WISN's Coverage of Scott Walker in 2009

Lately, talk radio host Mark Belling has been blasting WISN 12 for their coverage of gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker.  Back in May of last year, Brendan Conway reported that Walker "complained other states were taking Wisconsin jobs", but apparently had no problem using an Ohio firm to build his own campaign website.  Conway's narrative proved to be prejudiced for a number of reasons.

First, Conway interviewed a Wisconsin website developer who had a vested interest in telling WISN that he could have done the same quality work as the Ohio firm.  This is a bit sketchy, even for WISN.  What better opportunity is there for a young entrepreneur to get free publicity advertising his expertise on television?  Did WISN really believe they would get a different answer? 

Second, Conway found a time-tested Walker-critic to call Walker a hypocrite.  County Supervisor Chris Larson told WISN 12, "If this early in his campaign it's coming out that he is not doing this for his own campaign, how can we expect him to do that when he is elected to something higher?"  Why didn't Conway provide an opposing opinion by Supervisors Rice or Sanfelippo to balance out the story?   

And third, Conway misled the public.  Walker's website criticized the loss of "existing" jobs to firms in other states.  A good example of this would be if Harley Davidson moved its Menomonee Falls plant out of Wisconsin.  This would result in real job loss with a loss in wages, benefits, and pensions.

When Walker hired an Ohio firm to build his website, no existing jobs were lost. What was lost was a bidding opportunity.  Bidding is a lot like interviewing for a job. The job isn't yours until the employer evaluates what you can offer the company.  There are no lost wages, benefits, or pensions.  Conway knew this, but he covered the story in a way that most viewers wouldn't make this connection.

WISN's Coverage Last Week (or lack of it)

Last week, it was discovered that Tom Barrett spent half a million dollars on a Philadelphia firm for radio and television ads.  After Belling criticized channel 12 for their failure to cover the story, their television station was pelted with phone calls.  They said they would pass along the information, but WISN 12 has yet to run the story.

On Barrett's campaign website, it says,

"His vision features specific plans for investments in financial capital, our colleges and universities, and workforce skills that make the difference in whether the high-paying jobs of the future come to Wisconsin or go elsewhere."

Barrett's message is clear: invest in Wisconsin, or jobs will "go elsewhere."  But Barrett has invested half a million dollars in Pennsylvania's economy, not Wisconsin's.

To be fair and balanced, Conway should find an advertisement firm in Wisconsin that says they are "disappointed" with the Milwaukee Mayor and that "there are a dozen other agencies in Wisconsin that could have done better work than what Barrett's out-of-state firm has done."

After that, Conway should find County Supervisor Chris Larson to see if he thinks that Barrett is also a hypocrite for outsourcing campaign work.  After all, if Barrett is not keeping jobs in Wisconsin during a campaign, then how can we expect him to do this when he is elected to something higher?       

Conclusion

El Conquistador has called WISN's news director Lori Waldon four times for an official response.  The first time we called, she was on lunch break.  Fair enough.  The second time, she was unavailable.  The third time, she was out and would return in an hour to take our call.  And the fourth time, she was in a meeting for an "undetermined" length of time.  When we asked for her regular office hours, they said they didn't know what they were.  Really?  In other words, when they do news stories, they expect people to open their lives to reporters, but when a reporter needs information from them, they don't have to oblige. 

Protesting Arizona Baseball

Earlier this week, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Voces de la Frontera, an advocacy organization, planned to protest the Brewers' game with the Arizona Diamondbacks on Monday night.

The purpose of the protest is to pressure Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig to move the All-Star game from Phoenix, Arizona to somewhere out of the state.  According to their website, moving the game would make a powerful statement against extremism and discrimination.  If Voces is successful and the All-Star game is moved, it will cost a battered Arizona economy $60 to $120 million in revenue.

Brewers' Vice President of Communications told El Conquistador that the protest staged by Voces Monday night stayed within the designated area and was conducted peacefully.

The Consequences of Moving the Game

In Voces' press release, they stated that "boycotting Arizona's SB1070 is one of the major civil rights struggles of our generation."

But they aren't really boycotting an inanimate law named SB1070.  Voces de la Frontera is boycotting the people of Arizona, 33% of which are Latino.  Moving the All-Star game from Arizona to another state will disrupt an already vulnerable economy.  And the businesses most at risk are resorts, hotels, restaurants, and traveling services, all of which are saturated with Hispanic workers.  Essentially, Voces de la Frontera would harm the very community they are professing to help.

When El Conquistador called Voces to ask about the Brewer protest, Christine Neuman-Ortiz was blunt.  She asked, "Have you ever called me about my opinion on the border?"  When I said no, she replied, "Next time you print something about me, call me first."  She hung up before I could respond.   

Ironically, Neumann-Ortiz instructed me to call her next time I plan to write about her in the paper, but she refused to talk with me when I tried to do just that.  Unfortunately, when you hang up on a reporter, you leave the impression that your organization is unprofessional and vulnerable to criticism.

As an advocacy group, Voces de la Frontera exists so they can oppose those that don't share their political views. Back in October, they staged a protest in front of Paul Ryan's office in Racine because the Federation of American Immigration Reform (FAIR) had listed Representative Ryan as attending their rally.  Voces considers FAIR to be a racist organization, and therefore took offense that their Representative attended.

Only one problem, Ryan never attended the rally.  FAIR mistakenly put his name on their roster, which Ryan had instructed them to remove shortly after.

Conclusion

Christina Neuman-Ortiz should have taken her own advice and called Ryan before staging a public protest in front of his office.  She had nearly a month to check her facts, and to the best of our knowledge, she did not call Ryan's office.  As a result, his good name was tarnished in the Racine Journal Times over a simple misunderstanding.   

In politics, you can't expect to bully representatives using political gimmicks and not be able to take a punch yourself.  Thick skin is not just a trait required by politicians, you can't always expect positive press.

A Free Society is a Voting Society

It was Dwight Eisenhower that said "The future of the republic is in the hands of the American voter."  The notion is that our republic, a system of electing people in our likeness to do our bidding, is built almost entirely upon what happens at the ballot box.  If true, it follows that voting should be a right protected by careful and prudent measures. Protecting our right to vote involves more than just voting freely, but voting legally.

A few weeks ago, Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen launched a task force to battle against voter fraud across the state.  The issue resurrected a sharp partisan dispute between liberals and conservatives with low-income earners caught in the middle.

One source cited that nearly 6% of all people in the U.S. have no form of photo ID most of which are poor.  The question then arises, would purchasing an id cause a problem for the poor? Answer: not if they take voting as seriously as buying, say, a case of beer.

In my line of work, I've been to a lot of poverty-stricken homes.  I have yet to find someone so poor that they couldn't get their hands on a case of beer.  If you can buy a case of beer, you can afford a photo ID. More to the point, the Indiana Supreme Court ruling stated that voter ID law didn't impose any substantive obstacles for the poor.  In fact, in the five years since the law had passed, not a single person, poor or otherwise, has come forth claiming to be disenfranchised.

Voter Fraud in 2004

To the liberal mind, incidents of voter fraud are largely inconsequential.  The numbers are just too small to notice.  But some would argue they are small because we currently have no system in place to apprehend those who vote fraudulently.

In the 2004 election, the Milwaukee Police Department found that Milwaukee residents cast more ballots than the number of actual residents living in Milwaukee.  The Special Investigations Unit (SIU) discovered that some absentee ballots were cast by non-residents, some by out-of-state college students, and some by felons.

SIU concluded that on-site registration and voting without identification provided no deterrent to "double voting."  They said that "Michael A. Smith" could vote as Michael Smith, Mickey Smith, and M.A. Smith leading to three resultant votes.  And if they were challenged, it would take too long to investigate allowing those votes to be recorded.

Voter Fraud in 2008

Back in 200o, Jim Witkowiak lost an election for an Alderman seat to Angel Sanchez by a mere 17 votes.  At the time, Witkowiak discovered that nearly 200 people who registered to vote didn't exist.  Witkowiak ran again in 2008 winning the election.  This time, however, he sent out literature to the registered voters planning to introduce himself.  To his surprise, 80 of the 400 postcards he mailed out came back undeliverable; 75 of them didn't exist.   

Recently, Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen has charged 5 Wisconsin residents with criminal counts of voter fraud from the presidential election of 2008.  Two of them worked for ACORN registering themselves to vote multiple times.

Conclusion

Those who think that voter fraud is inconsequential point to the few cases on the books where voter fraud has been prosecuted.  However, few cases emerge because there is no regulatory system in place to deter or apprehend fraudulent voters.  For this reason, Van Hollen has organized a voter task force to protect one of the more sacred rights of a functioning democracy.

Clearly, in localized elections where turnout rates typically number in the hundreds, 17 votes can make a difference.  If voter fraud is inconsequential, then all that is lost by building a task force is an unnecessary task force.  But if voter fraud significant, then a task force will protect what President Eisenhower called the future of our republic.