As recently as 2005, the Democrats in Wisconsin seemed in disarray. If you were a reporter looking for comments on a partisan issue, it was easy to find Republicans with smart comments, led by longtime state party chair Rick Graber. By contrast, the Democratic Party apparatus seemed non-existent. Its chair Linda Honold was terrible with the media, and there often seemed to be no one driving the overall Democratic strategy.
Today the situation is almost the reverse. Republican state chair Reince Priebus is OK with the media, but the party isn’t exactly deluging reporters with material. For years, one-time Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen was the key strategist – even after he was forced out of office in the caucus scandal. When the conservative MacIver Institute was set up last year, its press releases had been reviewed by Jensen, and it is now run by his former chief of staff, Brett Healy. “The Republicans don’t do anything without checking with Scott,” one GOP insider told me. But given what a low profile Jensen has (he still faces possible imprisonment for his caucus-related charges), this doesn’t translate to a robust public strategy.
Meanwhile, the Democrats have put together a rapid response team. Hyperactive party chair Mike Tate and Communications Director Graeme Zielinski seem on top of every issue. (Zielinski is a former Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter who actually covered the 2004 race between U.S. Senator Russ Feingold and Republican challenger Tim Michels.) They’ve been pummeling Terrence Wall, a Republican challenger to Feingold in this year’s campaign, slamming Wall’s recently released TV ads while noting the Associated Press found them “misleading.”
Just in case former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson wants to get in the race, they gleefully pounced on a speech he gave in Madison where he declared the Feingold race is likely to be decided “on things, you know, that are not that particular to Wisconsin” – not the sort of statement a candidate for state office would want to make.
Back when Republican Mark Neumann announced his candidacy for governor, Tate released a statement within a heartbeat: “It’s official. Mark Neumann is ready to party like it’s 1995.” In reality, Neumann was last in office in 1998, but Tate decided 1995 had a better ring. Heck, why let the facts interfere with a funny line?
Just as important to the Democrats has been the launch (in 2006) of One Wisconsin Now, a non-profit advocacy organization run by one-time journalist Scot Ross, who had previously worked on campaigns of Democrats like Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk and Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager. The group did some of the early research on Wall’s taxes, which helped lead the way to the devastating revelation that Wall hadn’t paid taxes in 12 of the last 15 years. And yesterday, One Wisconsin released a statement contending Thompson thrived financially from sitting on health company boards while the economy collapsed.
One Wisconsin and the state Democratic Party have combined to do some effective opposition research – or certainly more effective than what’s been offered of late by the state Republican Party and the odd duck MacIver Institute ( which calls itself a “think tank” but does take slaps at liberals and Democrats). For now, it’s the Republicans who look like they’re getting out-gunned.
Taxpayers Alliance Under Attack
One Wisconsin Now’s latest campaign has targeted the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance. That’s interesting because the group has been something of a sacred cow. Since 1932, the non-profit Alliance has been preparing reports on spending and taxation by the state and local governments. The group describes itself as “nonpartisan and fiercely independent,” with “an unrivaled reputation for accurate, objective research.”
The mainstream media has never really questioned that description, but in the age of dueling ideological blogs, the Alliance has been taking its lumps. The group “misleads, distorts and will not come clean,” declared liberal Paul Soglin. Fellow liberal Ed Garvey has called the Alliance a “Republican front organization.”
One Wisconsin Now at least has a sense of humor about its attacks. It has created a “WISTAX Watch,” which comes complete with a quiz where you get to guess if certain comments were made by the state GOP or by Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance. More seriously, One Wisconsin has tracked political contributions by Alliance board members, finding 92 percent have gone to Republicans and conservatives.
Clearly, there is a concerted effort by liberals to portray the group as an adjunct of the Republican Party. But I don’t buy it.
Veteran political reporters recall when the Alliance was bitterly criticized by former Gov. Tommy Thompson for doing reports that revealed how much he had increased spending and taxation. Thompson actually met with the group’s board of directors to complain. And this is a Republican-front group?
Speaking for myself, I have followed the Alliance’s reports for decades and have learned things about governmental finance. I’ve always found its director Todd Berry very helpful.
But just because the group is non-partisan doesn’t mean it’s unbiased. There’s a reason it’s called the Taxpayers Alliance and a reason why its board has been dominated over the years by business people: Because the group’s mission is to spotlight government taxing and spending. Its reports are like a drum beat repeating the message that taxes are rising, taxes are rising.
A case in point: Its June 2008 report found that Wisconsin had dropped from the top 10 states in total taxes for the first time since 1980. Did it lead with that historic accomplishment? Nope. It first noted that the state’s tax burden had risen in the previous year – but the increase (which the Alliance never tallied) was a mere 1.7 percent. Yet this “rise” in tax burden was the headline.
Alliance researchers just can’t help themselves. They will always find a way to pound the anti-tax theme. Thus they always put more emphasis on taxes than fees. When all state taxes and fees are included, Wisconsin has never ranked in the top 10 and currently ranks right in the middle of the states. Yet the June 2008 report never even offered a national ranking for total taxes and fees.
The most accurate way to describe the Alliance is as a fiscally conservative or anti-tax group. I’m not even sure that replacing some board members would change this. After 78 years of vigilantly tracking taxes, the Alliance is hardwired to deliver information that, however well-researched and accurate, is meant to persuade governments to spend less.
The Buzz
-UW-Milwaukee Chancellor Carlos Santiago is still looking for another job, insiders say. Word has it he applied for the open job of chancellor at the University of Hawaii and was turned down.
-The MacIver Institute did do some intriguing research about why new MPS Superintendent Gregory Thornton might have wanted to leave his job in Pennsylvania.
-After repeated front-page stories about problems with the federal stimulus spending, the Sunday Milwaukee Journal Sentinel buried a nationally syndicated story, which found the stimulus plan worked, way back on page seven. The story’s key graph: “Perhaps the best-known economic research firms are IHS Global Insight, Macroeconomic Advisers and Moody’s Economy.com. They all estimate that the bill has added 1.6 million to 1.8 million jobs so far and that its ultimate impact will be roughly 2.5 million jobs. The Congressional Budget Office, an independent agency, considers these estimates to be conservative.”
-And for all fans of JS reporter Bob McGinn, Pressroom Buzz offers a fascinating look at what makes him the nation’s best football writer.
