Charlie Sykes Solicits For The Commission Of A Felony

The other day, we reproduced a column from the Shepherd Express in which they pointed out that Charlie Sykes committed slander against Senator Lena Taylor and how TMJ 620-AM should lose their broadcast license.

Friday morning, Sykes continued with his poor behavior, albeit along a different tangent.

He started out complaining about the recall and the fact that it is allowable for people to sign a petition more than once.  The two facts that he left out is that only one signature would be counted and that there is good cause for someone to feel the need to sign more than once.  With all of the right wing nut jobs trying to suppress people's rights by tearing up and defacing petitions, once would almost have to sign more than once to ensure one gets counted.

Of course, Sykes never condemned the felonious acts of the petition saboteurs, but would only lament that they are actually being held responsible for their behaviors.

Then Sykes correctly stated that the Government Accountability Board (GAB) will not be going through to ensure the validity of each signature. He said that makes Scott Walker and his campaign responsible to go through and verify each vote. He stated that this was wrong and should not be.

Unfortunately for Sykes, this was not the first time he pushed for this to happen. And thus I have already covered that topic:

When I saw them complaining that the GAB not certifying every signature, I'll admit that I was puzzled. I remembered writing last year how Maistelman and Associates got Paris Procopis, who was challenging Senator David Cullen, off the ballot by eliminating invalid signatures. At the same time, the law firm also successfully defended Todd Kolosso from James Sensenbrenner's attempt to have him thrown off that ballot.

I called Attorney Michael Maistelman, one of the state's leading election attorneys, to confirm my suspicion that this was another bogus complaint. Attorney Maistelman confirmed that it has always been the responsibility of the candidate and his or her campaign to challenge the signatures of their opponent, whether it is for a recall or even just for nomination papers to get on the ballot. He also told me that he has bumped a number of Republicans off of ballots by having invalid signatures stricken leaving his client's opponent with not enough to get on the ballot. He said that the Republicans have done that to a number of Democrats as well.

Maistelman also confirmed that it was always the campaign that paid for that legal work to be done. He added that Scott Walker's campaign would have much more funding than what would be needed to review and challenge the signatures of the recall.

So in other words, what Sykes is doing with his complaining is saying that the GAB should use tax payer dollars to fund the political work for Walker's campaign.  That would be, of course, classified as criminal solicitation, which in itself is a crime.

TMJ needs to start holding Sykes responsible or we will need to start holding them responsible as we take back our airwaves.

Patrick McIlheran: A Waste Of Tax Payers Dollars

Six months ago, Patrick McIlheran, champion of the tax payers and fighter of government waste, showed his true nature by leaving the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and going to suck at the government teat.  That is, of course, something he has spent years criticizing people for doing.

Bill Christofferson has looked into this, and even though we still don't know exactly what he is supposed to be doing, we do know he's getting paid extremely well for it, whatever it is:

What we do know is that McIlheran has landed in a pretty cushy job at taxpayer expense.

Legistorm, which tracks Congressional salaries, reports that McIlheran was paid $27,213.84 between the time he bellied up to the public trough on June 20 and Sept. 30. That works out to an annual salary of $93,300.

And, of course, there's a government health care plan (horrors!) and lots of other benefits, including both Social Security and a pension. The Congressional Budget Office says benefits add 26% to 50% on top of salaries, depending on age, salary, length of service, and retirement plan. So that's at least another $25,000 from the taxpayers, and probably quite a bit more. But at least he doesn't have to join a union. That must be a relief for a generally anti-government, anti-union, anti-worker, bootstraps kind of guy.

Whooey! $93,000 salary is a lot of money, especially for a guy who doesn't work full time and for a job no one knows what he supposed to be doing.

Well, there is one thing we do know he does do. He sure tweets up a storm about things that have nothing to do with his supposed job.  The funny thing is he never seems to be doing it during the evening, when his off of work.

I'm sure that Citizens for Responsible Government, Badger Blogger and the rest of the usual "watchdogs" will be on this apparent waste of tax payer money in no time.  Then again, maybe not. That would require integrity.

Sykes' Slandering Should Cost TMJ Their License

Sometimes one comes across an article so good, you can't really improve on it. This week's Expresso in the Shepherd Express is one of those. With permission, here it is:

620 WTMJ doesn't own the airwaves.

It rents a frequency from the public, which owns the airwaves.

WTMJ's broadcast license is a privilege, not a right.

That's why it's so shocking that WTMJ's star talker, Charlie Sykes, continues to use the public airwaves to smear those who disagree with him and profit from the potential recall of Gov. Scott Walker.

Sykes, along with Brian Sikma of conservative phony “watchdog” group Media Trackers, pushed a false story about Sen. Lena Taylor's alleged role in aiding a felon to vote in the April election.

Sykes and Sikma didn't just allege it. They claimed the Taylor-as-accessory-to-a-crime story was true and ran with it.

Other Journal Communications properties followed suit. Four of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's ace reporters fleshed out the story, as did WTMJ-TV's Charles Benson.

The problem is that the story was false. The felon in question was able to vote in the spring election, as Dan Bice, who worked on the original Journal Sentinel story, finally reported this weekend.

Taylor is demanding an apology, and she should get one.

But Sykes and Sikma aren't backing down.

In fact, they're digging in.

Although Sykes and Sikma attempt to pose as credible pundits just looking out for the little guy, they are anything but credible. Their job is to hype stories, no matter how false, to inflame their audience. That gets ratings and attention in other media outlets. It also promotes their political agenda.

Sikma is a conservative agitator who uses social media to demonize Democrats. Media Trackers is an offshoot of the national tea party group American Majority, which gets some of its funding from the uber-conservative Bradley Foundation.

Many just argue that Sykes is hopelessly morally corrupt. Sykes and his wife are both bought and paid for by the Bradley Foundation, which has propped up Scott Walker's career through thick and thin. The head of the Bradley Foundation, extreme right-winger Michael Grebe, chaired Walker's campaign. Sykes doesn't care if his story about Sen. Taylor is incorrect because it feeds into the biases of his listenership, keeps listeners tuning in and drives traffic to his website, where he provides links to pro-Walker, pro-Charlie Sykes merchandise. We kid you not. Sykes is selling T-shirts, hoodies and other swag with the slogan “Unite to Reward Scott Walker: Charlie Sykes Radio Show. 8:30-Noon—620 WTMJ.”

If spreading outrageous lies and “uniting” with a political candidate for profit isn't enough of a reason to terminate WTMJ's license to broadcast on the publicly owned airwaves, then what is?

OK, there are two things to add after all.

One, not only was Grebe Walker's chair during the campaign, he is also pulling the strings on Walker's recall campaign as well. He's the one behind those false advertisements that have been bombarding our TVs for weeks already.

Secondly, if you want to help reclaim our airwaves, you can learn how here.

Wisconsin's Best Comedy Duo

In the annuls of comedy history, certain duos will always be remembered as the greats: Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, Desi and Lucy.

Now, in Wisconsin, we have another two greats teaming up

One half of the new comedy duo is long-time funny man, Charlie "I got nothing" Sykes.

Joining him, fresh from his gig with Media matters, is Brian Sikma.  Sikma of course is the guy behind such classics, "Hey, those women can't sign - they're black!" and "Adultery Is OK, If You Time It Right."

Their first routine is "Did Lena Taylor Aid A Felon To Vote."  In this skit, they accuse State Senator Lena Taylor of aiding a known convict in voting illegally.  The made a stink of it for a whole week, building up for the punch line.

But it was Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Dan Bice who delivered the punch line: He was eligible to vote because he was no longer on papers.

You see, Sikma and Sykes, who often call Media Trackers as a reliable news source, didn't know enough to contact the Sheriff's Office to get the information:

Sikma said his group went through Collins' county court records but failed to check with the sheriff's office. Sikma said he was unaware that Clarke's shop would provide information regarding the release dates of inmates.

When asked if he would apologize, Sikma said he would not, saying that he stood by his false information. Classy.

I'm not expecting Sykes to stand up and be a man about it either.

So, now that Sikma and Sykes have been caught slandering and libeling Sen. Taylor for a week, which is only the latest in a long string of lies told by both of them, I bet you're wondering where the comedy comes in.

Simple.

No one should ever take these two clowns seriously.

Media Tracker Official Condones Adultery?

While doing some research for the previous post, something of interest caught my eye.

Brian Sikma

Brian Sikma, Communications Director for the troll blog, Media Trackers, wrote a post last summer trying to spin away the loss the Republicans suffered in the first round of recalls. In said post, there was the following paragraph(emphasis mine):

Even though Democrats are touting their ability to knock off two incumbent state senators as a major success in the face of failed GOP attempts to go after three Democratic senators, Democratic gains are shallow. Every incumbent senator who faced a recall challenge (regardless of party) survived except when a massive personal scandal or political earthquake hit. Sen. Randy Hopper’s ill-timed affair with a staffer exploded early in the recall cycle and irreparably damaged him politically. Sen. Dan Kapanke’s district had for years been trending Democrat, and his personal connection to voters was not enough to outweigh the long-developing party shift that finally flipped the seat’s party affiliation.

Ill-timed?!

Perhaps Sikma would like to explain when he thinks it would be better timing for a married man to carry on an adulterous affair with someone. And by the way, his mistress was a lobbyist, not a staffer.  There's a distinct difference, not that either would make it OK, regardless of the timing.

Perhaps if Sikma was from Wisconsin, he might have known that.

But being a native of Indiana, he might have different values than ours.

Sikma was so confident in this stance that he also cross-posted the same thing at another one of his sites, the misnamed "Reclaiming Our Heritage."

Perhaps it's the fact that Sikma is OK with adultery, as long as it's well-timed, that makes Charlie Sykes so fond of him.

Media Trackers: Professional Trolls

It is quickly becoming common knowledge that the glorified right wing blog called "Media Trackers" is nothing more than a front group for the right-wing well-moneyed special interests groups which does little than smear Democrats and progressive causes by spewing their hateful propaganda.

To further this clarification of who they are, it is becoming quickly evident that instead of reporters or even bloggers, the crew at Media Trackers are nothing more than professional trolls.

In a recent email promoting their site, they included this libelous passage:

You can file this under the heading of "Tolerant Left." Graeme Zielinski refused to respond to a Media Trackers' inquiry this week, and took the chance to call yours truly a Nazi, racist, etc. His bullying apparently doesn't stop with conservatives. He's bullied reporters in the past, and most recently he went after a Wisconsin Public Radio show host who actually went so far as to have a conservative on the show. Kudos to the host for not backing down.

The link in that paragraph leads to a libelous attack on Graeme Zielinski, who they absolutely can't stand since he is not intimidated by their bullying. It is also noteworthy that while they accuse Zielinski of calling the head of Media Trackers, Brian Sikma, a Nazi, they don't offer one scrap of evidence of this. Then again, that goes with their tendency to just make things up.

The troll post that they link to is full of funny stuff though.

At the beginning, they mewl about how Sikma was "accosted" by Scot Ross of One Wisconsin Now on whether Sikma was even a resident of the state. They were probably shaken by this since Sikma is a native of Indiana.

While the rest of the post is just a continuation of their personal attacks on Zielinski, it does raise an interesting thought.

With their troll-like writings, their pseudo-intellectualism and their immaturity, it does give one cause to believe that they might be the source behind the malicious parody twitter account made to mock Zielinski.  The tone and even the words are too similar to be ignored. The parody tweets also closely follow the issues that Media Trackers is trying to push.  Unfortunately for them, the creators of this account have a very poor understanding of what parody means and an even worse ability to actually do it.

Is it any wonder that the only people that give them any credence at all are Charlie Sykes and the more disreputable right wing bloggers?

Charlie Sykes, Mr. Compassion

Charlie Sykes, who I understand is still on the radio (but not mine), is shamelessly shilling for his new book, "A Nation of Moochers" (not to be confused with A Nation of Victims," his earlier "work").
Here's a post he found at the right-wing Heritage Foundation website and shared with his public, which gets right to the heart of the matter.
The trouble with poor people, Sykes says, is that they are trying to live in the 21st Century.
Besides that, they don't dress nicely and are depressing to be around.
From Sykes "Nation of Moochers" Facebook page:

One of the problems with poverty is that the poor have so much stuff...

80 percent of poor households have air conditioning. In 1970, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.

92 percent of poor households have a microwave.

Nearly three-fourths have a car or truck, and 31 percent have two or more cars or trucks.

Nearly two-thirds have cable or satellite TV.

Two-thirds have at least one DVD player, and 70 percent have a VCR.

Half have a personal computer, and one in seven have two or more computers.  

 More than half of poor families with children have a video game system, such as an Xbox or PlayStation.

43 percent have Internet access. [Can you imagine?  That's more than two out of five who can get on the Internet!  Outrageous! -- Xoff]One-third have a wide-screen plasma or LCD TV. One-fourth have a digital video recorder system, such as a TiVo.

Just call him Mr. Compassion.

Even the Heritage Foundation is kinder:

The fact that the average poor household has many modern conveniences and experiences no substantial hardships does not mean that no families face hardships. As noted, the overwhelming majority of the poor are well housed and not overcrowded, but one in 25 will become temporarily homeless during the year. While most of the poor have a sufficient and fairly steady supply of food, one in five poor adults will experience temporary food shortages and hunger at some point in a year.

The poor man who has lost his home or suffers intermittent hunger will find no consolation in the fact that his condition occurs infrequently in American society. His hardships are real and must be an important concern for policymakers.

Sykes would certainly be welcome to visit our food pantry for Milwaukee's homeless and low income veterans any Tuesday morning, and ask the people moochers there how many cars, TVs, and computers they own.
Cross-posted at Uppity Wisconsin.

Not Her Day Time Gig

Today's TMJ 4 did a segment this morning at 8:45 on the "Kristi" ad that is being run lately by the Walker campaign.

In it, a teacher named Kristi talks about how she thoughtfully arrived at the conclusion that the recall campaign against Walker is wrong.

The segment that 4 ran shows the ad and then talks about the Facebook battle over the ad, leading off with a recall supporter writing how she wanted to "punch" Kristi.

No where in the piece did they mention that Kristi, is a choice teacher (and by choice, I don't mean elite), and that she is a Republican activist.

On it's own this is an effective ad. And quite it is possible that the people who put together this piece at 4 might have missed this information.

They will be running it again at 9:45 am this morning and hopefully some mention will be made. It would be took bad if they run it as is.

Why? This is yet another example of how the Walker campaign can't handle the truth, because they dole it out in pieces -- those pieces that suit their cause.

It was the case when Walker failed to mention that he would go after collective bargain, and oops, he's doing it again with the "Kristi" ad.

It's up to 4 to take the ball and run with it.

UPDATE -- TMJ 4 did not alter the piece at 9:45am. I know that this piece was no doubt produced the night before, but there was a comment that could have been made when the camera went back to Tom Murray that Kristi is a private school teacher has been pointed out, but then didn't give him copy to that effect.

If anything, why didn't correspondent who did the original piece when she communicated with Kristi over Facebook ask the teacher where she taught. The reporter could have kept the info as background, but at least she would have been able to point out the kind of school where Kristi taught.

Something That Charlie Sykes, Media Trackers, Wisconsin Reporter, WPRI and McIver Institute Should Familiarize Themselves With

The Tort of "False Light."

Read it, learn it, stop doing it.

Sykes' Fraudulent Fraud

Whoo boy! Charlie Sykes was all pumped up on Monday!  He claimed that he found the undeniable, unequivacable proof that the Democrats and Scott Walker recall groups were unethical, fraudulent, minor-bribing degenerates.

Only thing is his proof of fraud was fraudulent.

And from Illy-T, who's been covering the exposed scandal of a non-scandal all day long (in reverse order)

• Sykes' "fraudulent" petitioners
• Sykes the ex post facto equivocator
• More fraud accusations

And from the Brawler: Sykes - Race Baiter

And if you're wondering why Sykes would let his already tarnished reputation become further begrimed, well, he's already done more self-inflicted damage with absolutely no evidence.

They're Not Even Trying Anymore

The incestuous relation between right wing politicians and right wing money tanks has been shown time and time again.  But now they're not even trying to be subtle about it any more.

Charlie Sykes, who is owned paid by the Bradley Foundation, an extremist bunch of right wingers known for publishing the racist "The Bell Curve," to be the "editor" of WPRI (Worms Promoting Republican Ideology) sat down to interview David "Chokehold" Prosser.  One line says it all (emphasis mine):

Because that incident was still under investigation by the state Judicial Commission at the time of this interview, we did not address that issue in what was otherwise a wide-ranging discussion on the campaign and the state’s high court. I sat down with Justice Prosser in mid-October at the offices of the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation in downtown Milwaukee. ...

Keep in mind these things:

• The Bradley Foundation gave a ton of money to Prosser's campaign
• The Bradley Foundation gives a ton of money to WPRI
• Sykes' current (third) wife works as the Bradley Foundation's Director of Communication

To sum it up, the Bradley Foundation is merely using Sykes as a puppet to produce their propaganda to protect and promote the politicians they have purchased.

This is simply how corrupt the right wing has become.

Forward To The Past!

Charlie Sykes, faithful water carrier for Scott Walker, gives free advertising to the Walker campaign by repeating their spin on the recently released results of a survey done by DPI. They compare it to the report from WEAC in 2004.

First, you have look past the fact that they are comparing apples to oranges by using reports from two wholly different agencies.

But Walker is saying that things are just as good or better than they were seven years ago, which only goes to confirm one of the recallers major complaints, he is making Wisconsin a regressive state by trying to take us back in time when things weren't as good as they have been in more recent years.

Of course, compared to last year, things are much, much worse.  Sadly, if Walker is not recalled, things will be even uglier next year when his "tools" are all used up.

Boots and Fables

Ol' Boots Robinson promises to play hardball with any recall petitioners he sees, argue with them till he's blue in the face, record, video and photograph them, boycott their businesses, publicize their names, and do whatever he can to make their lives miserable.

He's from Texas, you know, and that's what they do to liberals down there. Just ask Rick Perry what he'd do if Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernake showed up there.

Maybe United Wisconsin should make sure it has the Robinsons' address and send a steady stream of people. We can start a pool on how long before he blows his cork, goes apoplectic and foams at the mouth. And we could record, video and photograph it.

But that would be wrong

Mountains Out Of Molehills and Molehills Out Of Mountans

Charlie Sykes touts another "breaking story" from the crack reporters propagandists at Media Trackers and at the MacGuyver Institute.  This time the story has to deal with some knucklehead who made a stupid off-the-cuff comment on Facebook about killing Scott Walker.

Keep in mind that there is no specific plan on how the alleged assassin-wannabe would go about the deed, strengthening the point that it was more of a vent than an actual threat.

Now compare that to the story at Mother Jones, where a group of thugs have actual plans on how they are going to try to tamper the recall effort by committing fraud in misrepresenting themselves and then destroying the ballots they have signed.

So how serious is this threat?  The article explains:

Michael Maistelman, a Wisconsin attorney and election law expert who reviewed screenshots of the comments, says the postings could raise serious legal issues if the plan is to tamper with official recall petitions. "If a person fraudulently solicits recall petitions and then destroys those petitions, they will probably go to jail," Maistelman says. "The law is very clear on this."

[UDPATE]: Reid Magney, a spokesman from Wisconsin's Government Accountability Board, says destroying or defacing an official recall petition would violate state law. (Here's the relevant statute.) Such a violation, he adds, would be a class I felony in Wisconsin, which carries a maximum fine of $10,000 and up to three-and-a-half years in jail.

Somehow, I don't think it pays to wait for Media Trackers or MacGuyver to cover this story. They simply don't deal with reality.

Cross posted at Cog Dis.

Media Trackers Exposes Their Own Flopsweat

Media Trackers, like the MacGuyver Institute and WPRI, are sham groups that serve no purpose than to be the propagandists for the conservatives and for Corporate America.  They get their funding from the likes of the Koch brothers and the Bradley Foundation.

But they do serve one useful purpose.  They are a gauge of sorts to see how nervous the conservatives are at any given time.  The more desperate the story, the more desperate or their masters.

Judging from a recent story from Media Trackers, they must be very nervous as the movement in which the people of Wisconsin rise up and reclaim their state by recalling Scott Walker begins.

This propagandist group, represented by one Collin Roth, if that's even his real name, claims they have "exposed" a cabal of lefty politicians and community leaders who are poised to bring Walker down by following the rigged rules the Republicans have rammed through in an effort to shred the Constitution and stop the people from exercising their rights.

Their proof of this cabal? The alleged members received an email!

Obviously, because they received an email, they must be in cahoots.

But this gave the researchers here an idea.  Why not find out who these people at Media Trackers are by seeing what emails they might be receiving.

Seeing what kind of group Media Trackers is, our crack research team concluded that anything dealing with them closely resembles spam, since that is what they produce.  Hence, they further concluded that the best way to see who Media Trackers is was to check the spam files.

Preliminary reports show that it is possible the members of Media Trackers are friends with various Nigerian princes and widows and English attorneys who are involved in a money laundering scheme.  It is also believed, judging by the likely emails that they receive, they are looking for high-paying easy work, cute girls that want to chat, and suffer from erectile dysfunction.

And now you know and knowing is half the battle.