Paul Soglin: Waxing America

Waxing America's Wisconsin Readership Losing It

Readers of Waxing America, at least a certain element, are starting to lose it. Comments about the Supreme Court race, which are opened and uncensored, except for personal attacks and slime, reveal that we have attracted some right-wingers who are prone to weak thinking.

It started the day after the election.  My analysis of the election and the effort to learn from it brought this response:

• Losers make excuses. Winners get the job done.

Obviously the Right does not like it when the Left learns from its defeats and tries to improve in anticipation of the next election.

The suggestion that Butler could win under the right circumstances (and we do have two Democratic Senators and a Democratic Governor) elicited this rebuttal:

• ...vast bulk of Wisconsin is a conservative state. To see a conservative elected shouldn't surprise anyone who looks at the big picture. ..and
• ...What this should be conveying to you Paul, is that the state is slowly tipping more right than left.

Many, including the conservative Wisconsin State Journal, not just those on the left, are considering appointed judges as a better route to a qualified judiciary. I observed that if Butler got steamrolled that was an option, but I was withholding judgment. My own preference is simple disclosure as to where the issue committees get their money:

• Have you noticed...when a democrat loses an election...the process was corrupt, the campaign was nasty, and feelings were hurt!!!!!
  When a democrat wins, then the process doesn't need to be "fixed"????

• Of course Pauly,* you and your ilk (lefty stooges) will want to take the vote away from Wisconsin citizens. This is where We The People are allowed to judge the judges.

Some of the harshest judgments were attributions to things never said:

• You liberals just can not accept defeat, can you? If liberals win, all we hear about is "a new day" and "the voters have spoken" and that it's "time to move on". But if conservatives wins, it's evil, nasty, racist, sexist, white men cracking their whips again and more government reform is needed to clean up the evil, nasty, racist, sexist system...

But my favorite was this bon mot from someone claiming to be Fraley:

You don't like the outcome of a contest and want to avoid losing again...change the rules! Nice motto. So which is it, Paul?  Wisconsin voters are: 1) Racist 2) Stupid 3) Not worthy of the honor of selecting judges

Those are the only three options the whine brigade has before them. Until you settle on one option, I guess we can just assume you think it's all three?

This Fraley, borrowing from the worst of the Communists, under the guise of freedom, allows the accused of making choices, choices from his limited world view.

• Wisconsin voters are not racist, but the advertisements taken out by the Gableman fellow travelers were.
• Wisconsin voters are not stupid, just witness the election of our United States Senators and Governor, and the fact that next fall, both houses of the State Legislature will be Democratic.
• And certainly Fraley is not accusing the Wisconsin State Journal, most of the other dailies in the State and many prominent Republicans of not trusting the voters, when they called for the appointment of judges long before the outcome of Tuesday's election was known. Or is he?

Update Sunday, April 6, 2008.  Not knowing when to quit, Jim Widgerson jumper into the fray, Paul Soglin embracing another Wisconsin tradition McCarthyism.

Wrong.  Fellows, McCarthyism is accusing someone of being a Communist without any evidence and not allowing the accused to confront the accuser.

a mid-20th century political attitude characterized chiefly by opposition to elements held to be subversive and by the use of tactics involving personal attacks on individuals by means of widely publicized indiscriminate allegations especially on the basis of unsubstantiated charges;

What you guys are searching for is 'red-baiting.'  That is where you focus on guilt by association.  For example, if Barack Obama attends a specific church, you suggest that he supports all of the positions held by the leader of the church.

Or, for example, if extreme terrorists elements want the US out of Iraq, then any American who wants the United States out of Iraq has to be at best a terrorist sympathizer and at worst, a terrorist.

Now where have we heard that?

*I believe the correct spelling is P-a-u-l-i-e

Michael Gablelman: The People Have A Question For You

Madison, Wisconsin, March 25, 2008 Michael Gableman at 57:36 Supreme Court Debate-Butler/Gableman:

....The voters of this state would simply be far better off if all of the third party interest groups took their interests elsewhere and stopped running these ads.

That is what Michael Gableman told a state wide audience Tuesday night in a debate with Supreme Court Justice Louis Butler.

This is the same Michael Gableman who later in the debate was to call Justice Butler "disingenuous." Repeatedly.

The question for Michael Gableman is this, and keep in mind when previously asked if he had meetings with Wisconsin Manufactures & Commerce, prior to his announced candidacy, he refused to answer:

Mr Gableman, did you or anyone representing you, either directly or indirectly through intermediaries, have discussions with Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, The Club for Growth, and/or the Coalition For America's Families, or their representatives, in which you or your representatives of intermediaries were assured that in excess  of $2 million would be raised and committed to their running advertisements designed to assist in your election?

In other words, can you look at the people of Wisconsin and tell them that before you decided to run for Supreme Court Justice, you had no knowledge of a commitment by what you refer to as "third party interest groups" were going to raise this money to assist your campaign effort?

Is there a reporter in this state who can get that question before Gableman?

disingenuous: lacking in candor; also : giving a false appearance of simple frankness

liar: a person who tells lies

lie: a: an assertion of something known or believed by the speaker to be untrue with intent to deceive b: an untrue or inaccurate statement that may or may not be believed true by the speaker

candor: unreserved, honest, or sincere expression

Is it a lie or just disengenuous to ask for the money, get the commitment from the special interests and then when they run the TV ads, Gableman claims he wanta them to stop?

What Did Gableman Know and When Did He Know It?

Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce (WMC), The Club for Growth, and The Coalition for America's Families are the three main organizations funding the effort to elect Michael Gableman to the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

While average Wisconsinites write out checks for ten and twenty dollars to support the candidate of their choice, these three groups, be the end of March, may have spent over $5 million.

Questions for Michael Gableman, or anyone else who knows the answers and is willing to stand up and tell the truth:

• Who are the people from these organizations that met with you or met with your intermediaries?
  
• When you were stunned to learn how much money they would raise for you, and you asked,"Where will the money come from?" what did they tell you?
• Do the names of companies like Wal-Mart, Home Depot, and the international pharmaceutical companies come up?
• Did anyone suggest that the money could be routed through the United States Chamber of Commerce and the Institute for Legal Reform so it would be hard to discover the source?
• If you are the winner in the Supreme Court race can you promise that you will not hear any case involving a a party that funneled money through any of the named organizations in this post?
  • Before hearing every case, will you promise to examine the financial records of these shadowy organizations to make sure they have not bought you?

Clouds Gathering Over East Washington Avenue.

There are storm clouds gathering over East Washington Avenue in Madison. That would be over 501 E. Washington, the home of Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce (WMC).

There is an undercurrent to this spring's Supreme Court race that was not present in last year's judicial election or any judicial election for that matter. Ever.

There is an anger and a determination to do something about WMC. Last winter, a commentator added the identities of all the WMC board members to one of my posts.  This week Jim Bouman blogged Use economic clout to hammer the arrogant Directors of WMC:

...a list of the directors of WMC... I found the President of TDS Telecommunications listed there--David Wittwer... Hey, I send Wittwer $70 a month.

I wrote him a letter. I told him that I had nothing but appreciation for the superb service received...Then, I told Wittwer I was dumping his company ASAP...

Many of us have been hammering away at WMC for over a year. We have made it clear that the board members are responsible for the actions of the organization, and that includes the purchasing and the content of political ads that are run against fine people like Louis Butler.

Wisconsinites don't like what is happening. Jim Pugh, WMC mouthpiece, can whine all he wants about the right of WMC to express itself, but that does not inoculate the member companies against a storm that is brewing. WMC members can have free speech and they have to take responsibility for it.

Over the past week it is clear that significant numbers of Wisconsinites will remember the nature of this judicial race and who is responsible.  In fact, many hold WMC responsible for TV ads run by other right wing fanatics. WMC can protest all it wishes, but they are identified as poisoning the well and encouraging this behavior in others.

I do not know who will win the Supreme Court race. I do know that WMC must change or become as irrelevant as the knee-jerk lefties who assume that anything that is good for the Wisconsin business climate is bad for the rest of the state.

Gablemean Surrogates Punched Out in Green Bay

Playing footloose with the truth was all it took for the Coalition for America's Families to find itself knocked off the airways in Green Bay. The bizarre right-wing group pasted together a television ad twisting the record of the Justice Louis Butler. The result was that WBAY-TV in Green Bay, pulled the anti-Butler ad:

WBAY in Green Bay began running the ad Wednesday night.

But general manager Steve Lavin says the station pulled it from the air Thursday because station lawyers thought it could be defamatory.

A full response to the ad, presented by the Butler Campaign the previous day, was posted on Wispolitics.com, Butler Campaign: Response to Coalition for America’s Families’ false ad and statements.

The rebuttal demonstrated that the shadowy organization working to get Gableman elected to the Supreme Court twisted the facts about specific cases and distorted the record of Butler who, in actuality,"voted to uphold criminal convictions in 97 percent of cases brought before the court." So much for the argument that Butler is "soft on crime."

Right now Gableman has the Coalition for America's Families, Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce (WMC), and the Club for Growth running advertisements designed to get him elected and to disparage the record of Louis Butler.

It is time for Wisconsin to say "We have had enough." Gableman obviously is not capable of distancing himself from his playmates. He had that opportunity two weeks ago when he refused to acknowledge, that the accusation that Butler had let lose a sexual predator, was not true.

Wisconsin deserves better than Gableman who does a poor job of picking playmates. Fortunately there is Louis Butler.

Madison Storm February 17, 2008. Blogging Unless the Power Goes

The storm moved in after midnight. It started with rain.

7:00 am No Sunday newspaper. We have great people doing the delivery but even they know not to venture out in this mess.  The street is covered with ice. I doubt we will get the cars unlocked today-they too are covered with ice. All the utility lines and tree limbs are sagging under the weight of the water and ice.

8:00 am Showered and then rinsed the bathtub and filled it with water. If the water pumping stations loses power we will have enough H2O for the dogs and cats; I plan to drink Crystal Light.

8:45 am A tree limb went down and with it the telephone line. We still have service.  The anchor in the house came out and the line is laying across the line.

8:47 am The rain turned to snow.

8:50 am Boris is out there in the snow and rain having a grand time. He is trying to carry the six foot limb that broke of the birch tree.

9:00 am Called the AT&T. The representative answered in three minutes and told me that crews would be out by Tuesday. I told her her "Tuesday if we were lucky." She smiled through the phone line and thanked me for being understanding. She said I could pick up the limb and that it was all right if I wanted to get the downed line out of the snow. I am thankful i did not get someone in the Philippines.

9:05 am It is back to rain.

9:10 am I am dressed for when hell freezes over and headed out the back door.

• Removed the downed limb.
• Put the step ladder in the yard and laid the line over it. Hooked the end of the line to the fence. Now the line is four feet off the ground.
• Moved fire wood close to the back door in case we need it later.
• The dogs want to play. Threw the ball and Frisbee for ten minutes to Boris and Roxy. Sara opened the door and told me that I was an idiot. The dogs are having a grand time. I am wet.
• Knocked icicles form the edge of the roof. I know better than to try to remove ice from tree limbs - it only breaks them.

9:35 am It appears the precipitation has stopped or slowed to a drizzle. I am going to go check the flashlights and get out some fresh batteries. Boris is still ruling over the backyard.

11:15 am It can't decide what to do. It could be a drizzle, it could be sleet, I know it isn't snow or sunshine. The dogs are having a grand time. But I have a feeling that the weight of the weather on the branches is going to start taking a toll soon.

11:45 am Another small branch, about six feet long, 3 inches in diameter, separated from a birch tree.

11:59 am Definitely a mixture of sleet and snow.

12:06 pm Definitely snow. A good day to read. Along with the campaign to expose WMC, I meant to read Judicial Elections: Robe Warriors by Zach Patton in the March, 2006 issue of Governing Magazine. Join me (this merits its own post later in the week; thanks to Jim Rosenberg @ Random Thoughts for the reminder):

The real power player on the business side is the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce, which has dedicated millions of dollars in recent elections
to reshaping the state-level judiciary with business-friendly judges.
The chamber, which represents the interests of more than 3 million
businesses across the country, has reportedly spent $120 million in
just the past four years, most of it through the Institute for Legal
Reform, a tax-free affiliate. All that spending is paying off: In
2004, the chamber won every single contest in which it was involved.
Those triumphs all but guaranteed that spending by groups on both
sides of the tort overhaul debate would continue to rise. "We're going
to see more of the same for 2006, if not worse," Weiss predicts.
One reason judicial campaigns are costing so much is that they're
being waged more and more on the television screen. From 2000 to 2004,
the number of states that saw judicial TV ads quadrupled to 16,
meaning there were ads in four out of every five states in which
candidates ran head to head. Spending on TV ads in 2004 totaled $24.4
million, obliterating the previous record of $10.6 million set in
2000.

2:00 pm  No cars on our street since 9:35 am. No bicycles either. Oops.

The snow is piling up and I have no clue as to whether switching from rain to snow is better.  I think it is. Rain would have formed more ice increasing the likelihood of bringing down more trees and power lines. I think.

According to DANE 101 the Hillary Clinton event is canceled.  They think.

Sara is watching something about Yellowstone on the History Channel. Natasha is with us and will probably not go back to her dorm tonight. Alex came in from Milwaukee Friday to join Natasha in auditioning for an extra role in the Johnny Depp Dillinger film. She went back to Milwaukee last night to beat the storm.  Good move.

We have enough Crystal Light to get through Tuesday. I love the raspberry.

I have an appointment at the Labor Temple at 1:00 tomorrow followed by another across the street at Coffee Cargo. I plan to make both of them.

3:00 pm First phone call of the day since 9:00 am. It is from Hillary Clinton. At least it sounded like her.

4:00 pm Another phone call. Hillary again.

4:05 pm Another phone call. Natasha's roommate is ill and stranded in the dorm. Sara and Natasha go out and spend 15 minutes scraping the ice from the car.

5:00 pm Sara and Natasha are back from picking up the prescription and dropping it off. Sara says the roads are better where there is no plowing. The car gets traction in the snow. No snow, and it is ice. Another phone call. It is Hillary Clinton.

6:00 pm  Dinner. Sara, not too subtlety suggests that maybe I overreacted and the danger from the storm was not all that great. Sara and Natasha have been drinking the Crystal Light.  There is only enough to get us through Monday.

10:00 pm  Power is out to the west of us. I am vindicated.

The Capital Times Leads Wisconsin Journalism into 21st Century

Like most people, I was taken by surprise when The Capital Times announced that it was discontinuing publication of a daily newspaper and entering a new world - a world of on-line journalism and a two-day-a-week newspaper.

The surprise was that not in the demise of the daily newspaper. The surprise was the publishers and editors realizing that the future was on the Internet.

The die was cast a half a century ago when The Capital Times and the Wisconsin State Journal entered into a joint operating agreement to use the same press. In what appeared to be a stroke of good fortune and insight, The Capital Times won the right to publish in the afternoon.  The State Journal was 'stuck' with the morning.

In successive years, city after city, the newspapers folded. First the afternoon papers went under. Then cities with four dailies found themselves with one morning paper as television reduced the demand for competing newspapers.

For the past forty years Madison's afternoon newspaper was fighting a losing battle. Under the circumstances, it is amazing they hung in this long.

Then came the Internet.  There is an entire generation that has never read a newspaper but maybe a dozen times in their lives. But they get their news. They get it from the Internet and  television, which accelerated the demise of the dailies and is also feeling the impact.

This is a marvelous opportunity for Madison and The Capital Times. In the tradition of The Capital Times and the Progressive Magazine, there is an opportunity to not only present local news but also a continuous stream of analysis of critical state and national issues in a most timely manner.

Go for it.

Another Reason to Kill Your Television: Logo Overload

It started with those little logos at the bottom right hand corner of the screen.  The logo of the network you were watching.

Then the logos evolved.

Some start moving.

Some started advertising the next hour's programming or next season's shows.

Some even moved and jumped and marketed other shows.

Networks suck.

You are their prisoner. You pay them for the right to watch their shows and then on your dime they shove advertising into the format with no respect for those who created the programming you are watching. Or you.

Forty years ago, we heard about subliminal advertising. Millions was spent on figuring out how to flash messages to viewers without their knowing it.

Then some genius figured out subliminal was unnecessary.

Bite me.

Selecting the Democratic Presidential Nominee: Obama

In my lifetime there were two candidates who offered real change. One was George McGovern and the other Bobby Kennedy. Neither was electable. One's campaign was cut down by the felonious Nixon administration; the other by an assassin's bullet.

There are four qualities or characteristics that we examine in selecting a presidential nominee.  They are positions on the issues, personality-trust, electability, and propensity to advance fundamental change.

We rarely get past the first two qualities. For each voter, the candidate's positions on critical issues such as choice, war, support of public education, and free speech rule out the vast majority of candidates. Left with only two or three serious contenders, the issue of personality takes hold. And then we move on to the hypothetical match-ups where the pundits speculate as to which candidates do best against the various nominees of the opposing party.

Consequently, it is unusual to view a candidate through the prism of fundamental change.

Few candidates offer themselves up as advocates of change. When they do, it is not as a catalyst for progress but as part of a rant against the bureaucracy, usually the pledge to bring change to Washington.

Governors from both parties, like Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan promised change. Neither weakened the grip of the lobbyists, neither ended corporate welfare, neither advanced the cause of social and economic justice, though Carter tried.

Barack Obama provides the opportunity for the Democrats to nominate a candidate who is sound on the issues, has the personality and public trust to win, and is promises fundamental change. On issues from war to poverty, economic development to the environment, Obama knows the priorities.

Most importantly his campaign statements and his performance as a United States Senator demonstrates he appreciates the narrow path a president must navigate to stand on principle and to compromise when required.

There is no one thing that Obama has said or done that leads me to the conclusion that he is to be trusted in uncharted waters, but it is the compilation of his record.

• He was prepared to stand before popular sentiment in 2002 and 2003 and question the foundations for the war in Iraq.
• He understands that to combat poverty, we need to enhance the family and advance public education. 
• He appreciates the problems created by NAFTA and that we need to make American products competitive abroad while we protect jobs in this country.
• He recognized the mistake made by Congress in compromising our civil rights and civil liberties in the overzealous attempt to ferret out terrorists.

i admire his appreciation for liberties and rights, his determination to get to the root of poverty, and his commitment to economic justice.

Most impressive was his judgment in questioning the premise of the Iraq war.  He performed far better than the so-called more experienced and mature leaders who should have known better. That is why I trust him with our future.

Judicial Activism: The Phrase You Will Hear For The Next Seventy Days

In the next two weeks the campaign for Justice on the Wisconsin Supreme Court will unfold. The biggest spender will not be the candidates but Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce (WMC).

In its effort to unseat Justice Louis Butler, WMC will collect millions of dollars from its members and out of state right wing contributors to fund its issue ads against Butler, the incumbent justice.

The first of these issue ads, schedule for release in the next week of two, will probably drive home WMC's ideological message about "judicial activism."

The groundwork was laid last year when the the Federalist Society funded the writing of a white paper by Milwaukee attorney Rick Esenberg who teaches two classes at Marquette Law School.

The paper is entitled is entitled A Court Unbound? The Recent Jurisprudence of the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

Then last month WMC funded videos entitled, Prof. Rick Esenberg: The Wisconsin Supreme Court, A Court Unbound with  Esenberg orally expounding on the subject.

Finally WMC scheduled a series of sessions on the subject for February and March, WMC Regional Meetings: Wisconsin Supreme Court Unbound

All of this funded by WMC members who do not mind the WMC logo finding its way onto the forthcoming attacks against Butler.

Most of the companies who authorize these advertisements would never put their own name and logo on the advertisements.

As the anti-Butler campaign heats up, the judicial activism/court unbounded nonsense may not catch on.

That is what happened when WMC went after Linda Clifford. The public simply did not care.  So WMC went to Plan 'B.'

Recall that in last spring's Supreme Court election, Clifford was referred to, in tones reminiscent of a horror movie, that she was an "IMMIGRATION LAWYER," conjuring up visions of the 5' 3" attorney wading across the Rio Grande carrying several aliens from Mexico on her back. Then she would go back across the border and bring in five more illegals.

Needless to say, the immigration work that Clifford did was to get work visas for professional, highly skilled workers, needed in the very industries that make up the WMC membership.

Never let truth or accuracy get in the way of a good, nasty advertisement.

Update: I corrected Esenberg's credential at Marquette. I thought he taught one class. As iTenant notes, he teaches two classes and that gives hum full faculty status.