@billmon1 7th Circuit Appeals Court (Chicago) has put a "stay" on Randa's order. http://t.co/diTUv67vf5. Randa overstepped.
— Eileen (@BDBgoldens3) May 8, 2014
Today's episode of "Right Wing Pols in Black Robes" was made possible by the Charles & David Koch Foundation…
http://t.co/BbdWjPpPYL
— billmon (@billmon1) May 8, 2014
From the National Journal article:
… On Tuesday night, a judge ordered that a secretive investigation into the funding of Gov. Scott Walker’s recall campaign be halted. In his ruling, U.S. District Judge Rudolph Randa found that the secretive investigation violated the First Amendment rights of its targets—conservative political groups.
Some background: In 2012, Walker faced a recall election, which he survived with unprecedented support from Republican groups—and despite pro-union groups’ attempts to oust Walker. One of those Republican groups, the Wisconsin Club for Growth, was accused of illegally coordinating its campaign funds with Walker’s campaign, and a secretive “John Doe” investigation was launched. In Wisconsin, a John Doe investigation is “an independent, investigatory tool to ascertain whether a crime has been committed and if so, by whom.”
In turn, one of the group’s directors, Eric O’Keefe, sued the state attorneys involved in the probe, saying the investigation violated his First Amendment rights.
In effect, Randa’s decision says the state’s investigation against the Club for Growth is completely baseless. Randa even ordered that all materials collected in the investigation should be destroyed, and said the group did not need to cooperate with prosecutors.
This is just the latest instance of Wisconsin courts becoming a last resort for political maneuvering. Last week, a federal judge struck down Wisconsin’s controversial voter-identification law, which Walker signed into law in 2011. And the status of Walker’s most polarizing law, which banned public-sector unions from bargaining collectively, has become a judicial ping-pong match—upheld, overturned, upheld, ad nauseam….
“Insisting that poor people be allowed to vote, conspiring to evade fund-raising regulations — both sides do it!”
The Federal stay sounds like a win for the good guys, however briefly. I’m hoping our Wisconsin commentors can weigh in on this one.
Omnes Omnibus
There was some talk about it in one of the Freddie threads.
ETA: AL already provided the link that I was offering.
Morzer
Ah, the Republican judicial progression at work: from anti-liberal activist judges to originalist judges to conservative activist judges all in the space of a generation.
ulee
Anne Laurie. Please report to the nearest containment center. Signed, Eddie Munster (aka Paul Ryan).
Baud
That district court opinion is cray cray.
Xboxershorts
Isn’t this Eric O’Keefe the father of the infamous felonious mischievous film editor in chief?
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: You want cray cray? Try the order denying the motion to dismiss. One thing you should note as you read it is that the GAB, the nonpartisan agency that oversees elections in WI, unanimously authorized the investigation.
burnspbesq
@Baud:
That would apply to both the order denying the defendants’ motion to dismiss and the order granting the preliminary injunction.
Hal
Since I’m no attorney, what’s the difference between a john doe investigation and one carried out by the police or a grand jury? You don’t have to share information with the people you are investigating, or even advise them you are in fact investigating them, do you?
burnspbesq
@Omnes Omnibus:
I’m halfway tempted to spend some money with PACER to get a copy of the complaint. It must be a piece of work.
Omnes Omnibus
@Hal: This, from the OP, is a good description. In some ways, it is like the old federal independent counsel process.
Omnes Omnibus
@burnspbesq: Here you go. You’ll love it
RSR
“A Republic, if you can keep it.”
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus: @burnspbesq:
He’ll get reversed. But I didn’t see anything in the earlier opinion as deliciously wingnutty as this:
That’s Sarah-Palin-in-a-black-robe crazy.
Morzer
@Baud:
A conservative judge who doesn’t understand how and why government works the way it does? Well, there’s a shock and a half!
burnspbesq
@Omnes Omnibus:
Holy shit (shakes head).
Any idea what’s in the redactions (home addresses and SSNs, maybe)?
Omnes Omnibus
@burnspbesq: No, some groups have filed motions to have the records opened to the public.
kindness
Conservative judges seem to have all gone off their rockers.
I blame Scalia. They’re all jealous of him.
Baud
@Morzer:
It’s not so much wrong as it is trite. I could see that being part of a speech at tea party rally.
Morzer
@Baud:
I think in this context it is wrong – and deliberately wrong as a means of letting the judge get to where he wants to go politically, rather than from an eye to what the law actually requires. It’s a very deliberate reframing of the law and the rights of citizenship in such a way that a self-determined representative of the citizenry can simply interpret away any parts of the law that tweak his wingnut soul.
Morzer
@efgoldman:
Law school? I am amazed he got through high school, never mind college.
John O
Citizens United and McCutcheon will be the death blows to this country. Glad I won’t be around to witness it. It’ll take a generation or two to figure it out.
trollhattan
Am part of the small, odd cohort believing Walker is the most-likely Republican nomination in ’16. Seems his path is being cleared and re-striped.
Morzer
@trollhattan:
I think he’s more plausible as a candidate than many people believe – in his slimy dweeb-like way – but I can’t seeing him ever being president.
Omnes Omnibus
@trollhattan: The man is a walking void. Hell, it is possible that I have met him, but I have no memory of it. He completely lacks charisma. Rick Santorum has more personal magnetism.
Comrade Dread
It really is just a matter of time before even the dollar limits on campaign contributions are overturned. Based on the reasoning of the high court so far, there isn’t any corruption unless the FBI catches a contributor handing a pol a big bag of money with a $ on it and the words “For your Yea/Nay vote on HB/SB xxxx.”
We’re taking longer than the Ruskies to end up under the rule of Oligarchs, but we’re joining them all the same.
catclub
@trollhattan: you and Charlie Pierce and me to some extent. “Seems his path is being cleared and re-striped. ”
But the problem is all the obstructions that need to be cleared. Also, others claim he is charisma challenged.
Gin & Tonic
@Omnes Omnibus: He completely lacks charisma
So did Nixon.
rikyrah
Old White Male Racist Tells Black Woman To Move To The Back Of A Bus In New York (VIDEO)
MAY 7, 2014 5:52 PM
Nearly 60 years have passed since civil rights icon Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man after being ordered to move to the back of the bus. In 2014, despite declarations by Republicans and conservative Supreme Court Justices that racism is over in America, it seems old white racists want to revive Jim Crow. And that apparently includes buses.
In the wake of overt racism by the likes of people such as LA Clipper’s owner Donald Sterling and conservative hero Cliven Bundy, yet another act of racism has emerged. This time, it’s an old white man in New York on a city bus.
Caught on audio and video, an old white man demanded an African-American woman to surrender her seat and move to the back of the bus. She asks him why and then it gets uglier from there as he targets her hairstyle and invokes Donald Sterling
http://youtu.be/mUPfyvI4W3k
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/05/07/back-of-the-bus/
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: Nixon is arguably one of the five most intelligent presidents we have had. Easily top 10. Walker is not at that level.
Mike in NC
Walker / Haley 2016
Because you cannot get enough wingnut GOP governors.
Gin & Tonic
@Omnes Omnibus: You mentioned charisma, not intelligence.
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: Right, but someone lacking both isn’t going to get the brass ring.
Mike in NC
@Omnes Omnibus: Recent speculation is that Nixon was a bipolar paranoid schizophrenic, which seems to fit the case of why he was such a deranged asshole.
Morzer
@Mike in NC:
He was a teabagger before his time.
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: I don’t think that Nixon gave a shit about domestic policy. He would be liberal, conservative, or a bewildering combination of both if that is what he needed to do. His interests were his own career and foreign policy, in that order.
lamh36
OT, but, earlier today, this tweet from FLOTUS was posted to twitter:
Our prayers are with the missing Nigerian girls and their families. It’s time to #BringBackOurGirls -mo
I figured that this WH wouldn’t have allowed the FLOTUS pic to be posted thereby attaching the Obama “clout” to the issue unless they were planning more than just administative consultation on the issue, as was previously reported.
I may be wrong, but this from ABC news seems like newer info that I’d heard before.
U.S. sending military team to Nigeria to help plan search for kidnapped girls: http://abcn.ws/1ita7TM
Botsplainer
@efgoldman:
Garden variety sociopath, with little in the way of governing vision. If it helped him, he did it.
Morzer
@efgoldman:
Sounds like a teabagger to me. I think you badly overestimate the amount of true belief among the teabaggerati – especially their leadership. You’re talking about people who have one overriding mission in life: always be grifting. Nixon would have fitted in among them like an unshaven pig among shit.
Omnes Omnibus
@Morzer: Too smart for that.
Villago Delenda Est
@Baud: A party rally held at the Zepplinplatz in Nuremberg, perhaps.
Morzer
@Omnes Omnibus:
Not sure that intelligence is what matters here. I think they share the same unscrupulousness, the same willingness to screw over others, the same seething resentments and paranoia, the same lack of any positive vision of the future. Nixon, to me, is the real ancestor of the teabaggers, with his careful appeals to the nastier aspects of America’s id and his willingness to tell any lie necessary to gain power.
Mnemosyne
@Gin & Tonic:
I disagree with you about Nixon’s charisma — he didn’t have Reagan levels of it, but he had a decent amount. He had very little charm, but that’s not the same thing.
Nixon garnered the undying loyalty of too many people to be deemed charisma-free.
Villago Delenda Est
@Mnemosyne: Agreed. Nixon knew how to work the system to get political favors that could be cashed in later.
Omnes Omnibus
@Morzer: He and his willingness to let the Birchers inside the tent are the well from which teabaggers spring, but I do not think he is of them. Semantic difference, sure, but I think it does matter.
ulee
Did Anne really post this, or did she really go to bed at 800pm and just have the robot that pretends to be her post this?
Omnes Omnibus
@ulee: No one cares.
Morzer
@Omnes Omnibus:
I agree that he isn’t of them chronologically, but I do believe that spiritually and genetically he is their forefather, if not quite their “onlie begetter”. Still, we would need Rick Perlstein to adjudicate that one.
I believe people are wrong who think the teabaggers don’t want to govern. I think they very much do want to and have an agenda of the worst variety, but they are currently unable to put it into practice because they only have a grip on one part of the government, which is, I think, why the Supreme Court has become so much more nakedly partisan and activist of late, because they sense that this is the highest the conservative tide can rise, and if it were done, it were well it were done quickly. I suspect that their real achievement will be to destroy the credibility of the Supreme Court as a source of credible law and legal judgments.
Violet
@Mnemosyne: Agree. Nixon had a certain type of charisma. Plus he was smart and canny and put in a lot of effort on behalf of other candidates so they were owed him. And then he called in chits.
I just don’t see that kind of thing in Walker. He doesn’t seem that smart, he’s charisma-free, and he’s completely devoid of charm. Has he worked hard for other candidates to earn favors? He strikes me as someone who doesn’t like to work hard.
Morzer
@efgoldman:
I never thought you, of all people, were making excuses for Tricky Dicky the Non-Crook.
Omnes Omnibus
@Morzer: I said he and his acceptance of the Birchers are the well from which teabaggers sprung. So we really aren’t in disagreement on that. I would say that teabaggers don’t want to govern they want to rule. There is a difference. And, finally, the Supreme Court has been demolished as an a credible athority before and it has rebuilt itself. Also, if one conservative justice disappears and a even a moderate takes his place, the Court changes entirely. 2016 is vital.
eemom
@Omnes Omnibus:
Correct, and not a semantic difference. The teabaggers themselves are only tools.
Morzer
@Omnes Omnibus:
I think they do want to govern as well as ruling – but the way in which and intentions with which they want to govern are so profoundly different from and repugnant to our more civilized, reasoned and frankly, honest concept of what governing means that we often assume that they aren’t interested in governing. We see them, understandably, as wreckers of civilization, but we fail to understand that they want very much to establish their own perverted idea of civilization in place of what Americans have labored for generations to achieve in rising out of the darkness of much of our past.
Morzer
@efgoldman:
I don’t see why you can’t accept my agreement with your earlier claim that you weren’t making excuses for Nixon. I never thought you were making such excuses and I don’t think you are now. What’s your beef with that?
Omnes Omnibus
@Morzer: I see rule and govern as different. Rule means make people follow orders. Govern means act in a way that is intended to benefit those being governed.
Morzer
@Omnes Omnibus:
You see, that’s where I think you get the teabaggers wrong – because you bring this concept of benefit to the governed into the idea of governing and then assume as a corollary that “the governed” equals or should equal everyone. I think that the teabaggers see white people as the only deserving beneficiaries of government and their repellent agenda as the only one that will truly save “their country” (increasingly equated with their race). They want to govern, in your sense, but not for the benefit of the entire American people.
I don’t think you can split ruling and governing so neatly. You can’t govern without making people follow some orders, whether you do so via direct coercion or via legislative measures expressed and enforced through the law and its agencies. Nor is it likely that anyone rules without intending to benefit some fraction, at least, of the ruled, even if that fraction is only the ruler and cronies.
Morzer
@efgoldman:
Fine, gramps, I’ll get off your lawn and leave you to romp about with your zimmer frame. Sleep well!
ulee
@Omnes Omnibus: buzz off. you’re a sychopant.
Morzer
@ulee:
A sychopant? One who breathes heavily at the thought of figs?
It just goes to show how little one knows of people on the internet. There I was assuming that Omnes was quite respectable, and now you tell me that he’s a fruit fetishist.
ulee
@Morzer: It’s a keyboard error. But, yea I’m sure she breathes heavy at the sight of anything edible. I’m off to bed. I’m working tomorrow.
Omnes Omnibus
@Morzer: In my view, govern has acquired an implication of consent and agreement, while rule has not. If you are suggesting that the tea folk want to govern based on the wishes of people like them, you are right. I still say that is ruling not governing, because the group constituting people like them is actually rather small.
Morzer
@Omnes Omnibus:
Off-topic here for a moment, but what in the world is ulee trying to achieve here?
As to whether the teabaggers can legitimately govern, I think their desperate attempts to rig the system indicate that they don’t think they can do so within the bounds of the American system in its present form. Which, of course, just proves to them that they are being brutally repressed and their country stolen by those people. I find their view of the world contemptible, but I am sure they intend to govern according to it if we are weak or foolish enough to let them.
Omnes Omnibus
@Morzer: Ulee posted a bunch of suicidal comments here a while ago and people tried to talk him or her down. More recently, ulee posted some arguably racist comments and then when questioned about them doubled down. Now ulee is just being weird. I suspect that this commenter has some personal issues.
As for the rest, I find little with which to disagree in what you said.
Frankensteinbeck
@Morzer: and @Omnes Omnibus:
I think it’s about power, but not power in the sense of personal power. It’s about white dominance, which is inextricably tied to fundamentalist Christian dominance. A racist can afford to be generous when he feels totally in control, and you saw that back in the late 80s, when Reagan’s reelection proved it was morning in America… for white people. Well, being nice has gotten blacks to a level of such equality that a black man was elected president, and then the white establishment, throwing absolutely everything they had, could not stop him from being reelected. Now it’s an existential struggle from their perspective. They must stomp on everyone who is not on their side and do anything, anything, to keep political control they can use to slow down the rising tide of racial equality. Keeping the country operating is a luxury they can no longer afford. The one and only priority must be kicking minorities, especially the black man in the white house. It that means shooting themselves in the face in the hopes the bullet hits him, so be it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Frankensteinbeck: Sadly, you may be right.
Morzer
@Frankensteinbeck:
I do wonder what will happen if they lose big in 2016, as all the signs suggest that they will. I think there are enough weaponized teabaggers hopped up on imaginary racial grievances and Fox fantasies that it won’t take much for some serious outbreaks of violence. Hell, they’ve already exploited the vile Stand Your Lilywhite Ground laws whenever they can.
Morzer
@Frankensteinbeck:
One point that does give me a little hope: it’s pretty clear that homophobia is no longer an issue that favors the GOP in most of the US. How do the teabaggers come to terms with that while keeping the Talibangelicals in the Big White Clown Tent? I don’t see them being able to square that particular circle.
Omnes Omnibus
@Morzer: If there are outbursts of violence, I suspect that they will further alienate the “normals.” Of course, this won’t help anyone hurt by the idiocy. I do think our politics are on a leftward swing; it just isn’t swinging as fast as many of us were hoping it would.
GxB
@Violet: Ding, ding, ding!
That would be my impression too. Which makes him GWB v2.0 (charisma downgrade) but he is a true blank slate in the sense that he has no ability to think for himself. The end result is a perfect sockpuppet for the next Dick “Dick!” Chaney to manipulate. Problem there being his total dry wonderbread persona will make him a hard sell. I’m waiting for the MSM to start churning out the slobbering profile pieces on him. Then I’ll know for sure that he’s in the game in ’16.
kideni
Judge Randa has a history of bizarre rulings that the appeals court makes haste to overturn (look up Georgia Thompson and see how he helped railroad an innocent state employee just to try to make Democratic governor Jim Doyle look bad in 2006). His ruling was horrifying. Not just that he ordered the DAs to destroy all the evidence they’d gathered or be considered in contempt of court, but he actually said this:
“The plaintiffs have found a way to circumvent campaign finance laws, and that circumvention should not and cannot be condemned or restricted. Instead, it should be recognized as promoting political speech, an activity that is ‘ingrained in our culture.'”
Yes, he is praising people for circumventing the law.
Frankensteinbeck
@Morzer:
The thing is, the Talibangelicals ARE the Big White Clown Tent. That homophobia is dropping seems like a separate issue from racism to us, but it’s not. It is part and parcel of their ‘we are no longer dominant’ crisis. The ones that aren’t all that homophobic still know that if the White Establishment (think Bill O’Reilly) were in charge, gay marriage would not be legal. The ones that are only mildly racist but really hate women and gays know that if True Christians were in charge, a black man couldn’t be president. We see issues. They see a tide, one single mass of change sweeping over them. They talk about a culture war because they have viewed this as a war for years, and they keep losing ground.
What particularly interests me is that gun nuts and kleptocrats have handcuffed themselves to the White Establishment. It’s gone really well for them since Reagan, but when the White Establishment drowns, they drown with it.
Omnes Omnibus
@GxB: I know that I may be biased by my proximity to him, but he seriously cannot compete on a stage with the standard GOPers. One won’t notice him. As I said before, Rick Santorum has more charisma. He has not chance in a national election. He is taking advantage of some particular features of of Wisconsin politics that will not necessarily project onto the national stage.
GxB
@Omnes Omnibus: Oh, I agree, the problem is the R bench is looking mighty thin, and it may lead to some desperate (if not comedic) events. They’ll have to slap some pads and a helmet on somebody and send him out there. I’m a bit surprised they dropped Ryan as quickly as they did… In any case no matter who they send out, I’m calling it right now, they have 45% of the popular vote – no matter how awful – it’s just up to Rove et. al. to work their old black magic to eke out that last 5%+1.
Going to be a strange election that’s for sure.
Violet
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m nowhere near Wisconsin but I agree. He’s charisma-less. Add to that the fact that he comes across as not very bright and he doesn’t stand a chance. A candidate for president can be dumb but they cannot also lack charisma or charm. Walker’s missing both and doesn’t have the brains.
I don’t care how much the MSM tries to push him, at some point he has to stand up on a stage and have something that makes people want to vote for him. Personality, charisma, quick wit, intelligence, good looks, whatever. He has to have something. He’s got none. And he’s missing a chin. Not going to happen.
Omnes Omnibus
@GxB: Ryan can’t hang. He couldn’t deliver WI to the assholes. Wi is one of those states that is more conservative locally than nationally. It is a function of districting. Wi’s Democratic areas tend to be very strongly D. Most of the GOP areas are less numerically overwhelming..
Morzer
@Frankensteinbeck:
They are a big faction within the tent, but they aren’t the whole of of it by any means. You’ve got the business groups, the old-fashioned country clubbers (diminished though they are), the glibertarians, the legacy Republicans (although most of them must be dead or close to it by now), the Log Cabin boys. I think that there’s some real potential for the GOP to lose a small, but significant chunk of its base because of homophobia and blatant racism, helped on by the Talibangelical crazies. Will it cost them more than say 1% of the base? Maybe not – but that might be a tippingpoint, if even that 1% just sits out elections and waits for a better day to come. Then again, you’ve got the votes that the Democrats lost because the President is, shall we say, not entirely of a whiteskinned persuasion. If some of those voters come home to HRC just as the GOP loses 1% of its base, well, you’ve got some very interesting potential there.
Morzer
@GxB: Hell, there’s even been some talk of drafting.. why yes, Mittens for 2016! Now if that isn’t the definition of a thin bench, I don’t know what would be.
Frankensteinbeck
@Morzer:
Of those groups, I think only the Legacy Republicans think the homophobia is a problem. The Log Cabin boys blatantly will not give up this abusive relationship until they are personally thrown in jail for sodomy – and maybe not then. Glibertarians and kleptocrats are defending their right to oppress others. Saving a group they don’t care about one way or the other from oppression is not going to be worth changing their vote. But it’s true that while there’s no GOP without the Talibangelicals, the Talibangelicals might chase OTHER parts of the coalition away. I’m not sure who, but it could happen.
Morzer
@Frankensteinbeck:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/05/07/ted-cruz-christians-shouldnt-be-required-to-do-business-with-gay-people/
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches towards
CalgaryIowa to be born?Ecks
@Baud: How dare you malign such incisive reasoning!
In a related note, Judge Randa should also protect me from the government’s attempts to force me to go to prison. Frankly, I shot my neighbour fair and square, one sovereign citizen to another, and it’s not my problem that he has chosen to be all dead over it now. I was merely exercising my God-given right of a fifth amendment solution to the problem of living next to an annoying person. Now the courts must reign in this vile government overreach; prison restricts my liberties, and they can’t do that because Constitution!
Paul in KY
@Morzer: I would like our candidate to run against him. Only problem might be that he would take Wisconsin & we need Wisconsin.
Paul in KY
@efgoldman: he was better at ‘governing’ than Reagan, GW Bush I and or course, GW Bush II.
Howard Beale IV
And just like that, the stay is quashed: