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You are here: Home / From the People’s Republic to a Banana Republic

From the People’s Republic to a Banana Republic

by John Cole|  April 4, 20113:07 pm| 124 Comments

This post is in: Blatant Liars and the Lies They Tell, Bring on the Brawndo!, Teabagger Stupidity

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I can’t believe it was less than a year ago when I was crowing about how awesome Madison was:

Just in his mid-20s, Brian Deschane has no college degree, very little management experience and two drunken-driving convictions.

Yet he has landed an $81,500-per-year job in Gov. Scott Walker’s administration overseeing environmental and regulatory matters and dozens of employees at the Department of Commerce. Even though Walker says the state is broke and public employees are overpaid, Deschane already has earned a promotion and a 26% pay raise in just two months with the state.

How did Deschane score his plum assignment with the Walker team?

It’s all in the family.

His father is Jerry Deschane, executive vice president and longtime lobbyist for the Madison-based Wisconsin Builders Association, which bet big on Walker during last year’s governor’s race.

The group’s political action committee gave $29,000 to Walker and his running mate, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, last year, making it one of the top five PAC donors to the governor’s successful campaign. Even more impressive, members of the trade group funneled more than $92,000 through its conduit to Walker’s campaign over the past two years.

Total donations: $121,652.

That’s big-time backing from the homebuilders.

The younger Deschane didn’t respond to questions about his job.

But his father said he doesn’t think his group’s financial support of the first-term Republican helped his son in his job search.

“He got the position himself,” said Jerry Deschane, who returned to the trade group in September after a hiatus during which he worked as an independent lobbyist for many groups, including the builders association. “I didn’t get it for him.”

Is it possible to be more blatant than this? Hosni Mubarek and Qadaffi called- they want an apology for the accusations of cronyism.

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Reader Interactions

124Comments

  1. 1.

    Morbo

    April 4, 2011 at 3:11 pm

    Heckuva job, Deschanie.

  2. 2.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 3:11 pm

    Is it possible to be more blatant than this?

    i do believe qualifies, does it not?

  3. 3.

    Sue

    April 4, 2011 at 3:12 pm

    Whoa! Madison is still awesome! We’re counting on Madison and Dane County and large parts of Milwaukee County to help send a huge message tomorrow, the first big message of the campaign to take back Wisconsin.

  4. 4.

    AWL

    April 4, 2011 at 3:13 pm

    His salary is $81,500 but if you include his yearly benefits I believe he actually makes around $130,000 per year! Someone call Fox News!

  5. 5.

    comrade scott's agenda of rage

    April 4, 2011 at 3:16 pm

    We’re shocked at this?

    Dunno why, it’s SOP for the modern Republican Party.

  6. 6.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 3:18 pm

    @lllphd:

    ooh, woopsie; the link didn’t work.

    that would be this, referencing randy hopper’s mistress not even applying for that cush job, and also too getting that apparently requisite raise.

    campaign ‘perks.’ and, i’d say, qualifies for “possible to be more blatant than this”

  7. 7.

    Warren Terra

    April 4, 2011 at 3:18 pm

    Damn those public employees unions! It’s all the schoolteachers’ fault!

  8. 8.

    terraformer

    April 4, 2011 at 3:18 pm

    They don’t care. They don’t care and will continue not to care until they are put out of office. And then they’ll not care some more.

  9. 9.

    lacp

    April 4, 2011 at 3:18 pm

    Yes, but he doesn’t have collective-bargaining rights, so it’s all good.

  10. 10.

    BGinCHI

    April 4, 2011 at 3:19 pm

    It’s a reverse Galt with a half twist.

    9.8

  11. 11.

    martha

    April 4, 2011 at 3:19 pm

    Thank you John! The new wingnut plan for wastrel sons: put them on the public dole.

  12. 12.

    Roger Moore

    April 4, 2011 at 3:21 pm

    This is just more proof that public employees are overpaid and need to be stripped of their collective bargaining rights.

  13. 13.

    FlipYrWhig

    April 4, 2011 at 3:22 pm

    @martha: Ten bucks says the Smails Deschane kid picks his nose.

  14. 14.

    Sue

    April 4, 2011 at 3:22 pm

    And let’s not forget that the new budget turns a bunch of positions from hires into appointments. By the Governor.
    The thing I’ve noticed about Walker’s budget is how very, very thorough it is. They thought of everything and if I were a suspicious person I would say it looks like the kind of thing the Republicans have been working on for years. It’s like a Republican letter to Santa, a wish list a mile long, and before a bunch of senators left the state and threw a huge monkey wrench into the process it was probably a done deal.

  15. 15.

    cathyx

    April 4, 2011 at 3:23 pm

    But his father said he doesn’t think his group’s financial support of the first-term Republican helped his son in his job search.

    “He got the position himself,” said Jerry Deschane, who returned to the trade group in September after a hiatus during which he worked as an independent lobbyist for many groups, including the builders association. “I didn’t get it for him.”

    What’s that saying? “Some people were born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple?”

  16. 16.

    Carnacki

    April 4, 2011 at 3:29 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: FTW!

  17. 17.

    patrick II

    April 4, 2011 at 3:30 pm

    Wisconsin State Senator’s Randy Hooper’s Valerie Cass, a former Republican legislative staffer, was hired Feb. 7 as a communications specialist with the state Department of Regulation and Licensing. She is being paid $20.35 per hour. The job is considered a temporary post. Cass previously had worked in the state Senate and for the GOP campaign consulting firm Persuasion Partners in Madison. She also was paid for campaign work for the state Republican Party and U.S. Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner before that.

    Is girlfriend more blatant than son of donator or not?

  18. 18.

    Jay in Oregon

    April 4, 2011 at 3:31 pm

    But his father said he doesn’t think his group’s financial support of the first-term Republican helped his son in his job search.
    __
    “He got the position himself,” said Jerry Deschane, who returned to the trade group in September after a hiatus during which he worked as an independent lobbyist for many groups, including the builders association. “I didn’t get it for him.”

    Of course he didn’t. That young man put a lot of effort into being born to a lobbyist and big-time Republican donor.

  19. 19.

    blondie

    April 4, 2011 at 3:34 pm

    Has anybody clicked on the link to comments on the JS story? I’ve been noticing – the thumbs up/thumbs down ratings are running approximately 5-1 in favor of comments railing about Republican misconduct, and conversely, about 5-1 against those “brave” enough (b/c of anonymity, maybe?) to try to defend the hiring.

    I wonder if this is a good proxy for tomorrow’s election there. Maybe not by that margin (though I can hope!), but at least in terms of energized turnout.

  20. 20.

    Bulworth

    April 4, 2011 at 3:34 pm

    This can’t be true. It just can’t.

  21. 21.

    Brachiator

    April 4, 2011 at 3:36 pm

    Is it possible to be more blatant than this?

    This is unpossible! According to the GOP script, only Democrats engage in machine style politics, cronyism, nepotism, favortism.

  22. 22.

    Brian S (formerly Incertus)

    April 4, 2011 at 3:36 pm

    “I didn’t get it for him.”

    “See, if I’d been in charge of the hiring process and had hired him, then I’d have gotten that job for him, but since I didn’t actually hire him, you can’t say I got him that job. And why do you hate seeing young people succeed despite their educational shortcomings? Elitist!”

  23. 23.

    Warren Terra

    April 4, 2011 at 3:38 pm

    @patrick II:

    Wisconsin State Senator’s Randy Hooper’s Valerie Cass

    Is this meant to be “Wisconsin State Senator’s Randy Hooper’s girlfriend Valerie Cass”, or something like that? Because that’s what the rest of your comment would seem to imply, but your blockquote is garbled and you didn’t hyperlink a source.

  24. 24.

    Martin

    April 4, 2011 at 3:41 pm

    Wow. $121K in donations gets you an $81K job (plus bennys), valued at least at $400K over a 4 year governors term, assuming you aren’t so stupid as to get yourself fired from a job handed to you.

    Everyone under median salary in the US is clearly doing it wrong.

  25. 25.

    Napoleon

    April 4, 2011 at 3:43 pm

    @blondie:

    And what to me makes that really amazing is that newspaper comment sections impress me as a cesspool of wingnuts.

  26. 26.

    Gravenstone

    April 4, 2011 at 3:44 pm

    Yeah, this was the lead story in today’s J-S. Amusingly enough, one of our local wingnuts is the one who brings in the paper to work.

    “He got the position himself,” said Jerry Deschane, who returned to the trade group in September after a hiatus during which he worked as an independent lobbyist for many groups, including the builders association. [b]“I didn’t get it for him.”[/b]

    As I read that particular line, my mind readied this unspoken addendum, “My name was more than enough.”

  27. 27.

    Lolis

    April 4, 2011 at 3:46 pm

    Doesn’t our meritocracy blow your mind?

  28. 28.

    soonergrunt

    April 4, 2011 at 3:49 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: I see what you did there.

  29. 29.

    FlipYrWhig

    April 4, 2011 at 3:52 pm

    @soonergrunt: I’m not even a huge Caddyshack person, but it was just sitting there waiting to be said…

  30. 30.

    Chris

    April 4, 2011 at 3:52 pm

    @Brachiator:

    This is unpossible! According to the GOP script, only Democrats engage in machine style politics, cronyism, nepotism, favortism.

    It’s true: the stereotype goes back well into the nineteenth century, during which political machines like Tammany Hall and its cousin in Chicago were infamous for their corrupt dealings.

    Apparently, no one noticed that while local Democrats were running political machines in this or that city, Republicans had created a machine that spanned the entire nation.

  31. 31.

    pk

    April 4, 2011 at 3:54 pm

    They claim to hate the government, yet they all get jobs in the government.

  32. 32.

    patrick II

    April 4, 2011 at 3:57 pm

    @Warren Terra:

    Yes, sorry, that is Hopper’s girlfriend Valerie Cass. Hopper’s wife and maid famously signed Hopper’s recall petition because Hopper had moved out of his house and was living with the 25 year old Cass.

  33. 33.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 3:58 pm

    @patrick II:

    yup; my point at #8 (and #1, but i botched the link).

    thanks for blockquoting the relevant details.

  34. 34.

    srv

    April 4, 2011 at 3:59 pm

    Who said:

    the real reason for progressives’ passion for trains is their goal of diminishing Americans’ individualism in order to make them more amenable to collectivism.

    And who did Krugman run into on the Amtrak 161?

  35. 35.

    me

    April 4, 2011 at 4:03 pm

    I saw a guy collecting signatures to recall Sen. Wirch who didn’t look like the typical teabagger (i.e. he was black and was rapping to himself). I wonder if he was being paid to do it and if so, who was paying him.

  36. 36.

    El Cid

    April 4, 2011 at 4:04 pm

    @Chris: The most controversial thing about the Tammany Hall corruption was that it doled out benefits to poor people and non-Anglo Saxons.

  37. 37.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:05 pm

    @srv:

    GEORGE WILL!!

    hypocrite par excellence!!

  38. 38.

    Linda Featheringill

    April 4, 2011 at 4:05 pm

    Can governors be impeached in Wisconsin?

  39. 39.

    shortstop

    April 4, 2011 at 4:07 pm

    I can’t believe it was less than a year ago when I was crowing about how awesome Madison was

    Madison continues its ranking of awe-sum. Did New York City stop rocking when Pataki and Giuliani were running the state and city? No, it did not.

    The body simply needs to expel the foreign object right now.

  40. 40.

    patrick II

    April 4, 2011 at 4:08 pm

    @lllphd:
    Wow, I botched that whole thing. Mistyped and stepped on your toes too. I’ll have to be in not such a big hurry next time.

  41. 41.

    Ash Can

    April 4, 2011 at 4:08 pm

    Sue @ #3 is right; Madison is still awesome. It’s not Madison’s fault that too many people around the state took Scott Walker and the rest of the Republicans at their word. Like I keep saying, we — and the state of Wisconsin in particular — can only thank our lucky stars that Walker was so inept at implementing the Kochs’ plan. And the more I think about it, the more I believe that the Dems who fled to IL saved Wisconsin, because they gave the people in their state enough time to figure out just WTF was going on.

  42. 42.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:10 pm

    hey, folks; watch for headlines like these to start popping up in stealth manner as greedy corporations figure out that their shock&awe over-reach is backfiring, so they finally release the valve li’l itsy bits, just to appease the rabble.

    be aware.

  43. 43.

    the fenian

    April 4, 2011 at 4:10 pm

    Randy Hopper remains an awesome name for a ‘ho-monger.

  44. 44.

    Breezeblock

    April 4, 2011 at 4:10 pm

    Ah, luckily I don’t care anymore. And thank god for sweet sweet booze…

  45. 45.

    ppcli

    April 4, 2011 at 4:11 pm

    @martha: “Thank you John! The new wingnut plan for wastrel sons: put them on the public dole.”

    Meet the new plan, same as the old plan.

  46. 46.

    PurpleGirl

    April 4, 2011 at 4:11 pm

    But his father said he doesn’t think his group’s financial support of the first-term Republican helped his son in his job search.

    Can I see the public job listing; the resume and cover letter; any and all e-mails scheduling an interview; the name of the person conducting the interview; the report about the first interview… They have paperwork to back up the claim, amirite?

  47. 47.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:11 pm

    hey, not to worry! i botched my link, so you likely didn’t even see it up there.

    i was just glad you went to the trouble to post the quote.

  48. 48.

    bemused

    April 4, 2011 at 4:12 pm

    @srv:
    Ha, ha.

    The hypocrisy gene is dominate in republican DNA.

  49. 49.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:13 pm

    @Linda Featheringill:

    sure, but don’t hold your breath. you saw what W got away with, didn’t you?

    and can you imagine that republican assembly bringing impeachment proceedings against walker?

  50. 50.

    Zifnab

    April 4, 2011 at 4:14 pm

    Total donations: $121,652.

    Wait? So a $121k donation nets you a $81k / year job? Which – if he keeps it for two years – turns a $40k profit?

    33% return over two years is a damn good investment. How do I sign up for this gravy train?

  51. 51.

    Chris

    April 4, 2011 at 4:14 pm

    @srv:

    the real reason for progressives’ passion for trains is their goal of diminishing Americans’ individualism in order to make them more amenable to collectivism.

    It’s weird. Republicans really believe there’s this enormous conspiracy whose ultimate purpose is nothing but to destroy them and their way of life personally. As if a dark and sinister cabal of international Jewish bankers conspirators, if they really existed, would have nothing better to do with their time.

    It’s the same mindset that makes Mr. Gabby Johnson of Johnson County believe that the CIA’s out to mutilate his cattle.

  52. 52.

    martha

    April 4, 2011 at 4:16 pm

    @ppcli: Sadly, so true. But now, at least we can call them out and laugh at them.

  53. 53.

    Duncan Dönitz (formerly Otto Graf von Pfmidtnöchtler-Pízsmőgy, Mumphrey, et al.)

    April 4, 2011 at 4:17 pm

    @martha:

    Didn’t they begin that way back in 1994, when George Bush the Younger got elected to the governorship?

    I really wonder what Republicans must be saying about Walker right now when there isn’t anybody listening but other Republicans. 4 months ago, it looked like the Republicans were on the rise. They’d won the House, whittled away at the Senate, Obama was looking unpopular, and everybody in the press was still dutifully buying into the line that the Democrats had “overreached” and the Republicans were beloved around the country.

    Now Walker is, what, 3 months into his term, and he’s clumsily laid bare everything the Republicans have really wanted to do all along, but were mostly too smart to let anybody see. The guy is a walking public relations meltdown for the whole party. I mean, how dumb do you have to be to fall for the fake Koch call? I wonder if any Republican bigshots are plotting to shoot him yet.

  54. 54.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:17 pm

    @bemused:

    dominant? i’d argue hypocrisy is the defining gene for conservatives (highly linked with authoritarianism).

  55. 55.

    Napoleon

    April 4, 2011 at 4:18 pm

    @El Cid:

    Funny you should say that. In all the news I watched regarding the recent troubles in the Middle East there was mention of minority in Egypt such as Copts and the out of power majority Shia in Bahrain complaining that they are locked out of public jobs.

  56. 56.

    ppcli

    April 4, 2011 at 4:19 pm

    @martha: Yes, there is that. For example, I never fail to smile when I remember the story about the conversation with Irving Kristol where he went on and on about how one of his pals had gotten Bill Kristol into Harvard and another onto Quale’s staff and another,… And then when the conversation turned to affirmative action, he announced “I’m against it. It hurts meritocracy.”

  57. 57.

    FlipYrWhig

    April 4, 2011 at 4:19 pm

    @Zifnab:

    33% return over two years is a damn good investment. How do I sign up for this gravy train?

    Get to work being born a deep-pocketed Republican’s son, then cultivate the precise lack of abilities required.

    Damn, I’m only half qualified.

  58. 58.

    bemused

    April 4, 2011 at 4:20 pm

    @Chris:

    Terrified wusses who jump at their own shadows. No wonder they think bullying is the answer to everything.

  59. 59.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:21 pm

    @ppcli:

    ooh ooh; got a link for that??

  60. 60.

    jwest

    April 4, 2011 at 4:22 pm

    Does anyone remember “beefy former bar bouncer”, Craig Livingstone?

    Doesn’t it embarrass most of you to tears even bringing up the subject of nepotism, patronage jobs and bed feathering?

    The irony…it hurts so badly.

  61. 61.

    Bulworth

    April 4, 2011 at 4:22 pm

    Can I see the public job listing; the resume and cover letter; any and all e-mails scheduling an interview; the name of the person conducting the interview; the report about the first interview… They have paperwork to back up the claim, amirite?

    This only applies to DFH, like university profs.

  62. 62.

    fourlegsgood

    April 4, 2011 at 4:23 pm

    THis is wingnut welfare in all it’s ugly glory folks. I’m sad to say that this goes on in every state, in every industry where republicans have inserted their nasty little snouts.

    It’s why so many of them are loyal, year in, year out. They get each other well-paying jobs, and better yet, they get their friends KIDS well paying jobs. It’s despicable.

  63. 63.

    Nellcote

    April 4, 2011 at 4:26 pm

    @Gravenstone:

    Yeah, this was the lead story in today’s J-S.

    Thanks for mentioning that. I often wonder how often these nifty online stories make it into print.

  64. 64.

    aimai

    April 4, 2011 at 4:26 pm

    @BGinCHI:

    Fantastic comment. I think that should be a rotating tag.

    aimai

  65. 65.

    Redshift

    April 4, 2011 at 4:26 pm

    @pk:

    They claim to hate the government, yet they all get jobs in the government.

    If you don’t believe in government, you feel no obligation to make it work, so why not shovel tax money to cronies by hiring their unqualified children to fail to do work you don’t think should be done?

  66. 66.

    FlipYrWhig

    April 4, 2011 at 4:28 pm

    @jwest: Heckuva job, westy!

  67. 67.

    bemused

    April 4, 2011 at 4:29 pm

    @lllphd:

    I’m sure you’re right about that. So-called moderate R legislators have been shoved out or silenced with only extreme authoritarians left.

  68. 68.

    gnomedad

    April 4, 2011 at 4:29 pm

    Yet he has landed an $81,500-per-year job in Gov. Scott Walker’s administration overseeing trashing environmental and regulatory matters and dozens of employees at the Department of Commerce.

    Fixed. He’s perfectly well qualified.

  69. 69.

    cathyx

    April 4, 2011 at 4:31 pm

    JWest- I think that ad for Prosser you linked to in the previous post should embarrass you.

  70. 70.

    Chris

    April 4, 2011 at 4:31 pm

    @Redshift:

    If you don’t believe in government, you feel no obligation to make it work, so why not shovel tax money to cronies by hiring their unqualified children to fail to do work you don’t think should be done?

    While they wouldn’t phrase it exactly that way, I’m pretty sure that’s exactly how a lot of them think.

  71. 71.

    Emma

    April 4, 2011 at 4:31 pm

    Craig Livingstone? The guy in Clinton administration who got caught collecting dirt on the Republicans and was made to resign? Uh?

    And I would be much more willing to be embarrassed if the Republicans didn’t constitute themselves into the (im)Moral Majority and presume to lecture us about God and ethics.

  72. 72.

    shortstop

    April 4, 2011 at 4:33 pm

    @the fenian: And a district-abandoner, since his new home with his moll is outside the one he’s representing.

  73. 73.

    shortstop

    April 4, 2011 at 4:35 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Cracked me up.

  74. 74.

    Redshift

    April 4, 2011 at 4:36 pm

    @Zifnab:

    33% return over two years is a damn good investment. How do I sign up for this gravy train?

    Hell, that’s nothing compared to the return companies regularly get on campaign contributions to congresscritters, which can run to several thousand percent.

    I seriously think a good Democratic outreach to businesses (especially small business) would be to calculate the ROI on a bunch of specific contributions to Republicans, and put them in terms like: “You worked hard and built your business to get X piddling % ROI. These guys hired a lobbyist and got 1000% on your dime. Do you think that’s fair?”

  75. 75.

    Ash Can

    April 4, 2011 at 4:36 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Oh, my. You’re not kidding. I Googled Craig Livingstone, and, well. LMAO.

    @jwest: Please keep posting here. You’re hilarious.

  76. 76.

    Donut

    April 4, 2011 at 4:37 pm

    I might get pelted with rocks and garbage for saying this, but lots of Democrats dole out lots of patronage jobs, wherever they can, too.

    This is one time where there is no false equivalency – each party actually does this just as much as the other.

    This is only an issue right now because of Walker’s other problems, IMO.

    Believe me, I’m not endorsing it, but really, let’s not pretend that this is not rampant at every level of government.

  77. 77.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:37 pm

    @bemused:

    i think they call it “survival of the f**k’dest”

  78. 78.

    rikryah

    April 4, 2011 at 4:40 pm

    NO DEGREE?

    hell to the no.

    this is an ad that should run in a loop for his recall.

  79. 79.

    bemused

    April 4, 2011 at 4:40 pm

    @lllphd:

    Or Lord of the Flies.

  80. 80.

    geg6

    April 4, 2011 at 4:42 pm

    @cathyx:

    He’s a wingnut. NOTHING embarrasses them.

    Edited to add: Witness his bringing up Livingstone. I know it’s one of those wingnut legends, like the “murder” of Vince Foster, but that is some seriously weak sauce.

  81. 81.

    Chris

    April 4, 2011 at 4:45 pm

    @Redshift:

    I seriously think a good Democratic outreach to businesses (especially small business) would be to calculate the ROI on a bunch of specific contributions to Republicans, and put them in terms like: “You worked hard and built your business to get X piddling % ROI. These guys hired a lobbyist and got 1000% on your dime. Do you think that’s fair?”

    If there’s a way to get unions and small-to-medium-sized businesses on the same page and against big business… whoever can manage that would have a pretty good grounding for a real populist movement.

    Unfortunately, 1) we only have one of the two right now, 2) they’re both much weaker than they used to be, 3) there’s a ton of distrust between the two of them to overcome.

  82. 82.

    Elizabelle

    April 4, 2011 at 4:45 pm

    Sickening.

  83. 83.

    shortstop

    April 4, 2011 at 4:46 pm

    @Donut: Man, this gets old.

    The offhandedness of your reference to “Walker’s other problems” doesn’t diminish the (indeed) centrality of those other problems to our point. Look, this isn’t hard. You don’t wage a flat-out war against public employees in general, particularly those who are highly educated/skilled/trained for their fields, and then put your pals’ idiot sons into cushy taxpayer-funded positions for which they have zero qualifications.

    Kind of like you don’t blather sanctimoniously on about family values and then get caught on masse with your pants down with persons who are not your much-vaunted spouses (x2 for legislatively anti-gay folk who are in the closet).

    Guess which party does both of those things? Guess which one doesn’t?

  84. 84.

    Napoleon

    April 4, 2011 at 4:48 pm

    @rikryah:

    . . . and the text should be something like this, from an older woman teacher “Governor Walker tried to bust the union I was in and then he cut the funding he gave to the school district I work for and what did he do with some of that money? He hired a contributor’s kid who was an unqualified uneducated drunk, gave him a X% raise over the qualified person he replaces so that he was being paid X times what an average State of Wisc. Employee makes.”

  85. 85.

    lllphd

    April 4, 2011 at 4:48 pm

    since this discussion has flirted with genetics and the like, may i veer just slightly more in that direction, at the risk of going off topic, to point to this headline from thinkprogress:
    On Anniversary of MLK Jr. Death, AEI Hosts Lecture on ‘State of White America’ by Author of The Bell Curve

    nice.

  86. 86.

    Warren Terra

    April 4, 2011 at 4:50 pm

    @jwest:

    Does anyone remember “beefy former bar bouncer”, Craig Livingstone?

    To take this riposte as seriously as I can be bothered to:
    1) Your argument is that we can’t complain about Republican featherbedding because a Democrat did something you think is comparable twenty years ago? That’s your argument? Really?
    2) As best I can recall, Livingstone worked his way up from volunteer to campaign worker to aide to a job in the White House. By the standards of political machines since time began, he had earned continued employment in some capacity where he could continue to show the same energy and partisan zeal he had demonstrated; that’s how hard work and loyalty are rewarded. He was given a job by the incoming administration in recognition of those very real, if irrelevant, qualifications. He disastrously and criminally (and perhaps not unpredictably) misused that job – loads of partisan zeal, it turns out, wasn’t an appropriate qualification for the job he was given – but it seems to me that his story is just a wee smidgen bit different from floating into a cushy job because your Mommy told her influential lobbyist and campaign donor husband that no, she hadn’t been sleeping around.
    3) There are a bunch of near-perfect parallels to the Craig Livingstone story in the recent Bush administration: campaign volunteers or paid campaign workers given important jobs that they perverted for political ends. This was especially notorious in the Justice department, in stories that TPM covered excellently and that resulted in hearings before the House. But I’m guessing you weren’t too worked up about those.
    4) On the other hand, the Bush administration also had examples much more closely parallel to the Deschane situation than was Livingstone; in particular, the decision was made to hand over the reconstruction of Iraq to a bunch of kids with no professional qualifications but a load of partisan signifiers. It’s not a perfect parallel – not all of them had donor parents, though several did, and some were even donors themselves, like the dude put in charge of the health care system. But I’m guessing you probably kept your trap shut about that one, too.

  87. 87.

    Mouse Tolliver

    April 4, 2011 at 4:52 pm

    @Napoleon:

    And what to me makes that really amazing is that newspaper comment sections impress me as a cesspool of wingnuts.

    Maybe the astroturf operations have scaled back on the sockpuppets because people are starting to notice.

  88. 88.

    Napoleon

    April 4, 2011 at 4:53 pm

    @Donut:

    I would actually disagree with this. Sure both sides hire incompetents as political pay back or other reasons but Republicans tend to do it even in positions that really count. I recall after Katrina reading someone saying Clinton would have never hired a Michael Brown for FEMA head. He hired a pro. Instead when he hired Paula Jones (or whatever her name was) he stuck her in some unimportant desk job at the BMV.

  89. 89.

    Ash Can

    April 4, 2011 at 4:54 pm

    @Donut: As a Chicagoan, I’ll be the last to argue with the general point that Dems indulge in patronage as well. What’s mockworthy in this instance is that Walker is so gung-ho about sticking it to all the other workers on the public payroll, and that the party that’s whined about government being inefficient and incompetent has, as one of its current poster boys, someone willing to put an experience-free fuck-up on the public payroll — at a relatively high level of pay and responsibility, yet — for the sole apparent reason of his being the son of a major donor.

  90. 90.

    Catsy

    April 4, 2011 at 4:58 pm

    @jwest: This is fucking hilarious.

    Pro tip for you, Sparky: when you have to reach back to the middle of the Clinton administration for your transparent tu quoque attempt at deflecting criticism, you’re just demonstrating to any and all that you’ve got nothing.

    Nothing.

    Seriously. Craig Motherfucking Livingstone? That’s your response?

    I suggest a career doing donkey shows while wearing a Britney Spears costume. That might be somewhat more respectable and less humiliating than the way you’ve managed to beclown yourself here.

  91. 91.

    Calouste

    April 4, 2011 at 5:01 pm

    @lllphd:

    Maybe Ayaan Hirsi Ali might realize what the club she is working for is really all about, but I guess being the resident Muslim-bashing house negro just pays too well.

  92. 92.

    El Cid

    April 4, 2011 at 5:03 pm

    @Napoleon: This is a pretty common hidden agenda when you hear power hungry elites decrying corruption and nepotism and ethno-favoritism in benefits and jobs: it’s because the corruption and nepotism — if they exist at all — are going for people and groups they don’t like.

    Likewise, if out-groups complain about the corruption and nepotism and ethno-favoritism of the most powerful, then it must be that they’re being stirred up by hidden or evil forces.

    Thus, in Bahrain the protesting Shi’as are all Iranian dupes and conspirators.

    In Egypt, there was a lot of bitterness at the huge wealth the Copts had before the coup against King Farouk which led to Nasser’s rule. Well, that and being discriminated against generally due to their Christianity. And that’s just the government discrimination.

  93. 93.

    bemused

    April 4, 2011 at 5:03 pm

    @Warren Terra:

    3 and 4 excellent points.

    I don’t remember any republican or conservative anywhere, well known public figures or my next door republican neighbors, getting upset about any of those deliberate, outrageous abuses of power. Not even a peep.

  94. 94.

    Zifnab

    April 4, 2011 at 5:04 pm

    @shortstop:

    Guess which party does both of those things? Guess which one doesn’t?

    I’ll go with “both” and “neither”.

    The big difference between Republicans and Democrats in this regard is how Democrats will try to run with a squeaky clean image while Republicans will try to run on a squeaky clean image.

    I remember Bush Jr walking into the White House to people chanting “He’ll bring honor and integrity back to the Oval Office!” As though not cheating on your wife was a central tenant of the job.

    Policy just isn’t as important to the Republican base as the Democrat base. Image becomes everything.

  95. 95.

    Resident Firebagger

    April 4, 2011 at 5:06 pm

    In Deschane’s defense, two drunken driving convictions is about average for a Wisconsin resident…

  96. 96.

    GregB

    April 4, 2011 at 5:14 pm

    Has his brother Qusay gotten a plum job yet?

  97. 97.

    numbskull

    April 4, 2011 at 5:15 pm

    @Donut: Actually, it’s not rampant at every level of government, so let me be the first to pelt you with imaginary stones.

  98. 98.

    Joel

    April 4, 2011 at 5:16 pm

    Apropos of nothing…

  99. 99.

    srv

    April 4, 2011 at 5:20 pm

    If you didn’t know who you wanted to vote for in 2012, Pawlenty has his first ad for ya!

  100. 100.

    The Populist

    April 4, 2011 at 5:20 pm

    Wow, some welfare check!

  101. 101.

    shortstop

    April 4, 2011 at 5:24 pm

    @Zifnab: You’re going to have to provide me with some examples of elected or high-profile Democrats making wholesale attacks on public employees in tandem with the patronage, and bleating about family values and against gays and lesbians while helping themselves to extramarital and/or same-sex lovin’. I’m coming up short.

    What you say otherwise is valid. But it really is the hypocrisy, stupid*. The reason Walker’s getting hit with this now isn’t because he’s generally unpopular; he’s unpopular for the specific reason that he attacks public employees as overpaid, incompetent and unnecessary.

    *not directed at you

  102. 102.

    asiangrrlMN

    April 4, 2011 at 5:28 pm

    @srv: I really, really, really have to get my visceral loathing for the man (and for Bachmann) in check or the silly season is gonna be constant agita for me.

  103. 103.

    Donut

    April 4, 2011 at 5:32 pm

    @shortstop:

    You can tone down the condescension a little bit, you jerk.

    I am a proud graduate of the University of WI in Madison and have many friends with skin in this game, asshole – some of those highly skilled state workers you are talking about.

    I know it’s “not hard” to understand government corruption – I currently live in Chicago, to boot. I used to work with Bill Daley’s kid at Fannie Mae. Nice guy, Bill Jr. Not especially qualified for the job he had and has currently. I get it, I promise. I understand the issues.

    But this really is not a special case, genius. All levels of government are packed with dipshit children and girlfriends of contributors and/or other powerful people. And both parties do it. They most certainly do.

    I’ve not actually heard a lot of complaints from the GOP about government crony-ism lately, and especially not vis-a-vis the Wisconsin situation. I’ve heard lots of talk about union thuggery and communism/socialism and left wing loonies and overpaid state employees.

    And yes, I agree that’s all bullshit.

    Your point is taken (and agreed with) as respects family values talking points versus actual behavior on the GOP’s part.

    But I don’t quite see how that’s relevant to what I was saying.

    Can you please try to dispute what I am actually talking about, rather than addressing me as if I’m a moron?

    Thanks!

  104. 104.

    SpotWeld

    April 4, 2011 at 5:32 pm

    So who wants to file the FOIA request to see if Deschane’s Department of Commerce email account has been used for unapproved politcal purposes?

  105. 105.

    Madeline

    April 4, 2011 at 5:39 pm

    @Ash Can: This. 68% of Dane County voted for the other guy.

  106. 106.

    El Cid

    April 4, 2011 at 5:39 pm

    @Calouste: She was on Al Jazeera yesterday being interviewed by David Frost warning that the revolutions in Muslim countries was really a threat to everyone, because the Muslim hordes like the Muslim Brotherhood could not resist their caliphate-seeking Talibanistic ways. (About 22 minutes in.)

  107. 107.

    Gravenstone

    April 4, 2011 at 5:41 pm

    @Catsy: To be fair, wingtards have only a limited selection of talking points at their disposal. Add to that the fact their talking points have no apparent expiration date on relevancy and, voila, twenty year old non-sequiturs at the drop of a hat.

  108. 108.

    Zifnab

    April 4, 2011 at 5:44 pm

    @shortstop:

    You’re going to have to provide me with some examples of elected or high-profile Democrats making wholesale attacks on public employees in tandem with the patronage, and bleating about family values and against gays and lesbians while helping themselves to extramarital and/or same-sex lovin’. I’m coming up short.

    Clinton, for starters. He bargained with Gingrich to cut welfare and pass NAFTA, ran as a family man alongside his wife and daughter, rallied the blue collar working folk against those damn uppity liberals in his “Sister Solja” moment, signed DADT and DOMA, and then got busted getting his Presidential poll danced on.

    Then there’s ex-Senator John Edwards, who ran side-by-side with his influential and progressive wife while signing the Bankruptcy Bill that sold out the middle class to the credit card companies. He got busted coming out of his mistress’s hotel room. As a southern Democrat, he also has a record supporting some of the more moderate gay bashing.

    I mean, neither of these guys are tea party radicals. And there’s no wet suites or dildos in the closet. But the philandering, gay-averse, pro-banker, anti-union Democrats definitely exist.

  109. 109.

    joe from Lowell

    April 4, 2011 at 5:53 pm

    In case anyone isn’t clear, the purpose of a “builders association” is to allow builders to built shitty houses and not get in trouble for it.

  110. 110.

    El Cid

    April 4, 2011 at 6:00 pm

    @joe from Lowell: Don’t forget to stop any land use restrictions or regulations and an unwillingness for municipalities to extend water & sewer systems!

  111. 111.

    shortstop

    April 4, 2011 at 6:06 pm

    @Donut:

    rather than addressing me as if I’m a moron?

    Sorry about the condescension. I admit I thought you were a “I’m a lifelong Democrat, and I think the Dems are making a mistake here…” troll. My bad, and my apologies.

    But this really is not a special case, genius. All levels of government are packed with dipshit children and girlfriends of contributors and/or other powerful people. And both parties do it. They most certainly do.

    No one is disputing that, Donut. Nobody. But this really is a special case, because it’s not a complaint about patronage in general. Both parties do NOT launch coordinated public union-busting campaigns across several states, going so far in one as to get themselves hauled into court for ignoring the law and defying a judicial order. Both parties do NOT engage in constant, vicious rhetoric about how teachers, professors, firefighters, police and all other government workers are lazy ne’er-do-wells who suck from the public teat via inflated and undeserved salaries.

    Walker and his buds have done all that, and now we have the case of a really unqualified, really overpaid state employee who got his job simply because his pop gave Walker some cash. These people have absolutely set themselves up for the well-deserved ridicule they’re getting in this case.

  112. 112.

    Bruce S

    April 4, 2011 at 6:15 pm

    This is, in truth, a perfect appointment to the Walker team. As commenter Rikyrah is wont to observe, “They are who we thought they were” or something like that.

  113. 113.

    FlipYrWhig

    April 4, 2011 at 6:21 pm

    @Zifnab: I take your point, but I don’t think Clinton ever ran as a “family man.” The Gennifer Flowers story hit during the New Hampshire primary, didn’t it? If he ever intended to run as a family man, his ability to do so was yanked out from under him immediately (and, trust me, you don’t want to get in the habit of yanking things out from under Bill Clinton).

    (Also, as Bob Somerby is wont to point out, Sister Souljah had just said that black people, instead of killing each other, should have a week of killing white people. Not terribly surprising he might want to call that out. On the other hand, you didn’t mention it, but the execution of Rickey Ray Rector would be a useful example of Clinton attempting to pacify critics by looking Tough On Black Crime.)

  114. 114.

    Wolfdaughter

    April 4, 2011 at 6:32 pm

    @jwest:

    Wow, jwest. Best you can do? History 15 years out-of-date?

    And do tell us how the Clinton Administration smeared all sorts of Republicans using info obtained in the FBI files? With links. To reliable resources. The FBI-Gate was a stupid move, sure, but what negative results did it finally have?

    Besides, I don’t see anyone here claiming that Democrats have never also practiced in nepotism. Nepotism is wrong regardless of who practices it.

    But you seem totally unable to grasp that one the one hand, claiming that allowing teachers and other public sector workers to negotiate salaries and bennies, is breaking the state budget (already shown conclusively to be untrue) but hiring marginally qualified people, nepotistically, is somehow OK.

    Weak tea, dude, weak tea.

  115. 115.

    demz taters

    April 4, 2011 at 6:34 pm

    @joe from Lowell:

    In case anyone isn’t clear, the purpose of a “builders association” is to allow builders to built shitty houses and not get in trouble for it.

    You mean, to leverage their collective power. Kind of like a union.

  116. 116.

    fasteddie9318

    April 4, 2011 at 6:44 pm

    @demz taters:

    You mean, to leverage their collective power. Kind of like a union.

    No, pinko, it’s nothing like that at all. Why? Because shut up, you socialist radical, that’s why.

  117. 117.

    fasteddie9318

    April 4, 2011 at 6:44 pm

    @demz taters:

    You mean, to leverage their collective power. Kind of like a union.

    No, pinko, it’s nothing at all like that. Why? Because shut up, that’s why.

  118. 118.

    Roger Moore

    April 4, 2011 at 6:48 pm

    @demz taters:

    You mean, to leverage their collective power. Kind of like a union.

    No, no. They’re a voluntary association of civic minded businesspeople getting together to inform our representatives about important issues. They’re not a gang of thugs who use threats of violence to extort outrageous salaries for doing nothing much like unions are. Besides, IOKIYAARD.

  119. 119.

    Wolfdaughter

    April 4, 2011 at 6:53 pm

    @Zifnab:

    Still false equivalency, Zifnab. Yes, you can argue the NAFTA is bad for the little guy, and I agree. But saying that it equates to trying to break public sector unions’ backs is going a LITTLE far. And yes, Clinton couldn’t keep his pants zipped, and that was a weakness which I certainly would prefer he didn’t have. But he didn’t preach “family” values while doing something else.

    Sorry, but at this point in history, and going back at least 30 years, the Republicans have far outdone the Democrats in hypocrisy.

  120. 120.

    ppcli

    April 4, 2011 at 7:20 pm

    @lllphd:

    Sorry – I was away from the thread awhile. In case you are checking, here is the link.

    http://www.economist.com/node/12599247?story_id=12599247

    The cash quote is:

    “I remember back in the late ’90s when Ira Katznelson, an eminent political scientist at Columbia, came to deliver a guest lecture to an economic philosophy class I was taking. It was a great lecture, made more so by the fact that the class was only about ten or twelve students and we got got ask all kinds of questions and got a lot of great, provocative answers. Anyhow, Prof. Katznelson described a lunch he had with Irving Kristol back either during the first Bush administration. The talk turned to William Kristol, then Dan Quayle’s chief of staff, and how he got his start in politics. Irving recalled how he talked to his friend Harvey Mansfield at Harvard, who secured William a place there as both an undergrad and graduate student; how he talked to Pat Moynihan, then Nixon’s domestic policy adviser, and got William an internship at The White House; how he talked to friends at the RNC and secured a job for William after he got his Harvard Ph.D.; and how he arranged with still more friends for William to teach at UPenn and the Kennedy School of Government. With that, Prof. Katznelson recalled, he then asked Irving what he thought of affirmative action. “I oppose it”, Irving replied. “It subverts meritocracy.”

  121. 121.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    April 4, 2011 at 7:55 pm

    @Jay in Oregon:

    That young man put a lot of effort into being born to a lobbyist and big-time Republican donor.

    He had to, because there was quite a crowd of souls lined up at that cervical rubicon, just waiting to climb into the infant of the GOP guy. The other choices that day for births were a trash picker, a carpet salesman, 2 fast food managers and a Best Buy guy.

  122. 122.

    Mike in NC

    April 4, 2011 at 8:07 pm

    Well, pretty much every day there’s a story about the new governor of SC hiring a relative or crony for a cushy job. No surprise, as her husband has two jobs: one lucrative gig with the state government and another as an officer in the National Guard.

  123. 123.

    Julia Grey

    April 4, 2011 at 8:45 pm

    Sorry, but at this point in history, and going back at least 30 years, the Republicans have far outdone the Democrats in hypocrisy.

    That’s because their socio-political philosophy is at war with human nature. They’re fated to lose the fight against themselves.

  124. 124.

    Dr. Squid

    April 4, 2011 at 8:49 pm

    Didn’t you know that the Free Market says that Republicans, even ones with thumbs up their asses, are worth twice as much as teachers?

    I get the feeling that this story is not just a case of nepotism and cronyism, but an attempt by the Walker Administration to use taxpayer money to reimburse campaign contributions. That type of behavior can get you thrown in jail even if you are a Republican.

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