Wisconsin: GOP Senate Majority Provided Shills for Redistricting Hearings.

[Scuba]

Coverage thanks to Blogging Blue.

Last Wednesday, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel published an article on the redistricting emails that were withheld from the courts. These emails were withheld even after the attorneys (Michael Best & Friedrich) for the Madison GOP legislators in their gerrymandering scam were fined for doing so. That is a story onto itself and I recommend the article.

But there is a brief description of one of the emails which exposes just how low to the ground the GOP is willing to go to cheat the citizens of Wisconsin of fair representation:

A July 2011 public hearing before a Senate committee was highly orchestrated, with attorneys for the Legislature recruiting people to testify, outlining the testimony of witnesses and writing questions for the Republican members of the committee.

The GOP members of the WI Senate not only participated in gerrymandering WI senate and assembly districts, they made a mockery out of public hearings by providing their own shills to testify. They not only limited our rights to fair representation, they limited our free speech rights and our rights to petition our government. A total affront to the citizens of Wisconsin!

[ewagner]

1. The modern Republican Party of Wisconsin

...is, in my opinion, a cancer growing on the once-proud State of Wisconsin...

[ladjf]

2. The Republican drumbeat if criminal behavior goes on and on relentlessly. nt

[mojowork_n]

3. That sounds familiar.

They weren't recruited by attorneys and it wasn't about redistricting, but I remember something kinda similar when there were "Pay Day Loan" (reform) bills in the legislature. To try and put a cap on 500 and 600% annual percentage rates being charged. Those least able to repay were the ones to whom those 'services' were marketed. So open hearings were held on the North Side of Milwaukee (Washington Park Senior Center) and the South Side (West Allis City Hall.) The PR people for the loan sharks had a posse of po' 'n black folks steppin' up to the mic at both locations. Saying that they 'appreciated the opportunity' to pay those high interest rates, because they really needed the money.

I talked to one of them, later, outside the hearing room. What she told me sounded a little unusual, but she had looked like their best witness to me, so I wonder if she had received special attention. She had gotten some kind of start up loan to get a HEPA vacuum and was working on getting certification to be able to do (government-mandated?) or (agency-approved?) clean up. Which paid the sub-contractor a very BIG dollar-per-hour rate. Pay Day Loans, which normally are repaid in two or three weeks, and Small Business start up loans are totally different things, but there she was, telling the crowd what a wonderful service the Lenders were providing. Some of the other folks there looked like they were testifying in exchange for less convoluted quid pro quo's. (Coupons for free pizza, 6-packs of Coke and Chee-Zee Bread, maybe.) They definitely didn't look like they were regular attendee's of public hearings, but they all really looked like they could use a buck.

Similar things happen when there are "minority participation" mandates for hiring, for some kinds of public construction jobs. The projects are Mega-million dollar bonanza's for the same big bidders that always get big contracts. But they take the time to hire small electrical sub-contractors to put the face-plates on electrical panels, when everything else is done. They pay them a few thousand bucks for the opportunity to make sure they have black faces available for photo-opportunities, when they're needed. On the front end of those same jobs, before anything's even begun, they'll hire some ex-felons for a few hours to push brooms or wheel barrows around. They'll keep their names on file as steady workers on those projects, even though they only end up working a few hours, or days.....


J-S article from the time, about Pay-Day Loan reform:

http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/63725182.html

"....Some lawmakers said they didn't see a reason for the Legislature to regulate the industry, saying people should be able to make their own financial decisions, even if they make poor choices.

"Why is it the government's job to protect people from themselves?" said Rep. Joel Kleefisch (R-Oconomowoc)....

.....The chairman of the Financial Institutions Committee, Rep. Jason Fields (D-Milwaukee), said he hasn't seen a need for the rate cap and that the committee is unlikely to pass a cap because of a lack of support from Sheridan and the Senate.......

Fields said he has concerns about creating a database because other state computer systems have had security breaches.

"We haven't been the most successful at keeping people's private information private," Fields said.

We didn't win that one, but Jason Fields is no longer representing that Assembly district. Mandela Barnes (keep an eye on him) wore out his shoes going door to door and with next to no money, won the race going away.

Edit Afterthought:

How many years has it been? Why don't people get it? Anatole France quote from the late 19th Century:


La majestueuse égalité des lois, qui interdit au riche comme au pauvre de coucher sous les ponts, de mendier dans les rues et de voler du pain.

The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.

Le Lys Rouge [The Red Lily] (1894), ch. 7

Variant: How noble the law, in its majestic equality, that both the rich and poor are equally prohibited from peeing in the streets, sleeping under bridges, and stealing bread!

[Scuba]

4. Kleefisch for Usury. He can use that as his next campaign slogan.

[mojowork_n]

6. Pay Day Loans is Penny Ante Usury

They were well-organized and they made lavish and generous donations to legislators
like Kleefisch, or Grothman or Vukmir. (I don't know, I haven't looked it up.)

But what's 30 or 40 or 50 bucks a pop -- even if it is 500 or 700 percent A.P.R. -- on 2 or 3
hundred dollar loans?

For totally shameless profiteering you gotta look at the Daddy Warbucks contractors that
make a killing privatizing services to the military (that used to be done by G.I.'s), or the
worst:

Rmoney's boys making 3,000 percent (plus) on the Delphi bail-out:

http://www.thenation.com/article/170644/mitt-romneys-bailout-bonanza

Couldn't believe the President didn't mention that last night when they were talking about China,
jobs and "keeping America strong."

Or for that matter, the same vulture, Paul Singer (Elliott Management) holding up the Greek
bailout because he wanted to be paid first.

[Scuba]

7. Singer is happy to starve a half million people if he can make money doing so.

[mojowork_n]

8. Sometimes they choose not to starve, or root through dumpsters.

https://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/04/04-6

It's probably too late to hope for something happening, it's been six months.
Besides being much older than the vegetable seller in Tunisia, I wonder what
the difference was between the pharmacist and the fellow who gets a lot of
credit for the Arab Spring:

In Athens, witnesses said the man appeared in the busy square during the morning rush hour, put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger after yelling out: "I have debts, I can't stand this anymore."

Another passerby told Greek television the man said, "I don't want to leave my debts to my children."

A suicide note found in his pocket blamed politicians and financial troubles for pushing him over the edge, police said.

The government had "annihilated any hope for my survival and I could not get any justice. I cannot find any other form of struggle except a dignified end before I have to start scrounging for food from the rubbish," the note said.

HOLY CR*P:

Adding a second link to this Global Vulture story:

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/argentina_orders_evacuation_of_ship_MUVPoyiJs7b92uRYvC4sxJ?utm_source=SFnewyorkpost&utm_medium=SFnewyorkpost

Incredible, the Argentine Navy just lost a training ship in Africa, because Singer found a judge in Ghana who would....

....judge acted on a claim by NML Capital Ltd., which is based in the Cayman Islands. Its owner, billionaire investor Paul Singer, leads a group demanding payment in full, plus interest, for dollar-based Argentine bonds bought at fire sale prices after the country's economy collapsed a decade ago, forcing a sharp devaluation of its currency.

The vast majority of bondholders accepted about 30 cents on the dollar years ago, which is roughly what the holdouts led by Singer initially paid for the bonds....

Said the Argentine Foreign Minister:

"... the judge's intention to obligate a sovereign nation to negotiate with an entity dedicated to financial piracy from its fiscal hideaway in the Caribbean. This is the only unacceptable option for Argentina..."

[midnight]

5. So to prepare and protect from future GOP orchestration of witnesses what can be done?