failed legislators? We—the taxpayers—really don’t think that you and your colleagues should have a job for life.

Thanks for your time and I eagerly await your draft for a system of political and legislative accountability.

Best wishes for the New Year,

Tim Slekar

American Exceptionalism

By Jeff Simpson

Interesting report coming out for our friends on the right who keep defending torture.

“Debating about it, ummm … Some of the worst things that happened you don’t know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib … The women were passing messages out saying ‘Please come and kill me, because of what’s happened’ and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It’s going to come out.”
“It’s impossible to say to yourself how did we get there? Who are we? Who are these people that sent us there? When I did My Lai I was very troubled like anybody in his right mind would be about what happened. I ended up in something I wrote saying in the end I said that the people who did the killing were as much victims as the people they killed because of the scars they had, I can tell you some of the personal stories by some of the people who were in these units witnessed this. I can also tell you written complaints were made to the highest officers and so we’re dealing with a enormous massive amount of criminal wrongdoing that was covered up at the highest command out there and higher, and we have to get to it and we will. We will. You know there’s enough out there, they can’t (Applause). …. So it’s going to be an interesting election year.”

It really shows you what a sick twisted person Dick Cheney(and the rest of the Bush Administration that condoned this) is.    Remember this when your Republican uncle tells you how necessary torture was, right after explaining that Jesus is the reason for the Season.

The Whiteness of 2015

 By Jeff Simpson

Reince Priebus, former voter cager, Robin Vos's old roommate and now national chair of the Republican party has a vision for his party:

Our overarching vision is a country that offers equal opportunity for everyone.

Reince also defines "everyone" differently than most.  One way that you can help support the Republican Party, and get a dose of their true vision, is to buy a 2015 GOP calendar:

The "Your America” Calendar features photos of what the American Dream means to supporters across the country — whether that’s a serene view of our lands’ natural beauty or your grandchildren waving the American flag for their very first time. Get your Official GOP 2015 “Your America” Calendar by submitting $9.00 or more to the RNC.




The people of color in the Republican vision of 2015 is as easy to find as the hitchhiker on the Old Style can.  We know that they have no use for people of color, but they could have at least found a stock photo to throw in the background of their vision for America.

Or maybe, since the Republican takeover of 2014, there truly is no future for people of color in America!

Abele's Mental Health Board Boondoggle Worsens

As I have reported before, Milwaukee County Executive Chris "Boss" Abele is in a hurry to close up the Milwaukee County Mental Health Complex so that he can sell the land to his wealthy friends.

When those pesky County Board Supervisors threatened to slow down the process of moving these vulnerable adults out by asking for common sense safety nets and precautions, Boss Abele did what he usually does when he doesn't get his way.  He threw a tantrum and ran to his friends, Scott Walker and the extremist Teapublicans in the state legislature, and had the mental health system removed from the county board's jurisdiction.

In place of the county board, Milwaukee's mental health system is overseen by Boss Abele's Mental Health Board.

From its conception, Abele's Mental Health Board has been a growing disaster.

First off, its formation was delayed while Walker and Abele selected their hand-picked political appointees to be on the board.

When the Board finally started to meet, their first job was to rubber stamp Boss Abele's budget for their system with no chance of analyzing it to see if it was sufficient.  However, more problems arose with the concern of whether their actions are even constitutional.  The Board has the authority to tax people but are not only not elected, they didn't even have public hearings on their budget.  In other words, it was taxation without representation.

This week, it was reported that Boss Abele's Mental Health Board still isn't ready for prime time:

Observers are raising questions about the Milwaukee County Mental Health Board and its plans for restructuring mental health care throughout the area. Formed in the spring, the board has yet to begin formal discussions on how it will lead the transformation to a decentralized health care system focused on community-based facilities.

According to board member Mary Neubauer, the board was initially faced with budget and organizational issues that required its attention and is now ready to make progress on its main mission. Chairperson Kimberly Walker said in an email that the board has discussed priorities that it will “flesh out” at its Dec.18 meeting.

“Once the board identifies priorities and goals, we will work in collaboration with the administration to see that strategic plans are developed and implemented,” Walker wrote.

In other words, they still don't know what they are doing. They don't even know what they want to be doing.

Yet, while the Board is trying to find itself, Boss Abele is still pushing vulnerable citizens out of the complex, with or without proper support systems that will be able to meet their needs and keep them safe.

But, wait! With all things Abele, there is more.

Not only does Abele's Mental Health Board without direction, they are also lacking even the most basic support:

The 13-member board operates without a dedicated staff, raising uncertainty about how it will carry out its responsibilities. “Board members have a hunger for data and information but that raises questions about how the board will function without anyone on staff to gather the information,” said Rob Henken, director of the Public Policy Forum in Milwaukee.

Questions also remain about how the board will manage the makeover of the mental health care system. “No one knows yet what level of oversight the board will choose for itself,” Henken said. “Will it be like a traditional board of directors that sets an agenda, or will it be more administrative and focus on day-to-day details?”

Neubauer said that some level of support staff is “most definitely needed” to gather data and provide analysis for the board to make decisions. Once armed with the information it needs, she believes, the board can lead the mental health care transformation.

[...]

Added Barbara Beckert, Milwaukee director of Disability Rights Wisconsin, “One of the concerns we had from the beginning was who will be supporting the board,” she said. “It is very important to have an independent staff that the board can direct in an analytical role. But to date that has not been available.”

The board has the ability to hire its own independent staff and assign responsibilities, according to Beckert. Until now, the county has proved some administrative support and information gathering.

Well, isn't that special?

Because the Mental Health Board is still lacking any independent reports or analyses, they are forced to rely on information spoon fed to them by Boss Abele, who's proven time and time again to be less than a reliable source of information.

By the time that the Mental Health Board will be ready to do their job, a lot of damage will already be done and most of these vulnerable adults - as well as the taxpayers - will have been thrown to the corporate vultures.

But it is not all bad news.

In their meeting on Thursday, the Mental Health Board, at the persistence of AFSCME, was able to gain a guarantee that Abele would not continue to try to treat the county workers at the mental health complex differently than other county workers.  This will mean sparing those workers thousands of dollars in unnecessary pay cuts.

The Mental Health Board has also taken action, again due to the persistence of the unions, to start to address the serious safety issues that are present at the mental health complex caused by Boss Abele's incompetent handling of the system.

That's more than Abele has done in the four years he's been running the place.

Right To Some Honesty

BY Jeff Simpson

 While our neighbors to the West spend this time between elections deciding what to do with a $1 Billion surplus, the Republicans in Wisconsin keep finding ways to add to our $2.2 Billion deficit they created.   

Now, shortly after the election, Assemblyman Chris Kapenga says he has a "Right to Work" bill ready to go.  Of course Mr. Kapenga told us this in early December, forgetting to mention it during the election season that ended less than a month prior.   Not a single mention of "right-to-work" as part of his agenda on his campaign website.  

Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald tells us:

"It's my opinion it has to come up early" in the session that begins in January, Fitzgerald told reporters. "I don't know how we get through the session without having this debate.

Of course when Mr. Fitzgerald says "It has to come up early" he does not mean it should come up during the election season.  Now that he has faced the voters saying one thing, it is time to do something completely different.   In case you were wondering, the number of mentions by Senator Scott Fitzgerald of "right-to-work" laws on the campaign trail = 0! 
 

For those of you scoring at home, adding up the mentions of 'right-to-work" laws on the campaign trail ofSpeaker Robin Vos, Republican Majority Leader Jim Steineke, and Joint Finance Committee co-chairJohn Nygren also add up to zero!

The only time "right-to-work" was really mentioned in public, was in a private moment, with Scott Walker's kissing partner and biggest donor, which happened to be captured in an obscure documentary.    It is funny how a $500,000 donation, means you can get Scott Walker to actually talk about the issues.   

Spend months ducking the issues and spend millions muddying the waters, then when you are elected, claim a mandate and start talking about extremist legislation like it is why you won the election.   

Very convenient.   

No one will ever confuse our current group of elected reps for these guys! 

How long we will let OUR elected reps continue doing this to us?

Cross Posted at Purple Wisconsin 

Politics Defined

You will never find a more accurate description of politics today:

A Hell Of A Time

From our friend Steve Carlson!  Happy Holidays!

RoJo Squared - Profiting At Taxpayers' Expense

The Milwaukee Business Journal did a story about Robin Vos' popcorn business with an interesting twist:

Probably the biggest surprise when Wisconsin Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos gave me a tour of his Burlington popcorn business was the female inmates working there.

I visited RoJo's Popcorn for a story on Rep. Vos' small businesses, which consist of the Burlington popcorn-processing and packaging plant and south side Milwaukee retail and online shop Knight's Popcorn.

At the time, Vos told me he used to oppose a corrections-system-to-work transitional jobs program, but in recent years had retained temporary workers from a women's correctional facility in Racine County at his Burlington business. He also employed a former inmate from the program at his retail shop.

I was reminded of my visit with Vos Friday when I read a Wisconsin State Journal article that Vos wants to expand prison work-release programs in Wisconsin. He told the State Journal that recent experiences at his factory changed his mind about "how we get people back to work."

It's not surprising that Boss Vos would support this. In his twisted worldview, it's a win-win-win scenario.

He gets to exploit prisoners who work for next to nothing, he gets to use taxpayer dollars for their healthcare and he has an operation to help cover his graft.

Coincidentally, another RoJo - US Senator Ron Johnson - had the same profiteering business scheme:

Republican Senate candidate Ron Johnson, who has campaigned against government subsidies to business, employs up to nine prison inmates at his plastics factories whose health care costs are paid by the state, according to records obtained by The Associated Press.

Public records show that Pacur Inc. and Dynamic Drinkware LLC, two companies run by Johnson, employ up to nine inmates at a time through a state Corrections Department jobs program.

Johnson's companies offer private health insurance to the regular employees at the Oshkosh factories. But Melissa Roberts, an executive assistant with the Corrections Department, said the companies don't have to cover the inmate workers. "The benefit is that they don't have to pay health benefits," she said.

Isn't it quite convenient that these reprobates keep finding laws that are supposed to be for the good of the community but seem to be even better for their wallets?

A Curious Point About Mike Ellis Hiring A Political Operative

Jason Stein of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that soon (but not soon enough) to be retired State Senator Mike Ellis is spending taxpayer money to hire a Republican state operative for a couple of months:

In November, outgoing Senate President Mike Ellis (R-Neenah) hired the campaign manager of Senator-elect Van Wanggaard (R-Racine), an ally of Ellis. Kyle Koenen will be paid more than $3,400 a month as a legislative assistant while waiting for a permanent job in Wanggaard's office to start in January.

As of the last reporting date on Oct. 20, Wanggaard's campaign had thousands of dollars in cash that could have been used to pay Koenen to do political work instead of state work so he wouldn't have been out of a job for the two months following Wanggaard's election victory.

But Ellis, who retires in January, said that he has been frugal overall with the money in his office's budget for personnel and that there has been enough official work for Koenen to do since one of his full-time staffers left his office this month to work for another senator. Including Koenen, Ellis has three staff members, one in Neenah and the other two in Madison.

"I still have constituents to take care of and phone calls to answer," Ellis said. "I can't take care of the district with two people."

Stein goes on to use the usual corporate media shtick of false equivalency, claiming both sides do it, as if that somehow makes it OK.

I think Stein missed a very curious point about Ellis' stunt.

As the gentle reader will recall, the Teapublicans put out a hit on Ellis earlier this year, having him secretly videotaped at a bar, in which Ellis boasted about creating a Super PAC to go after his Democratic appointment and stating that Scott Walker works only for himself.  They wanted Ellis out because he did not always toe the party line and they had a lot of money making ventures - like school privatization - to cash in on.

So, when his party stabbed him in the back like that, why in the world would Ellis turn around and help them out?

Did they break Ellis' ego like he breaks gavels?  Is Ellis that much of a sheep? Do they have compromising photos of Ellis with a sheep?

All I know is that if I had been betrayed like Ellis was, I would be loathe to do them any favors.

RIP Fuzzy Thurston

Sadness struck Packer Nation on Sunday when it was announced that famed Fuzzy Thurston passed away:

Fuzzy Thurston, a key player on Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers championship teams of the 1960s, died Sunday after a long illness. He was 15 days shy of his 81st birthday.

His family announced the death on Sunday afternoon via Twitter, prompting an outpouring of sympathy messages from Packers fans.

[...]

Thurston became the Packers' starting left guard upon his arrival in Green Bay. He missed part of the 1965 season because of injury. Thurston's last year as a starter was 1966. He was a backup to Gale Gillingham in his final season, 1967.

Thurston was inducted into the Packers Hall of Fame in 1975. He was inducted to the Wisconsin Athletic and the Wisconsin Football Coaches Association halls of fame in 2003 and was a member of the Valparaiso Athletic and Indiana Football halls of fame.

"The Packers Family was saddened today to learn of the passing of Fuzzy Thurston," Packers president and chief executive Mark Murphy said in a statement. "Fuzzy was an endearing figure for Packers fans for more than 50 years, going back to his all-pro playing days and continuing through his rousing welcomes at Lambeau Field as a favorite alum. Our sincere condolences go out to Fuzzy's family."

I was fortunate to have met Fuzzy once.

My wife and I had taken Vangie, an elderly friend, out for lunch at a restaurant called King's Table in King, Wisconsin, just outside of Waupaca.

It was mid-October and my wife and I were decked out in our Packer gear.

When we asked the waitress for our bill, she said that a gentleman sitting halfway across the room wanted to compliment us on our outfits and the way we attended to our elderly friend. She further said that he would like to pay for our lunch tab.

I looked up in surprise and saw an older but vibrant man sitting at a table. Like us, he was garbed in his Packer finery and when I made eye contact with him, he broke out in one of the biggest smiles I've ever seen and gave me a thumbs up.

As I looked closer at him, I saw that he was wearing a hat with the number "63" on it.  My jaw bounced off the table when I realized that Fuzzy Thurston had just paid for our lunch.

I immediately went up to him and shook his hand, thanking him for his generosity.  It was only then that I noticed a large bandage on the front of his throat.

Still smiling, he held up his hand, indicating that I should wait.  He reached in his pocket and pulled out a wad of bills.  He flipped through the money until he found one of his business cards for his restaurant.  He pulled out a pen from his coat pocket and autographed the card for me.

It was a coincidental meeting, but it showed Fuzzy's character and what a generous and outgoing man he was.

Former VA Governor Bob McDonnell Could Face Ten Years In Prison

Well, well, well:

The matter is far from settled. The probation office recommended a punishment from 10 years and a month to 12 years and 7 months. Calculating an appropriate range of sentences in the federal system is a complicated, mathematical process that takes into account a variety of factors, including the type of crime, the defendant’s role and the amount of loss. The judge has yet to see the arguments from each side.

McDonnell and his wife, Maureen, were convicted in September of lending the prestige of his office to Richmond businessman Jonnie R. Williams Sr. in exchange for $177,000 in loans, vacations and luxury items.

McDonnell is scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 6. His wife’s sentencing is scheduled for Feb. 20, and her guideline range is expected to be lower than her husband’s. The probation office has not yet filed a report concerning her.

[...]

The range is particularly notable because last December, prosecutors offered to let McDonnell plead guilty to just one count of lying to a bank as part of an agreement that would have meant he could be sentenced to three years in prison at the most and probation at the least. Importantly, though, McDonnell would have been required to sign a statement acknowledging that he helped Star Scientific, Williams’s dietary-supplement company, at the same time the businessman was giving him loot, fully shouldering blame for a relationship he has insisted was not criminal and was driven largely by his wife.

It is no great leap of logic to connect this to the way that Scott Walker, the Teapublicans and their dark money overlords are fighting so hard to kill John Doe.

Isn't that enough to make one wistfully dream what Wisconsin would be like if we had a legal system - both on the state and federal level - that wasn't so damn corrupted.

H/T to Crooks and Liars

Another Day Another Religious Gaffe By Scott Walker

Just a couple of days ago, Scott Walker became a national laughingstock when it was reported that he signed a letter to a constituent with "Thanks again and Molotov."

Now, another religious gaffe by Walker has surfaced.

Last month, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Walker tried to justify his refusal to expand Medicaid in Wisconsin by saying:

“It’s probably not fair to ask the son of a preacher to use biblical metaphors,” Walker said. “My reading of the Bible finds plenty of reminders that it’s better to teach someone to fish than to give them fish if they’re able. . . . Caring for the poor isn’t the same as taking money from the federal government to lock more people into Medicaid.”

Blogger Chris Walker (no relation to the governor) caught the gaffe and pointed out that Walker was actually citing a Chinese proverb and not a Bible verse.

Walker (the blogger, not the despot) goes on to point out that Bible actually contradicts what Walker (the despot, not the blogger) is trying to argue.

That's gotta be rather embarrassing to the preacher's son.

But there's more.

Dan Bice of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel finally got around to reporting on this gaffe and contacted Team Walker who had a curious response:

Team Walker disagrees.

"The governor specifically says it’s in his reading of the Bible," said Laurel Patrick, press secretary for Walker. "He’s not quoting scripture."

Well, doesn't that clear nothing up? He's citing the Bible but not the Bible? Huh?

The one thing we do know is that not only did Scott Walker drop out of college, he apparently dropped out of Sunday School too.

Cross posted at Crooks and Liars

Walkergate: Kelly Rindfleisch Asks John Doe To The Big Dance

Kelly Rindfleisch, one of Scott Walker's top aides who pleaded guilty to illegally doing political work while on county time, is appealing her conviction.  Again:

A former aide to Gov. Scott Walker when he was Milwaukee county executive has appealed her conviction for misconduct in public office to the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

Kelly Rindfleisch filed the appeal on Friday. It comes after a state appeals court on a 2-1 vote upheld her conviction last month.

Rindfleisch was one of six people convicted as a result of a now-concluded “John Doe” investigation focusing on activities in Walker’s county executive office. Walker was never charged.

Rindfleisch had pleaded guilty to felony misconduct in office in October 2012 for doing campaign fundraising for then-lieutenant governor candidate Brett Davis during the time she was receiving a county paycheck.

Her appeal is based on investigators’ seizure of roughly 16,000 emails from her Yahoo and Google accounts. She argues on appeal that the emails were obtained during an unconstitutional search and should be suppressed.

Keep in mind that she appealed this issue during her trial and appealed her conviction on this matter.

She is obviously hoping to do a Scott Jensen-like maneuver in getting the case in a friendly venue where the rule of law is not as important as the rules of their corporate overlords.

I also find it ironic that Rindfleisch keeps crying about how broke she is but keeps finding the money to pay high-end Attorney Frank Gimbel to file these frivolous appeals.  Then again, she's probably getting a discount rate since Gimbel is a big supporter of Walker, who is helping pay for Rindfleisch's legal defense fund.

Scott Walker's Hanukkah Gaffe

Scott Walker had a major gaffe recently and people were paying attention!


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The Jensen Deception

BY Jeff Simpson

 In Monona Grove, like many other public school districts in Wisconsin, we have a code of conduct that students have to sign and we expect them to live up to.   In this code of conduct this line is prominent:

Honesty (Students will be trustworthy and truthful, no matter what the consequence.)

 

The Elmbrook School District hasa special policy on Academic Honesty:  

Policy 5131.2 - Academic Honesty
The District regards academic honesty as vital to the academic, social and emotional development of all students. Honest and ethical behavior is an essential component in the learning process. Academic honesty requires that all academic work is the legitimate, truthful effort and product of the student. In contrast, academic dishonesty is an attempt by students to claim and show possession of effort, knowledge and/or skills that are not their own. Academic dishonesty in any form shall not be permitted.
Which brings us to the issue of the day, public education, and the recent November elections.  
We will see an expansion of "school choice" and the head of the "school choice" movement in Wisconsin is formerly convicted felon, Scott Jensen.  Jensen was basically given a "get out of jail free' card from his good friend and fellow Republican, Attorney General elect Brad Schimel.    
After Jensen left in disgrace, he went right to be head lobbyist for American Federation for Children(AFC). AFC is funded by the Walton and DeVos family and their main goal is to privatize our public education.   

AFC's visions is defined as(emphasis mine):

 

The American Federation for Children envisions an education system where parents are empowered to choose the best educational environment for their child, where innovation and entrepreneurism revolutionizes our education system, ensuring all children, especially low-income children, are provided with the opportunity to receive the finest education possible, whether it be in a traditional public school, public charter school, virtual learning, private school, home school or blended learning.

Doesn't there seem to be a disconnect that the organization that just wants parents to be "empowered to choose the best educational environment for their child" hired as its point person someone who has a proven history of not being able to be trusted to help serve the public?  

To make matters worse, they give the ethically challenged Jensen lots of money to buy elections.  As Bill Lueders recently pointed out:

 

School choice proponents, many from out of state, funneled $64,000 directly into candidates’ coffers in 2014, through AFC and another group. (The AFC-affiliated funder, Wisconsin Federation for Children Political Fund, filed its last report Nov. 26, a month late, risking a penalty of up to $500. Its Washington, D.C.-based administrator did not respond to an emailed question about the late filing.)In addition, AFC made independent expenditures of $866,000 to boost or oppose candidates. This adds to the nearly $10 million in state electoral spending by school choice proponents between 2003 and 2012, as tallied by the nonpartisan Wisconsin Democracy Campaign.
AFC’s spending in the Nov. 4 elections included $148,000 to help narrowly defeat Democrat Rep. Mandy Wright, a former teacher and school choice critic. It spent $123,000 to help Republican Todd Novak score a razor-thin win over Democrat Dick Cates. And it poured $240,000 into GOP choice proponent Howard Marklein’s successful bid for an open Senate seat.**
** To put things in perspective, while they are spending tens of millions of dollars on elections, our annual budget(approximately 3200 kids, 250 staff, six buildings is $32 Million).   Also average teacher pay in WI is approaximately $47,000/yr, while Scott Jensen makes a over $200,000/yr.   

 When you give Scott Jensen that kind of money to play with, he uses it just as you would expect!    

 

Yet, in its electioneering, AFC commonly doesn’t even mention school choice. It attacked Wright for allegedly using sick leave to attend a protest, which she insists is not true. It went after Cates for his vote on the local school board concerning the Pledge of Allegiance. And it ripped Democratic Rep. Gordon Hintz for threatening a female colleague and being cited in a massage parlor sting operation, both in 2011.

 

Now let's sum it all up, we have a disgraced former elected rep, who is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in small time races, to attack certain candidates disgracefully and dishonestly, late in the game, about every issue BUT school choice, and then AFC wins by razor thin margins.   Then Mr. Jensen declares:

 

Jensen is proud of these victories, which he says give it “a school choice majority in both houses.” He attributes this success to public support for school choice.

 

How Jensen sleeps at night is something he will have to answer, but why we continually reward this behavior in our political system is something that we have to take a long look at.  

 

Mr. Jensens behaviors, if he were a student in our district, would result in probably suspension and possible explusion(depending on the behavior plan we would work out between the principal, his teachers and parents).   

 

Is the person who would not be able to be hired into our schools, the person we want entrusted with millions of public education dollars?   

 

Do you feel safe knowing that YOUR children's future is in Scott Jensen's hands?    

 

Images from public profiles!  

Cross posted at Purple Wisconsin