Mark Belling, of far right radio fame, recently referred to a member of the Milwaukee governing body as a "bitch".  Not the first time he's shown that he is incapable of expressing his views without using bathroom stall language.  Here's my letter I just sent to his boss at Clear Channel. Had someone at MSNBC said it about one of their right wing favorites, the far right would be screaming for blood.

It is my understanding that Mr. Belling referred to a a member of the Milwaukee governing body as a "bitch".  He may have danced around the borders a bit, but the implication was clear.  This, of course, was not the first time that Mr. Belling has shown his lack of ability to express his views without the use of offensive street language.  

Let me remind you, sir, that Clear Channel does not own the airwaves.  They are owned by US, the American people.  Your company merely leases space. 

Bonnie's got BAP's Bunny Ears Burning!

 Bonnie's got BAP's Bunny Ears Burning! 

Local illiberal and WeVoter Poobah Bonnie Ketterhagen continues to supply loads of Tea Party entertainment value to the local scene! At last Saturday's Burlington Area School District open house and again at Monday's school board meeting she complained about the distribution of leaflets during the recent school board race, which her candidates lost handily. Please see page 4 of the April 11, 2013 edition of the Standard Press. For background on this issue, please refer to the following Standard Press article: WeVote Leader Takes Issue with Fliers

Without providing any reasoned argument as to why our rights should be infringed, other than she doesn't like it, Bonnie wants the board to adopt a policy banning the distribution of informational fliers on BASD property. "Please stop all postings," she said. "Just say no." "The board has opened a floodgate of possibilities," said Ketterhagen. "This is not a free speech issue. It is a property rights issue. It is not litter. It is a trespassing issue."

Not a free speech issue? Trespassing on public property? HELLO! Whose schools are they anyway? They're OUR schools, they belong to ALL of us! Which I suspect is the thing the Tea Partiers object to the most. How can you trespass on PUBLIC property? And this is an election we're talking about here, probably THE most sacred act of our Republic!

Senator Soundbyte Rides Again!

Senator Ron Johnson (R-Chamber of Commerce) is living proof that you can be dumb as a post and get elected if you have nice hair, a pretty, marry into money and stick to canned sentences no more than 10 words long. He's now among a dozen dip-schmidts in the Senate who threatened to filibuster ANY new arms control legislation including the expanded background checks favored by the vast majority of American citizens and which were at one time even acceptable to the Bloody NRA.

I hope he and his puppet-masters are ready to have their noses rubbed in blood like naughty dogs when the next Sandy Hook happens. Please read more at the Root River Siren blog: http://rootriversiren.blogspot.com/2013/04/mr-victims-of-government-wont-allow.html

Ya hey da Republicon "tought" fer da Day

And now your Republicon "thought" for the day
Courtesy of Senator Frank Lasee
A miles long sulfide trench is A-Okay
But them windmills is bad da envirnmunt der-hey!

http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/article/20111011/GPG0101/110110429/Wisconsin-wind-turbine-moratorium-sought-by-Sen-Frank-Lasee-R-Ledgeview
  Hey http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/article/20120308/GPG0101/203080569/Wisconsin-Senate-kills-windmill-siting-legislation-Frank-Lasee-blames-Democrats-Dale-Schulz   HEY! https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2013/03/02/state-senator-frank-lasee-introduces-bill-to-protect-health-and-safety/   Whadda jerk der eh?

Hey Governor.  Want to make a quick boost to the economy?  Push to legalize same-sex marriage.  Washington state estimates that same sex marriage boosted spending in the state by 88 million dollars.  Iowa?  Somewhere between 12-13 million.  New York?  A whopping 259 million dollars. Not only would it generate a lot of revenue, but it would also give you credibility with the actual, real "not-just-in-name-only" libertarians out there and totally confuse your left wing opposition.  OK, I know that about 90% of those that call themselves "libertarians" really aren't, but it's a thought.  And think of how it will confuse us "liberals"  Call the Koch brothers and see what they think.  Since it won't affect their efforts to turn Wisconsin into a resource rich third-world nation, they probably won't care.

The Goods on the WeVote Burlington Part I

American Majority Rally - Madison 2011 with
Their Hero the Late GOPropagandist Andrew Breitbart

Perhaps you've heard me before say things like our communities, civility, rationalism, our educators and not only our public schools, but our public institutions generally, are under attack by the combined forces of greed, selfishness and short-sighted ignorance. While some of you are no doubt aware of what I’m referring to, others may have dismissed it as mere paranoia.

Well now I’ve got the goods on the WeVote Burlington Tea Party and the big money, American’s-for-Plutocracy national agenda behind them and their attempt to take over our local school district. http://americanmajority.org/majority-2/its-time-for-new-leaders-in-our-education-system/

EXCERPT: One of the groups that joined the New Leaders Project is We Vote Burlington. Activists in a local group led by Bonnie Ketterhagen attended an American Majority training and decided to bring some change to their own school board. They recruited two new candidates for the school board elections, trained them using American Majority’s campaign resources, and helped them to victory in the Spring of 2012.

Chicken products vs. byproducts.

Andy Mitchell

9:21 PM  -  Public

The Republican party--the party of small government, the party of the power of the individual to make their own decisions, the party of "keep government out of my medicare"--continues to serve people chicken crap and try to convince them it's chicken salad.  In Kansas, women that go to their doctor to discuss abortion will be read a script by their health care provider that is (1) mandated by the government and (2) false.  Here in Wisconsin, a doctor's written prescription that was discussed and agreed upon in the privacy of a closed exam room can be overruled at a crowded public counter if the pharmacist objects to distributing it.  That's right...if he objects to the medication and the use, he can legally refuse to give it to you.  And the list goes on.

The White Wash Won't Work Walker!

Empty GM Plant in Janesville Wisconsin

Even with the white wash, It's Not Working Walker!

Wiscosippi's Gubnah Walker would have you think that all is on the mend in the Badger State and we're on our way to sunshine, roses and his promised 250,000 jobs. In a state that has gone from 11th to 44th in job creation under little Scooter's rule, nothing could be further from the truth.

(Psssst, Scooter, dampening consumer demand in a 70% consumer demand driven economy in the middle of the Great Republicon Recession by attacking public worker job, benefits and retirement security was one major brain fart, even for you!)

Vulture School Vos - Robbinhood in Reverse

Robbin "School Vulture" Vos, vassal to the feudal American Legislative Exchange Council (fALEC) stated yesterday that he is open to Grothman's proposal of tax credits for families to send their kids to private schools. Of course he is! It's another fALEC connived way to destroy the arch enemy of the Cult of Con, public education, while rewarding the rich!

Think of it! No longer will those kids in places like Mequon and Greenfield have to suffer the indignation of mingling with the student bodies at high schools the likes of Homestead and Whitnall that have poverty rates approaching single digits! 

NOTE, I tried to post this to facefook today and include the link to the Root River Siren Blog where there is a post on this issue and I got the following response from facebook: 
"The content you're trying to share includes a link that's been blocked for being spammy or unsafe:"

Tea Leaves

Congratulations!

Whether you stood up to run for office and serve your community, organized, donated, leafleted, canvassed, phoned, wrote a letter, addressed postcards, refused to be intimidated by false accusations, wore bunny ears, or simply paid attention and voted, Thank You!

You stood up for our children and grandchildren, our community, for civility and rationalism, for our educators and not only for our public schools, but for our public institutions generally, which are under attack by the combined forces of greed, selfishness and short-sighted ignorance.

Well done. E Pluribus Unum Baby!

WeeVoter Candidates Even Refuse Interviews

If you haven't yet had a chance, grab a copy of last week's Standard Press and read the sidebar on Page 6. It recounts the exhaustive attempts by the paper to get the WeeVote endorsed candidates to grant interviews to the paper and present their views and ideas of what they would like to do if elected to the BASD Board.

It was noted that candidates Larry Anderson and Jim Bousman readily agreed to participate, and their contemporaneous answers to the questions posed are included in last week's edition.

The WeeVote candidates on the other hand at first agreed to answer the same questions posed to the other responsive candidates, but only if presented to them in writing. The Standard Press agreed, but told the WeeVoters that they would have complete the process in approximately one hour as the responsive candidates had done. Even this was unacceptable to the WeeVoters as they began refusing to communicate with the Standard Press to confirm or deny their willingness to participate, even when offered a more generous response time, better suited to their . . . sensibilities.

WeeVote Violates Code

As Glass Houses aptly points out in a comment to the article about Bonnie Ketterhagen in the March 22nd edition Standard Press, the WeeVote candidates are now in violation of State Code (just like last year) for adding pink fluorescent streamers that blow in the wind to their yard signs: http://lab.southernlakesnewspapers.com/?p=8566

Glass Houses was kind enough to add a link to the pertinent Wisconsin Administrative Code section below:

Trans 201.16 Political signs.
(1) Definitions. "Political sign" means a sign erected for the purpose of soliciting support for or opposition to a candidate or a political party or relating to a referendum question in an election held under the laws of this state.
(2)Exemption. A political sign which would otherwise be subject to the permit requirement of s. Trans 201.07, is exempted if all of the following conditions are satisfied:
(a) The sign does not exceed 32 square feet in surface area.
(b) The sign is erected entirely on private property with the property owner's consent.
(c) The sign is erected less than 45 days before the election for which it is intended and is removed within 7 days after the election except that a sign erected before a primary election may remain in place until 7 days after the next following general election if the sign solicits support for a candidate, political party or referendum question that is before the electorate in both the primary and the general election.
(d) The sign does not contain flashing lights or moving parts or in any other way fail to conform with s. 84.30 (4) (b), Stats.
(e) The sign is not erected in a location where it constitutes a traffic hazard.
History: Cr. Register, July, 1983, No. 331, eff. 8-1-83; am. (2) (e), Register, July, 1996, No. 487, eff. 8-1-96.

WeeVoter Late to the Parade

Some folks are just late to the parade as exemplified in this letter to the editor from Ms. Catherine Theilen published yesterday in the Standard Press website: http://lab.southernlakesnewspapers.com/?p=8685

She criticizes BASD School Board member Larry Anderson for not using Gubnah Walker's "Tools" to twist the thumbs of our local educators to the full extent possible and ONLY saving the citizenry $1.7 million dollars. How selfish and vindictive can the WeeVoters get with their punitive and myopic Tea Party agenda?

She then goes on to say "My suggestion is put the whole district on Obama care." What does that even mean? Does Ms. Theilen know? Does she mistakenly believe that means free healthcare provided by the federal government leaving taxpayers off the hook? My strong suspicion is that she has been the willing, but unknowing consumer of vast amounts of disinformation and likely knows little to nothing about Obamacare.

But the most entertaining and revealing part is that she turns her ill-informed ire on us wayward pamphleteers advising us as follows: "A helpful hint to the people putting political literature on car windshields: please stop.  You are in violation of Burlington city littering ordinance #200-2 sections A & C."

It's NOT Working Walker!

Thanks to the Siren we have an excellent chart that shows plain as day what miserable failures Scott Walker and his "tools" are. Wipe it clean in 2014!

Remember, the Great Republicon Recession started in September 2008, so Wisconsin was holding its own with respect to job creation until Walker took office in December 2010 with his empty promise to create 250,000 private sector jobs.

Can a WeVoter Yell at Someone in Bunny Ears?

A Warren of Lit Droppers

Once again, the WeVoter Poobah Bonnie Ketterhagen just isn’t making any sense. She calls the distribution of campaign leaflets “disrespectful”. What on earth is disrespectful about exercising democracy on public property? Nothing! http://lab.southernlakesnewspapers.com/?p=8566

And threatening to have her Tea Party minions “watch, patrol, police and monitor” these public places for citizens distributing informational literature is just another petty attempt to bully and intimidate. It won’t work, bullies need to be stood up to and called out.

Besides that, just try and yell at someone in BUNNY EARS!

Ten Years After Bush-Cheney Time Bandits & War Criminals

Remember? 12 years ago about this time of year in 2001, before 9/11, Dick Cheney was holding his secret energy task force meetings. Only the Dickster and the fossil industries were allowed to attend or know what was discussed, the public and any other groups were excluded and the content kept secret through executive privilege.

Under a Freedom of Information Act request the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch was able to get three small documents from the conclaves that inadvertently happened to be at the State Dept. and therefore had to be released under the law. These three little documents speak volumes about the agenda of the Cheney Administration.

Public Education is Patriotic!

Healthy public education is a founding principle of our democracy. Our Founders knew that it was vital to nurturing liberty, the pursuit of happiness and justice for all.

In 1784, Thomas Jefferson put forth the Northwest Ordinance, pertaining to the northwest territories of our young Republic, OH, MI, IN, IL and WI. It set aside the 16th Section of every township for the purpose of public education. The proceeds of the sale of this land at $1 per acre was put toward funding public education. This was the first national education law in the world! Public education is a foundational value of our more perfect union, that the citizens of a Republic, a representative democracy must be educated if they are to be free to govern themselves.

To honor and preserve such a system is a core patriotic value. To tear such a system down is not conservatism in the American way, but rather in the British imperial way, when only the eldest sons of the masses, if they were fortunate, might learn the craft of their fathers and only the Aristocrats, whose yoke we threw off with our Revolution were allowed to be truly educated.

The People couldn't be allowed to become educated under the old, pre-revolutionary British imperial way our they might decide they wanted to, and were capable of, governing themselves. To the aristocracy that was unacceptable, the People were to be Ruled! The shot fired around the world shattered that old system and brought forth the freedom of equal rights, self determination and self governance through the informed consent of the citizenry. An informed consent that requires an educated public.

WeVote Burlington is a local affiliate of the Tea Party, which has a national agenda of tearing down our public institutions of education and replacing them with private, for-profit schools that will not serve te public equally. The Ketterhagens, the Koldeways and Mrs. Miller may think this agenda is worthy of advancement through our community's school board, but their moral compass is misdirected and they’ve got their flag turned upside down.
http://burlingtonareaprogressives.blogspot.com/2012/11/ketterhagens-snake-strangled-banner.html

Furthermore, existing board member Phillip Ketterhagen has scapegoated our fellow citizens who teach, referring to them as cattle who need to be hit in the head with a 2x4. Yes, I understand it’s a metaphor, but metaphorically speaking that makes Ketterhagen the equivalent of a bully, berating and threatening our communal family with physical abuse . . . metaphorically of course!
 http://burlingtonareaprogressives.blogspot.com/2012/06/i-have-it-from-reliable-sources-that-tp.html

Our board of education should be a panel to nurture the best interests of our community, our children and our democracy, not a club to be wielded in beating down our family members, friends and neighbors to advance a narrow, radical, self-centered and, in the American way, unconservative political agenda. We mustn’t let our community turn into a dysfunctional family by electing two more tea partiers, Julie Koldeway and Norma Miller to act as enablers for the bully on the board.

We need sound, knowledgeable stewards of the public trust to nurture the health of our schools, both fiscally and educationally. That's why this citizen is voting for Larry Anderson and Jim Bousman for BASD board on April 2nd!

 

WeVote Candidates Refuse Debate

I've just gotten word that the Standard Press is NOT going to have a candidate forum because the WeVote PAC school board candidates have refused to participate. To me, this repeated refusal by the Tea Party candidates, Julie Koldeway and Norma Miller, to face the local press, to face their opponents and most importantly to face the public, the voters, and to answer questions SPEAKS VOLUMES!

I say repeated, because Julie Koldeway had already refused to participate in a public forum sponsored by the Standard Press that was to be held before the primary election. That forum unfortunately was cancelled due to a severe winter storm.

This fear of confronting the public appears at times to border on paranoia with perhaps the absurd notion that the Standard Press might be part of the "liberal media" and out to get the WeVote folks by twisting their words as exemplified by their grand poobah Bonnie Ketterhagen in this Standard Press article where she copies her comments to the WeVoters as documentation stating; “Below is a copy of the email I sent to the Standard Press after they submitted questions and requested an interview with us. If what appears in this week’s edition is different, you will know the truth.” http://lab.southernlakesnewspapers.com/?p=8244&t=Partisan+politics+marks+School+Board+election

I find it interesting that for a Standard Press article published a year or so ago about the WeVotes, Bonnie Ketterhagen and Julie Koldeway both refused to answer questions unless they were submitted in advance, so that they could carefully craft their answers and respond in writing. It's a pattern now and it's obvious that the local tea party people are afraid of something, maybe it's just saying something stupid.

However, the other two candidates, Larry Anderson and Jim Bausman were both willing and eager to participate, to state the cases for their candidacies and answer to the citizens of the Burlington Area School District.

So will it be candidates that are willing to stand forth, be open and up front about themselves and their positions, or those that fear brightlight, questioning and the potential exposure of their group's agenda before the public? The choice is yours Burlington. Vote on April 2nd (or before if you'll be away over spring break!).

Norma TP Miller Not Qualified

Burlington School Board Candidate and Tea Partier, Norma Miller in letter published in yesterday's Standard Press opinion section, said; "Right now we spend 85 cents out of every tax dollar on staff wages and benefits. That means 15 cents out of every tax dollar is spent on our children."


Ah NO, it does NOT! That statement alone demonstrates why she is not qualified to be on the Board, with regard to both her attitude toward our teachers and by her lack of understanding of how the funds to support our students are applied.

Apparently, Ms. Miller doesn't understand that the teachers are there for the students. That's not only completely misguided, it's unprofessional and disrespectful. How else are the students supposed to get educated? Education is a people intensive effort, not just in BASD, but in the schools all over our nation. Of course the bulk of the funding goes to teachers and other staff. They are what makes a building a school!

And her notion that only the remaining 15% goes to the children is equally absurd. That 15% goes to run and maintain district facilities. Like the teachers, are not the buildings also for the students? Of course! But apparently Ms. Miller believes that an ediface is more important than an educator to your children's and granchildren's future and that of our community.

I guess by her way of thinking we can cut costs by 85% and give our children nice buildings where they can stare vacantly at an empty blackboard and magically educate themselves.

I my opinion, Norma Miller offers little prospect of good stewardship over our schools or our future citizens!

The Tea Party is a Cancer!

How can you tell the Tea Party IS A CANCER? Because an investigation of the TPs by the National Cancer Institute and the National Institutes of Health reveals it's a synthetic concoction funded by the Tobacco and Fossil Industries. Its' safe to breathe around the TP asstroturf, just don't Inhale.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/16042-focus-false-spontaneity-of-the-tea-party