Scott Walker's Non-Denial Denial in the John Doe Investigation

Here's Scott Walker answering questions about the John Doe investigation today. Note the carefully chosen language:

"I think it's very clear when all of this is done, no matter how much time it takes, and again my campaign has been involved with cooperating with them for more than a year, I have every confidence that when this is completed, people will see that our integrity remains intact," Walker said.

Emphasis added, of course.

You know what words I didn't read? I did not participate in any illegal campaigning on taxpayer time, or I did not coordinate any illegal campaign activities while county executive, or I unequivocally reject as false any accusations that I abused my previous office, etc. Instead, Walker answers with a response that was obviously clearly by his counsel.

There are some other gems in the piece, at least one of which is obscured by the secretive nature inherent to John Doe investigations. Like this one:

Walker declined to answer a question about whether he or his attorney had been contacted by investigators. By contrast, he said last week that he had not yet talked with anyone in Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm's office.

"I have not, and I certainly would be willing if they asked me to in the future," Walker told the Journal Sentinel last week.

[...]

Walker said if he had been aware of any other county employees doing political work with county resources on county time, he would have acted the same way he acted in the Wink matter.

"If we had known about anyone else, we would have taken the same action," Walker said.

Asked about the proximity of his office to space occupied by Kelly Rindfleisch, his then-deputy chief of staff in 2010, and whether he knew what Rindfleisch was doing, Walker declined to comment, saying he wanted to abide by the rules of the John Doe probe and not provide details publicly.

If Walker hasn't been contacted by the investigators, then I don't think he is necessarily bound by the same gag order that prevents those involved in the proceeding to keep quiet. I'm not sure about that, but it does seem to follow. If it is true, he's either lying about not being contacted by the investigators or really doesn't want to have to answer any questions about Rindfleisch at all.

Seeing as his closest associates are the one being served with subpoenas these days, it should be clear by now that Walker is a possible, if not probable, target of the investigation. It's a Little Big Horn strategy that can only really point to one individual. Walker's words today are the first public sigh that I've seen that he knows he's in a ton of legal trouble. It's usually the first sign of someone who is going to be in a lot of trouble in the near future. Maybe that has something to do with Darlene Wink's agreement to cooperate in the investigation.

As for Brett Davis -- his words today seem to have marked himself as impending roadkill. He gave the only answer worse than a non-denial denial: he gave a "no comment." That's never a good sign.

The Attacks on Charles Franklin are Baseless and Need to Stop

The recent attacks against Charles Franklin's poll for Marquette Law School are beyond idiotic. They're so stupid that I'm actually embarrassed for the people making them as they have revealed themselves to be so filled with rage at Scott Walker that any deviation from their own worldview appears to be reason enough to lash out at the messenger.

Perhaps the silliest attack is that Franklin is himself a conservative, and thus has a motive to skew his polls as such, based solely on two pieces of evidence: he conducted the poll for Marquette Law School (an institution so conservative that it employs noted reactionary Russ Feingold) and that he once conducted a poll for WPRI. If this were true, then Franklin would also be a flaming liberal because he sold Pollster.com, of which he was a co-founder, to the Huffington Post. He can't be both.

The second criticism has been about the ideological weights of the sample used for the poll, which runs something like this:

Conservative = 41.6%
Moderate = 32.5%
Liberal = 20.7%

Liberals are whining -- and there really is no other word for it -- that this weighing system is unfair. It's not just fair, it's reality. The most recent Gallup poll of American ideological identity ran this way:

Conservative = 41%
Moderate = 36%
Liberal = 21%

Which looks an awful lot like the sample Franklin took. Last October, when Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm, surveyed the state it used the following sample:

Very/Somewhat Conservative = 42%
Moderate = 30%
Very/Somewhat Liberal = 19%


There was no outcry then. You can find four other recent polls conducted by PPP in Wisconsin with the exact same weights here, here, here, and here. In fact, it appears that PPP always uses those weights when polling Wisconsin. I would post the ideological breakdown of the St. Norbert's poll from November that concluded 58% of Wisconsinites wanted to recall Walker, but they didn't even publish how they weighed their sample. We could go on and on and on like this, pulling out examples from just about every pollster whose done work in Wisconsin in recent years, but the the weights really aren't going to change all that much because they're consistent with industry practice.

Charles Franklin's academic credentials are damn near unimpeachable. He's one of the world's foremost authorities on polling and he didn't get that reputation by being a partisan hack -- he earned it by being a scientist and as such he's all about the data. In recent years he's gone out of his way to explain the science in terms the public can understand. Franklin is exactly what the creators of the Wisconsin Idea had in mind when they came up with the concept. Accusing him of slanting his polls to conform with the supposed ideology of his temporary employer strain credulity and betrays the fact that the accuser doesn't understand much about polling.

Polls are both tools and weapons. The folks who are criticizing Franklin only seem to understand the latter. It's one thing to rip on a poll like Rasumussen for it's consistent "house effect," but to essentially accuse Charles Franklin of fraud -- which is exactly what his detractors are doing -- is asinine. If Wisconsin progressives want any prayer of recalling Scott Walker they are going to have accept uncomfortable realities on occasion. Franklin's poll has one simple findings: there's still a lot of work to do. If the left is going to attack any messenger who brings them this news in the future, they should give up right now because they will fail.

How Many More 2,750 Word Front Page Articles on on the John Doe Investigation do You Think Scott Walker can Take?

All of these stories seem to fly around a nucleus like so many electrons.

Enter The Chief's Recall Total Pool

The rules are simple:

• Estimate the total number of signatures United Wisconsin will submit to the GAB tomorrow in the comments section below. Forecast any of the individual races or go for the grand total.

• The winner gets a limerick composed in their honor written by yours truly.

The Chief's official guess is 789,623 for Walker. 532,687 for Kleefisch. 22,777 for Moulton. 23,337 for Wangaard.  23,783 for Galloway. 25,448 for Fitzgerald. That's a grand total of  1,417,655.


How did we arrive at our guess? The Dems passed along that they are in possession of over 3000 pounds of signatures in a fund-raising plea today. I assume that's for everyone: Walker, Kleefisch and the four senators.

If we assume that each petition was printed out on twenty pound bond paper, which is standard for copying paper, then the Recall Effort will have collected no less than 295,857 sheets of paper -- presuming that one ream (or 500 pieces) weighs 5.07 pounds.

And this is where things start to get dicey. Some petitions have enough room for five signatures, some ten. Assuming each petition is filled out completely (an extreme unlikelihood), that gives us a window between 1,479,285 -- hypothetically more than enough to initiate recalls for all six targets -- and almost three million.

If the drive does exceed our expectations -- and here we're just talking about the Walker drive -- these are a few important milestones:

• 1,004,303 -- The number of people who voted for Tom Barrett in 2010.

• 1,080,480 -- 50% of voters who voted in 2010

• 1,128,159 -- The number of people who voted for Scott Walker in 2010.

• 1,350,000 -- Total, if the rate at which the first month of signature collection continued during the second month. This is almost certainly not going to happen.

We'll explain how we arrives at our numbers on Wednesday. Spoiler Alert: it was mostly guessing.

Ron Johnson's Misguided Obsession with Domestic Oil Production

When Ron Johnson was running for office in 2010 he made one of his first policy gaffes came when he made comments that could be interpreted that he supported potential oil drilling in the Great Lakes. This was right around the time it was revealed that Johnson owned six figures worth of stock in BP, stock he promised to eventually sell, a promise he ultimately reneged on, then sorta followed through with following the election when he sold of his entire stock portfolio. Last May Johnson voted against a bill that would have stripped oil companies of several billion dollars worth of government subsidies, which Johnson has routinely opposed on principle.

The moral of the story is that Johnson's relationship with the oil industry is checkered, at best.

Most of this oil business happened during the early months of summer 2010, when no one was paying attention, and as a result domestic drilling never really become much of an issue. Since Johnson took office, however, he's made it a point to champion domestic oil production in most of communiques with the masses. It's not terribly surprising since it's been a pet cause among conservatives for the last decade, and it might be seem odd coming from Johnson given his political past with the issue and the fact that he has no expertise with the matter at all, so why does Johnson appear to be making domestic drilling his issue de jour?

First of all, Johnson's drilling agenda is about five years old. He accuses the President of "limiting energy development" in the U.S. in his column in yesterday's Wall Street Journal and adds:

The administration has squandered billions of dollars on politically connected, green-energy boondoggle projects, while at the same time maintaining a de facto moratorium on off-shore drilling, and dragging its feet on granting permits for other energy utilization projects such as the Keystone XL Pipeline and restricting and limiting leases for offshore energy production. Republicans could propose a plan to utilize crucial domestic resources, including oil, natural gas and coal, to produce energy and create jobs.

(For the record, Obama has actually pledged to to increase lease sales both off-shore and in Alaska.)

He elaborated on that thought in an interview with Newsmax today:

Johnson accused Democrats of being beholden to extreme environmentalists in their rejection of both drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and the construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to Texas.

Alaskans want drilling and their view about their own environment is more important than those of people in California, New York or Massachusetts, he said, declaring: “If Alaskans want to drill in ANWR, we should let Alaskans drill in ANWR.”

The pipeline will be built unless Obama declares it against the national interest, Johnson said. “If you take a look at the 20,000 jobs the construction would create; you take a look at the $20 billion in private sector investment; you take a look at the hundreds of thousands of jobs that would be created long-term; and the impact on our energy prices, I think it will be very difficult for President Obama to make that determination.”

So Johnson domestic oil production plan revolves around three different elements: off-shore drilling, drilling in ANWR and the Keystone pipeline. 

But let's take a look a what is actually happening to oil production in the United States, which has actually increased since Obama entered the White House:

So far from "limiting" oil production, it's actually picked up and without drilling in environmentally sensitive areas. Last year, for the first time in six decades, the U.S. became an oil exporter. All of this has happened despite the disruption in off-shore drilling Johnson decries.

This has occurred largely because of drilling in the Bakken Oil Formation in North Dakota. The discovery and subsequent exploitation of this cache has completely transformed the way we think about energy in America. The USGS estimates that there are "only" 896 million barrels of oil under ANWR, but there are 18 billion barrels in the Bakken. That's just recoverable oil using today's extraction technology, the estimate has actually been growing as the technology is reconfigured to meet the needs of the location. The estimates of the total oil in the formation range from 167-503 billion barrels.

There really is no comparison between the reserves in ANWR compared to those in the Bakken.

The oil in the Bakken formation is one of the big reasons green tech firms are dropping like flies these days. Most of these firms were founded prior to 2008 when Bakken oil boom began and acquired much of their seed capital from investors expecting sky-rocketing gas prices in the years ahead. That's not going to happen now. This poses a huge problem for environmentalists who can no longer lean on the "energy independence" and/or "national security" aspects of green energy promotion, which tended to be their strongest arguments.

If conservatives were smart that would drop ANWR all together on focus on Bakken because vigorous development of that formation is going to happen regardless of who's in power. It's an easy win. To an extent Republicans are kind of doing this by harping on the Keystone pipeline, but why ditch a perfectly good talking point when it's still moving voters, right?

During his first year in office Johnson has tried -- without any success whatsoever -- to find an issue that he can latch onto and call his own. He's tried to become a point man on the deficit, on regulations (and specifically banking regulations) and even on senate procedure, but has failed to find a cause that can separate him from the rest of the pack. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that Johnson has eventually made his way to energy. If energy isn't your cup of tea, don't worry: Johnson will likely be opining on another completely unrelated topic in about six weeks or so.

This is becoming one of the most fundamental problems of Johnson's tenure: his impatience with the issues. There's very little doubt Johnson believes he has the answer to all that ails Washington, but in attempting to be a master of all issues he's become an expert in none of them. Instead of adopting a cause and sticking with it for the long haul, Johnson seems to be test-driving as many as he can handle in order to find the one issue where others will actually follow his lead. This why Johnson fills his op-ed pieces with shallow discussions of between 5 and 12 issues when he really should be focusing on just one.

Ron Johnson unveils another Doomed Initiative called "America's Choice"

Oh, Lord. Fresh off the heels of a disastrous first year in the U.S. Senate, Ron Johnson decided to kick off his second year in office with a plan to transform Congress into a partisan Thunderdome spectacle designed solely to "highlight the differences" between the two parties. Seriously, those are his exact words.

Here he is in today's Wall Street Journal:

Americans are frustrated over Washington's inability to address our nation's economic and fiscal problems. That's why I have been working with a growing group of senators and House members to develop a plan that can build public support for solutions. It's called "America's Choice."

One quickly discovers that Johnson and his team spent more time working on the branding of this "plan" than on the plan itself. 

America's Choice seeks to highlight the differences between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party led by President Obama.

If the entire piece can be reduced to one sentence, here it is. This plan does not appear to advance an policy goals, has no ambitions to put people back to work and is not supported by any data, but is designed to embarrass the President during a re-election. The only good thing about this plan so far is the brazen transparency of it all.

It could do so over the coming months by presenting to the country, through a series of votes in the House of Representatives, the battle between those who believe in broadest terms in limited government and freedom and those who promote government control and dependency. 

Could do so? It doesn't sound like Johnson thinks enough of his niftily-named plan to actually think it will have any hope of doing so, but then again his plan calls for votes in a House of Congress to which he does not belong. Why Johnson is asking the House of Representative to carry the water when he is a member of the Senate is a bit ridiculous, but not entirely inconsistent with Johnson's M.O. Johnson does subscribe to the inane belief that a supermajority is required to get anything done in the Senate, a tenet that runs counter to his consistent whining that the Senate never gets enough done and this very plan. Go figure.

What are the choices these votes could present? Growing government spending and debt or growing the private sector and reducing government. Limiting energy development or using America's energy resources. Punishing success or pro-growth tax reform. A government takeover of health care or repealing ObamaCare and replacing it with patient-centered, free-market reforms.

Blah blah blah... We've heard this all before: the Manichean worldview of government coming from Johnson is as unproductive as it is tiresome.

The alternatives are stark. President Obama's faith in government is so strong that he has increased its size to 24% of gross domestic product from 21%, and increased our nation's debt by over $4 trillion. Republicans, on the other hand, believe long-term self-sustaining jobs are created in the private sector—that government cannot tax, spend and borrow our nation to prosperity.

Just because Johnson and his Republican cohorts keep saying it, doesn't mean it's true:

And on taxes, Obama's lowered those too.

Will green energy power America's future? The administration has squandered billions of dollars on politically connected, green-energy boondoggle projects, while at the same time maintaining a de facto moratorium on off-shore drilling, and dragging its feet on granting permits for other energy utilization projects such as the Keystone XL Pipeline and restricting and limiting leases for offshore energy production. Republicans could propose a plan to utilize crucial domestic resources, including oil, natural gas and coal, to produce energy and create jobs. 

To be fair, the green jobs initiative has been something of a bust, but it should be noted that it does conform to Johnson earlier demand for "using America's energy resources." Clearly, Johnson was only talking about fossil fuels.

The problem with the green jobs initiative has been the recent oil boom in North Dakota, which has kept oil prices down in the U.S. below the point where spending on green tech -- much of which is still in the expensive R&D phase -- is profitale. Last year the U.S. became an oil exporting country for the first time in over 60 years. The fact is that we are developing our oil resources here in the United States, as fast as humanly possible. Johnson is still speaking the coded GOP language calling for drilling in ANWR and off the shore of Florida even though, at the moment and like the green tech industry, neither of those are necessary.

Regulatory overreach in this administration has been breathtaking. Executive agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Labor have been in hyper-drive, adding to the already job-crushing $1.75 trillion annual cost, according to the Small Business Administration, of federal regulatory compliance. Republicans could propose a regulatory moratorium to give businesses a chance to recover, and then enact real reform to achieve common-sense regulatory balance.

 Another series of rote talking points Johnson includes in everything he does...

President Obama has launched a divisive campaign pitting one group of Americans against another. 

Which is exactly what this "America's Choice" plan seems to aspire to do. You remember that "plan," don't you? The one Johnson opened up his op-ed piece discussing, but hasn't talked about since, even though we're now half way through the piece? Yeah, that one.

Yet 10% of Americans already pay 70% of all income taxes. 

And here's Ron Johnson, once again, valiantly sticking his neck out for the upper marginal income earners. This is a mathematical reality of a progressive tax system. We've discussed this before here and here.

Increasing the tax burden on that group is counterproductive. Sowing class division is an act of political cynicism producing terrible economic consequences. Significant pro-growth tax reform is the better path to build our economy and create jobs. 

It'd be great if Johnson used this incredibly value space in a national newspaper to outline such a tax plan, but instead we get an electioneering strategy.

The next part just rags on Obamacare:

Government takeover of our health-care system has been a liberal-progressive dream for decades. President Obama and Democrats in Congress passed the partisan Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. It neither protects patients, nor does it make health care more affordable. But it will lead to a government takeover of one-sixth of our economy, and it will blow a hole in an already horribly broken budget.

Republicans are united in our commitment to repeal ObamaCare and replace it with patient-centered reforms. Malpractice tort reform, health savings account expansion, insurance purchase across state lines, reduction of government mandates, and equalized tax treatment of insurance premiums are some of the key changes we will propose to the country. 

Now back to "America's Choice:"

America's Choice would clearly present two different visions of the country's future—one represented by the Republican Party and the other represented by the Democratic Party and its leader, President Obama. Once Congress returns from recess later this month, the Republican majority in the House could focus on one major area of domestic policy at a time. For example, February could be used to debate, craft and pass an energy utilization policy. 

It should be clear by now that Johnson is using his word count to propose a plan that he has not discussed with any other members of Congress. Johnson doesn't offer much in the way of detail because Johnson is completely oblivious to the fact that this is an election year for everyone in Washington except for himself (and 65 colleagues in the Senate). It's every man for himself.

When the House debates and passes an agenda item, Republican senators, candidates and conservative groups could concentrate on the same issue, using the same powerful facts and figures to inform and persuade the American public. Coordinating our focused efforts improves our ability to compete with the presidential bully pulpit and counteract media outlets that often work to marginalize us. 

This would have been sage advice ... about 20 years ago. This is actually what the conservative movement does extremely well. The only thing this paragraph goes to show is that Johnson doesn't get invited to the important meetings.

In 2011, President Obama stopped running the country and started running his re-election campaign. In his cynical attempt to divert attention away from his record by dividing us, Republicans have been put on defense. The America's Choice agenda would put us on offense.

If done well, we just might put enough pressure on Senate Democrats and the president to actually pass legislation that will begin to solve our problems. If not, Republicans will have provided Americans with a clear choice in November.

Again, in the end it's all about politics.

This op-ed just continues to drive home what a lousy Senator Johnson is. This plan is nothing more than branding, an empty catch phrase that has no details to consider carefully, no support from his colleagues and nothing to offer his constituents. There's a complete lack of focus on the issues -- Johnson mentions about eight of them during the course of his word limit and they seem to roll of the pen like poll-tested talking point rather than actionable items.

Expect "America's Choice" to wither on the vine until being blown away by a stiff autumn wind. This will be yet another one of Johnson's fail attempts to do his job.

MORE: It's been about 36 hours since Johnson's op-ed dropped and so far it's gotten very little traction. Only one of Johnson's senate colleagues has publicly signed on to the program and largely because it "was his idea first." Jennifer Rubin, WaPo's conservative blogger had this to say about the proposal:

Johnson’s very public style of marketing legislation, he conceded, is not how government usually operates. To someone coming from the private sector, however, as he did, “it is obvious” that lawmakers have to development a coherent message and sell their ideas to the public. At the very least, Johnson’s goal is to line up with that of Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.): Lay out a vision, explain it to voters and contrast it with the president’s.

That's about as delicate a way a sympathetic journalist can possibly say, "this guy doesn't know what the hell's going on in Washington."

Does Tommy Thompson work for a Private Equity Firm that uses an Off Shore Tax Shelter?

Wow, could we possibly hear any more about private equity than we have this last week?

Of course, we can!

It probably will come as little surprise that Tommy Thompson has dabbled in the Private Equity business. He joined the Boston-based  Peak Ridge Capital Group in 2010. It looks like PRCG was so happy to have Thompson aboard that they created an office in Madison, but the Wisconsin branch office isn't nearly as interesting as the one in Hamilton, Bermuda, which is well-known as a popular tax haven.

Unfortunately, PE firms are notorious for their lack of transparency. They are, after all, private firms and don't usually have to file SEC papers and what have you (there are exceptions). I actually had a monster of a time just trying to find which companies were in Peak Ridge's portfolio and no luck trying to find where they are incorporated. They seem to have registered with the Massachusetts Secretary of Commonwealth, but did so in 2007, seven years after they were founded.

Anyway, most Caribbean tax shelters have a couple of rules for using their countries to hide revenue from Uncle Sam. The first is that the business has to establish a physical presence on the island, usually in the form of a P.O. Box. The second, and I'm told this rule varies from island to island, is that the company must hold at least one board of directors meeting on the island every year. Both are true of Bermuda. The take-away here is that firms don't set up offices in Bermuda unless they're doing business in Bermuda, and the only businesses in Bermuda are wearing kick-ass shorts once a year and sheltering taxes.

This is probably one of those things more respectable people should look into.

Walkergate Update

Bottom line: worst than anyone anticipated, even Walker's most vehement detractors.

Allow Jake and Zach to take of the details, but here are the take-away points from the allegations:

• Veterans were (allegedly) defrauded for a very small amount of money (relatively speaking).

• Children were preyed upon by an (alleged) sexual predator.

• Scott Walker apparently never learned that "it's not the crime, it's the cover-up" and continues to twist his involvement in ways that would make a contortionist blush.

All of this dropped while Walker was in DC giving a speech at a conservative "think tank" this morning.

I recommend taking a look at Jake's very serious reading of the complaint. It's absolutely devastating. These are the kinds of allegations that keep high-rolling lawyers well-fed for years.

If Ever there were a Statement that Screamed "Fact Check Me!" -- it's this One

Before we end up with one of these "half true" rulings from the Journal-Sentinel, let's parse what was said:

Johnson said the United States has created a "very compassionate society," but in Wisconsin that same compassion has created a welfare state that encourages people not to work.

"A family unit can't survive on $22,000, but after they receive all of their government entitlements they receive more than $62,000," he said. "We have a safety net for the poor, but not for those who are out there working."

This seems to suggest that a family of (no size given) is eligible for $62,000 worth of state aide. Notice how Johnson says "receive," not "earn" or "make" or ""acquire."

But much of this is undoubtedly the cost of programs like BadgerCare, which could be expensive if the recipient is ill, but that isn't money a recipient is "receiving," per se: it's a service deemed to have a certain value. Johnson makes it sound like poor folks making $22,000 a year are being given an additional 200% pay raise -- in cash -- just for sitting on their assess. This is almost certainly not true.

Furthermore, I'm not sure where Johnson thinks his hypothetical family's initial $22,000 came from. He seems to think one can just acquire it by doing nothing. In actuality, if a person working for the federal minimum wage ($7.25 an hour) 40 hours a week all 52 weeks a year, the kind of real lazy bum who didn't take any vacation time, that person would make exactly $15,080. He'd have to work another 636 hours worth of overtime (at $10.88 an hour) to reach the $22,000 threshold.

That translates into just over a 52 hour work week every week of the year without any time off just so that they can reach an income Johnson seems to believe materializes out of nowhere.

Levity (this Blog could use some)

First, the local/instant YouTube classic almost eight years in the making:

And secondly, action from the Texas 5A Division II high school championship at Cowboys Stadium:
 
There's actually another angle from which the above splendor can be seen. I encourage you all to check it out.

Don't Buy Scott Walker's Chest-Pounding over the New Shopko Merger Jobs

There's some good news for folks in Green Bay tonight, as giant area retailer Shopko is creating about 120 new job via a merger. The news is so good that Gov. Walker's team is all over it with a press release:

MADISON—Governor Scott Walker today announced that Shopko will commence a corporate expansion project with assistance from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) that will result in the creation of more than 120 new positions at its corporate headquarters in Green Bay.

"My number one priority is helping Wisconsin businesses create jobs," Governor Walker said. "I am pleased we were able to work with Shopko to support their expansion and ensure it will take place in Wisconsin."

“We appreciate the WEDC working with us to support our growth and bring new, good paying jobs to Wisconsin,” commented Paul Jones, President and CEO of Shopko.

Founded in 1963 and headquartered in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Shopko is a $2 billion retailer that operates 149 stores in 13 states throughout the Midwest, Mountain and Pacific Northwest regions. The company announced today a merger that will result in a significant investment in Wisconsin and creation of new positions at its corporate headquarters in Green Bay. The creation of more than 120 new jobs will be assisted with an award of up to $2 million in Economic Development Tax Credits administered by the WEDC.

That's lovely. $2 million can pay salary and benefits to between 15-20 low to mid-level executives for about a year. But, really, how did those jobs end up here? Here's a more plausible explanation:

Over the past two years, Shopko has purchased seven stores from Pamida and successfully transitioned them to the Shopko Hometown format. These locations have delivered an improved customer experience and have seen a significant increase in store traffic, sales and profitability, the release stated.

Once Pamida’s chain-wide conversions are complete, the company plans to accelerate the addition of new Shopko Hometown stores in the second half of 2012 and into 2013, Burns said.

Both companies are owned by affiliates of Sun Capital Partners, Inc. a private investment firm focused on leverage buyouts, equity, debt, and other investments in market-leading companies.

Pamida has been owned by Shopko since 1999, and for the last six years they have both been owned by the same private equity firm who finally decided to reduce redundancies, increase shareholder value and all that jazz. Actually, Sun Cap looks like they started the merger process, or at least investigating the viability of a merger, two years ago, before Walker was in office or WEDC even existed.

Why this merger is getting tax credits might be an interesting issue to discuss. Shopko has twice the revenues of Pamida and it's almost always the case that the smaller guy has to pack his bags and move to the bigger kid's backyard during a merger. I'm not sure how floating $2 million Shopko's way does anything to create jobs that weren't already coming here. $2 million is 0.1% of Shopko's annual revenue, so it's really nothing to them; in fact, it's such a negligible pittance that Shopko didn't even mention WEDC's involvement in their press release on the merger. The $2 million Walker gave Shopko is little more than a gift basket from the neighborhood association's welcome wagon.

Without knowing much more about the deal itself or WEDC's involvement, I can only comment on what it looks like from the outside and, frankly, it looks pretty weak. The tax credits appear to be something WEDC floated Shopko's way solely for the sake of being able to claim that they are involved in job growth here in Wisconsin even though the state probably did absolutely nothing to bring those jobs here. That's one expensive press release.

If that's the case, then Walker et al. are incompetent at either 1.) messaging that they missed a golden opportunity to tell everyone that the economy is looking up and that jobs are coming back to Wisconsin without state government involvement (something I'm routinely told conservatives are quite fond of); or 2.) job creation that they can't count on private businesses to extol the Administration's leadership and/or policies without having to pay them.

Taking credit for something he had nothing to do with is quickly becoming a Scott Walker calling card. Lately we've had his heroic "expansion" of Family Care and now his fiat creation of jobs in Green Bay -- Walker truly seems adept at nothing than his own self-promotion.

It's a good thing that good jobs are coming to Green Bay and, yes, those jobs should be counted toward Walker's promise of 250,000 new jobs in the state by the end of his term; but Walker shouldn't pound his chest too much because he likely didn't do much -- if anything -- to bring them here.

MORE: Jake reminds us all of the eerily similar Spectrum Brands incident from not too long ago.

Did Rush Limbaugh Really just Accuse the GOP of Rigging Last Night's Caucus for Romney?

Is there any other way to read this?

RUSH: I can't tell you the number of people -- and I stayed up all the way until they found the votes.  My gosh, I thought I was watching the Democrats last night.  Ninety-nine percent of the votes in and they can't find the votes from two counties.  They couldn't find 'em.  They didn't know where the guy who had the votes was, and everybody knew what was going on.  At this point Santorum held, what was it, an 18-vote lead.  Everybody knew that what was going on here was a way to find a victory for Romney.  So fine, the total number of votes doesn't really matter.  Santorum won last night.  I mean that's the bottom line here.

That's pretty serious accusation to just shrug off with ""Pffffft, whatever!" or, excuse me, a "so, fine."

A Genuinely Idiotic Defense of Ron Paul

Ahead of tonight's Iowa caucuses, Jonathan Krause does a characteristically lazy job of explaining his support for Ron Paul:

I had someone ask me recently what is the appeal of Ron Paul as a Presidential candidate.  Paul heads into the Iowa Caucuses tonight neck-and-neck with Mitt Romney for the lead in the polls--despite getting ZERO attention from the cable news networks.  I gave that person my new answer to explain Ron Paul: He is Barack Obama for people who actually know something about politics.  By that, I mean that when Ron Paul speaks everybody is able to hear what they want to hear.

Saying that the appeal to both Obama and Ron Paul are based on their Rorschach-test-personalities is asinine. In terms of policies, both candidates ran campaigns that jived with their legislative records and were very specific about what kinds of goals they hoped to achieve while in the White House. The appeal of each candidate lies mostly in the presentation of their personalities. In 2008 Obama painted a portrait of the future that promised to unify the country and move passed the contentious years of the Bush Administration, and he did it with soaring rhetoric. Since the mid 1970s Ron Paul has waded into the fever swamps of some of the worst elements of American politics in order to grow a movement based on apocalyptic fear and resentment.

But just what the hell does "when Ron Paul speaks everybody is able to hear what they want to hear." mean? Here Krause's weak explanation:

For those of us Deficit Hawks we hear him talk about reducing government spending and balancing the books (the only candidate to do so in the 2008 campaign).

Paul is noted for being a "deficit hawl" only by accident. What he does want to is cut government spending, not on fiscal grounds, but on ideological grounds. One former congressional budget expert gave his budget plan a solid F for missing the entire point of budget "balancing" altogether:

Paul says he wants to eliminate the income, estate and capital gains taxes. That would be fine if he also at least mentioned in passing that he'll also need to eliminate almost everything the federal government does to prevent the deficit and debt from rising. He doesn't.

The unfortunate thing about this analysis is that it underestimates Paul's inclination eliminating the Federal government, of which he has claimed up to 80% is "technically unconstitutional."

Those opposed to expansion of government hear him talk about limiting Federal powers to those only contained within the Constitution.  

See above. Paul's "interpretation" of the Constitution is something of a joke in the legal community, where it is widely considered to be so narrow and arbitrary so as to be only useful to militia members and "sovereign citizens" acting as pro se council.

Krause is also tacticly adopting the classic "state's rights" argument here, which historically speaking, has been fraught with contradictions at best, and malicious intent at worse. 

The anti-war crowd hears him talk about bring the troops home immediately.  

Nope. Paul's appeal is strictly to isolationism, which another contradiction of Paul's brand of Libertarianism that exposes a nasty and ugly xenophobia while simultaneously betraying an apparent hatred for "free markets" on a global scale. Paul is titanically out of his element on foreign policy.

The Occupy crowd hears him talking about doing away with the Federal Reserve and breaking down the big banks.  

This statement betrays the fact that Krause knows nothing about banking. Paul is dead set against breaking up big banks. He's against bail-outs, which would lead to mergers that would actually increase the size of some banks given another situation like the meltdown of September 2008. Paul's opposition to the Fed would actually make banks more powerful.

The potheads hear him talk about ending the war on drugs.  Gay rights activists hear him say he doesn't care who gets married to whom. The Tea Party hears him talk about doing away with the IRS.  

Again, see the above discussion re: budget-cutting. 

Even the anti-Semites hear him talking about ending unquestioned support for Israel.  

I don't even know where to begin discussing this line. We can argue about the policies and merits of all of the groups mentioned above, but anti-Semites have no value whatsoever. Krause wants to treat them like just another constituency. This is deplorable.

But Krause's arrant slip is telling: Paul's brand Libertarianism is really nothing more than an aggressive version of post-modernism tied up in "conservative" packaging. Paul goes beyond just telling crowds that they can live better with less government, he tells them that whatever they think about very important concepts like morality, justice, ethics, etc. -- they're right. Everyone's right in Paul's Libertarianism because everyone is an individual. This has horrible consequences that allows some of the worse elements of society to justify racism and other truly contemptible notions. 

Like the Apostles who spoke in tongues in the Bible--everyone hears Ron Paul talking their language.

And that language is relativism. That's the big picture point Krause is missing here. Ron Paul is the great 21st century evangelist of conservative relativism.

Krause continues:

But by being everyone's candidate, Ron Paul is no one's candidate.  

Well, if that's not the stupidest and most meaningless thing I've read in a long time, than I don't know what is.

Now, the next part is such a blatant tautology that it defies my already exceedingly low expectations: 

Even if he was elected by some major miracle, he would have ZERO political base in Washington.  As other pundits have pointed out, there is no "Ron Paul Caucus" in Congress.  Outside of the deficit reduction idea, he would have no chance of passing any of the other legislative ideas he proposes--and Washington would be plunged into even deeper gridlock.

Got that? A victory for Ron Paul would mean chaos in Washington. It would mean that all the things Paul stands for would never have any hope of actually being realized. It would mean absolutely zero progress for all of his causes. It's a Catch-22 that all Libertarians must reconcile before placing their votes with Paul. Krause has spilled the beans here: a vote for Paul does nothing.


But that's not going to stop Krause from voting for him: 

I voted for Ron Paul in 2008 as a form of protest against two other candidates who were only talking about new ways to spend even more money we don't have.  If he somehow was the GOP candidate in November, I'll be writing in Paul Ryan on my ballot--as a form of protest against two candidates who have no ability to lead a country.

See, Krause will be voting for the guy he has just has no possible chance to effectively lead the country to protest the blah blah blah. Now recall Krause's introduction to his post: "Ron Paul: He is Barack Obama for people who actually know something about politics."

Does this kind of reasoning sound like Krause knows the first damn thing about politics?

Or anything, for that matter?

Ron Paul appeals to folks like Jonathan Krause because Paul's message is simple: you know better than anyone else how to live your life. That's fine up until a point where the individual must function with others. This is the point where many Ron Paul supporters struggle in life and the frustration from that struggle results in a lot of resentment. Ron Paul provides these people with justification for that resentment and an alternative to the status quo. That's the central message people hear when they listen to Paul, not his stand on the War on Drugs or the Fed.

This is a major part of the reason Paul appeals to conspiracy theorists: Paul's message validates what they believe. It's also one of Paul's major selling points to Krause, who isn't a conspiracy theorist (so far as I know), but does not let his ignorance of any subject get in the way of proclaiming his expertise. Not so long ago, conservatives railed against this kind of relativism. Now they celebrate it.

MORE: Boy, did I fuck up the landing on this one. See the comments below for more.

What's with Libertarians and Conspiracy Theories?

Now that people are finally paying attention to some of the really weird things Ron Paul believes, let's ask what the hell is up with Libertarians?

You'd be astonished by the sheer volume of the conspiracy theories that fall under the Libertarian banner. Here's just a quick primer: Agenda 21, FEMA camps, the North American Union (the "Amero" and the "trans-American Superhighway), the Trilateral Commission and Council on Foreign Relations, the Bilderberger Group, the Moon-landing "hoax," Barack Obama wasn't born in American, 9/11 was an inside job, the Federal Reserve will eventually turn over America's wealth to the New World Order and on and on. If you'd like to hear them all just listen to the lunatic Alex Jones or join the John Birch Society.

Just about every Libertarian I have ever met has had a very personal and very visceral problem with authority that pre-dates their adoption of Libertarianism. In fact, it often seems that Libertarianism was constructed to provide an intellectual framework to what is essentially a gut feeling that starts at an early age. Unfortunately, Libertarianism doesn't really make much sense outside of a sophomore poli sci seminar.

But instead of abandoning or correcting their flawed philosophy, Libertarians find scape goats among the authorities because it serves two purposes: 1.) it validates their distrust of the powers that be and 2.) it allows them maintain a philosophy that vindicate the idea that they can pretty much do whatever they want. That's the generic psychological answer, one that can be grafted on to any that espouses conspiracy theories. There are also historic influences, chief among them is Joseph McCarthy.


It goes without saying that McCarthy was anti-communist, but his heyday happened to coincide with the beginning of the contemporary Libertarian intellectual roots. One of McCarthy's biggest fans was Murray Rothbard, the economist who would serve as something of an intellectual mentor to Ron Paul and Lew Rockwell. McCarthy, the original conspiracy theorist, only we don't call what he believed about communist infiltration of the government a conspiracy theory today -- we say he was lying, exaggerating, ginning up an issue for political purposes, engaging in demagoguery, or was drunk. The Birchers, of course, adopted McCarthy's vociferous hatred for anything that resembled communism and did what they could to defend their patron saint, who had died the year before the group was founded in 1958. This also meant adopting McCarthy's conspiracy theorizing. 

Rothbard backed up some of the nuttier Bircher conspiracy theories, albeit for different reasons. When lead Bircher Robert Welch began the fluoride-in-the-drinking-water panic, he said it was a socialist plot to dull the minds of Americans into submitting to a further expansion of government. Rothbard, on the other hand, just cut out the brainwashing talk and argued that said that fluoride was just creeping socialism.

Why did he do this? It's hard to say. Rothbard's view likely kept him out of the elite academic jobs and without much political influence, so it's entirely possible that he was a true believer. There's also reason to believe that he was courting conspiracists as part of a strategy to build a broader Libertarian movement (Rothbard was obsessed with this kind of political activity, which shows up frequently in his writings).

Libertarian conspiracies all follow the same formula: they start with the expansion of the state, end with the loss of individual rights and portend a future of Communist domination -- just like Joseph McCarthy's "infiltration" of the State Department. Conspiracy theories are rooted in Libertarianism's DNA. It appeals to radical individualists who are apt to see any kind of association as a plot to infringe on a man's desire to be left alone. These are folks who think they're entitled to do whatever they want to do without being subject to burdensome restrictions, even creating their own realities.

What the War on Crime can Teach us about Winning the War on Unemployment

Charles Lane has an interesting piece in the Washington Post about the decrease in crime rates in America in the last 20+ years. His general point is that we have yet to identity the reason for the precipitous drop and to the best of my knowledge, he's correct: there really is no consensus on just why crime is down. There are likely many reasons, and Lane mentions a few of the them, but I'd like to put forth three ideas -- one that Lane touches briefly upon and two others that he doesn't even mention -- as possible parts to a greater answer:

3.) Better Policing: When New York Police Commissioner Bill Bratton implemented the CompStat, police departments all over the country finally discovered a tool that could help them almost predict where and when crime was going to happen. That created a fundamental change in emphasis from ex post facto enforcement to prevention. Comparing this story to a Moneyball-esque shift in thinking is only out of line because life and death was actually at stake during the early days of CompStat.

Police departments all over the country have become more professionalize and trained in the last 20 years. Being a cop once was considered a blue-collar, working class job. It's now one that requires a college degree. This has led to less (or, at least, cyclical) corruption and a better working relationship with the people the police serve. The public's attitudes about cops have also changed. Some of this has to do with 9/11 when much of the country was vividly reminded just how heroic some of these guys have to be at times.

2.) Gentrification/Suburban Ennui: It took us most of the 20th century, but Americans only started learning how to care for our urban areas once we realized how painfully dull suburban life is. In the early and mid-1990s, most major cities in the country began to revitalize themselves -- renovating waterfront, building ballparks, turning warehouse space into loft apartments, etc. People, and younger ones in particular, had grown up in the suburbs and were so dead set against living there as adults that they were willing to spend money and risk some degree of their safety to not do so again. The fact that cities were beginning to clean themselves up made urban life seem all the more attractive.

1.) Globalization: Americans have literally outsourced our gang violence across the border to Mexico. The decrease in crime and violence in America cannot be seen as unrelated to the drastic upturn in violence in Mexico, where a war is being waged by various drug cartels over access to the American market. This is not unlike the gang crime we saw in urban areas in the 1980s, only now it's far more sophisticated, better funded and taking place in a country with far fewer law enforcement and economic resources to fight back.

All three of these reasons are inter-related, and perhaps it's unfair to rank them in order of importance, but I did so because they each represent essential ways of looking at the problem: #1 is the global or mega-economic outlook; #2 is the macro-economic outlook; and #3 is the micro-economic outlook, or how crime-fighting occurs street to street, house to house in America.

The great lesson to be learned here is that Americans tackled all three of these levels simultaneously beginning in the early 1990s: we changed the way we policed our cities, we changed the way we lived in our cities and we went after the supply with an aggressive counter-narcotics strategy that targeted the over-seas source. We now have less influence over level #1 then we did 20 years ago, but have made such huge strides with levels #2 and #3 that we've been able to mitigate this lack of control.

The War on Crime has largely been a success where two other domestic struggles -- the Wars on Drugs and Poverty -- have been failures. Given the current economic climate, it's probably time to look at the methods used during the War on Crime and see if they can be applied to the War on Poverty, or at least the War on Unemployment. If we look closely we can find a good deal of crossover.

There is already a great deal of intervention and activity by the state in levels #1 and #2, but it's important to recognize that level #3 is fairly under-served and this should be a problem because, according to every politician every, small business are the real job creators. Unfortunately, they are also responsible for most job losses, as well. Given that so much job loss and production occurs on the micro level, or the level of each individual small business, it's astonishing that there isn't more attention paid to it.

There's really no reason why we can't use statistical modeling to anticipate where unemployment will occur next. For example, if you're in a paper-making industry job in the state of Wisconsin, you're job isn't safe. Period. Now the last thing a struggling business in a dying industry wants to see is a government official stopping by and asking "So, how are you going to wind this down?" and this should in no way happen, but perhaps some kind of program can be created that slowly (and confidentially, so as not to frighten customers) transitions workers into new fields before jobs just suddenly evaporate.

These type of models have existed forever on Wall Street and investors use them all the time to evaluate industries and specific firms. "The Market" will always know who is dying well before the state, or anyone else for that matter, does. If we can "predict crime" then we should also be able to do the same with unemployment. I know there is a significant difference between the volume of data in each category, but I still think it can be done. If a mom and pop restaurant files three consecutive years worth of loses to the state DOR, it's probably not long for this world.

One of the ways police were able to curb murder rates in the 1990s was to anticipate retaliatory violence. They beefed up patrols in neighborhoods and even knocked on the doors of potential retaliators just to inform them they were being watched a little more carefully. (Some of the first criminological work into social networks helped develop this strategy). Civil libertarians blew a gasket from every quarter: everything from "racial profiling" on the left, to "big brother police state" on the right. Perhaps they were right, but those concerns are almost completely forgotten today. (Much of which had to do with the beat cops in rough neighborhoods spending years developing personal connections and goodwill in those communities. It was painstaking work that was literally conducted street by street, block by block and house by house.)

There will, of course, be fierce objections to this kind of anticipatory action. The civil libertarians of yesterday will be replaced by the economic libertarians of today, and this group has always enjoyed significantly more political power. These folks will cry "socialism" and worse. They also will have a point: when businesses fail, someone gains from the decrease in competition. It's important to understand that this is not a proposal to prop up failing businesses with state funds, but with help them wind down with "optional transitional support" to another line of work.

This is about moving people from one job to another before unemployment ever happens or an unemployment check is ever sent. One sentiment you'll hear often from the unemployed is that they don't need "job training" so much as they need "unemployment training," that is, instruction on how and where to look for work and fill down time productively. There are few things worse then looking for a job: it's a daunting, frightening and humiliating task, and when people are left to themselves they can easily be overwhelmed.

Again, this is going to require a sea change in how we view unemployment. Currently, the left sees the unemployed as victims of social and business circumstances, while the right sees them as either lazy or failures. Neither view is correct.

It's time we look at unemployment the same way we look at crime and to attack it like we attack crime. For this to work, any kind of municipal agency devoted to this task has to adopt the same principle police used in the roughest cities in America:

• Developing close relationships with business owners in specific neighborhoods or communities so that they can understand their shifting employment needs, just as beat cops earned the trust of locals in rough neighborhoods.

• Intervene at the early signs of trouble.

• Demonstrate results professionally and consistently.

Essentially, what I'm recommending is the creation of a highly-trained force of economic "social workers" or better yet "agents" -- yes, in the Hollywood sense of the word -- for the unemployed. These would be people struggling business owners can turn to to help re-locate employees in the event of a closure with actual jobs. Think of these folks as Human Resources ninjas.

This wouldn't even necessarily have to be a government-run organization. It cold just as easily be a philanthropic organization in the same vein as, say, Teach for America. This organization could recruit from recent college graduates, drop them into cities and give them a plan to follow. A program like this would be almost ideal for future MBA students since the skill set required to be successful in this kind of occupation are immediately relevant to a future in business. (Plus, they would be observing, first hand, how businesses fail.) Ideally, this program would be a stepping stone to a much more lucrative job with one of the connections any given "agent" made in the private sector. This could create an incentive that will attract the best and brightest.

For centuries Americans viewed crime in almost strictly punitive terms: you do the crime, you get what's coming to you. Unfortunately, we've also viewed unemployment in similar terms. American started to tackle crime comprehensively in the 1990s. We threw the kitchen sink at the problem: We banned assault weapons and yet simultaneously passed concealed carry laws. We put 75,000 new cops on the streets (far more than was actually needed, but still 25% less than the 100,000 in the original plan). We started midnight basketball leagues and community watch organizations. We imprisoned scores of thousands of young people and yet finally started focusing on treatment for drug abusers.

Lane calls the drop in crime "the most important social trend of the past 20 years" in America. I actually think he's under-selling the accomplishment: it's nothing short of a contemporary Apollo project. Lane goes on to say:

Plunging crime rates also debunk conventional wisdom, left and right. Crime’s continued decline during the Great Recession undercuts the liberal myth that hard times force people into illegal activity — that, like the Jets in “West Side Story,” crooks are depraved on account of being deprived. Yet recent history also refutes conservatives who predicted in the early 1990s that minority teenage “superpredators” would unleash a new crime wave.

Government, through targeted social interventions and smarter policing, has helped bring down crime rates, confirming the liberal worldview. Yet solutions bubbled up from the states and municipalities, consistent with conservative theory. Contrary to liberal belief, incarcerating more criminals for longer periods probably helped reduce crime. Contrary to conservative doctrine, crime rates fell while Miranda warnings and other legal protections for defendants remained in place.

On the whole, though, what’s most striking about the crime decline is how little we know about its precise causes. Take the increase in state incarceration, which peaked at a national total of 1.4 million on Dec. 31, 2008. This phenomenon is probably a source of success in the war on crime — and its most troubling byproduct. But increased imprisonment cannot explain all, or most, of the decline: Crime rates kept going down the past two years, even as the prison population started to shrink. Crime fell in New York faster than in any other U.S. city over the past two decades — but New York locked up offenders at a below-average rate, according to Zimring’s new book, “The City That Became Safe.”

Looking for causes of the decline is, indeed, important, but I think the real take-away lesson is that we tried everything, regardless of ideological origin. This is not how we're attacking unemployment. We're neglecting the micro-economic level and it would not surprise me if we achieved the same decline in unemployment that we saw in crime if we adopted the same hands-on, house by house, person to person, go-to-the-unemployed-don't-wait-for-the-unemployed-to-come-to-you tactics.

Ron Johnson's Disastrous First Year in Office

Toward the end of his campaign for the U.S. Senate, Ron Johnson eschewed his hide-and-seek media strategy and met with the editorial board of the Green Bay Press Gazette, universally considered to be one of the most conservative (and therefore, sympathetic) boards in Wisconsin. During the meeting Johnson was asked a fairly straight forward question that created a moment of uncomfortable awkwardness that rivaled anything we've recently seen from Republican Presidential candidates Rick Perry and Herman Cain. In case you've forgotten, here it is:
Within hours the Press Gazette announced on it's web site that it was endorsing Johnson's opponent, Russ Feingold. The incident proved to be portentous.

Johnson has largely flown under the radar, thanks to the polarizing policies of Scott Walker, and he's escaped a great deal of the scrutiny and criticism that come with his office, both from the media and the state Dems, who have devoted all of their energy to Walker. In the absence of that kind of attention, it's easy to appreciate just how poorly Johnson's first year in office has gone.

Johnson's approval ratings as of November are a dismal 36% or 37%. What should trouble Johnson more is the fact that between 30-40% of respondents don't know who he is or aren't sure what to make of him yet. These are people who will learn about Johnson from his performance in office, and to date performance has been awful.  

Here's a quick look back on Johnson's first year in office:

• In January Johnson took to the pages of the Journal-Sentinel to write an open letter to President Obama sarcastically welcoming him to Wisconsin ahead of a visit. It was an uncomfortable moment for someone who was still unknown to many in the state and held very few public events during his campaign for office.

• In April, shortly after Rep. Paul Ryan released his controversial budget plan, a plan that was so toxic that the GOP leadership wouldn't even touch it, Johnson said it didn't go far enough.

• In May Johnson voted to continue massive tax breaks for the major oil companies.

• In late June FEC reports revealed that Johnson gave himself a $10 million severance package when he left PACUR, a sum that seemed suspiciously close to the $9 million Johnson spent on his own campaign for Senate. Johnson did not answer questions regarding the matter very convincingly and the only reason the issue hasn't been a bigger deal is because the FEC is essentially a toothless enforcement agency. 

• A few days later, Johnson tried to take ownership of budget deficit issue and failed miserably. First he published an incoherent op-ed (seriously, just look at the chart) at the Daily Caller that, far from suggesting a solution to the budget problem, seriously called into question his own understanding of the deficit.

• A week later he tried to bring the business of the Senate to a screeching halt over raising the debt ceiling and was rebuked by the GOP Senate leadership in a private conference on the Senate floor. Johnson's temper tantrum seemed to personify the recklessness of the GOP's game-of-chicken strategy which caused the public to blow a gasket.

• Two weeks later, Johnson flip-flopped and began a full-throated advocacy of a budget proposal he earlier dismissed as draconian.

• In August, Johnson laid out 12 economic policies that he called "necessary components" to "get our economy moving again." To date Johnson has shown barely any progress on any of these policies.

• Johnson has developed a reputation for hyper-partisanship:

In the interview, Johnson insisted that he’s open to working with Democrats and “that if you want to accomplish things in this country, … you have to work with the other side.”

But even on the select occasions McConnell has been forced to work with the other side to keep the government running and raise the national debt ceiling, Johnson objected.

• That being said, one of only three bills Johnson authored this year is the so called Regulation Moratorium and Jobs Preservation Act of 2011 which is a deeply cynical bill without any actually policy value designed solely to embarrass the President politically. 

• Johnson's decision to block to appointment of Victoria Nourse to the federal bench has been widely criticized, even by members of his former campaign staff.

• Johnson's developed a reputation for complaining about the rules of the Senate.

“Johnson is always a big critic of how things are being run, but he has yet to show that he understands how to get things done in Congress,” a senior Republican Senate aide said. “Just being a vocal critic may not be enough of a selling point to a caucus that wants to see real results on some very tough issues.”

• In October Johnson teamed up with a former banking CEO and fellow Ayn Rand fan-boy to write a brazen op-ed that announces in no uncertain terms that Johnson represents the interests of the banking industry. 

• Later that month the Journal-Sentinel revealed that Johnson had purchased a $1 million house near Capitol Hill.

• If that wasn't enough, Johnson capped off a busy October by writing an op-ed in the Washington Post arguing for a "return" to super-majority rule in the Senate, a position that will surely come back to haunt him if the GOP takes over the Senate (as some people believe they will) next year.

• In December Johnson was defeated for a leadership position in the Senate.

• Then he voted against widely popular bills to end Congressional insider trading and the payroll tax extension that the GOP subsequently got steam-rolled over.

The most important year of any Senator's time in office is his or her first. The above are not examples of a successful Senator. Time and time again Johnson's come out of Washington looking like he's completely out of his league, at best, or like a bought-and-paid for shill for wealthy interests (at worse). Whichever scenario you prefer it's next to impossible to not paint Johnson as an out-of-touch elitist with no regard for those below his own economic station. To this day he has not answered the question asked by the Green Bay Press-Gazette. Yes, Johnson has solutions for economic recovery, but these involve giving rich people more money through tax breaks and telling working class folks to work harder.

Most importantly, Johnson has been on the losing end of the three biggest GOP legislative disasters of the last year: The Paul Ryan budget, which Johnson claimed didn't go far enough; the debt ceiling debacle, which Johnson behaved petulantly during; and now the payroll tax imbroglio, which Johnson voted against. Each of these incidents brought measurable and immediate declines in GOP congressional approval ratings. Don't think for a second this stink hasn't already rubbed off on Johnson, who enjoyed an approval rating of 44% as late as July.

Even one of Johnson's two most visible legislative successes -- the bipartisan expansion of the APEC travel card program -- is essentially a program that allows frequent business travelers to circumvent long security lines in airports when flying to participating countries. It's a perfectly legitimate program that's just smart policy, as anyone who's traveled overseas lately can attest, but at the same time it is a program that literally lets the rich folks cut in line ahead of the rest of the hoi polloi.

And that's a perfect metaphor for what appears to be Johnson's governing principle.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about Johnson's first year is his utter and complete lack of patience and rather pronounced desire to have things done his way. These are not good qualities to have in a legislative body designed to be lumbering and deliberative. Johnson remains a very sarcastic voice with a conspicuous contempt for those who disagree with him, combining those qualities with a questionable competence and deeply unpopular policies is a recipe for a one-term career filled with irrelevance.

The Story of the Real Ebenezer Scrooge

Really just too wonderful not to pass along [via Brainiac]:

The story goes that Charles Dickens was visiting Edinburgh to give a public reading of his work in 1842, and spent some time looking around the Canongate church graveyard. He saw one grave that made him shudder. The name on the grave was Ebenezer Lennox Scroggie--mean man." According to Peter Clark, a British political economist who seems the starting point for this story, Dickens misread the inscription. It actually said "Meal man," because Scroggie was a corn merchant.

But Dickens was shocked by the inscription, and apparently noted it in  his diary. A geneology website reported Dickens's comment this way in 2010: "[T]o be remembered through eternity only for being mean seemed the greatest testament to a life wasted." In a 1996 telling, Clark reported the comment from Dickens diary in this way: "How bleak to have one's shrivelled soul advertised forever. It made me shudder. It made me feel for the flesh corrupting beneath me." Shortly afterwards, Charles Dickens published "A Christmas Carol," with a main character named Ebenezer Scrooge, and the plot revolving around what it would be like to be forever stamped as a "mean man," when there was still time to change your ways.

Apparently Ebenezer Scroggie was about as far from his fictional namesake as one can get. A "History of Leith, Edinburgh" website reported in 2010: "In life, Scroggie was apparently a rambunctious, generous and licentious man who gave wild parties, impregnated the odd serving wench and once wonderfully interrupted the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland by grabbing the buttocks of a hapless countess." However, for those seeking to link Ebenezer Scrooge more tightly to the heartlessness of economics, it may be comforting to know that Scroggie was apparently a cousin of Adam Smith. A 2004 article in the Scotsman newspaper reports: "Scroggie was born in Kirkcaldy, Fife; his mother was the niece of Adam Smith, the 18th century political economist and philosopher." There is now some talk in Edinburgh of erecting a monument to Scroggie, although his actual gravesite was apparently removed for redevelopment of the port back in the early 1930s.

Merry Christmas.

Why is the "Christian Civil Liberties Union" (No, Seriously) Shilling for Mining Interests by Engaging in Quasi-Election Fraid?

Jim and Ginny Maziarka are a lunatic couple of Christian fanatics from West Bend who advocate book-burning. They are the kind of psychotic dipshits who think the Harry Potter books promote witchcraft. I can only imagine how terribly wretched and shallow their lives must be to invent new things to be outraged about to compensate for whatever ongoing series of failures have crippled their intellects.

Here's Ginny's blog. It's hilarious.

Ginny's claim to fame is a little scuffle she started a few years back regarding books she believed to be "inappropriate" at the West Bend Public Library. The whole incident turned the city of West Bend into something of a national laughing stock, instead of just the regional laughing stock it normally is. There's actually no end to the accounts of her antics available on the web and they would all be just as hilarious if somewhat important people didn't take her and her ongoing effort to return the world to the dark ages seriously. Here's an interview she conducted with Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, prominently displayed on the then-candidate's web site.

Anyway, it was during the Library fiasco that Maziarka was joined  by an organization called the Christian Civil Liberties Union who helped her pursue her latter day Bonfire of the Vanities. The CCLU has its "headquarters" in Milwaukee ... at 2634 W. Vliet Street. Normally that's neither here nor there, but I couldn't help but notice that it's the same address being used for an ad hoc organization called Mines for Wisconsin in this photo of a flyer  found in West Bend currently making the rounds.

The "Bob" listed as a point of contact is most likely Robert Braun, the, um, head of the CCLU.

I seriously doubt this is a very productive way of hatching a less than sophisticated plot to sway an election, but the multiple angles this flyer appears to encapsulate -- evangelical nutcases shilling for big business by attempting to engage in election fraud -- really just sums up the contemporary state of the Republican "grassroots" quite nicely. If activists like Ginny here didn't have AFP or the Eagle Forum, of which she and her organization claims to be affiliated, this would be the best they could do.

The Ryan-Wyden Meicare Plan

Here it is. Comments below.
WydenRyan

The document above is fairly short of numbers, projections and other important data, so I'll have to reserve final judgment on the plan until an independent analyses start coming out.

So far, there's a broad consensus developing that Wyden's participation with Ryan in this new Medicare plan is a gift to the GOP. That might be true, but I think that it misses an important point: Ryan didn't need Wyden to amend his own plan. He could have done it all by himself and Dems would have been forced to adjust their attacks according to the new scheme.

Avik Roy describes the "competitive bidding" aspect of the plan:

The basic idea behind competitive bidding is that, say, on a county-by-county basis, you let private plans and traditional Medicare offer plans with the same actuarial value compete, to see who can offer the same package of benefits the most efficiently. Each plan in a given county will name a price for which they are willing to offer these services, and seniors are free to pick whichever plan they want. However, the government will only subsidize an amount equal to the bid proposed by the second-cheapest plan. If you want a more expensive plan, you have to pay the difference yourself.

Fair enough, but I'm not convinced competitive bidding alone will be enough to keep costs down (Roy notes that the cost containment measures are basically meaningless and I tend to agree). 

Johnathan Cohn discusses the key conservative ingredient of the plan, "premium support:"

The Ryan-Wyden plan is the latest twist on an idea called that wonks call “premium support.” Today, most seniors enroll in the traditional government insurance program. Those who want other options are free to shop around for alternatives through what’s known as the “Medicare Advantage” program, in which private insurers make available regulated insurance policies. Under a premium support system, all seniors would shop around. The government would simply issue every person over 65 a voucher (at least in the figurative sense). In most schemes, seniors would pay extra for joining plans that cost more than the vouchers and receive rebates for joining plans that cost less than the vouchers. 

Cohn later goes on to point to a report that argues premium care will lead to a tiered system of care. I'm not sure that's such a bad thing, so long as the lowest tier is of a high quality.

This is where we need more information. What percentage of senior does the plan expect to take advantage of premium support over the traditional Medicare model? What kind of projected savings are we looking at from this group? Can they create a model that doesn't increase overhead costs (not likely, but we'll see)?  Joe Klein notices, just as we did last night, that the plan lacks any medical cost control measures, which will makes these questions among the more important.

All in all, I think Kevin Drum has a pretty good take on the scheme:

Bottom line: this isn't necessarily a bad plan. Unfortunately, it's also not clear if it's really a very effective plan either. But I'd certainly put it into the broad bucket of plans that are reasonable starting points for conversation. Given Paul Ryan's immense credibility with the tea party wing of the Republican Party, it's significant that he's put his name to this. It's worth a conversation.

And that's ultimately the most intriguing aspect of the plan: it's very obviously a starting point and not a destination. This is probably as good a place as there is to start having a Medicare reform conversation.

Ron Johnson's Very Bad Week

Ron Johnson is having a very bad week.

First, he lost his party leadership bid.

Then he made an unfortunate statement regarding workers on minimum wage that probably runs contrary to many employees experience (especially mine and, apparently, even Johnson's own).

In same meeting he declared his opposition to unemployment benefits.

Lastly, Johnson voted against a bill that would restrict insider trading among congressmen then vowed to filibuster.

On the bright side, Johnson did get to kick back with a few colleagues at a lobbyist-infested fundraiser at a swanky DC hotel.

Usually these kinds of setbacks take place over the course of a few weeks if not months. When they happen in the course of just a few days they reinforce a narrative of someone who is working to protect the status quo for both politicians in Washington and money-interests everywhere.

This was a pretty shitty day in general for state Republicans. Other highlights include:

• Walker's policies are killing jobs in a variety of ways: one report from a liberal think tank outlines how Walker has cost the state 18,000 jobs this year. Another describes how Walker's anti-wind energy policies have cost 1,000 jobs. Yet another plant closed, this time in Two Rivers, costing the state another 190 jobs.

• Wisconsin lost 14,600 jobs in November, the fifth month in a row that job numbers have been down on Walker's watch.

• Yet another Walker supporter was arrested for voter intimidation.

• The first arrest was made in the interminable John Doe investigation into the Walker administration.

• It became clear that Walker's rejection of rail funds is now costing tax-payers more than what the state would have needed to contribute had Walker accepted them.

• The sketchy GOP mining bill was meet with large and vociferous opposition during a hearing in Milwaukee.

• Walker's education cuts are reeking havoc on the state's school districts and his claims to the contrary are proving too hard to believe for most fact-checkers.

• Thanks to revised federal labor figures, it turns out Wisconsin only lost 2,400 jobs in October. Better than initially thought but still moving in the wrong direction.

• Dems announced that have collected over 500,000 signatures in their drive to recall Scott Walker.

• Jeff Fitzgerald decided to kick off his campaign for U.S. Senate by trying to revamp the GAB, a move that's impossible to see as anything other than petty and changing the rules in the middle of the game.

• Paul Ryan significantly revised his Medicare reform plan and crafted a plan that looks more like Obamacare (at least to Ezra Klein) than it does Ayn Rand.

• A prominent Madison Dem pollster shows Paul Ryan's popularity slipping in his district and a path to victory for his opponent.

• Noted Wisco GOP mouthpiece Christian Schneider when he compared unreported rapes to juiced up major league baseball players during the pre-steroids testing era ... for some reason.

• The ACLU filed a suit that may have some legs over the draconian voter ID passed that's already losing in the court of public opinion.

So, yeah, it's been a busy week.