ARTICLE
May 17, 2012
Air pollution
By Amy Goodman
Campaign spending and campaign TV advertising have skyrocketed, but the broadcasting industry would rather you didn't know that.
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GARVEYBLOG
May 16, 2012
No one said it would be dull!
By Ed Garvey
When Joe Gruber and I drove to Milwaukee last February to protest the decision of Scott Walker to cut the heart out of Wisconsin's Family Leave law, we thought it might be lonely picketing the state office building on a windy and very cold day. But right on cue, a couple buses arrived carrying UWM students to join the picket line. We marched in the cold and talked to the crowd. It was an upbeat crowd, but no one would have predicted what followed. Two days later, the "uprising" was under way and you know the rest of the story.
We are down to a short time from judgment day. Will people turn out to vote in huge numbers? I am confident the answer is yes! This is our chance to reclaim our state, our chance to alter the way campaigns are funded. Saturday we will gather in Chippewa Falls for Fighting Bob Fest North and then on September 15, in Madison, we will gather for Fighting Bob Fest #11.
I sense that progressives are ready to do battle. Everywhere I go the conversation rapidly moves to the gubernatorial election. I have heard no one claim "burn-out." So get out your calendar and write down May 19 and September 15 for Fighting Bob. We are also on radio. "Blog Talk Radio" is on from 11 a.m. to noon every Thursday. We are slowly building an audience and urge you to join us. It is fun!
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GARVEYBLOG
May 15, 2012
Here come the Bucks
By Ed Garvey
There goes your money! The header on a minor story in the New York Times today reads, "Govenor signs Vikings Bill." We have been writing about this theft of taxpayer money. Well, "theft" is too strong since the good people of Minnesota, calling themselves Vikings as if they are shareholders, agreed to be taken to the cleaners in order to keep their beloved Vikings in Minnesota. A deal is a deal even if one party holds a gun to the head if the other. Build the stadium or say good-bye to the Vikings. Some deal! The cost? Only $975 million. Less than half of the JPMorgan loss!
The Vikings, with a franchise worth a billion or so, will pay about half of the costs. The people will pay the rest. If it gets delayed? Dunno. Cost of change orders? If the Vikings change their mind in five years and move? Or threaten to move? Oh well. What are the odds? (Pretty darn good.)
Here is the warning. Herb Kohl has been watching the Vikings--not the on-field stuff but the off-field maneuvers. Kohl will moan that the Bradley Center is outdated; the scoreboard is too small; parking is bad; restaurants mediocre. The solution? Easy does it: Instead of worrying about the size of the scoreboard, worry about the points on the board and ask, Can Herb always be wrong when it comes to player talent?
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ARTICLE
May 15, 2012
A deep, rich tradition of lying
By Ed Garvey
The U.S. keeps getting in wars, and the government keeps lying about them.
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GUESTBLOG
May 14, 2012
Triumvirate of campaign deform
By Bill Kraus
Despite widespread agreement on the deleterious effects of money in politics, we have a long history of not doing much about all the things we complain about.
Almost all attempts, from the worthy to the fantasized, have been thwarted by three formidable forces:
1.) Recalcitrant Republicans who think their minority position means that only disproportionatley large amounts of money will achieve electoral success. To put it bluntly an even playing field is not likely to be on their wish list.
2.) Duplicitous Democrats who lament their self- perceived inability to raise as much money as their Republican opponents and support regulation of campaign spending until they achieve a working majority despite this handicap. Their appetite for reform depends entirely on whether or not they have that majority.
3.) The U.S. Supreme Court whose rulings for three centuries have firmly rejected regulation of and limits on political spending.
I know, I know, Republicans once supported the disclosure of political contributors and the Supreme Court even encouraged legislation that would do this, and many on the left continue to believe in and invent ways to bring small contributors with their minimal money into play in a big way. But the fact is that we are about to have a billion dollar presidential campaign.
So what are we to do? Sit still in front of our TV sets and watch the increasingly clever and creative appeals designed by an increasingly clever and creative campaign management industry? Let our answering machines collect for future erasure an endless accumulation of robo phone calls? Read and toss the beautiful 4-color brochures that arrive with the daily mail? Spend endless hours with our various, miraculous electronic devices sorting through the fire hose rush of tweets, posts, blogs, and propaganda of all sizes and shapes that all that money is buying and dispersing into our own cyberspace?
Not appealing, but a case can be made is that what more and more of us are both doing and complaining about.
What is overlooked is that we still have the ultimate weapon. We have what all that money is being spent to get. We have our votes.
We can vote against the negative and for the positive. If all is negative, we can vote for the lesser of the two.
We can stigmatize over-spending.
We can kick back against the parallel campaigns by the mom and apple pie organizations who are promoting their own little ideologies.
We can get back into politics. We can tell candidates what kind of campaign spending we want and don’t want.
We can put our votes where our mouths are in any and every way.
If we can’t find candidates or causes that agree with us, we can join with others who feel the way we do and let the professionals know that our votes and their strategies are incompatible.
I’m dreaming? Perhaps.
But it beats sitting on the sidelines bitching about our screwed-up electoral system.
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GARVEYBLOG
May 14, 2012
Wow!
By Ed Garvey
Here is the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's unbiased assessment of Scott Walker: "Walker is now a national figure and a rising star in the Republican Party, a man on the move, keeping up a relentless campaign schedule in the state after engaging in a methodical fund rising drive around the country."
We need a "laugh-o-meter" for JS. This would be humorous if it were not so serious. Let me see. "Man on the move"? Where is he going? Jail perhaps? How about the John Doe investigation? Or the conversation with the Beloit billionaire union buster Hendricks who urges Walker to tell her how we can make Wisconsin a Red state? A Right-to-work state? Is that too hot for JS?
Krugman! Yes. German opposition to Merkel's austerity isn't selling at home, in Greece, Spain, Italy or other countries. Too bad, Congressman Ryan. You are a dollar short and a decade late!
Did you listen to Romney pandering to the bigots in the Falwell audience? Worth reading. Who is this guy? He says God is at our door to knock for us! OK? Ok.
Let's see. Some of the Dewey & LeBoeuf partners think the firm's former chairman is a crook. Others say he was just incompetent!
And Jamie Dimon at JPMorgan Chase said his firm's recent $2 billion loss is a teaching moment. It was because of stupidity and sloppiness! Really? And one woman is responsible for all of it? What the hell is going on?
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GARVEYBLOG
May 13, 2012
Walker the talker
By Ed Garvey
Never at a loss for words and rarely allowing truth to get in his way, Governor W. wasn't phased when we learned about his "conversation" with David Koch! (It was a good fit for Candid Camera, but ignored by Charles Franklin.) When he met the media? No problem. Embarrased? Nope. By telling Koch that they (W's men)considered placing trouble-makers into the capital demonstrations, he really, in my view, ended any credibility he had. He should have resigned for discussing illegal activity, but no way. He plays hard ball.
In Beloit with cameras whirring, a billionaire widow asks, With all the fervor of a three-year-old on Santa's lap, please Santa, "Can you make us a red state?" And Santa, played by W., says, first steps first. He will first divide and conquer. You know...public employee unions go first. Normally 2 follows 1, but Walker acts like nothing happened! Step 2? Did I say that? There might not be a number 2, or a Santa for that matter.
Right to work? Don't worry about it! It won't get to my desk, was his Romney-like response. I couldn't see the facial expression but I could feel the wink, wink to his supporters. Promise the voters anything but give them Arpege! Egad! The question posed by the billionaire who gave him $500,000 and a warm embrace, wants Right to Work. And Walker? Well, I guess so. He voted for it in the Assembly and it is GOP doxology, but, hey, don't bet the farm on it! This is Candid Camera time again.
Stick with the Gov. W. He will create 250,000 jobs, put candy in every school bag, and fool 'em again!
Meanwhile, Franklin Alert. Prepare yourselves for a rash of polling data from the so-called Marquette Law School poll. MJS continues to publish anything that has the Marquette poll in the title but won't tell us who is paying for the polls, who is shaping the questions, who determines if a poll will be published or not, and if MJS is getting first dibs on the results? We need a laugh-o-meter.
The latest chuckle from Charles Franklin? Lots of people won't vote against our bold governor. A million petition signers? Who asked? Ok Santa, let's go!
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ARTICLE
May 13, 2012
Two sets of rules
By Joel McNally
Wisconsin's judicial conservatives, who claim to hate loopholes, have come up with the best loophole ever.
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GARVEYBLOG
May 11, 2012
Whoopee! Vikings remain in Minnesota
By Ed Garvey
Talk about scalping tickets! The Minnesota Legislature approved a bill yesterday that will provide $498 million in public money for a new stadium, as if they need one!
NY Times speculates that a Super Bowl game will be played in Minneapolis to thank the people of Minnesota for their largess. The Vikings, who will probably get help from the other NFL teams to pay their share of construction, will pay $477 million. The total will be $975 million as we reported yesterday. Now, think of costs to tear down the current stadium. Who pays? Who gets naming rights, parking and concessions? I will bet you a "Romney $10,000" that the Vikings get the benefit of all that just like the Seligs when Miller park was built.
Another $150 million will come from expanded gambling options. Too bad they can't put roulette and black jack into the new joint. Why not?
Dewey--that would be Thomas Dewey who ran against Harry Truman. Will the legal profession as a whole need a bailout or just the Dewey LeBoeuf firm? For those keeping up with the collapse of Dewey & LeBoeuf, today's story is a mind-blower. In 2010 the firm raised $125 million in a bond offering. The firm did not warn of risk factors. Had they warned investors, it would have opened the big can of worms and few would have purchased the bonds. The firm, according to the NY Times, has effectively shutdown.
As well they should. The firm's pension plan is supposedly $80 million underfunded. What happened? Multi-year, multi-million dollar pay contracts it gave to top lawyers are what happened. Apparently 100 so-called "top lawyers" are owed millions of dollars. They are owed so much that many have taken off! I was told that a major lawyer in the sports world of litigation works at Dewey for an astounding $1,100 per hour.
Stay tuned. This will be interesting.
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GARVEYBLOG
May 10, 2012
Brother can you spare a dime?
By Ed Garvey
A note on Minnesota's proposed football stadium. The Minnesota state Senate approved a plan to build a $975 million stadium for the down-trodden Vikings. For the people who don't follow sports, the Vikings are a professional football team. The team has not done well on the field lately so the new stadium will, it is hoped, inspire the team to play better. The House voted to build the stadium as well. Whoa Nelly!
Are they building a new stadium because the current facility is run-down and terrible? Are they out of money? In danger of bankruptcy? Has the fire marshall ruled it a danger? No, no and no. But we all like presents and this is taxpayers' gift to the Vikings and indeed all NFL teams that will get a few more dollars from Viking gate receipts. They will drop a thank you note in the mail.
Surely, you must be thinking, this is is a misguided Republican plot to use up money that might otherwise be spent on health care, housing, tuition and public schools. This is a Paul Ryan-like trick to take money from those who need it most. I'll bet you can't wait to watch Democratic Governor Mark Dayton toss this idea into the trash can. Ah, you would be wrong. Dayton, the multi-millionaire governor, has been fighting for the new stadium for years. I am not kidding!
Here is the odd part of this scheme: NFL teams split all revenues equally, so having a new stadium won't even bring in more money to the Vikings to purchase on-field talent! (Okay, a little more as prices rise, but not as much as a third-round draft choice would cost.)
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