Wisconsin Recall Election Results 2012: Live Updates (VIDEO)

HuffPost  Posted: 06/05/2012  8:09 pm

The Wisconsin recall election results have all eyes on the Badger State.

Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett (D) challenged Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) in Tuesday’s gubernatorial contest.

HuffPost’s Mark Blumenthal reports:

The final round of polls on Tuesday’s Wisconsin recall election are something of a puzzle, although the uncertainty is more about the margin separating the candidates than the outcome. While virtually all show Republican Gov. Scott Walker leading his Democratic challenger, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, they disagree about the size of Walker’s lead.Six polls completed in the last 10 days have shown everything from a 12-percentage-point Walker lead to a dead-even race. One explanation for the difference is sponsorship: Internal polls sponsored by the Democratic campaigns have typically shown a closer contest. Beyond that, although the polls differ considerably in their methods, nothing stands out to explain why some show Walker doing better than others.

Five additional contests were held in Wisconsin on Tuesday.

Below, a live blog of the latest developments to unfold.

LIVE BLOG & MORE HERE

Read Full Post »

Koch Brother Admits Buying Wisconsin Governor (VIDEO)

Read Full Post »

Jan Brewer Recall Possible As Arizona Collective Bargaining Has Democrats, Unions Planning Protests

Huff Post – First Posted: 02/ 2/2012  1:25 pm Updated: 02/ 2/2012  5:09 pm

By- John Celock

Arizona could become the next Wisconsin as plans for protests, Capitol sit-ins and a potential effort to recall the governor get underway in an effort by progressives to block the passage of sweeping legislation to ban collective bargaining.

State Democrats and union leaders said that plans are in place to launch Wisconsin-style measures in an effort to block the collective bargaining ban measures currently headed to a vote in the Republican-dominated Senate. Among the plans being considered are rallying large groups of public employees around the Capitol complex in Phoenix, lobbying moderate Republican legislators and potentially exploring a recall campaign against Gov. Jan Brewer (R). With Republicans’ large majorities in both legislative chambers, Democrats believe rallies and public pressure may be the only way to block the passage of the bills.

“You may wake the sleeping giant of Arizona, between attacks on the schools, unions and the Latino population,” state House Minority Leader Chad Campbell (D-Phoenix) said.

Republican lawmakers have proposed bills that would prohibit all public employees — including police and fire personnel — from collectively bargaining, ban the automatic deduction of union dues for public employees and prohibit the compensation of public employees for work done with the union. The bills were approved by the Senate’s government relations committee Wednesday.

“These bills are an all-out assault on workers and the middle class,” said Senate Minority Leader David Schapira (D-Tempe).

Arizona AFL-CIO Executive Director Rebekah Friend said the unions are currently planning the rallies, but did not give a timeframe for when the events would actually take place. She said the labor movement was prepared for the payroll deduction bill and Brewer’s previous announcements on collective bargaining, but were surprised by the scope of the current bills, including the addition of public safety workers.

“They over-reached this time,” Friend said of the state’s Republican leadership. “The people who have been their friends are against them.”

VIDEO & MORE HERE

Read Full Post »

Walkerville Tent City Up And Running (VIDEO)

Walkerville tent city up and running

Crooks and Liars

By scarce

June 06, 2011 05:13 AM

MADISON (WKOW) — The makeshift community of protesters against Governor Scott Walker’s biennium budget is up and running.

The two-week long “Walkerville” tent city began Saturday with a kickoff event at 7 pm.

“This is all part of the anger and frustration at politicians that aren’t listening to working class folks from around this state,” said organizer Peter Rickman.

Protesters are calling it “Walkerville” after the “Hooverville” towns set up during the Great Depression.

Overnight camping is allowed along certain streets on Capitol Square, but not on Capitol grounds.
…
“If the people’s house is going to be closed down we’ve gotta have a presence known,” said Walkerville organizer Peter Rickman.

Rickman hopes to bring back the presence everyone remembers in February.

“We want to hold the politicians accountable for the bad choices they’re making,” said Rickman.

Each day will have a theme. Sunday – a rally was held for K-12 education.

“We’ll take this message of dignity for all workers across this state,” said Peggy Coyne, MTI President during a speech.

“It’s the impact of those dollars across the state that really indicate how bad the choices are going to be,” said Mary Bell, President of the Wisconsin Education Association Council.

“This budget is going to have a long lasting devastating impact on the kind of life we enjoy in Wisconsin,” said Bell.

VIDEO AND MORE HERE

Read Full Post »

Scott Walker: Glory Days Over?

The “Glory Days” of Scott Walker May Already be Over

Submitted by mark karlin on Tue, 04/26/2011 – 8:34pm.

MARK KARLIN, EDITOR OF BUZZFLASH FOR TRUTHOUT

These are not the glory days that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker was envisioning as he assumed his Napoleonic reign.

Walker, for instance, is openly complaining that the apparently successful effort to initiate recall elections for at least five (now six) Republican state senators who have sided with him, well, that such exercises of democracy are making it difficult for him to govern in a “republic.”

That may explain why the Wisconsin legislature – otherwise known, perhaps, as the rubber-stamp body of the autocratic ruler of the state of “Walkerstan” – is going to try to make it extremely difficult for university students to vote. Shrink the pro-union and progressive vote and win elections by making sure that older white Republicans get the privilege of casting a ballot.

Walker is also hoping to rely on the Koch brothers and other wealthy sources, such as the Bradley Foundation in Milwaukee, to keep the public misinformed. As BuzzFlash first reported, the Kochs are putting quite a bankroll into a Facebook campaign to recruit right-wing advocates for “conservative think tanks” around the nation.

And as evidence of the rather suspicious, unsavory and unethical relationships among Walker, David Prosser and Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus continue to mount, Walker has been reduced to taking claim for creating jobs that were already announced by his Democratic predecessor.

As the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported on April 24:

Little did anyone know that Gov. Scott Walker was such a huge fan of recycling.

Just look at his latest jobs announcement.

Walker recently took credit in a widely reported press conference for creating 125 jobs at a state manufacturing plant, even though then-Gov. Jim Doyle announced the same new jobs back in December.

About now, Walker may be remembering that he personally can be recalled after a year in office.

You probably won’t hear the governor of “Walkerstan” playing Bruce Springsteen’s “Glory Days” any time soon.

Read Full Post »

Wisconsin Judge Rules Union Law Not In Effect

Wisconsin Judge Declares Union Law Not In Effect

TODD RICHMOND and SCOTT BAUER   03/31/11 11:33 AM ET   via: HuffPost

MADISON, Wis. — A Wisconsin judge ruled Thursday the state’s divisive new collective bargaining law had not taken effect, and officials in Republican Gov. Scott Walker’s administration say he plans to comply with the ruling and to halt preparations to begin deducting money from public workers’ paychecks.

Dane County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi issued her declaration a day after Walker’s aides said they believed the law was processed correctly and that they would continue efforts to enact it, despite the judge’s warning to halt such efforts.

Two Walker administration officials who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because the governor hadn’t publicly announced his plans said he would announce later Thursday that he would comply with Sumi’s ruling.

The law would require most public sector workers to contribute more to their health care and pensions, changes that amount to an average 8 percent pay cut. The measure also strips them of their right to collectively bargain any work conditions except wages.

Walker signed the proposal into law earlier this month after weeks of large pro-union protests in and around the state Capitol, prompting Democrats to file several lawsuits challenging its legitimacy.

MORE HERE

Read Full Post »

Red vs. Blue: The Great Midwestern Backlash

Red vs. blue: The great Midwestern backlash

New GOP governors in Wisconsin, Ohio and Michigan are suddenly unpopular. The economy gives, and it takes away

Salon- By Andrew Leonard

Friday, Mar 18, 2011 08:30 ET

In 2008, Barack Obama carried Michigan, Wisconsin and Ohio, three crucial Midwestern states in which he had campaigned unceasingly. Two years later, the midterm tidal wave handed monolithic control of the state legislature and governor’s mansion in each state over to Republicans. The new governors, Wisconsin’s Scott Walker, Ohio’s John Kasich and Michigan’s Rick Snyder, immediately and forcefully moved to exploit their power in pursuit of bold Republican agendas.

We’re not just talking good old-fashioned budget-balancing mandated cuts in public services. The grandiose ambitions of Wisconsin’s Walker have been well chronicled. But Michigan’s Rick Snyder has been equally aggressive. Snyder is proposing to cut corporate taxes in Michigan by 60 percent while simultaneously hiking the percentage of state revenues raised from individual income taxes from 31 percent to 41 percent. He just signed a “financial emergency law” giving him the right to appoint emergency managers — with the legal power to arbitrarily cancel union contracts — to replace locally elected government authorities. In Ohio, Kasich plans to gut public education spending, end collective bargaining by public sector workers, sell prisons to the private sector and push through a voucher plan for charter schools.

So now comes the backlash. Polls in each state show support for the trio of Republican governors plummeting. In Wisconsin, Democrats are counting the days until Walker is eligible for a recall, and in the meantime, pushing hard to retake control of the state Senate. On Wednesday, 5,000 protesters marched through the Michigan state Capitol — the largest protest yet in that state — and Gov. Snyder was booed by workers at a Ford Focus plant. Grass-roots resistance to Ohio’s Kasich doesn’t yet appear to have reached quite the same fever pitch, but if he ran for reelection today against his 2010 opponent, he’d get clobbered.

As quickly as the politics of the Midwest reversed themselves, once, they are doing so again, and political observers can be excused for suffering a severe case of whiplash. We’re used to seeing the pendulum swing in the United States, but the action over the last two years — from Obama’s breakthrough to the Tea Party rebellion to Cairo-in-Wisconsin — is more reminiscent of a strobe light’s jitteriness. How to explain it?

MORE HERE

Read Full Post »

Judge Blocks Contentious Wisconsin Union Law

Judge blocks contentious Wisconsin union law

By JASON SMATHERS, Associated Press via: Salon

Friday, Mar 18, 2011 12:20 ET

The move will put an immediate halt on the law that was meant to go into effect on March 25th

A Wisconsin judge issued a temporary restraining order Friday blocking the state’s new and contentious collective bargaining law from taking effect, a measure that drew tens of thousands of protesters to the state Capitol and sent some Democrats fleeing to Illinois in an tempt to block a vote on it.

The judge’s order is a major setback for Walker and puts the future of the law in question.

Dane County Judge Maryann Sumi issued the order, which was requested by that county’s District Attorney Ismael Ozanne, a Democrat. Ozanne filed a lawsuit contending that a legislative committee that broke a stalemate that had kept the law in limbo for weeks met without the 24-hour notice required by Wisconsin’s open meetings law. The Republican-controlled Legislature passed the measure and Gov. Scott Walker signed it last week.

Secretary of State Doug La Follette planned to publish the law on Mach 25, but the judge’s order will prevent that from happening, at least for now.

A spokesman for Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald declined to comment, citing the legal fight. Messages left for comment with Walker’s spokesmen, as well as Democratic legislative leaders, were not immediately returned.

The bill was part of Walker’s solution for plugging a $137 million state budget shortfall. A part of the measure would require state workers to increase their health insurance and pension contributions to save the state $30 million by July 1. Other parts of Walker’s original proposal to address the budget shortfall were removed before the bill passed last week. The Legislature planned to take those up later. Lawmakers are not scheduled to be in session again until April 5.

People opposed to the law converged on the state Capitol over the past month with massive demonstrations that went on for days on end.

SOURCE

Read Full Post »

Wisconsin DA Files Lawsuit Against Scott Walker & Wisconsin Republicans

Scott Walker And Wisconsin Republicans Face Legal Battles Over Bill

Politicususa- By Sarah Jones

March 17, 2011

In the aftermath of his Draconian power grab, Governor Scott Walker has been smirking his way though celebratory dinners and being slapped on the back by national Republicans who whisper “Vice Presidential material” to him through the decayed orifices of their corporate mouths. Scott’s pleasure with himself is evident to all who are forced to watch this soulless Koch logo preen his way through a press conference.

But back in his home state, things don’t look very good for Scotty. Numerous lawsuits have been brought against Walker’s anti-union bill, the most important one of which calls for the bill to be voided. After reading numerous complaints, the Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne believes the Republicans violated the open meeting law of Wisconsin. He further requests a stay on publishing the bill until the court can hear these matters. In addition, several other suits have been brought against the Republicans for violating open meeting laws and passing a financial bill without the necessary quorum.

After receiving at least five complaints regarding the Republicans’ alleged violation of the open meeting law, the DA filed a lawsuit. The suit alleges that in the March 9 meeting during which Republicans passed Walker’s anti-union bill, killing collective bargaining, the special legislative committee (consisting of Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald of Juneau, Senate President Mike Ellis of Neenah, Assembly Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald of Horicon and Assembly Majority Leader Scott Suder of Abbotsford) violated the Wisconsin Open Meeting Law in several ways.

Firstly, the Republicans claimed they were in an emergency meeting and thus exempt from giving notice as required by open meeting law, but the DA found they do not meet the requirements for an emergency meeting. Secondly, Republicans claimed that Senate rules overrode the state law, but the DA determined that because they had both the assembly and the Senate in the meeting, the Senate rules do not apply. Thirdly, the Republicans held the meeting at a time when they restricted access to the Capitol to the public (as well as lawmakers) as well as holding it in a tiny room where there was no room for the public.

MORE HERE

Read Full Post »

Unequal Protection: Part I: Corporations Take Over

Unequal Protection: Part I: Corporations Take Over

Truthout

Tuesday 15 March 2011

by: Thom Hartmann, Berrett-Kohler Publishers | Serialized Book

Chapter 1: The Deciding Moment?

The first thing to understand is the difference between the natural person and the fictitious person called a corporation. They differ in the purpose for which they are created, in the strength which they possess, and in the restraints under which they act.

Man is the handiwork of God and was placed upon earth to carry out a Divine purpose; the corporation is the handiwork of man and created to carry out a money-making policy.

There is comparatively little difference in the strength of men; a corporation may be one hundred, one thousand, or even one million times stronger than the average man. Man acts under the restraints of conscience, and is influenced also by a belief in a future life. A corporation has no soul and cares nothing about the hereafter….

—William Jennings Bryan, in his address to the
Ohio 1912 Constitutional Convention

Part of the American Revolution was about to be lost a century after it had been fought. At the time probably very few of the people involved realized that what they were about to witness could be a counterrevolution that would change life in the United States and, ultimately, the world over the course of the following century.

In 1886 the Supreme Court met in the U.S. Capitol building, in what is now called the Old Senate Chamber. It was May, and while the northeastern states were slowly recovering from the most devastating ice storm of the century just three months earlier, Washington, D.C., was warm and in bloom.

In the Supreme Court’s chamber, a gilt eagle stretched its 6-foot wingspan over the head of Chief Justice Morrison Remick Waite as he glared down at the attorneys for the Southern Pacific Railroad and the county of Santa Clara, California. Waite was about to pronounce judgment in a case that had been argued over a year earlier, at the end of January 1885.

MORE HERE

Read Full Post »