If That's What It Takes

Now we know how Paddy Mac analyzes elections, courtesy of Charlie.

McIlheran polishes the turd.

Those Poor, Poor Exburbanites

McIlheran bewails the fate of the poor, genteel folks in western Waukesha County. He warns against doom and gloom that would surely befall them if the state were to pass the Great Lakes Compact.

Unfortunately, the majority of state senators don't see it the same way. Add to this that Waukesha Mayor Larry Nelson also supports the compact.

Making McIlheran's misery complete, the Brawler has already noticed this:

What McIlheran omits, of course, is that the mayor of Waukesha supports the Compact -- and is catching hell from County Republicans about it.

You'd think that'd be worth mentioning. But it undermines McIlheran's argument so it's just cast aside.

You can read the Brawler's whole post here.

Defending the American Nightmare

Today is the big day for the AFP and their misnamed Defending the American Dream Summit.

On their list of guest speakers is Vicki McKenna, aka the other McBride. They are also going to have McIlheran and Fred Dooley of the also misnamed Real Debate Wisconsin.

To spare you the pain of having to read their self-acclaiming posts that they are sure to be writing, Whallah! saves you the trouble by hiring two actors to recreate their contribution to this event:



Unfortunately, we cannot tell which actor is portraying which character, as they are somewhat interchangeable.

Also on the list of guest speakers is the local right wing media's darling law enforcement official David Clarke. I kind of wish I saw his appearance, especially in light of his frugal use of taxpayer's money:

Sheriff Clarke wants to force his deputies to make their legal signatures legible, and anyone who they think is not legible is being referred to internal affairs. This is not a choice being given to the Captain’s, they have been ordered to find/start 5 cases every week.

For other insightful looks at their little shindig, I would refer the gentle reader to my piece on folkbum's as well as the work of the Motley Cow.

And I would be remiss if I did not point out how the Chief explains why they were still looking for attendees as recently as yesterday, or the lackluster of one of their other star speakers.

H/T to Watchdog Milwaukee for the Clarke piece.

Why Are They Leaving Wisconsin?

A recurring theme for our favorite MSJ columnist/blogger/squawker is that there is a brain drain going on in Wisconsin. McIlheran keeps stating that this is because of the poor economic incentives, the high taxes, or some such nonsense.

Now, let's re-enter the world of reality. Bruce Murphy, of Milwaukee Magazine, has a column highlighting the homophobic tendencies of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in the way they chose to cover the passing of Governor Lee Sherman Dreyfus. MSJ was the only paper in the entire state not to mention that Governor Dreyfus did a lot to promote gay rights.

This story is an interesting read in itself. However, in the comments thread, we see two people who respond to this story, and coincidently steal some of McIlheran's thunder:

>> posted by Jay on 1/15/2008 12:11:22 PM

Hmmm. A homophobic paper in a homophobic city in a homophobic state. Hard to imagine. WI and MKE used to be able to call themselves progressive. Now we're just another embarrassing hate-state opposed to personal freedom. Count me as one of the MANY young, educated people here who are looking to leave, and leave this place to all the biggots.

Good riddance Milwaukee.

>> posted by Jake on 1/15/2008 2:18:27 PM

Hate to echo the pessimism, but I agree with Jay. I grew up here and, needless to say, Milwaukee ain't what it used to be. I'm outta here, too.

On a sidenote, a third commenter, and a friend of Whallah!'s, adds something that calls for further investigation:

>> posted by Michael Horne on 1/15/2008 2:59:56 PM

I am the only person who wrote regularly for the Sentinel who was openly gay, and I never found another from the Journal or the merged papers. I've been gone from there over 15 years and have yet to see another gay writer on the paper. Also note that now that Dr. Terry Boughner is dead, the paper has no go-to source on gay issues. They'd call on him 100 per cent of the time. Two of the largest gay sporting events in the United States -- one bowling, the other softball -- have taken place in this city for decades without a mention in the paper.
Michael Horne
milwaukeeworld com
P.S. You're pointing your finger in the right direction.

It's The Economy, Stupid!

Jay Bullock (yes, I'm done with that kingly talk--for now) points out that the economy is not as rosy as the local right wing media squawk brigade would have us think it is.

Jay refers to an article in this morning's paper that tells of how the financial aid office of Milwaukee County is being overwhelmed with a jump of people applying for assistance. He then continues:

... However, let's all keep this in mind the next time McIlheran wanders through to tell us how fantastic the economy is. You can also remind him of the increasing Milwaukee foreclosure rate (mirroring national trends) and the skyrocketing consumer bankruptcy rates we've seen in the last year.

Jay also points out that there is plenty of blame to go around for the dismal financial events here in Milwaukee (emphasis mine):

There's lots of blame to go around for this--Republican legislators targeting Milwaukee County, a county executive unwilling to stand up to those legislators or meet the needs of his residents, a federal government pursuing welfare-for-the-rich strategies....

The highlighted part stood out to me. It seemed that I had seen something like that earlier, and in more than one place.

Of course, McIlheran, along with his good buddy, Sykes, will be leading the effort to think that the local economy is booming and Walker is doing a great job, but we know better than that. Don't we?

Leading By Example

Forsooth, a good king leads his people not with an iron fist, but by example. Verily, the day previous, I had posted on an article by one of the Knights that say Squawk, pointing out the falsehoods with which he was trying to beguile the good people of Milwaukee.

Truly, I must have set a good example for my fellow knights. For this day, we fine that others have taken up arms in defense of the good people of Milwaukee.

Sir Paul the Wise and Mustachioed points out that WMC needs to be muzzled, and prevented from doing more sabotage to the business community in Wisconsin.

We also find that Brew City Brawler, the Arch (put up your)Duke(s) of Deliberateness points out that McIlheran fails to point out that one of the anonymous critics that McIlheran refers to is none other than the National Catholic Reporter newspaper.

And Yet Another Fan

McIlheran put up a quick post yesterday, announcing he would be on Sykes' show. Apparently someone else also caught the show, and commented on McIlheran's performance:

mdh

So,what will your job be? To parrot everything Charlie says? To get him coffee from the Green Room?

Why is is every political hack thinks their career is validated by appearing on television?

Tomorrows show: "Nod Yes To Anything Charlie Says" and get invited back next week.

"Squawk, you're right again, Mr. Sykes. Squawk".

And for the record, mdh are not my intitials.

Welcome to their world of waterboarding

Welcome to the bizarre world of Paddy Mac and his admirer Jessica Mac, in which waterboarding is something you might do at Tommy Bartlett's place in the Dells:

McBride says this is Patrick McIlheran, resident Journal Sentinel warmonger, "at his best." McIlheran, she says, "skewers the left on waterboarding" when he writes:

The usual retort is, “Would you want it done to you?” Well, no. Then again, I wouldn’t want to be locked up in jail at all, nor subjected to the good-cop, bad-cop routine. I do something to avoid those perfectly legal fates: I avoid committing crimes. If I weren’t a U.S. citizen and lived outside this country’s protection, I’d avoid making war on it. That’s a good way to not have it happen to you. But in any case, whether you’d find something unpleasant, even extremely so, isn’t the criterion for torture.

Actually, that's not the usual retort.

The usual retort is that waterboarding is inhuman, brutal torture -- something our nation should never consider using on any human being.

McIlheran says Congress ("the law") decides what torture is:

Mukasey’s explanation — and it’s a reasonable one; read it here (pdf) -- is that doing something to make someone feel like he’s drowning is awful, “repugnant,” even, and that, in his best legal judgment, it isn’t torture. The law says what is torture: “Whether a particular technique is torture,” Mukasey writes, “would turn principally on whether it is specifically intended to cause (a) severe physical pain or suffering, or (b) prolonged mental harm resulting from certain specified threats or acts.”

Or maybe it’s “cruel, inhuman or degrading” -- that’s illegal, too, he points out. When he’s AG, he’ll get briefed on classified interrogation the CIA does and decide, based on the law.

The Department of Defense has banned waterboarding. It can't be used by the military. But Congress hasn't specifically told the CIA to stop.

That makes it OK? Hardly.

You don't need Congress to tell you it's torture. You know it when you see it. And even the CIA knows it's torture.

This from an ABC News report:

Water Boarding: The prisoner is bound to an inclined board, feet raised and head slightly below the feet. Cellophane is wrapped over the prisoner's face and water is poured over him. Unavoidably, the gag reflex kicks in and a terrifying fear of drowning leads to almost instant pleas to bring the treatment to a halt.

According to the sources, CIA officers who subjected themselves to the water boarding technique lasted an average of 14 seconds before caving in. They said al Qaeda's toughest prisoner, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, won the admiration of interrogators when he was able to last between two and two-and-a-half minutes before begging to confess.

"The person believes they are being killed, and as such, it really amounts to a mock execution, which is illegal under international law," said John Sifton of Human Rights Watch.

The techniques are controversial among experienced intelligence agency and military interrogators. Many feel that a confession obtained this way is an unreliable tool. Two experienced officers have told ABC that there is little to be gained by these techniques that could not be more effectively gained by a methodical, careful, psychologically based interrogation. According to a classified report prepared by the CIA Inspector General John Helgerwon and issued in 2004, the techniques "appeared to constitute cruel, and degrading treatment under the (Geneva) convention," the New York Times reported on Nov. 9, 2005.

It is "bad interrogation. I mean you can get anyone to confess to anything if the torture's bad enough," said former CIA officer Bob Baer.

The question is not whether you'd like to have it done to you. The question is whether it should be inflicted on anyone. The answer is obviously no.

UPDATE: From thursday's NY Times editorial:

Waterboarding is torture and was prosecuted as such as far back as 1902 by the United States military when used in a slightly different form on insurgents in the Philippines. It meets the definition of torture that existed in American law and international treaties until Mr. Bush changed those rules. Even the awful laws on the treatment of detainees that were passed in 2006 prohibited the use of waterboarding by the American military.

And yet the nominee for attorney general has no view on whether it would be legal for an employee of the United States government to subject a prisoner to that treatment? The only information Mr. Mukasey can possibly be lacking is whether Mr. Bush broke the law by authorizing the C.I.A. to use waterboarding — a judgment that the White House clearly does not want him to render in public because it could expose a host of officials to criminal accountability.

... The administration’s standard is dangerously vague, invites abuse and amounts to a unilateral reinterpretation of the Geneva Conventions. Would Mr. Mukasey approve of a foreign jailer using waterboarding on an American soldier? Mr. Bush’s policies increase the danger of that happening.

McSykes is dead; long live McSykes

Some lefty bloggers used to use the term "McSykes" to denote how Charlie Sykes and Jessica McBride's mutual admiration society resulted in them writing the same thing about the same subject, or, more often, simply linking to one another's blogs to steer readers there.

"How insightful," Charlie would say, with a link to McBride's latest drivel. "What an eye for talent," McBride would respond, linking to Sykes.

Since Charlie's protege was banished from the WTMJ Kingdom, the echo chamber appears to have stopped. She still speaks highly of him, but doesn't even make it onto his blogroll of 23 right-wing Wisconsin blogs, including some that are pretty marginal.

But there's a new relationship blossoming with Sykes and the Journal Sentinel's resident wingnut, Patrick McIlheran, who have formed a new and improved mutual admiration society and send readers back and forth. Can a permanent McIlheran chair on the Sunday Sykes TV show be far behind?

So, the old McSykes may be history, but there's a new McSykes tandem to carry on. Praise the Lord.

Patrick and Charlie, we now pronounce you wing and nut. It's a match made in heaven.

UPDATE: McCarthy McIlheran says liberals aren't entitled to describe themselves as Americans, because they're really unpatriotic:

Time and again, left-leaning organizations have, in the years since, sought to wrap themselves in an outer mantle of traditional Americanism, despite their distaste for it.