When it comes to losing faith in our Justice System and the Wisconsin Supreme Court, no, Both Sides aren’t to Blame.

There was an interesting poll taken that didn’t get one shred of press, except in a feature column in the Wisconsin State Journal. I wonder why? Could it be because it reflected horribly on the current conservative activist State Supreme Court and Justice David Prosser?

According to On the Capitol-MARY SPICUZZA and CLAY BARBOUR:

Confidence in the state Supreme Court has plunged, according to a new poll conducted on behalf of the nonprofit group Justice at Stake.

An opinion survey conducted and released this week found voters' confidence in the court dropped to 33 percent, down from 52 percent three years ago. And the poll, a statewide survey of 750 registered voters, found only 23 percent said they support switching from elections to merit selection for the court. The survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.6 percentage points.

At least the poll seems to indicate people are following the news these days. When asked about allegations of a physical altercation involving Justices David Prosser and Ann Walsh Bradley, 84 percent said they were aware of it. And 80 percent said they were aware of an earlier incident in which Prosser called Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson a "total bitch" and threatened to "destroy" her.

Wisconsin Accounted for Half the Nations Employment Numbers? All Bulls**t!!

You just knew something was wrong, didn’t you? Did Wisconsin really add about half of all the jobs created in the country? 

This bold lie is so over the top ridiculous and insulting, that I’m surprised the truth will be reported by a few feature writers in our local newspapers.

This was a major breach of the public trust by the Walker administration, and they should be apologizing for it.

But what you saw instead was a concerted effort of Gov. Walker and the Republican state legislature to get as much mileage out of their bogus jobs SPIN as they possibly could before they were found out.

CapTimes: "It's incredibly important to put that in perspective," said Gov. Scott Walker in touting the new numbers. "To have 9,500 net new jobs in the state at a time when the country saw just 18,000 net new jobs all across the country is incredibly good news." Assembly Majority Leader Rep. Scott Suder, R-Abbotsford, also weighed in, saying "Accounting for more than half of the nationwide gain in June employment is a remarkable feat."

They didn’t hold the bullshit back.

But then, low and behold, we found out that other states had bigger job increases; Texas added 32,000 jobs, California 28,800, Michigan 18,000, Minnesota 13,200 etc.

The whole Walker press spin was pathetically wrong, as Cap Times’ Mike Ivey explains:

Claims that Wisconsin accounted for half of the nation's employment growth last month are pure fantasy. In fact, Wisconsin didn't manage to crack into the top five states in job growth.

The amazing claim, “half of the nationwide gain in employment,” stepped into the realm of the surreal. The real reason, and the source of this convoluted upside down lie told by the Walker administration, was less spectacular:

The reason the Bureau of Labor Statistics figures show just 18,000 more net jobs in June is that other states saw a drop in the number of people working.

Declines came in Tennessee (-16,900), Missouri (-15,700), Virginia (-14,600) and Kansas (-7,500), among others.

Not to mention, what should have been the headline instead: The state unemployment rate actually ticked higher in June.

Walker's Tight Fist of Government Ends up Muzzling Teachers and their lead Negotiator, who's under investigation for objecting to the new handbook.

We're finding out now that teacher input into public education will soon be slipping into the obscurity, maybe even disappear, with the new limits on collective bargaining in place. Kaukauna, along with other public school districts, will be depending more now on the political winds of the school board whether or not teachers have a say. The much touted "we haven't seen any layoffs" rhetoric may be true, but that's because of the mass exodus of experienced teachers, who were bullied and pushed out of the system.

The fact the Patrick Meyer, head negotiator for the Kaukauna Education Association, is being investigated for objecting to the new teacher handbook, sends the needed chilling message that you can no longer question authority. It's an amazingly dictatorial shot across the bow that signals money, not educational quality and a united motivated staff of teachers, is the new guiding force.

Hopper/Walker fundraiser for recall gets more heat from protesters.

The state of unrest never takes a break in Wisconsin. While the Doyle administration never saw the same unrest and protester rallies at his public appearances, we're now being led to believe the furor surrounding Gov. Walker is just the normal way of doing business and no big deal.

Wrong! Our droopy eyed sociopath met up with his not so loyal followers again:

We Are Wisconsin: On Wednesday, more than 200 parents, teachers, public employees and leaders in the Fond du Lac area stood in 95-plus degree heat to “welcome” Gov. Scott Walker with a protest during his visit to help his friend and rubberstamp vote, Randy Hopper. Walker was in town to raise campaign cash for Hopper’s flailing campaign, as he desperately attempts to hang onto a loyal vote for his extreme agenda in Madison.

The fundraiser was at a posh and private country club that tried to keep people away, but that didn’t deter the 200-plus in attendance from making sure both Walker and Hopper knew their extreme agenda and their attacks on middle class families weren’t welcome in Fond du Lac. Braving the heat, standing outside at the entrance, the crowd made sure they were seen and heard by Walker as he drove by into the private, high dollar event.

State Rep. Jennifer Shilling's "behavior is out of line," Protesting in Madison "yelling, shouting." "Stop the Craziness" says recalled Republican Kapanke.

Is “petitioning the Government for a redress of grievances” a Constitutional guarantee?

In Fitzwalkerstan, and recalled Republican Sen. Dan Kapanke, no! Sit down, shut up, the voters have spoken, its a winner take all system now and wait until the next election. What other message is there in this new Kapanke ad:

DailyCaller: “Jennifer Shilling has acted differently in Madison. Yelling, shouting, standing shoulder to shoulder with special interests. Shilling’s behavior is out of line; it’s not the Wisconsin way. Just when we stopped the craziness, why would we go back to that?” says a voiceover as the ad shows images of Kapanke’s Democrat opponent, State Rep. Jennifer Shilling, protesting and holding signs.

Ouch! When the worst you can say about your opponent is that they protested their government for Wisconsin working families...that's sounds a little dictatorial. Check it out:

Democrats see Dan Kapanke as the Republican Senator they have the best chance at recalling. His district, SD-32, leans Democratic and the percentage of the vote in the district won by Obama was 5 percent higher than the state average. Conversely, Walker got a lower percentage of the vote in SD-32 than he did in the state as a whole. Moreover, Shilling’s district is contained within Kapanke’s senate district, meaning she has already succeeded at winning a majority in a district that comprises one-third of Kapanke’s district.

Here are a few conservative reader’s comments proving the authoritarian one party takeover by Republicans is perfectly fine with them, and what the founding father envisioned, I guess:

Not a big fan of the ad to be honest. They should have photoshopped out her shirt “working families”. It’s the first thing I noticed.

The photo of Trumka with the clenched fist says it all….hysterical mobs, gangland intimidation, threats…..the Democrats/Progressives favorite tactics….union mob bosses stoking the fires…..

Really? And those tea party, Freedom Works bussed in protests, Glenn Beck rallies and town hall disruptions were…?

FDR on Taxes

I heard this speech on Thom Hartmann's radio program, and had to pass some of it along. Franklin D. Roosevelt: Address at Worcester, Mass. 1936: 

In 1776 the fight was for democracy in taxation. In 1936 that is still the fight. Mr. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes once said: "Taxes are the price we pay for civilized society." One sure way to determine the social conscience of a Government is to examine the way taxes are collected and how they are spent. And one sure way to determine the social conscience of an individual is to get his tax-reaction.

Taxes, after all, are the dues that we pay for the privileges of membership in an organized society.

As society becomes more civilized, Government—national, State and local government—is called on to assume more obligations to its citizens. The privileges of membership in a civilized society have vastly increased in modern times. But I am afraid we have many who still do not recognize their advantages and want to avoid paying their dues.

It is only in the past two generations that most local communities have paved and lighted their streets, put in town sewers, provided town water supplies, organized fire departments, established high schools and public libraries, created parks and playgrounds—undertaken, in short, all kinds of necessary new activities which, perforce, had to be paid for out of local taxes.

New obligations to their citizens have also been assumed by the several States and by the Federal Government, obligations unknown a century and a half ago, but made necessary by new inventions and by a constantly growing social conscience.

The easiest way to summarize the reason for this extension of Government functions, local, State and national, is to use the words of Abraham Lincoln: "The legitimate object of Government is to do for the people what needs to be done but which they cannot by individual effort do at all, or do so well, for themselves." Taxes are the price we all pay collectively to get those things done.

To divide fairly among the people the obligation to pay for these benefits has been a major part of our struggle to maintain democracy in America.

Here is my principle: Taxes shall be levied according to ability to pay. That is the only American principle.

Before this great war against the depression we fought the World War; and it cost us twenty-five billion dollars in three years to win it. We borrowed to fight that war. Then, as now, a Democratic Administration provided sufficient taxes to pay off the entire war debt within ten or fifteen years.

Those taxes had been levied according to ability to pay. But the succeeding Republican Administration did not believe in that principle. There was a reason. They had political debts to those who sat at their elbows. The actors are the same. But the act is different. Today their role calls for stage tears about the next generation. But in the days after the World War they played a different part.

A balanced budget is on the way. Does that sound like bankruptcy to you? Why this increase in Government revenues? Because the taxpayer earns more money and spends more money. Though he pays more money in taxes, he has more money left for himself and for his family.

You would think, to hear some people talk, that those good people who live at the top of our economic pyramid are being taxed into rags and tatters. A number of my friends who belong in these very high upper brackets have suggested to me, more in sorrow than in anger, that if I am reelected they will have to move to some other Nation because of high taxes here. I shall miss them very much but if they go they will soon come back. For a year or two of paying taxes in almost any other country in the world will make them yearn once more for the good old taxes of the U.S.A.

I want to say a word also to the wage earners who are finding propaganda about the security tax in their pay envelopes. I want to remind them that the new social security law was designed for them, for the greater safety of their homes and their families. The fund necessary to provide that security is not collected solely from workers. The employer, too, pays an equal share. And both shares—yours and the employer's—are being held for the sole benefit of the worker himself.

Once more this year we must choose between democracy in taxation and special privilege in taxation. Are you willing to turn the control of the Nation's taxes back to special privilege? I know the American answer to that question. Your pay envelope may be loaded with suggestions of fear, and your dividend letter may be filled with propaganda. But the American people will be neither bluffed nor bludgeoned.

The seeds of fear cannot bear fruit in the polling booth. Inside the polling booth every American man and woman stands as the equal of every other American man and woman. There they have no superiors. There they have no masters save their own minds and consciences. There they are sovereign American citizens. There on November 3d they will not fear to exercise that sovereignty.

Arizona Gun Sales at a Record Pace

The Tucson Citizen reports

In Arizona, it is likely that more than 200,000 new weapons will be put in buyers’ hands after background checks this year. That figure doesn’t include firearms purchased at gun shows and through private transactions. Such non-tracked sales are thought to account for 40 percent of all sales, adding about 150,000 guns purchased annually. The estimated sales total: about 350,000 guns per year.

Retailers report that demand for small handguns that can be concealed in a purse or briefcase has soared, while sales of rifles and shotguns have remained flat or declined.

Ya get that? Thousands, maybe tens-of-thousands of untrained, unqualified people will be carrying guns in Arizona from now on. Do you think that'll do more good than harm?

Although background checks are required for guns purchased through licensed retailers, no such screening is needed for guns purchased at the more than 20 major gun shows held in Arizona each year or through private transactions among individuals.

Non-licensed sales, which are hard to track, are thought to represent about 40 percent of the approximately 20 million guns that are sold in the U.S. each year.

This is the number-one problem. It's not theft, which the pro gun guys keep pushing as the main source of guns which flow into the criminal world. They do that so they can claim to be victims, innocent victims, which is debatable anyway since so many of them leave guns lying around the house for the burglars to take. But by far the two main sources of guns which end up in criminal hands are done through legal sales under today's pathetic gun control laws.

Private sales which require no background check as well as straw purchases which do, account for most of the guns used in crime. You know why they're so difficult to trace?  There's no licensing and registration, that's why.

With a properly enforced licensing of gun owners and registration of each gun bought to one of those licensees, along with requiring background checks on every sale, we'd have the problem under control.  So, why do so many gun owners resist this so vehemently?

The claim we most often hear to explain why they won't accept licensing and registration is because confiscation of guns would follow. I don't believe that and I don't think they do either. Given the American culture and the proliferation of guns, I don't think we can realistically expect anything like that. There would first have to be radical changes in the government and its relationship with citizens, the entire system of democratic elections and power brokering would have to be changed first.  No, that's not the real reason they resist.

They resist for the simple reason they don't want to be inconvenienced. Please keep in mind that most people, even most gun owners, do not oppose such initiatives which would obviously do good.  It's the very loud and well-financed minority of extremists that we hear this from. Self-centered in the extreme, they just don't want to be inconvenienced, never mind the nearly 100 a day who are killed with guns or the 200 others a day who are wounded. Never mind that many of them are innocent, truly innocent victims. None of that matters to the gun-rights extremist.


What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Walker and the Fitzgerald Brothers Take Kids Milk Away. Hey, these are tough times....

Here we are, the dairy state, and we’re cutting the milk program.

Milk and food are school basics, that not only help kids concentrate, but gives aid to families that are already on hard economic times.

It seems the Republicans haven't gotten the message yet that they tanked the economy, wiped out millions of jobs, and sent families packing from their foreclosed homes. They seem to think if they cut food, milk and health care, the rising number of families devastated by the recession will get lower or just disappear.

If the Republicans are sincerely concerned about our children's future, then why are kids taking the biggest hit from their misguided and fiscally reckless budget cutting?

CapTimes-Susan Troller: Wisconsin may be the Dairy State but a school milk program, along with a breakfast meal plan for students, could go sour at some schools in the wake of aid cuts in Gov. Scott Walker's budget that were approved last month … the realities of what may be missing when students go back to school this fall are starting to emerge … Over the next two years, the school breakfast program will see a cut in state aid of $557,000 and the school milk plan will be cut by $137,000.

The state aid supplements federal funds for meal programs. In recent years, student participation in school breakfast programs has been increasing. Economically disadvantaged students, whose numbers have gone up in Wisconsin over the last five years from about 30 percent to more than 39 percent of all public schoolchildren, are eligible for free or reduced-cost meals. The milk program, which exclusively uses milk from Wisconsin dairies, depends on a combination of state aid and money from local districts.

The Department of Public Instruction had asked for an increase of nearly $795,000 over the two-year budget to maintain the state reimbursement rate for the school breakfast program. Instead, school districts will see a significant decrease … concerned that some of the state's poorest school districts may not be able to come up with the additional funds to keep their breakfast or milk programs in the black, and may have to eliminate them.

According to research on nutrition and learning, school breakfast and snack programs help kids concentrate in the classroom, increase student achievement, and reduce discipline problems. But if cash-strapped school districts are forced to make a choice between paying for a new roof or buying gas for school buses, a voluntary program like daily school milk may be dropped.

A member of the Wisconsin Senate's Education Committee, Sen. Kathleen Vinehout, D-Alma, has been talking for several months about the problems of rural school districts … "The cuts to the school breakfast and milk program are good examples of the pattern we've seen throughout the discussion surrounding this budget,"… Schools hammered by budget cuts, she adds, are most likely to cut school breakfast and milk programs and their neediest children will suffer most. "The governor says he believes in shared sacrifice. I guess that means the poor, the unemployed, the sick and the children," Vinehout says.

Gov. Walker is always telling us that once we see how great his policies are, people will realize all the doom and gloom predictions by his opponents were wrong, and we stop all this talk about recalling him next year. I'm thinking it'll be just the opposite of that.

Waukesha County Fair Kids Eating Contest, sets Great Example.

President Rick Perry? Oh my god no! If you ever watch one Perry performance, this is it.

It’s all the talk. “Texas Governor Rick Perry is toying with a run for president.” But this is the best the Republican Party has to offer?

On just one issue, sex education, Perry fell apart in the recent interview below. His response is so shocking, that you’ll find yourself staring into space pondering the end of civilization. Only the most conservative voters could ignore intelligence as the first qualification for anyone seriously running for president. With the same Texas style verbal affliction we heard from Bush, Perry simply...believes what he wants to believe. 

At the end of this short interview, you won't believe what Perry compares sex eds "success" with. This is a real treasure: 

Huffington Post: When confronted with the dismal statistics during an October 15, 2010 televised interview with Texas Tribune reporter Evan Smith, Perry's response was to reaffirm that "abstinence works."

Texas lawmakers cut sex ed from two six-month courses to a single unit of "abstinence only" education. Teens in almost all high school grades were having more sex after undergoing the abstinence only program. By 2007, Texas had the highest teen birth rate in the nation.  By 2009, 94 percent of Texas schools, which at the time were educating more than 3.7 million students, were giving no sex ed whatsoever beyond "abstinence only," a curriculum that includes emphasizing that birth control doesn't work. But none of this seems to matter to Gov. Rick Perry. 

Over Half of all Texas Middle and High School Kids Suspended or Expelled. Amazing!

Anytime you see a story headlined “school-to-prison pipeline,” you can’t help get the sinking feeling something is wrong with our system of discipline in schools. But while that idea is bad enough, what's happening in Texas is even worse.

It’s true that many Republican controlled states emulate Texas, but my guess is they’ll want to quickly glance over this major factoid:

New Initiative Targets 'School-to-Prison' Pipeline: A new undertaking from the U.S. Departments of Justice and Education targets school discipline policies that end up pushing children into the juvenile-justice system for crimes and rule-breaking on campus—and keeping them from pursuing their education.

But here’s the jaw dropping statistic I’m still trying to wrap my mind around:

Edweek: AG Eric Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan referenced a report by the Council of State Governments Justice Center from earlier this week that found that more than half of all Texas middle and high school students were suspended or expelled at least once between 7th and 12th grades.

More than HALF were suspended or expelled? Now that’s Texas family values. 

The Merit Pay Failure!!! What other free market magic tricks do conservatives have up their sleeve for teachers?

As Republicans continue to push theoretical and disproven educational policies, research marches on.

MERIT PAY FAILURE: The party of punishment wanted to reward “better” teachers with bonuses, merit pay, while penalizing all the other great teachers. But like all the other studies, where merit pay only works for manual labor, and not intellectual persuits, this bonus program for teachers didn’t work. 

Despite the following proof, Republican lawmakers nationwide will continue to promote merit pay as a great idea, and convince many Democrats that there must be something to it.

Edweek: A new study by the Santa Monica, Calif.-based RAND Corp. put the final nail in the coffin of New York City's teacher performance-pay program.  The Big Apple's Schoolwide Performance Bonus Program has awarded $50 million to teachers during from 2007 to 2010, but there has been mounting evidence that all those bonuses weren't having much of an effect.

Apparently the RAND study was the final straw. The RAND researchers, like those in the previous studies, found the program did not raise student achievement in mathematics or reading in any grade, nor did it improve teacher job satisfaction. The findings led to the city's decision last week to eliminate the program.

Researchers suggested that the program had not adequately motivated staff to understand the program or buy in to the criteria for the bonuses, and noticed that both participating and control schools already faced intense pressure to improve because of the city's accountability measures. As the report noted, "Many case-study respondents reported viewing the bonus as a reward for their usual efforts, not as an incentive for changing their behavior."

This one failed experiment, the “carrot and the stick” approach to education, will soon just disappear in the debate. A debate controlled by the louder merit pay voices. In the article below,

EdWeek: Merit pay is the zombie of education policy—it just won't seem to die. Even in an environment of less-intense accountability pressure, and even with much larger bonuses, the Tennessee POINT study found that merit pay does not improve student test scores. While it's worth attempting to replicate this experiment, and worth trying to find out precisely why monetary incentives don't help teachers raise test scores, I can't see any reason to be terribly surprised at the results of NYC's merit pay program.

 

18 School Officials from around the state Speak out against Walker’s “Dismantling tools” for Education.

How many more times are we going to be told that the protesters and school officials don’t speak for all Wisconsinites. With only about 26 percent of all eligible voters deciding for the rest of us, that one party rule means anything goes, Republicans seem to think we’re all conservative now. Many disagree:

Journal Times: Gov. Scott Walker’s statements that the 2011-13 state education budget puts schools in a good financial position misrepresents the reality for most districts, school officials and parents said during a press conference Wednesday.

School administrators from across the state, including Racine Unified Superintendent Jim Shaw, gathered at the Greenfield School District Administrative Office in Greenfield to speak out against the $800 million in cuts to public education. Each of the 18 officials said the budget will cause larger class sizes, fewer arts and library programs and lower-quality services for their district. For Racine Unified, it means far less money for special and bilingual education services as well, Shaw said.

Shaw said the district has been forced to make instructional cuts to make up the losses, including the loss of 125 staff members, a wage freeze for remaining faculty and $19 million reduction in benefits. The cuts could continue into next year with more reductions. Other school superintendents and board members echoed Shaw, saying the budget would result in a reduction in the quality of public education for Wisconsin’s children.

“Walker has given us dismantling tools for education, not ones to build schools,” said Ron Heilman, Eau Claire Area School District superintendent. “All schools are going to be negatively impacted in the coming year.” Heilman said the Eau Claire district has been given less than half of what it needs to make up its deficit for the 2011-12 school year, and is trying to deal with rapidly increasing class sizes without the ability to hire new teachers.

Come on, these school representatives must be from out of state, like the imported protesters Walker claimed were bused to whine about collective bargaining and vandalize the Capitol.

They’re all wrong of course, and don’t represent the rest of the state, like the Walker administration does:  

In a statement, Walker spokesman Cullen Werwie said “With all due respect, those select superintendents hardly speak for every school district across the state,” Werwie said. “The savings that school districts can receive outweigh the reductions in state aid.”

Shouldn't the Question be; what about the migraine I get every time I see Michele Bachmann spout off....?

MSNBC parts ways with Young Turk Cenk Uygur

I like the fight and verbal come backs from Rev. Al Sharpton, but Cenk (jenk) Uygur took on the Washington establishment, Republicans and Democrats. That didn't sit well with establishment media:



Salon's Glenn Greenwald:

Uygur explained that, several months ago, he was summoned to a meeting with MSNBC boss Phil Griffin and told that while it is fun and enjoyable to be an "outsider," that is not what MSNBC is for.  Instead, Griffin told him, MSNBC is "part of the establishment," and Uygur must conduct himself in accordance with that reality.  It's perfectly fine in establishment discourse to express contempt for one of the two political parties.  It's equally fine to periodically criticize your own.  But what is most assuredly not fine -- particularly in a high-profile nighttime spot and without having a real power base that comes from mammoth ratings -- is to be aggressively adversarial to the political establishment itself and the financial interests that fund, own and control that political system.  That is what Uygur was, and while there's no evidence that this was the primary cause of his removal, it was clearly a serious source of dissatisfaction with the station's executives, including MSNBC's chief.

Brookfield Personnel Director to Union Members: New Law doesn't cap wage increases to non-union members, so.....

As reality and the new collective bargaining law settles in, it's becoming more and more obvious how well thought out, and probably national, the plan is to break up public unions. Conservative areas like Brookfield will be showing the rest of the state how to speed up the unions demise.

From a position that came completely out of "right" field, Republicans dropped the bomb:

Patch: (Brookfield's) personnel director dangled an unusual carrot before city workers in arguing why they should vote to decertify their unions next year: the potential for larger raises. Future annual pay increases would be capped at the consumer price index for union-represented city employees except for police and fire fighters, under the state's budget repair law still being litigated in court.

But that law does not require local governments to cap wage increases for employees who are not represented by unions, city Human Resources Director Jim Zwerlein explained to aldermen. "It's not expected that a lot of these unions (statewide) are going to survive. The law is really incentivized to disband the union."

Theoretically, the city could approve larger pay raises to non-union staffers. Whether aldermen would actually do that is unknown.

Ah but the possibility exists, even though it's likely that city budgets would never really permit that from ever happening.

John Dillon, business agent for the Wisconsin Professional Police Assocation representing Brookfield's police personnel, said he was not surprised to hear pay raises could be an incentive to decertify. "The changes made to the collective bargaining laws provided a disincentive for union membership along with obstacles to remain an organized unit," Dillon said. "But that was the goal of the Republican Party. Destroy the Unions; destroy a major funding provider for the Democratic Party and eliminate your competition!"

Republicans Gleefully, Cruelly Delay Unemployment Benefits to Lazy Wisconsin Jobless. Fitzgerald won't say if or when they'll get to it!!!

Call me cynical, but it looks like a case of good cop, bad cop. The Senate plays the good cop by approving an extension of unemployment with no one week waiting period. It also gives the recalled Republicans a chance to say "See we tried but failed to do away with the waiting period." The Assembly is the bad cop and basically doing the bidding of the Senate and Walker administration.  

AP: A disagreement among Republicans in the Legislature over whether unemployed people in Wisconsin should have to wait a week before receiving unemployment benefits is putting an extension of coverage for the jobless at risk.  

A spokesman for Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald refused to say Wednesday if or when the Senate would take up the bill again. “At the end of the day, there are still 225,000 people out of work in Wisconsin,” Fitzgerald spokesman Andrew Welhouse said. “That’s far too many, and the end goal here is to get them working again.” 

 “You are killing this bill,” said Rep. Christine Sinicki, D-Milwaukee. She said her office had been deluged with calls from unemployed workers concerned about losing the benefits. 

 Walker supports both extending the unemployment benefits and keeping the one-week delay, said his spokesman Cullen Werwie. Rep. Joan Ballweg, R-Markesan, defended the waiting period, saying it would save the state between $41 million and $56 million.

Supposedly money will be saved by weeding out fraud, like over payments and wrongful approval of benefits. The one week delay gives the state time to deny and limit who gets unemployment. And yes, that’ll save money.

Get Ready for It: Families in Poverty Living Large, What’s the Problem?

While conservatives push to eliminate the minimum wages and most benefits, they’re also busy changing the public perception of poverty in America. Not surprisingly, they’ve concluded; poor people have it made.

The Heritage Foundation: If poverty means lacking nutritious food, adequate warm housing, and clothing for a family, relatively few of the more than 30 million people identified as being “in poverty” by the Census Bureau could be characterized as poor. The average poor person, as defined by the government, has a living standard far higher than the public imagines.

But do the poor live like millionaires? That’s one perception conservatives are pushing into the public’s subconscious as a way to finally remove their outrage over poverty in America.  

As scholar James Q. Wilson has stated, “The poorest Americans today live a better life than all but the richest persons a hundred years ago.”

So true, so true. Look at all the things we have now that only millionaires would have had in 1905: 

In 2005, the typical household defined as poor by the government had a car and air conditioning. For entertainment, the household had two color televisions, cable or satellite TV, a DVD player, and a VCR. If there were children, especially boys, in the home, the family had a game system, such as an Xbox or a PlayStation. In the kitchen, the household had a refrigerator, an oven and stove, and a microwave. Other household conveniences included a clothes washer, clothes dryer, ceiling fans, a cordless phone, and a coffee maker … the typical poor family was not overcrowded and was in good repair. In fact, the typical poor American had more living space than the average European. The typical poor American family was also able to obtain medical care when needed. By its own report, the typical family was not hungry and had sufficient funds during the past year to meet all essential needs.

So what’s to complain about? Ignoring the massive income disparity, the poor have it made. The following are “positioning” statements that portray poverty as no big deal.

In reality, the living conditions of poor Americans have shown significant improvement over time … exaggeration has the potential to promote a substantial misallocation of limited resources for a government that is facing massive future deficits. Each year the U.S. Census Bureau issues a report claiming that over 35 million Americans live in poverty.  In fact, without a detailed description of living conditions, public discussions of poverty are meaningless.

All this talk of poverty is meaningless, isn’t it? After all, poverty counts don’t consider safety net programs that boost the poor’s overall wealth.

For example, there are over 70 means-tested welfare programs that provide cash, food, housing, medical care, and social services to poor and low-income persons. The bottom line is that the economic resources available to poor persons are vastly greater than the Census claims. The assertions that poverty is widespread … provide justification for policies to greatly expand the welfare state and further “spread the wealth.” Poor families clearly struggle to make ends meet, but in most cases, they are struggling to pay for air conditioning and cable TV while putting food on the table.  

 Sounds to me like someone needs to sacrifice a few "luxuries." How do conservatives sleep at night? Very well, thank you.

Paul Ryan Protest features Wine Tasting Constituents.

What a great point to make in front of Paul Ryan's office in Racine, by Citizen Action of Wisconsin

Trying to End a government shutdown by negotiating with a Republican Party that wants to shutdown the government. What’s wrong with this picture?

Star Tribune: 

Minnesota's 20-day state government shutdown ended this morning, as lawmakers cast their final votes on the state’s budget and Gov. Mark Dayton signed the bills.

The test case for Democrats failed, and so did the hope that Republicans could be stopped...ever. 

You can’t keep the government from collapsing when the Republicans are swinging the wrecking ball, and they win if they’re allowed to end government services by never compromising.

Sociolpathic personalities are pretty much unmoved by the consequences of their actions.