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Just when you thought the Wisconsin “John Doe” fiasco couldn’t get any worse

Just when you thought the Wisconsin “John Doe” fiasco couldn’t get any worse

Newly obtained emails show gov’t agency calling voters “sheeple” and expose targeting of Scott Walker.

The Wisconsin “John Doe” investigations of conservatives has ended in fiasco … for prosecutors.

John Doe No. 1, clearly aimed at Scott Walker, focused on Walker’s time as Milwaukee County Executive. Despite enourmous efforts led by Democratic prosecutor John Chisholm, no evidence of wrongdoing by Walker was found.

John Doe No. 2, focused on alleged illegal coordination between conservative activists and the Walker campaign during the 2011 Recall Election, was far more notorious. Prosecutors, again led by Chislhom, used SWAT-like raids on homes, seized electronics and electronic records, and pretty much terrorized almost the entire conservative activist community in Wisconsin. Prosecutors denied that Walker was the target, something belied by the intimidation of all those who surrounded him.

John Doe No. 2 ended with a stinging rebuke to prosecutors by the Wisconsin Supreme Court:

¶133 Our lengthy discussion of these three cases can be distilled into a few simple, but important, points. It is utterly clear that the special prosecutor has employed theories of law that do not exist in order to investigate citizens who were wholly innocent of any wrongdoing. In other words, the special prosecutor was the instigator of a “perfect storm” of wrongs that was visited upon the innocent Unnamed Movants and those who dared to associate with them. It is fortunate, indeed, for every other citizen of this great State who is interested in the protection of fundamental liberties that the special prosecutor chose as his targets innocent citizens who had both the will and the means to fight the unlimited resources of an unjust prosecution. Further, these brave individuals played a crucial role in presenting this court with an opportunity to re-endorse its commitment to upholding the fundamental right of each and every citizen to engage in lawful political activity and to do so free from the fear of the tyrannical retribution of arbitrary or capricious governmental prosecution. Let one point be clear: our conclusion today ends this unconstitutional John Doe investigation.

In a sad epilogue, whistleblower Lutz, featured in the video above, committed suicide.

After the Wisconsin Supreme Court decision, it seemed that the revelations of impropriety would be at an end.

Not so.

In what legitimately could be called a bombshell, emails have been released showing how employees of the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board (GAB) (which regulated elections) denigrated Wisconsin voters as “Sheeple” and accused a spokesman of lying to the public about whether Walker was the target.

M.D. Kittle, who has been the leader in reporting on John Doe at Wisconsin Watchdog, reports, Explosive email exposes GAB attorney’s partisan motives in John Doe probe:

In January, testifying before the Legislature, Government Accountability Board director Kevin Kennedy called his agency a “Wisconsin success story.”

“The Legislature should be proud of the Board, not only for its nonpartisan nature, but for its accomplishments and performance over the first seven years existence,” Kennedy said in defending the campaign finance, elections, and ethics regulator against a growing list of critics concerned that the agency was alarmingly partisan and less than accountable.

Court-sealed GAB emails reviewed by the Wall Street Journal and one obtained by Wisconsin Watchdog seem to expose the regulator as hyper-partisan, a rogue agency leading a politically-charged campaign finance probe into Gov. Scott Walker and dozens of conservative organizations.

The referenced Wall Street Journal article reported,

In an email to Mr. Schmitz on Nov. 27, 2013, GAB staff counsel Shane Falk encouraged the special prosecutor to keep up the good work and “stay strong” in his pursuit of conservative nonprofit groups and allies of Mr. Walker. “Remember, in brief, this was a bastardization of politics and our state is being run by corporations and billionaires,” Mr. Falk wrote. “That isn’t democracy to say the least, but due to how they do this dark money, the populace never gets to know.”

“The cynic in me says the sheeple would still follow the propaganda even if they knew,” Mr. Falk continued, “but at least it would all be out there so that the influences on our politicians is clearly known.” By “the sheeple” Mr. Falk means Wisconsin voters.

In June 2014, Mr. Schmitz’s attorney, Randall Crocker, issued a statement saying that Governor Walker was not a target of the investigation into campaign finance coordination. “You just lied to the press,” Mr. Falk wrote in an email to Mr. Schmitz, copying Mr. Kennedy, others at the GAB and Milwaukee DA John Chisholm. “See the attached ‘target’ sheets from our search warrant and subpoena meeting. I see ‘SW’ right up there near the top on Page 1. Is there someone else that has those initials?”

The Doe team was also apparently concerned that exonerating Mr. Walker as a target might have an effect on the election or damage the chances of 2014 Democratic nominee for Governor Mary Burke. “If you didn’t want this to have an effect on the election, better check Burke’s new ad,” Mr. Falk continued, “Now you will be calling her a liar. This is a no win.”

The email in question is here.  The video ad by Walker’s Democratic opponent in 2014, Mary Burke, appears to have been taken down at YouTube, but we reported on it at the time.

Unlawful police raids. Out of control Democratic prosecutors. Lying government “accountability” board employees.

All for the purpose of getting Scott Walker, and covering the trail.

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Comments

Worse? I don’t know, Prof. Having confirmation of what we knew deductively motivated these thugs is sweet, but not really worse.

They were state employees totally in the thrall of Collectivist lies, and acting out on what they’d swallowed.

Just exactly like the IRS and others. As I’ve noted before, these totalitarians don’t need express orders. They all know the meme, and will act with all their power to execute the war on liberty.

    casualobserver in reply to Ragspierre. | August 28, 2015 at 12:39 pm

    It’s worse to me because it seems like they didn’t feel any – or enough – concern about what they were doing to use the right amount of caution. It may sound crazy, but you kind of expect a better effort to be clandestine. That they weren’t, either shows how deluded they are about how their campaign was “rightful” and/or legal or it shows they thought they had sufficient “protection” in same sense the mob behave when around other mob members and communicating freely.

      Ragspierre in reply to casualobserver. | August 28, 2015 at 12:58 pm

      Ah, you raise an EXCELLENT point. The Collective…in their delusional bubble…BELIEVE down deep that their opposition is evil, and that anything they do to stop evil is perfectly fine.

      For many of them, this is WHY they are in government in the first place. This is WHY so many of them are drawn to government jobs, and WHY getting rid of them is so essential to true reform. Hans von Spakovsky wrote an excellent essay on this years ago.

Why are there never repercussions for this sort of behavior? Weren’t laws broken? These people should be removed from public office, fined, thrown in jail and have their public pensions taken away from them. Then, and only then, will this sort of behavior stop. Quite frankly, I’m surprised nobody has beaten the living shit out of these scum.

What we need to do is to convince these folks that Bernie should be the next POTUS, so they’ll focus their attention on Hillary and the real scandals surrounding her instead of the imaginary ones they’ve been chasing.

That the depths and degree of this disgrace that was ‘only’ for a gubernatorial race and follow-up are still being exposed in one state gives you an idea of what to expect a year from now. It’s probably impossible to overestimate the depths these people will sink then. CA, IL, NY, MO, GA, FL, PA, and who knows how many others will certainly try and may very well steal the election if it appears closely contested. These sorts of efforts do not occur spontaneously overnight; they are carefully thought out and planned well in advance. I wish I were more confident Republicans were up to the challenge.

    JackRussellTerrierist in reply to Owego. | August 30, 2015 at 7:07 pm

    The ‘pubs often have a decent ground game for getting out the vote, but they suck like a cyclone when it comes to anticipating ‘rat voter fraud.

I have not been following this closely, so I apologize if this has been asked and answered:

Have any of the targets filed “prosecutorial misconduct” or “abuse of process” lawsuits yet for damages (both physical to property and defamation to reputation) yet?

With the steady drip-drip-drip of information, and the VERY obvious statements of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, it looks more and more like a slam-dunk case. The relevant language is here:

It is utterly clear that the special prosecutor has employed theories of law that do not exist in order to investigate citizens who were wholly innocent of any wrongdoing. In other words, the special prosecutor was the instigator of a “perfect storm” of wrongs that was visited upon the innocent Unnamed Movants and those who dared to associate with them. … Let one point be clear: our conclusion today ends this unconstitutional John Doe investigation.

If that is not an invitation by the Wisconsin Supremes to a civil suit for violation of the investigated parties rights, I don’t know what would be.

    Ragspierre in reply to Chuck Skinner. | August 28, 2015 at 1:00 pm

    Yep. I totally agree. They essentially opened the door and invited the fun to begin!

    I really expect that the suits are being drafted as we speak.

    Observer in reply to Chuck Skinner. | August 28, 2015 at 1:13 pm

    The only problem I had with this ruling is that the court didn’t include a sentence saying that it was immediately referring the matter to the Wisconsin State Bar for disciplinary actions against all the offending attorneys.

      platypus in reply to Observer. | August 28, 2015 at 4:29 pm

      If the court had done that, it likely would have been put on hold at the Bar Association until all possible civil actions were concluded. If not, then any related civil action would have sought a stay pending resolution of the Bar action. In any event, questions of res judicata and estoppel (or possibly jurisdiction) would have complicated the civil suits.

      It’s best the way it is.

    Secondary question: It has now been six weeks since the judge handed down the decision requiring the prosecution to return all items seized. Has this been done, and if not, will the prosecution face any consequences?

    I suspect No, and No.

Are the Milwaukee or Madison papers going to cover this?

Maybe this ought to be a RICO case.

It’s a prime example of having the Chicago thug machine spill over the border and connect with the federal stazi.

If you’re not from Wisconsin it can be rather difficult to grasp the extent to which the Democrats absolutely OWNED this state. It’s embarrassing, really. They still own Milwaukee and Madison from top to bottom and inside out. Media outlets in both cities have such an absolutely symbiotic relationship with the Dems that you sometimes have to wonder if you’re not the one living the altered reality. The bulk of Wisconsin’s judicial system drinks the same flavor Kool-Aid as that served in the Milwaukee DA’s office, so there’ll be no help there. Same with the sullen, butt-chafed career bureaucrats just waiting out Walker’s tenure as governor. It will take a Republican appointed U.S. Attorney to even get a criminal investigation discussed, let alone started, which is at best still two years out.

    Spiny Norman in reply to Merlin. | August 28, 2015 at 5:35 pm

    If you’re not from Wisconsin it can be rather difficult to grasp the extent to which the Democrats absolutely OWNED this state.

    I live in California. Believe me, I know.

    The Democratic Party here has managed to gerrymander themselves what sure looks like a permanent super-majority.

      platypus in reply to Spiny Norman. | August 28, 2015 at 5:53 pm

      There is a lawsuit going to eventually be in the US Supreme Court on whether the constitution equal representation should be limited to voters rather than the population. If the end result is that equal means voters only, then all hell is going to break loose. But it will be a good breaking loose.

Consider the brazen hypocrisy and contempt for the law of this Lois Lerner clone: “GAB staff counsel Shane Falk … “Remember, in brief, this was a bastardization of politics and our state is being run by corporations and billionaires,” Mr. Falk wrote. “That isn’t democracy to say the least, but due to how they do this dark money, the populace never gets to know.”

And, now consider the shameless hubris of this Hillary Clinton-Elizabeth Warren Progressive: “The cynic in me says the sheeple would still follow the propaganda even if they knew,” Mr. Falk continued, “but at least it would all be out there so that the influences on our politicians is clearly known.” By “the sheeple” Mr. Falk means Wisconsin voters.

Now for some fresh air…

“The welfare state is not really about the welfare of the masses. It is about the egos of the elites.”
Thomas Sowell

“In an email to Mr. Schmitz on Nov. 27, 2013, GAB staff counsel Shane Falk encouraged the special prosecutor to keep up the good work and “stay strong” in his pursuit of conservative nonprofit groups and allies of Mr. Walker. “Remember, in brief, this was a bastardization of politics and our state is being run by corporations and billionaires,” Mr. Falk wrote. “That isn’t democracy to say the least, but due to how they do this dark money, the populace never gets to know.”

“The cynic in me says the sheeple would still follow the propaganda even if they knew,” Mr. Falk continued, “but at least it would all be out there so that the influences on our politicians is clearly known.” By “the sheeple” Mr. Falk means Wisconsin voters.
——————-

What we have here, folks, is another fascinating glimpse into the underlying motivating psychology and mindset of Leftist apparatchik-pols/bureaucrats. That singular melange of sanctimony, arrogance, paternalism, self-perceived intellectual and moral superiority, smug contempt for the proleteriat (and, anyone who holds viewpoints at variance with Leftist orthodoxies), etc., all invoked to justify illegal, thuggish, infantile intimidation tactics and deceitful machinations that would make Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot proud. There is always a self-professed “benovolent” intent behind Leftists’ statist schemes.

When will Prosecuter persecuter John Chisholm be hand cuffed and marched off to jail.

GAB boss Kevin Kennedy is a bosom buddy of the IRS’s Lois Lerner. Connect the dots.