Maintaining a political blog in Wisconsin

Is like banging your head against a [scuffed limestone] wall:

[Dane County Circuit Court Judge Maryann] Sumi argues that the state senate violated the open-meetings law by failing to provide 24 hours' notice of a legislative meeting — in this case, the conference committee meeting that forwarded the bill to the full senate. Yet, in her order, she doesn’t address the clear exemption to the rule provided in Senate Rule 93, which allows for no notice of proceedings for conference committee bills. The state statutes clearly give precedence to legislative rules in the case of conflict; Sumi simply believes no conflict exists, ignoring the fact that the bill was, in fact, a conference committee bill.

The rest is blargh blargh dirty hippies blargh union thugs blargh. This is in the National Review (which once upon a time preluded its founder's teevee chat show with the second Brandenburg: these days Old Bach is spinning in his crypt like Frank Luntz on methamphetamines) and its own rather less meticulous composer is the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute "senior fellow" Christian Schneider. WPRI is another outfit wrapped up with Journal Communications, Inc. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel not infrequently features WPRI "policy research" as front page news (the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit is considerably less impressed), Christian Schneider is an oft-featured columnist, and Mike Nichols, another WPRI "senior fellow," is a regular columnist.

And Charlie Sykes, another of Journal Communications, Inc.'s marquee performer/clowns, edits WPRI's own magazine and so on and so forth.

They're every single one of them cuddled together in bed.

They also generally don't know what they're talking about and the above is a useful case in point. In fact Judge Sumi found that the defendants failed to give two hours notice of the meeting, whereas the statute is as clear as clear can be: "in no case may the notice be provided less than 2 hours in advance of the meeting." In. No. Case. Judicial conservatives, "strict constructionists," "plain meaning textualists," are you listening.

Hypocrite

Moreover the violation concerned the Republicans' selection of a tiny venue for the conference committee meeting, which served to disallow members of the public from attending, where larger accommodation was available. This the WPRI "senior fellow" Schneider simply ignores, despite its being among the crucial connections between the Open Meetings Law and the Wisconsin constitution at the heart of the action.

Schneider then hypocritically claims that Judge Sumi "doesn’t address the clear exemption to the rule provided in Senate Rule 93." Well of course she does, as this invalid argument was among the Fitzgeralds' defenses to the complaint. And there is no such "clear exemption" because Senate Rule 93 addresses the manner of notice required, and not the time of notice required. We've been through this months ago, after Ellen Nowak, chief of staff to the Waukesha County executive, had published at WisPolitics dot com her tissue of defamatory misrepresentations.

Judge Sumi doesn't "simply believe" no conflict exists: The unrebutted evidence that witnesses presented during the court's hearings demonstrated that no conflict exists. And the cherry on the backside of Schneider's remarkable cluelessness is his appeal to a Senate Rule for guidance on what he admits was a conference committee, for which Joint Rules of procedure exist, and which Judge Sumi also addressed.

Senior fellow: The law "allows for no notice." Pure b.s.

In short, WPRI's Schneider is hopeless, uninformed, and flat wrong.

Perfesser

Meanwhile in Journal Communications, Inc.'s daily organ the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, the equally addled Patrick McIlheran appeals to yet another Journal Communications, Inc. frequent columnist, Marquette's professor of #rwnj law Rick Esenberg,* to whom McIlheran laughably attributes a "most enlightening insight," linking to the prof's blog post.

McIlheran claims Esenberg "dismantled Sumi's understanding." Except Esenberg did no such thing and in fact repeats the travesty of law committed by the WaukCo. executive's chief of staff. And indeed if one follows the comments thread at Esenberg's blog you will discover your humble correspondent reiterating precisely the evidence and law which yesterday appeared as among the bases for Judge Sumi's decision, and which Esenberg either simply handwaves away or ignores completely.

And has never addressed, as far as I know. Because it's best to remain silent when you are wrong, I suppose, and allow your quasi-colleagues at Journal Communications, Inc. to wallow in their misunderstandings and present long-since-debunked "arguments" as alleged "journalism."

And, naturally, WPRI/Journal Communications, Inc.'s Charlie Sykes will repeat this complete nonsense once again this morning. We discussed similar situations at our panel event in Madison on May 12, and the Journal Communications, Inc. family is making us look like prophets.

Now maybe if we were to predict the Rapture, it will happen for sure and then all the JRNers will fly off to ... somewhere. It really is a joke.

* Esenberg is also trundled out as an expert "who has followed the case closely" in the Journal-Sentinel's straight news report of yesterday's decision. Did you know that he's the only lawyer in the State who has?

Ron Johnson misrepresents a WPRI poll

But the ensuing double negative can't improve things

There's an awful lot of baloney-slicing in this account (bottom line: Ron Johnson is full of it) but one amusing tidbit stands out:

[UW poli sci prof Ken] Goldstein, who ran the WPRI poll cited in the Johnson ad, said the campaign's language did not accurately summarize the question he posed. He noted the wide disagreement among policy experts over whether the Democrats' legislation was a "government takeover."*

Yeah, you don't want to mess with Goldstein and the WPRI's polls; they're a little touchy since their school voucher "fiasco" got busted.

In fairness, Ron Johnson's only been following politics since May when Dick Morris told him to on Fox News, so he wouldn't have known.

* That particular "wide disagreement" strikes me more as one between objective observers and hysterical propagandists.

For an example of the latter, look no further than WPRI's own "senior fellow" Christian Schneider, who recently claimed proposed health care reforms were "a complete federal government takeover of health care," and featuring "the government dictating to individuals what doctors they can see and what procedures they can get."

All of those would be false even if he was talking about Canada.

The WPRI "senior fellow," by the way, was delivering those hysterical propagandas on behalf of none other than Ron Johnson. On behalf of the so-called "nonpartisan" WPRI. Then fluffered by Charlie Sykes.**

So there are good reasons to fix that outfit with a jaundiced eye.

** The AM yeller's editorial contribution was a picture of a toilet, in predictable accordance with his coprophilia/coprophobia themes.

Think tank hook-up a "fiasco" for UW-Madison

Bradley cash — not liberals — is pollster's bad juju

Via Mpeterson:

The university described WPRI as a "nonpartisan, not-for-profit think tank" in announcing the partnership last year. But the institute acknowledges a free-market, limited government slant and receives funding from the Bradley Foundation, a Milwaukee group that supports numerous conservative causes.

Quite the tale, this here.

As a result [of the "fiasco"], the university recently asked WPRI to stop using its logo, has stopped providing graduate students for the project and won't publicize future polls.

Definitely well deep into "fiasco" territory. Approaching "goat rodeo."

And this makes no sense whatsoever:

Asked about other schools that would have rejected the deal, then-Interim Provost Julie Underwood said: "They don't have the kind of responsibility that we do because of our national prominence and our great resources."

That's not why you don't reject the deal, that's why you do reject it.

What I don't understand is why Prof. Ken Goldstein is lambasting the "liberals" for his discomforts. It appears he made his own bed with the WPRI gang (which includes just about every local right-wing Republican "pundit" notable). In fact it's difficult to understand why he's even surprised by what all transpired. What did he expect?

Academics aren't that naïve, are they?

By God, if the mere mention of "conservative think tank" doesn't set the klaxons to pealing, then you sure can't follow much politics.

eta: Bit of an update up in here.

And Emily Mills's accompanying photo-illustration is genius.*

Finally, Milwaukee Magazine editor Bruce Murphy gets a lick in:

Claims one former Democrat officeholder: "[WPRI president George] Lightbourn held jobs in budgeting and administration that were considered egghead jobs, but George was often referred to as George Lightbrains."

So mean! By the way, here's Mr. Lightbourn complaining about his overly generous government pension again, courtesy the Journal-Sentinel, which printed nary a word about the WPRI/UW "fiasco."

* Depicted is WPRI propagandist and Journal Broadcast Group superstar of all media Charlie Sykes, for the uninitiated.

Feingold on that WPRI polling "fiasco"

"As has been widely reported, WPRI is a group with strong Republican ties, most prominently to Tommy Thompson. As the Associated Press reported last week there have been serious questions about WPRI manipulating polling results so the media and voters should think twice about the credibility of WPRI's polling." — Feingold spokesman Trevor Miller

Veteran Wisconsin poll watcher Bill Christofferson notes that another Republican hopeful appears to be trending rapidly toward complete obscurity since daring to question the age of the Earth:

Bad news for Terrence Wall. In a recent Rasmussen poll, GOP Senate candidate Terrence Wall had 69% name recognition. But in the WPRI poll it had slipped to 18%. Do you think maybe someone's numbers are a little off?

xoff: We Prop up Republican Ideologues

The University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Political Science disavowed its relationship with WPRI in early February.

WPRI helps indict Gableman

Via the "nonpartisan" geniuses at the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, in direct support of the Wisconsin Judicial Commission's case against Michael Gableman:

WJC: The false statement of fact [contained in Gableman's teevee ad] is that something that Louis Butler did during the course of his representation of Reuben Lee Mitchell allowed Mitchell to offend again. And that is demonstrably false.

Compare and contrast:

WPRI: The ad ... accus[es] Butler of freeing his client so he could then go on to molest another child.

Yes, that is precisely what the WJC contends. That is exactly the "statement" the WJC argues the teevee ad contains. And that accusation is indeed demonstrably false. And Gableman knew it.

Case closed: thanks for coming out.

The WPRI blog post is comically rife with baseless innuendo and general idiocy. For example:

Liberal Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson waited a full 110 seconds before interrupting WJC executive director James C. Alexander’s opening statement ... *

She didn't interrupt Mr. Alexander at all. The WJC's counsel had just finished reading aloud a complete paragraph from his prepared opening remarks and in fact was in the process of silently turning a page to the next one when the Chief Justice inquired of him:

Are we looking at this language [in the teevee ad] from the viewpoint of the speaker, and what the speaker's intent was, and what the speaker did, or are we looking at it from the listener's?

A crucial point. Once again, according to WPRI, it's the former:

WPRI: The ad ... accus[es] Butler of freeing his client so he could then go on to molest another child.

The WPRI describes itself as a "think tank." Good work.

* To be sure, Alexander was interrupted repeatedly by "conservative" Justice Patience Roggensack, but apparently those interruptions were deemed unworthy of notice by the "nonpartisan" tank-thinkers.

(Of course it's ludicrous to criticize any of the justices for interrogating either attorney. That's what they're all there for.)

We Push Republican Ideas

"Nonpartisan" WPRI. Here's your invitation:*

Republican Ideas, like school choice, which didn't look as good in the last poll as the numbers WPRI decided to emphasize made it appear.

WPRI's concerns were hardly "nonpartisan":

I'm not concerned about journalists. I'm concerned about the Scott Ross types who would enjoy being able to portray WPRI's own data as showing lack of support for choice [which it did]. I know it's a pain in the ass but I’ve been burned a couple of times** and I don't need to be the one holding the gas can.

— WPRI president George Lightbourn

"Holding the gas can" is an odd metaphor for "honestly presenting a consistent array of results drawn from comparable samples." One might suspect it would have been less enjoyable to point out that WPRI's position on vouchers finds weak support Statewide than to have revealed Mr. Lightbourn's fearful partisan shenanigans.

* Includes bonus Gableman sighting.

** "You know what burns my ass?" "What?" "A flame about this high."

Speaking of the Wisconsin pee our eye ...

One of their "fellows" has a serious reading comprehension problem:

[F]or the President to flatly state that only Republicans do it is insulting.

Poor guy, he's insulted. Except the president stated no such thing. He's speaking, at an undisguisedly partisan event, solely about those attack ads which are being run against Democratic candidates.

Obviously. What do you expect at an undisguisedly partisan rally?

And those ads are disguised as the speech of nonpartisan citizens' groups, even though they are all run by Republican Party operatives. Not that much unlike the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, which laughably advertises its own self as a "nonpartisan" "think tank."

In fact it's tremendously difficult to say which is more comical when it comes to describing the WPRI: "nonpartisan," or "think tank."

It was the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, one may recall, that convinced a University of Wisconsin political science professor to jigger around with the results of a poll because it did not effectively enough demonstrate the results the WPRI desired from the outset.

So blatant was that chicanery that the University of Wisconsin published a statement disavowing any relationship with the WPRI.

And then there was the recent embarrassment before a unanimous panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Those three clearly didn't have any reading comprehension problem.

At least Obama wasn't being disingenuous about his partisanship.

Earlier: WPRI helps indict Gableman

WPRI report is "fatal" to minimum markup case

Its thinking tanked, sez 7th Circuit panel

Note Reagan-appointed judges Posner, Ripple, and Kanne:

Although the authors of the WPRI Report argue that "[m]ost of the empirical research done on retail gasoline markets suggests that the primary problem in the market is not predatory pricing, but rather a propensity towards price collusion," there is no evidence in the WPRI Report of any actual collusion in the Wisconsin motor vehicle fuel market.

Conclude all three:

The lack of evidence in the record supporting Flying J’s allegations of collusive conduct by gasoline dealers is fatal to its claim that the motor vehicle fuel provisions of the Act are preempted by the Sherman Act.

On teh web: WPRI.

Not even WPRI can spin this

And they collected the data:

Since mid-November the percentage of people who strongly oppose Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker — who view him "very unfavorably" — has more than doubled from 19% to 41%.

TMJ-4's makeup department better order a few extra kilos of talcum for Charlie Sykes tomorrow morning. Those lights are warm enough.

Even more remarkable:

Half the people in the survey were asked how they felt about "stripping most public employees of their right to collectively bargain over benefits and working conditions as part of a ploy to eliminate public employee unions altogether." With the issue framed that way, 58% opposed it and 32% supported it.

Thirty-two percent support a cunningly dishonest government-run project to take advantage of its own citizens. Isn't that lovely.

eta: On his teevee show this morning, Charlie Sykes took pains to point out that WPRI's pollster Ken Goldstein is a public employee. Doubtless Prof. Goldstein would appreciate this snide ad hominem swipe at his academic and professional objectivity.

Yet despite Sykes's heroic efforts to downplay the significance of the WPRI poll — its sample of respondents skews disproportionately toward union and Democratic households, he claimed — left completely unsaid throughout was the poll's greatest significance: that it comported substantially with a number of recent Statewide and national polls conducted by both Democratic and Republican outfits, all of which substantially comport with one another.

To wit, both Scott Walker and his policies are highly unpopular.

"Really diverse group we've got here today," said Sykes of his panel, which contained two WPRI "senior fellows" and Patrick McIlheran.

McIlheran nominated Scott Walker his "Winner of the Week" while Sykes said of the 14 Democratic Senators that the "adults" among them were being "held hostage by extremists like Chris Larson and Lena Taylor." Sykes also predicted that either the Senate stand-off will end early this week or else it will go on for "months," adding false dichotomy to his ever-expanding repertoire of logical fallacies.

Mercifully, no panelist attempted an analysis of the merits of Republican Senate leader Scott Fitzgerald's ersatz "arrest warrants."

OTOH it might have made Sykes's one-note tedium entertaining.

The best WPRI story of all times

From the archives:

Its thinking tanked, sez 7th Circuit panel

Note Reagan-appointed judges Posner, Ripple, and Kanne:

Although the authors of the WPRI Report argue that "[m]ost of the empirical research done on retail gasoline markets suggests that the primary problem in the market is not predatory pricing, but rather a propensity towards price collusion," there is no evidence in the WPRI Report of any actual collusion in the Wisconsin motor vehicle fuel market.

Conclude all three:

The lack of evidence in the record supporting Flying J’s allegations of collusive conduct by gasoline dealers is fatal to its claim that the motor vehicle fuel provisions of the Act are preempted by the Sherman Act.

On teh web: WPRI.

WPRI unveils catchy new slogan

The Wisconsin Policy Research Institute is a "think tank":










They do say that honesty is the best policy.

On teh web: WPRI.

Also: WPRI scribe Charlie Sykes "unreliable" — shocking report

Can't get enough WPRI? Try the Journal-Sentinel.

Today's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel has not one but two columns by Wisconsin Policy Research Institute "senior fellows," neither of which identify WPRI for the right-wing Bradley Foundation-funded Republican Party/Scott Walker shill that it is. In fact the president of the Bradley Foundation, Michael Grebe, was Scott Walker's campaign chairman.

WPRI also has a magazine of its own, which is edited by right-wing radio shouter Charlie Sykes. Charlie Sykes is also an employee of Journal Communications, Inc., which owns the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.

And the Journal-Sentinel endorsed Scott Walker for governor of Wisconsin, despite the paper's occasional quarter-hearted editorial page objections to Walker and his henchpeople's policies. Just so you know.

WPRI condemned Ron Johnson's labor practices

The WPRI is a nonpartisan [*spit take*] think tank

Flash back — April 10, 2009:

Wisconsin Policy Research Institute senior fellow Christian Schneider reviews draft legislation circulating in the Wisconsin State Assembly. He's inflamed by what he discovers: It seems an employer tax credit was proposed by Assembly Democrats for small businesses which hire certain otherwise disadvantaged individuals, including ex-felons. This outrage, announces the seniorly fellow, is simply "social engineering" under cover of exploiting the economic recession.

Flash forward — October 8, 2010:

Johnson's campaign would not say how many inmates his companies employ. State records, obtained by the AP through a State open records request, indicate the companies have participated in the work release program since 1998.

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

$10K times nine inmates times twelve years equals $1.08M.

Government health care, Ron Johnson has often shouted, is the "greatest assault on [his] personal Freedoms in [his] lifetime."

But today the WPRI sure hearts it some Ron Johnson.

In a strictly nonpartisan sense, of course.

Earlier — Ron Johnson: Communist China is where it's at

David Blaska funnies

In which a WPRI arch-partisan gets a little defensive:

David Blaska:
WPRI is not a "partisan" organization. It is conservative. And if that is wrong then how do you countenance the Havens Institute of the Rural Sociology Department?

Kyle Nabilcy:
Since there are probably more than four people reading this exchange, can I officially ask:

What the hell is the "Havens Institute of the Rural Sociology Department"? Since it seems that the department to which Blaska refers has been renamed the Community and Environmental Sociology Department, I can only assume that the "Havens" reference is equally out of date. I can't find any reference to such an entity on The Google.

David Blaska:
I'm sorry, it is the Dept. of Sociology (not rural) Havens Center.

Kyle Nabilcy:
Ah. Let's see here...

The A. E. Havens Center for the Study of Social Structure and Social Change is dedicated to promoting critical intellectual reflection and exchange.

Yeah, that sounds pretty unique to the left-wing. Good call, Dave!

The Daily Page

Incidentally the inspired scribblings of none other than the same David Blaska are featured currently at WPRI.org attempting to show how "on the crime issue, you can always count on liberals getting it wrong" by disingenuously caricaturing such "liberal arguments" as, "Don't trust the pigs." Mr. Blaska is described sardonically therein as "a former Democrat." Nope, ain't no partisans here, Nosiree Bub!

WPRI "hides the decline"

I've just completed George's voucher trick:

So this is how the "non-partisan think tank" works.

Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

— God's Ninth Suggestion (Beta version)

The problem is that it reflects a willingness to assume away inconvenient facts and then to construct graphs for broader public consumption that "hide" those facts and that are, taken by themselves, fundamentally dishonest.

— WPRI contributor Richard Esenberg

Sage advice, duly noted. Would that it applied to the WPRI.

Earlier: Gingrich et al engineered WI Demoncrat outrage

WPRI's Jack of Napes

WPRI "senior fellow" Mike Nichols advances a ludicrous false dichotomy* between science and tarot cards and concludes: "tarot cards." If anybody can make sense of this mess, let me know.

* See also the trilemma: Lord, liar, or WPRI senior fellow?

WPRI "senior fellow" is hot on the trail

Conservative think tank's breaking report:*
This Supreme Court race just got a lot more interesting

About a month ago, yeah.

[T]he campaign makes no secret of the fact that, during law school, [Wis. S. Ct. candidate JoAnne Kloppenburg] interned for the liberal stalwart, Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson.

Why would she make it a secret? Because she's scared of WPRI "senior fellows" rummaging around in her résumé? More importantly, Kloppenburg has been a law enforcement officer for the last 21 years, which is undoubtedly a less convenient fact for the WPRI crowd.

It's good they're finally paying attention, however.

* The op-ed page used to be kept clear of advertising.

WPRI "nonpartisan research" revealed

Apparently it involves Googling "impressionable college girls."*

Creepy. What's he doing at the State Capitol, stalking?

* You may take that about as seriously as their actual research.

On teh web: WPRI.

Speaking of your Bradley Foundation intellectuals

Who could forget this all-times classic:

Although the authors of the WPRI Report argue that "[m]ost of the empirical research done on retail gasoline markets suggests that the primary problem in the market is not predatory pricing, but rather a propensity towards price collusion," there is no evidence in the WPRI Report of any actual collusion in the Wisconsin motor vehicle fuel market. — Seventh Circuit Ct. App.

Price collusion = voter fraud.

Train boosters tempt Walker with bistro minivan

Food services car could turn the trick in new cost analysis

But seriously:

This train is not aimed at carrying people between Milwaukee and Madison (although it will if somebody wants to take it). This train is mainly intended to take people from Madison to Chicago and back.

There simply is no good way of making a 1-day trip from Madison to downtown Chicago and back. Driving I-90 to the loop can take 4 hours each way, and flying there takes about as long (when you include the TSA time and the hour or more it takes to take a taxi in from O'Hare).

The train (if Walker allows it to go forward) will take under 3 hours Madison-Chicago. While that doesn't seem like much of a difference, just an hour at most, there is a huge quality difference between train time and driving time. Time behind the wheel in Chicago traffic is unpleasant, stressful and tiring. Time on a train is comfortable, relaxing and productive.

There's one person who gets it.

Which reminds me: The other day when Jack Craver correctly criticized the Republican propagandist Wisconsin Policy Research Institute for its disingenuous portrayal of the Milwaukee-Madison leg of this enormous, nationwide rail project as merely a discrete alternative to taking the bus, a WPRI "senior fellow" turned up to mock Craver's emphasizing the overall plan as an "ancillary issue."

Read the comments. WPRI is an unintentional comedy machine.

If only its effluents could power the locomotives.

And, the same author whose commentary is indented above debunks comparisons between Wisconsin governor-elect Scott Walker's heroics and those of the NJ Tea Party poster boy Chris Christie:

The Wisconsin project's capital expenses are 100% federally funded while the ARC tunnel was only 30% federally funded ...

Because NJ had committed $2.7 billion for the ARC tunnel, even after paying $300 million in cancellation costs, NJ still has $2.4 billion it can now use for highways. By contrast Wisconsin will walk away from the project with a new debt of up to $100 million.

— TransitRider

Moreover, Wisconsin is a donor State and Walker's refusing nearly $1bn in federal investment will do little to improve that balance.