23.) No Degree at Marquette U.
Scott Walker left Marquette University thirty-four credits short of graduation. He since has used the failure to graduate as a badge of honor, pointing to prominent people, especially businessmen, who have been very successful without a college degree. It is unlikely, however, if millions of mothers and fathers would like to have a president who denigrates the value of a college degree.
Scott Walker has claimed that he left Marquette University only to take a job as a Red Cross fundraiser but John Nichols, a close watchdog of Walker, has found that Walker was spending much of his time gathering signatures to challenge an incumbent for a seat in the state legislature.
24.) Mixing Government and Political Work
Scott Walker was the Milwaukee County executive from 2002 to 2010. Part of Walker's duties was overseeing Operation Freedom, a charity that raised money for veterans and their families. Tim Russell, called the third most powerful person in Milwaukee County government, put in charge of Operation Freedom by Walker, was sentenced to two years in prison for embezzling $20,000 from Operation Freedom. Kevin Kavanaugh, a Walker appointee, was sentenced to two years in prison for embezzling $51,000 from the same charity.
The initial John Doe investigation centered on the discovery that members of Walker's county staff had routinely engaged in political activity on official time. Kelly Rindfleisch, Walker's deputy chief of staff, used a private email system while exchanging more than 1,000 messages with Walker's campaign staff. She was sentenced to six months in prison for working for a candidate for lieutenant governor while she was Walker's deputy chief of staff. Darlene Wink received one year of probation for mixing campaign and county work. Bill Gardner got two years of probation for laundering tens of thousands of dollars while working on Walker's first campaign for governor. Brian Piesick, a domestic partner of Russell, was fined and given community service for sending lewd messages to a 17-year-old boy. Piesick was listed for a time as the registrant for Walker's guv.website. Scott Walker, himself, used his campaign email to conduct county business.
Until the last few weeks, Scott Walker has insisted that he is not the John Doe listed as a target in an investigation of what went on during Walker's eight-year tenure as the Milwaukee County executive. If that was so, why did Walker set up a legal defense fund and hire a bevy of defense lawyer?
25.) Campaign Coordination with Donors
Francis Schwitz, the special prosecutor investigating Scott Walker's coordination with campaign donors, has maintained that under Wisconsin law, when a nonprofit group spends money on issue advocacy in coordination with a candidate's campaign committee, the nonprofit must report spending as a contribution to it or the candidate.
When Judge Frank Easterbrook, acting on behalf of the U.S, Court of Appeals for the Seventy District, sent back the Walker case to be resolved by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, he wrote: "If campaigns tell potential contributors to divert money to nominally independent groups that have agreed to do the campaign bidding... contribution limits become porous, and the requirement that politicians' campaign committees disclose the donors and amounts become useless."
Added to what Judge Easterbrook wrote, the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly said that government is entitled to regulate coordination between candidates' campaigns and purportedly independent groups.
That the Walker campaign was not following established law was encapsulated in a June 20, 2011 email to Walker from Kelly Rindfleisch, who was serving as coordinator of fundraising for Walker on behalf of the Wisconsin Club for Growth. "Stress that donations for WiCFG are not disclosed and can accept corporate donations without limits, and let them know that you can accept corporate donations and it is not reported."
Further confirmation on how the Walker campaign worked was revealed in a document dump, disclosing an September 7, 2011 email from Kate Donor, sent to Walker and top campaign staff. Kate Donor was a fundraising consultant to the Walker campaign. Donor wrote: "Take Koch's money." "Get on a plane to Vegas and sit down with Sheldon Adelson. Ask for $1 m now." "Corporations. Go heavy after them to give."
In the 2012 recall election, the Wisconsin Club for Growth contributed 49.1 million to Walker's campaign; also, it gave more than $2.5 million to Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, which gave $4.7 million to Walker.
26.) The Wisconsin Supreme Court Bails Walker Out
Here is what John Nichols has to say about how Governor Walker and his allies have manipulated the Wisconsin Supreme Court to achieve partisan political goals. "Walker's allies have poured money into election campaigns for the Wisconsin Supreme Court, where a conservative majority has steadily upheld the governor's most controversial moves -- including those weakening the political hand of the state's once-powerful labor unions. Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson, a stickler for judicial independence, refused to dance to Walker's tune, so his legislative allies crafted a constitutional amendment rewriting the rules for choosing the chief justice, his corporate allies funded a campaign to enact it; and Abrahamson was removed from her powerful office in April Two months later, when the court shut down an inquiry into alleged wrongdoing during the governor's recall election -- and, in so doing, effectively trashed the state's remaining campaign-finance laws -- Justice Abrahamson warned that the decision would usher in an era of 'anything goes' politics. That was just fine by Walker, who immediately moved to shut down the state agency that enforced election and ethics rules."
How did the Supreme Court shut down the investigation of Walker? It simply rewrote Wisconsin law. The then-existing law said "issue advocacy." The Supreme Court rewrote the law to read "express advocacy." In other words, as long as a group does not say "Vote for ___________" or "Vote against ___________," it can tout any and all of the preferred candidate's major policy issues. Justice Michael J. Gableman, who wrote the 4-2 decision, had been narrowly elected and probably would have lost if he had not received $2.75 million from the Wisconsin Club for Growth and the U.S.Chamber of Commerce. Given how crucial the WiCFG was to Governor Walker winning his recall election, Justice Gableman should have recused himself. Not content with shutting down the investigation, the court ordered all records of the investigation to be destroyed.
There is now real fear among campaign regulation advocates that the Wisconsin decision may be used to try to shut down all election campaign regulations across the nation. Strengthening these regulation should be an imperative action.
27.) Walker's War on State Agencies
Governor Walker has gutted the power of the elected state treasurer and the secretary of state; also, he has moved to shut down the state agency that enforced election and ethics rules. He has also waged a so far losing battle to strip the superintendent of public instruction of major powers. .
Governor Walker and his legislative comrades have so successfully gerrymandered the state that in the 2012 election for the State Assembly, Democratic candidates received 174,000 more votes that the Republican candidates, yet the GOP retained a huge 60-19 majority in the state chamber.
The latest campaign of Governor Walker is to do away with tenure in colleges and universities, and maybe even at the K-12 levels. Walker is following the lead of David Horowitz, who has enlisted students to take notes on their professors to try to reveal their efforts at indoctrinating students into liberal beliefs. Horowitz is implicitly saying that the more education you get, the more likely you are to be a liberal. This seems to be a case of leading from weakness, not strength.
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