The Capital Times
Wednesday, March 1, 2006
Anita Weier The Capital Times
The battle for the hearts and minds of Wisconsin voters began even before the state Assembly voted 62-31 Tuesday night to send a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and substantially similar arrangements to voters in November.
Activists fighting for and against the amendment have been working for months to build their forces and finances so that they can reach voters statewide. Now they are swinging into full battle mode.
"We have always anticipated that the Legislature would pass the ban," said Joshua Freker, communications director of Madison-based Action Wisconsin, which has led the fight against the amendment. "That's why for the past 600 days we've kept our focus on the work of educating hundreds of thousands of voters."
Immediately after the vote by the Republican-dominated Assembly, Action Wisconsin and Milwaukee Center Advocates officially kicked off the campaign to defeat the ban. The campaign name is Fair Wisconsin and its Web site is www.fairwisconsin.com.
In the next 10 days, Fair Wisconsin will hold kickoff training sessions in every region of the state to introduce the campaign.
"We will continue to work closely with many other organizations and individuals. We firmly believe that the fair and independent-minded voters of Wisconsin will reject this ban once they learn more about it," Freker said.
Fair Wisconsin already has identified -- through door-to-door and phone canvassing, petitions, event outreach and online advocacy -- more than 75,000 residents who will vote against the amendment, he said.
The group also has 4,000 volunteers in place statewide and has trained speakers in 13 communities around the state. Local organizing committees meet once a month in several cities. Churches representing nearly 500,000 parishioners have been identified that oppose the amendment, and numerous other organizations including the Madison City Council and the Urban League of Greater Madison will oppose it as well.
"The Republican Legislature has had their say, now it is time for the people of Wisconsin to have our say on whether we should write discrimination into our Constitution," Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz said in a written statement following the vote. "I am growing in my confidence that when this question is put to the voters, they will reject this immoral and unfair proposal."
Pro: Spend what it takes: Supporters of the amendment, however, are equally sure that they can win the fight, and they have been working hard for months.
Leading the drive is Madison-based Julaine Appling, executive director of the Family Research Institute of Wisconsin (www.fri-wi.org) and coordinator for the Wisconsin Coalition for Traditional Marriage.
"We will continue to do our statewide education effort," Appling said this morning. "The coalition is prepared to distribute a half million brochures as well as doing paid media through newspaper, radio and TV ads."
She continued, "You would be amazed how many people don't even know the issue is here and that they will have the opportunity to vote on it in Wisconsin."
The Family Research Institute has already distributed a DVD to 4,000 Wisconsin churches of all types of denominations, she said.
"We are completely funded by gifts and contributions from people that believe in what we are doing," Appling said. "We already had people on the ground raising money. We are not prepared to say how much we will spend, but we will spend everything we can to get this amendment passed in November."
The Family Research Institute of Wisconsin has six paid staff in Madison and a branch in Wausau staffed by volunteers.
\ E-mail: aweier@madison.com
Referendum Warriors Go To Battle
Zogby Poll Finds Troops Strongly Favor U.s. Pullout
The Capital Times
Wednesday, March 1, 2006
With a month to go before voters in at least 30 Wisconsin municipalities will have a chance to weigh in on the war in Iraq, a pro-war group in Dane County has entered the battlefield.
About three weeks ago, three Dane County Republican Party officials registered the Vote NO to Cut and Run political action committee, and about a week ago they launched a Web site at votenotocutandrun.com.
The site, and a planned bumper sticker and yard sign camaign, are a direct response to a referendum on the April 4 ballot asking voters if they want the U.S. to begin the withdrawl of troops from Iraq now. The referendum had made it on the ballot in Madison, Monona, Mount Horeb and about 27 other municipalities across the state.
"We just want to get the word out that we are supporting the troops," said Sam Johnson, a Dane County Republican Party discrict chair.
"We want the troops home as much as our opposition," he added. "We just don't want them home now, before the mission is accomplished."
He said the effort is bipartisan, reaching out to Democrats as well as Republicans. He said the PAC is receiving no Republican Party funding, but is operating on funds donated specifically for the anti-referendum effort.
As voting day approaches, both sides are rolling out the yard signs. The Bring Our Troops Home Coalition -- a group of Democrats, Greens, church groups, peace activists and others who spearheaded the signature-gathering efforts to get the referendums on Wisconsin ballots -- has printed 1,000 yard signs. Some are staying in Dane County, while others are heading to Baraboo and La Crosse.
Johnson said his group has printed 500 yard signs, and expects to dispense as many as 650 bumper stickers, concentrating its efforts in Dane County.
One activity that will not be taking place is an open debate.
Bring Our Troops Home organizer Steve Burns said he's tried repeatedly to engage pro-war activists in a public debate. He's called the three Dane County Republicans organizing the pro-war effort -- Johnson, Bill Richardson and Wendy Fjelstad -- and numerous others, and asked them to participate in an open debate. No takers.
"They either didn't return e-mails or phone calls or simply said no," Burns said.
Johnson confirmed that pro-war organizers are avoiding a public debate. "We know from experience it would serve their purposes more than ours to have a one-on-one debate," he said.
He explained that anti-war activists are too prone to screaming and are solely motivated by hatred for President Bush.
"We don't want to get in a shouting and screaming match with people who are basically irrational," he said.
\ E-mail: selbow@madison.com
Saturday, March 4, 2006
WILLIAM RICHARDSON
First, we have to admit that being taken apart by John Nichols, an editor and writer of national stature, while not an honor, is at least a tribute to the fact that we must have been doing something right to be flogged by a famous editor!
We have been working on the VOTENOToCutandRun.com Web site for the last three weeks and just put it up officially a few days ago. We agree with him on at least one thing: We think the site is "slick" too. Thanks! Expensive? No. Hard work? Yes. New appreciation for what a writer must do? Yep.
The three founding members of Vote No to Cut and Run, Wendy Fjelstad, Sam Johnson and I, are newly minted Republicans, joining the party in the last two years and elected a year ago to serve as Assembly district chairs for the Republican Party of Dane County. But the source of our funding was strictly grass-roots -- it started in our own pocketbooks. Republicans, independents and Democrats (so far no one from Progressive Dane, but we are hopeful) have donated $10, $15, $25 amounts mostly, with one individual stepping up to help fund some of the start-up costs. No money has come from the Republican Party at any level. How about a follow-up story on all the Bring the Troops Home Now referendum supporters and their funding?
We are not "so-called" -- we are called VOTE NO to Cut and Run. (Wouldn't that be called an editorial "cheap shot"?) Nichols calls it "peddling armchair slogans." We call it trying to get reasonable people with common sense regardless of their political orientation to look at the referendum -- which is: "Resolved: The U.S. should bring all military personnel home from Iraq now" -- and say, "Now?"
We ask them to imagine what would happen in Iraq, the Middle East, the United States and the world if we withdrew all our troops now! We grant we are amateurs at writing and persuasion and Nichols is a master at his craft. However, he did not mention, quote or discuss the actual referendum in his column or what would happen if we did remove all our troops now. Why? Will he now? We believe the important thing now is to address not how we got there -- the historians will handle that -- but what do we do now: finish the job of stabilizing a struggling, proudly purple-fingered democratic state or cut and run now as the referendum dictates.
Also agreed: We did not address several issues Nichols raised; we need to do so and will. Freeing 27 million people from Saddam and sons was already known, we thought. Shouldn't reporting the good news in Iraq be your job, too? However, the Web site does allow our soldiers, the Iraqi people, our governor and prominent Democrats to speak about the wisdom of an immediate withdrawal. The site shows how this referendum is a direct attack on the morale of our troops in Iraq, how our Wisconsin troops are reacting to being undermined by their hometowns and how this is, in fact, more about an anti-military referendum than it is about peace and justice and "just let the people decide" foreign policy in each city across the state.
The fact that 41 Wisconsin soldiers re-enlisted recently while serving in Kuwait/Iraq speaks to how high their morale is. Not every soldier who has, or is serving, likely agrees with every reason why they are there, but they are serving and deserve our support, not our criticism, or second-guessing their mission.
The Green Party, Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice, Code Pink, World Can't Wait, Not in Our Name, Answer and many other anti-military left groups have made this a partisan issue by placing it on the ballot in nearly 30 communities in Wisconsin, using tactics that included lawsuits to force it on each city, and make them pay for it, too. Check the minutes in most of the cities. They did not want to join Madison and pay local tax money to pretend they set national foreign policy.
We are reacting to those tactics. On our Web site, we define the background of the referendum groups and show how their literature and historical stance have been anti-military for many years and this pose of "caring for the troops" now is just that, a cynical pose.
Nichols mentioned that voting is a way for citizens to provide a "check and balance" on their elected leaders at all times. This referendum does not address our elected leaders; it is a local referendum in April. Voters had the choice of an anti-war candidate during the national Democratic primary for the 2004 presidential election and will again in coming elections. What is the real reason this referendum is being pushed?
* F inally, to call the Bring the Troops Home Now referendum rammers (hiding behind multilayered, well-funded, far-left front groups) "true" patriots (look at their history and anti-American literature) who are acting in an "American tradition" is beyond the pale, unless you are referring to their own old, worn-out playbook from the early '70s as a "tradition."
\ William Richardson is a retired UW-Madison professor, retired member of the Wisconsin Army National Guard and treasurer of the anti-referendum group VOTE NO To Cut and Run.
As Ambassadors To Iran, They Found Their Hosts Gracious And Curious About The West.
Wisconsin State Journal
Sunday, March 5, 2006
JOHN POTRATZ For the State Journal
At first glance, Bob and Bonnie Block make an unlikely pair of peace envoys.
But the two retired Madisonians returned recently from a two-week mission to the one-time nexus of anti-American fervor -- Iran -- and they say they found common ground with Iranians now immersed in Western culture even as they maintain a strong sense of history and tradition.
With tensions again flaring between Iran and the West, and the Blocks sharing an extraordinary interest in world politics, the couple signed on as peace ambassadors with the Fellowship of Reconciliation.
"We had wanted to do something in the Middle East," said Bonnie, adding the two previously had taken trips to Morocco and Turkey as tourists. "Iran was attractive because I see it as a form of pre-emptive peacemaking rather than pre-emptive war."
From Dec. 2 through 12, the two acted upon their enthusiasm for international affairs and donated their time to easing political tensions between the United States and Iran from the bottom up.
"I had never been to the Middle East before," Bob said. "My feeling was that we should beat the Marines (to Iran)."
A 15-year veteran of FOR -- an organization dedicated to breaking down diplomatic stonewalling between countries through "people-to-people" delegations -- Bonnie is well-read on Iranian politics, history and culture. Bob also has picked up a keen interest in international politics from his spouse, standing by Bonnie throughout numerous activist and social welfare endeavors.
"I'm not an activist," he said. "But I've lived with an activist for so long."
Complex relationship
To be admitted into FOR's programs, potential delegates must show an informed interest in the country they are visiting and submit to lengthy interviewing and background checks. After being reviewed by FOR officials, the Blocks were selected out of 40 applicants to join the 18-member delegation.
"Bonnie and Bob were amongst the most-qualified people," said Hossein Alizadeh, coordinator of FOR's Iraq and Iran program. "They were people who could truly understand the complexity of the relationship between the U.S. and Iran."
As ambassadors to Iran, the Blocks were immersed in Iranian culture. Throughout their trip, the delegates visited many historical sites, meeting with citizens, students and prominent officials such as the bishop of the Armenian Christian Church, a Jewish parliament representative and two Shiite mullahs.
"What we were hoping to do is open up dialogue, dialogue between Iranians and Americans," Alizadeh said. "We felt by sending people to Iran, the Iranians have a chance to talk to Americans: people from the so-called hostile nation.' "
Unexpected welcome
Despite receiving numerous complaints and criticisms of the U.S. government, the Blocks said the Iranian people were unexpectedly welcoming, often approaching them to say "hello" and take pictures.
"The people are very personable, adults and children," Bob said.
What struck Bonnie most, she said, was the commonality between Americans and the Iranian people -- many of whom get their daily fix of Western culture through satellite television. Yet Bonnie added what sets Iranians apart is their strong sense of history and tradition. While visiting a couple in the Iranian city of Esfahan, the Blocks were particularly impressed with their level of hospitality.
"We sat on the floor on a gorgeous Persian rug and they put a tablecloth down and they bring huge amounts of food," Bonnie said. "And we said, Well we can't eat all that,' and they said, It's a sign of respect to have more food than people can eat.' "
In the process of converging with the Iranian people throughout their 10-day journey, the Blocks also befriended many of their fellow delegates. While they accompanied ambassadors from around the United States and Germany, one of the delegates the Blocks came to know best was Nancy Parlin of New Richmond, Wis.
"I'm certainly impressed with (Bonnie's) record -- it sounds like she's very connected in Wisconsin, especially in the Madison area," said Parlin, a retired sociology professor and vice chancellor at UW-River Falls. "I think they're really quite amazing people in all the things they've done."
New standoff
Like the Blocks, Parlin, who also has a long history of activism going back to the Vietnam War, feels as though connecting with Iranians may be the only way to improve relations between their government and the U.S.
"I think you have to believe there is some value of individual people communicating with each other and having a sense that we, as Americans, really care," she said. "Simple things like human contact can have a significant impact -- it can't just be bombs."
Yet Iran is no stranger to bombs and has seen more than its share of turmoil in recent decades. And the U.S. has played an integral role in many of its conflicts. Beginning in the 1950s, Iran suffered a series of wars and political upheaval coinciding with on-again, off-again relations with the United States. Now that the relationship between Iran and the United States has reached yet another political standoff -- this time stemming from U.N. nuclear regulations -- Bonnie said she fears the two will again find themselves in conflict with one another.
While officially identified as a member of the "axis of evil" and seen as a potentially imminent threat to the United States, it would take Iran two to 15 years to develop a fully functional nuclear weapons program, Bonnie said.
"So clearly this isn't an emergency, and we have time to sit down and negotiate," Bonnie said. "In my opinion, the only reason I can think for doing this now, all this rhetoric, is because of the oil. That's not to say that we're wildly enthused about nuclear proliferation, I mean, I'm really opposed to that."
Easing strained ties
According to State Department officials, though, Iran's nuclear capabilities should not be taken lightly and while it is difficult to peg down any sort of timeline for the country to produce a viable weapons program, if the country was to establish one, it would be a "destabilizing event."
"They have many of the pieces -- they just haven't meshed all those capabilities," State Department spokesperson Noel Clay said. "It's a very serious issue -- not only is it a concern to the United States, but the entire international community."
To rectify increasingly strained ties with Iran, Bonnie said the United States must make a cooperative effort to negotiate with the Iranian government and to not hold the country to a higher standard than others with already established nuclear capabilities.
"One of the things they pointed out to us repeatedly in Iran was, What about Israel? What about India? What about Pakistan?' " she said. "None of those countries have signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and they all have nuclear weapons and we're not saying anything and they are really offended by that because it's a clear double standard."
Wisconsin State Journal
Monday, March 6, 2006
I cannot figure out the notion of the "unborn." I want to see every living person with decent housing, enough food, education and work, and health and retirement support. For this I am called a -- gasp! -- "liberal." Or worse. Yet those who get excited about the not-yet-living, the so-called unborn, are called "righteous."
Is there anyone out there who can explain this to me?
-- Sheila Spear, Oregon
The Capital Times
Wednesday, March 8, 2006
By Anita Weier The Capital Times
The chairman of the Assembly's campaign and elections committee said today that there will be a "reform day" coming up in April or May when the Assembly will take up the merger of the Ethics and Elections boards and several other campaign reform measures.
But the committee chairman, Republican Steve Freese of Dodgeville, would not predict that Senate Bill 1 -- which would merge the two boards into a Government Accountability Board with increased enforcement capabilities -- will become law.
"It's still an uphill battle," Freese said.
Another bill that will likely be up for consideration is one proposed by Rep. Spencer Black, D-Madison, that would prohibit appointed officials from organizing election fundraisers.
The merger bill, authored by Sen. Mike Ellis, R-Neenah, and Freese, has been approved by the Senate, but as of this morning was not among the 90-plus items on the Assembly agenda for Thursday, the last day of the regular session.
But Freese said it would be considered during one of the cleanup sessions in April or May.
Another reform measures faces quicker action and a clearer chance of success. On Tuesday the Senate-approved Senate Bill 612, which Gov. Jim Doyle says contains key provisions of the election reform package he proposed last year. The Assembly has scheduled the bill for a vote on Thursday.
That bill would:
Require mandatory training for all poll workers.
Prohibit voter drives from paying individuals on a per voter or quota system.
Enact safeguards to ensure felons are not allowed to vote.
Require a map to be displayed at every polling station to help direct voters to their proper voting wards.
Require the Elections Board to conduct a post-election audit to ensure proper election procedures were followed throughout the state and make recommendations for improvements.
Use uniform registration cards statewide to streamline the processing of registration cards.
Provide an option of centralized absentee ballot counting.
"Many of the problems raised with the November 2004 election were the result of poor management and overwhelmed and inadequately trained poll workers," Doyle said.
Mike McCabe, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, said that bill is important because problems at the polls have mainly been caused by long lines and poorly trained poll workers.
However, he is still hopeful that SB1 will somehow make it through, and Doyle also urged legislators to pass that bill.
"That would be a very important step if we could get a strong bill through both houses, but there have been plenty of efforts in the Assembly to weaken it, and it is not a foregone conclusion that they will act on it at all," McCabe said. "We have seen indications that it is likely to come to the floor but those aren't guarantees. I have watched enough reform bills be stonewalled."
The bill's focus on ethics and election enforcement is vital, said McCabe, who says he has little faith in the enforcement efforts of the current elections and ethics boards, as shown by the current prosecutions in the legislative caucus scandal. "If we had an Elections Board and Ethics Board that were functional five or more years ago, we would not have the criminal trials we have now," he said.
Another campaign-related bill that was approved by the Senate on Tuesday and sent to the Assembly was Senate Bill 564, which prohibits any county or municipality from printing more ballots prior to election day than a number greater than 150 percent of the votes cast in the most recent similar election.
The Republican-controlled Legislature also has passed bills requiring photo voter identification at the polls, but the Democratic governor has vetoed them.
McCabe questioned the need for such measures because of a lack of voter fraud in Wisconsin.
\ E-mail: aweier@madison.com
The Capital Times
Wednesday, March 8, 2006
Penny Eiler Watertown Peace and Democracy Coalition
Dear Editor: In his March 4 guest column, District 78 Republican Chairman William Richardson described me and the 13 other Watertown petition volunteers as an "anti-military left group" who used a lawsuit to "force" the Bring Our Troops Home referendum. Here's the truth:
We were exercising our First Amendment right to petition our government for redress. Wisconsin has a direct legislation statute, a 1911 law that is a part of Wisconsin's proud progressive tradition. We gathered the necessary signatures. According to the statute the Watertown City Council either has to adopt the resolution or put it on the ballot. They don't have to like it. Our aldermen chose to ignore the opinion of the League of Wisconsin Municipalities and refused us access to the ballot.
Our right to sue is outlined in the state statute. The City Council forced us to take this action if we wanted to honor the promise we made to 986 citizens that if they signed the petition the community would be given an opportunity to vote.
The city made the choice to gamble and the judge founded in our favor, also giving us reasonable attorney fees.
Mr. Richardson calls this "a partisan issue." I agree the community is divided, but it is not the referendum that is responsible. The division was there all along. The petition only empowered people to voice their discontent. Bottling up dissent in a community may seem like harmony to those whose opinion is assumed to be normative, but honest debate and airing of all opinions is healthier.
The Capital Times
Wednesday, March 8, 2006
By Judith Davidoff The Capital Times
When Lue Allen got pregnant in 1953, she was just 20 and not ready to be a parent.
"I was young," she said at a news conference this morning. "I was scared. I wanted one thing. I wanted an abortion."
Abortion was illegal at the time but Allen knew that if you could borrow $200 you could find somebody to do the procedure.
Allen did just that.
It wasn't a back alley," she said. But it wasn't clean or safe either.
Allen said she felt a tremendous sense of relief from the abortion and went on to marry and have four children.
"All were welcome and all were wanted," she said.
Allen shared her experience at a news conference at the State Capitol where Rep. Terese Berceau, D-Madison, and others unveiled a bill to repeal Wisconsin's 157-year-old criminal abortion ban.
"If you outlaw abortion you won't stop abortion," Allen said. "You'll just make it dangerous."
Berceau said her plan to start circulating the bill today coincides significantly with International Women's Day.
"Around the globe women continue to die from unsafe, illegal abortions," she said. It's a shame, she added, that politicians would rather women die than terminate a pregnancy.
South Dakota last week passed a law that bans virtually all abortions within its borders.
Dr. John Stevenson, who saw the harmful results of illegal abortions when he was a young medical resident at a Boston hospital, and Ann Peckham, a longtime Republican and abortion rights supporter, also spoke in favor of Berceau's bill.
Amanda Harrington, a rape victim, said she was grateful for the access to health services she had after surviving a violent sexual assault.
"Every choice made available to me proved invaluable to re-establishing the control over my life that I lost after my rape," Harrington said.
Berceau was also joined this morning by a number of her Assembly colleagues, including Monona Sen. Mark Miller and Madison Reps. Mark Pocan and Joe Parisi.
Wisconsin's ban was never removed from the books even when the 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade rendered it unconstitutional.
Berceau and others are worried that a more conservative Supreme Court may overturn Roe v. Wade. That would mean, under current Wisconsin law, that women and doctors could go to jail for performing or having an abortion.
Berceau said Wisconsin's ban is even more restrictive than the law recently passed in South Dakota.
Under Wisconsin's law, doctors who perform abortions could receive up to 15 years in prison and a $50,000 fine; women could go to jail for obtaining an abortion, even if they are rape victims or need an abortion to preserve their health.
Berceau acknowledged that her bill will not likely get far in the current Republican-controlled Legislature but said it might pick up momentum and be ready for the next session.
She said she knows there are Republican legislators who support abortion rights who are getting increasingly uncomfortable with continued attempts to restrict access to the procedure.
\ E-mail: jdavidoff@madison.com
Portage County Gazette
To the Editor:
Even as the Iraq war disintegrates into the disaster that many knew it would be before it began, a new, potentially more dangerous, war plan is being hatched by the Bush administration.
Allegations from Washington that Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapons program have become increasingly common, recently, despite the fact that International Atomic Energy Administration (IAEA) inspectors have found no supporting evidence.
(For the real reason that Iran is in being targeted, see www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8354.htm <http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8354.htm> and www.zmag.org/content/print_article.cfm?itemID=9582§ionID=22 <http://www.zmag.org/content/print_article.cfm?itemID=9582§ionID=22>.)
Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has responded to these charges with sharp anti-American rhetoric. We might wonder where the extreme Islamic reactivity that characterizes the Iran we see portrayed by the corporate media (there are many other facets to Iran) comes from. Is Iran inherently pre-disposed to hate the West, as some pundits claim? Do Iranians "hate freedom"?
In the early ’50s, Iran enjoyed one of the most promising democracies anywhere in the World. What happened to that democracy is a classic example of how U.S. meddling in the affairs of people who have something we want (in this case, oil) often has destructive consequences.
Two years ago, Concerned Citizens of Stevens Point sponsored a showing of a taped talk by author/historian Stephen Kinzer, in which he describes the CIA instigated overthrow of the democratically elected Iranian president, Mohammad Mossadeq. Mossadeq’s U.S. appointed successor, Mohammad Reza Shah – one of the worst tyrants of our time – left behind him a power vacancy within which Islamic fundamentalism has flourished.
We would like to show this excellent documentary again, as an historical reference for understanding the current political conditions in Iran (and the Middle East, in general). Please join Concerned Citizens of Stevens Point for a repeat viewing of "All The Shah’s Men" on Wednesday, March 15, at 6:30 p.m., Portage County Library, Pinery Room. Contact Steve Bartelt, 366-2444, for more information.
We would also like to use this occasion as an invitation to join in a state-wide peace rally being staged in Stevens Point on Saturday, March 18, marking the third year of this country’s invasion and occupation of Iraq. Activities, including music and speakers, will begin at 11:30 a.m. at P.J. Jacobs Junior High School, 2400 Main St. At 1 p.m., we will march from P.J.’s, through downtown Stevens Point, and back to P.J.’s.
If you would like to publicly express your dissatisfaction with this war within a community of like-minded people, please join us. Contact Steve Bartelt at 366-2444, or stevebartelt@gmail.com <mailto:stevebartelt@gmail.com>, for more information.
Steve Bartelt
Almond
Anti-war Effort Hasn't Caught Fire
Wisconsin State Journal
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
HUGO KUGIYA Associated Press
SEATTLE
On a late winter evening three years ago, with war only days away, several thousand people gathered in Green Lake park. They took positions along the edge of the lake and held hands, forming a human chain that encircled the lake, about 3 miles in circumference.
The gesture was an act of solidarity against the invasion of Iraq, which the demonstrators and thousands more like them around the country failed to prevent. Some vowed to return every Sunday until the war ended.
To that end, Ken Slusher, 58, is still there, staking a spot in the park, a few feet from the street, wearing a wide-brimmed hat for the weather, holding a sign calling for peace. A large percentage of drivers honk in support, lending a friendly wave or a thumbs-up.
But on a recent Sunday, Slusher, who volunteered for the Army during the Vietnam War, was one of only five demonstrators, an average turnout these days for what has been one of the stoutest running acts of protest in Seattle, a place as hospitable as any to acts of anti-war activism, where John Kerry received 80 percent of the vote in the last presidential election.
"What's happening here?" Slusher said. "People in South Africa joined together and literally sang apartheid away. ... People here, they want to complain, but they won't come out and do something about it."
The low numbers of protesters, here and elsewhere in the country, don't tell the entire story. The visible opposition to the war is impassioned, unflagging, and rooted in a sentiment shared by the mainstream: Polls show that skepticism and discomfort about the events and progress in Iraq have never been greater.
But even as the war and occupation reach the three-year mark, even as opposition to the war has solidified, it has not translated into a true, mainstream, anti-war movement. Local demonstrations are numerous but small. Some have fallen by the wayside.
"The movement hasn't caught fire," said Eric Larson, a senior policy researcher at the RAND Corp., a think tank. "Part of the reason that Americans are ambivalent is they still feel it's very important to get this (the war) right, and don't want to completely withdraw support. ... They're at the point of ambivalence rather than opposition."
Larson's point is reflected in a weather-beaten sign, planted on a street corner along an affluent, south Seattle boulevard. The paint is blistered. Moss grows on its top edge. It asks questions, rather than making demands: "Iraq. Are we sure? Why now?"
'So subdued'
"It (the activism) has been so subdued lately," Larson said. "What will be interesting is to see what happens on March 18 or March 19 and if the demonstrators come off as mainstream, if they are moms and dads, if they are from middle America, or if they come off as being on the fringes."
Various demonstrations around the country are being planned around the three-year anniversary on Monday. There will be vigils, concerts and marches. But a true mass movement remains to be seen. Activists left in the vanguard are sure of their convictions but few in number.
"Clearly for those families whose loved ones have died, the war cuts very close to home, but the war has not cut very close to home for most Americans," said Lawrence Wittner, a history professor at SUNY Albany. "The absence of the draft has eased the pressure on young men and to some extent has led to greater passivity on college campuses."
Casualties in Iraq, while high, don't approach the number in Vietnam. Taxes are down; the stock market is up; gas prices have fallen.
At demonstrations, opposition to the war may become a springboard for criticism of the handling of Hurricane Katrina, domestic spying, tax cuts, global debt, and the military prison at Guantanamo Bay.
Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq, has become the face of the anti-war movement.
"What she did was very simple and it resonated with people," said Leslie Cagan, director of United for Peace and Justice, a national coalition of groups protesting the war. "She went to the president's front door and said, I'd like you to answer some questions.' And the national press corps was there. ..."
One woman does not constitute a movement, however, and while Sheehan has garnered widespread attention, the masses have not necessarily followed. Still, the lack of drama associated with the anti-war effort belies the real effect of day-to-day activism, Cagan said.
"It's not sexy, but it's the backbone of any movement," she said. "It's helping people question the war and that's consistent with what you see in the polls every month."
Featuring the anti-war movement - Madison, WI.
The Capital Times
Friday, March 17, 2006
By Steven Elbow The Capital Times
As the war in Iraq grinds into its third year, anti-war activists plan to be out in force this weekend to call for its end.
The highlight in Madison promises to be a march on Saturday, culminating in a rally that organizers hope will draw up to 1,000.
"I think it's going to be a big turnout," organizer Rachel Friedman said. "I think people are wanting to get their voices heard."
The event will coincide with other anti-war protests planned nationally and worldwide, with at least 20 slated to dot Wisconsin, from tiny Hayward in the north to Beloit in the south.
The Madison event is sponsored by a coalition of more than 20 anti-war, Democratic, socialist, religious and other groups. It will begin at UW's Library Mall, where protesters will gather at 12:30 p.m., march past the Kohl Center, which will be hosting the Wisconsin high school basketball tournament, and end with an indoor rally at the Orpheum Theatre downtown.
Just before the march the Madison Area Peace Coalition will organize a demonstration at the military recruiting station at the southeast corner of East Washington Avenue and Thierer Road, near East Towne Mall, from 11 a.m. until noon. (More information is available at www.madpeace.com.)
Then on Monday, the third anniversary of the war, four people led by veteran peace activist Joy First will be in Washington, D.C., to march on the Pentagon, where they and 100 others from the National Campaign for Non-Violent Resistance plan to risk arrest by entering restricted ground.
Friedman said the group printed 500 posters for the Saturday event, which have been snapped up by local co-ops and other businesses to advertise it. She's also buoyed by support received during last weekend's St. Patrick's Day parade, during which they handed out at least 200 fliers.
"We ran out before we turned the second corner of the Capitol," she said. "We got a great response. We were carrying our Bring the Troops Home' signs and people were cheering and yelling."
She added, however, that support was not universal.
"A couple of people gave us thumbs down," she said.
A local group giving the coalition a big thumbs down is the Vote No to Cut and Run political action committee, led by Dane County Republican members, started in response to referendums in Madison and Monona that will ask voters next month to weigh in on whether to bring the troops home.
The referendum is advisory and would have no legal standing. But supporters say it would send a strong message to Congress.
"I think it would be a total disaster," said Bill Richardson, one of three Dane County Republicans who started the group, of pulling troops from Iraq. "I think we'd see the Middle East going into implosion and millions of deaths would be the result."
But he said his group is not large enough to go head-to-head with the anti-war crowd, and he doesn't anticipate a counter-demonstration on Saturday.
"We're pretty much a small, grass-roots outfit," he said. "We don't have coalitions of people. We're concentrating on getting people to vote, and getting people to vote no."
He attributed the group's size to the fact that their opponents have been organizing for several months, while he and his colleagues are in the initial process of reaching out to conservative and veterans groups.
"They seem to be very well funded and, to their credit, very well organized," he said of the anti-war activists.
Richardson said instead of protesting, his group plans to spend the weekend delivering yard signs and handing out bumper stickers, and getting its message out through its Web site at www.votenotocutandrun.com.
\ E-mail: selbow@madison.com
For those who haven't noticed, Israel opposes a two-state solution. It has been doing everything in its power to prevent a Palestinian state from emerging and will continue to do so as long as it can count on the complicity of its powerful friends and on abundant popular indifference.
Under such circumstances, it is incumbent upon ourselves to ask why Hamas has therefore been ordered - by Israel and its same powerful friends - to accept "the two-state solution," especially when, unlike Israel, it has stated clearly and repeatedly that it would accept a Palestinian state on the lands occupied by Israel in the 1967 war, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem. Indeed, all of its key spokespeople have said this.
Judea and Samaria, which are, or were, the northern and southern West Bank, have been subdivided and parceled out over decades to hundreds of thousands of Jewish settlers for their houses and orchards and gardens. They have been crisscrossed and circled with Jewish-only roads that bind the land to Israel. They have been manned with guards and gunmen and tanks and blue and white Israeli flags that defend, protect and assure the settlers that they are in fact Israelis belonging to a single Jewish state.
The settled lands with their settler families have been mapped and assigned, seized and secured from the Arabs in the shabby clothes in the rundown villages who live outside of, or have been forced to leave, the protected colonial zones. The projected frontiers, the future borders, depend on the disappearance of these Arabs, which is anxiously anticipated and actively encouraged. Most of the eastern perimeter of the current state is a concrete wall erasing from view that "other side," which is unmentionable in polite company. The eastern perimeter wall will soon be the western perimeter wall because the acting Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, has just announced that the rest of the unincorporated West Bank land will soon be annexed to Israel.
Women from the Jado family work their land near their house next to a section of Israel's separation barrier in the outskirts of the West Bank town of Bethlehem. |
In the same breath as he announces this latest unilateral declaration of confiscated land for a Jewish state, Olmert announces a sanctions regime against the Palestinians of the occupied territories for refusing to believe that this land transformation in which one society is strengthened and expanded and the other is dissolved into a thousand pieces is actually the two-state solution.
Israel allots to itself first use of the natural resources, especially water, from the territory it has appropriated or surrounded. An army of thieves and wreckers has turned the remainder - the pot-holed roads, the untended groves, the homes, the schools, the mosques and churches, the hospitals, universities, shops and remaining civil institutions - into a series of impassable mazes, a legal no-man's land, where travel restrictions, permits, coded IDs, passes, random searches, incursions and arbitrary accusations reduce the inhabitants into suspicious beings without names, faces, addresses or rights; a collective villain to be de-educated and de-nationalized and, one day perhaps, deported for the sake of the Israeli raison d'etre.
For those who haven't noticed, there is no sign of this process coming to an end. Instead, in addition to the bizarre demand that Hamas accept the two-state solution that Israel has categorically rejected and each day renders even more geographically impossible, another two demands are added to it: Hamas must recognize Israel, and it must renounce violence. In other words, it must recognize a state whose policies and whose leaders have worked tirelessly for decades to deny, undo, renounce, prevent and reject the existence both of Palestinians and of Palestine - not only in the present and future but also through erasing the past.
Still, our media take it upon themselves to show the world a circus mirror reality, grotesque in its distortions, in which a democratically elected government-without-a-state and its trampled, largely destitute people are made out to be holding hostage the hoodlums that are busy stomping them to death.
While they are being stomped, they must renounce violence so that the hoodlums won't get hurt. If they defend themselves they lose. If they complain, they are insincere. If they ask for something in return, they are untrustworthy. If they ask for a fair hearing, they are advancing an "agenda." If they hit back randomly, they are an instrument of terror.
So when the furies of the thousands of dead, tens of thousands of wounded and detained, and millions of bound and gagged rise up together in a whirlwind to protest, they will be pointed to as evidence of innate evil that must justifiably be contained, justifiably occupied, with justified indignation and bottomless financial aid.
Hamas' reward for coming to power just in time to provide all the aspiring Sharons the most perfect, served-up-on-a-silver-platter pretext for continuing their well-worn policies with a vengeance has been for the Kadima party - the party of the future - to announce that it will put the Palestinians on a starvation diet for presuming to exercise their rights. Hamas' reward for verifying the smashing success of Israel's goal to destroy Fatah has been Israel's insistence that it abide by all the agreements, treaties and accords that Fatah, essentially the Palestinian Authority, signed but that Israel shredded page by page. With every new brick laid for the settlements, every new road paved, every permit denied for work, education, medical care and travel, every truck left waiting with rotting produce, every tax and customs dollar stolen from a people interned on their own land, Israel parades its contempt for human decency and gets standing ovations in the U.S. Congress and elsewhere.
For those who haven't noticed, Israel opposes a two-state solution. It also opposes a one-state and a bi-national state, a federated secular state, and the zillion interim-state solutions that have been drawn up and debated and argued over the years. It opposes them because it opposes the presence of another people on land it has claimed as the exclusive patrimony of the Jews.
This has to be the starting point for effective activism against the racist and hegemonic vision that Israel is implementing and the U.S. guaranteeing, not faraway discussions on the most ideal solution. An effective opposition must not retreat into a slumbering or sidetracked lethal indifference.
Jennifer Loewenstein of Madison is a visiting research fellow at Oxford University's Refugee Studies Centre in Oxford, England. She has lived and worked in Gaza City, Beirut and Jerusalem and has traveled extensively throughout the Middle East, where she has worked as a free-lance journalist and a human rights activist. E-mail: amadea311@earthlink.net <mailto:amadea311@earthlink.net>
Published: March 17, 2006
(Published Sunday, March 19, 2006 10:32:48 PM CST)
By Carla McCann /Gazette StaffSubmitted by WNPJ member Nan Cheney
The Capital Times
Friday, March 24, 2006
Nan Cheney
Dear Editor: Those who think there must be a more gentle way for Scott Jensen and Sherry Schultz to receive punishment -- prison-free -- might look at the bigger picture.
Prison sentences are far too long for most criminals -- from pot smokers to embezzlers. I suspect Jensen supported most tough on crime legislation and the building of more prisons during his leadership position in our Legislature.
Until the reform of present law, we can only hope for "justice" that is fair and equal.
The Differences Between The Animal Rights Activist And The Uw-madison Professor Were Sometimes Stunning.
WNPJ member group Alliance for Animals featured in this article
Wisconsin State Journal
Friday, March 24, 2006
KAREN RIVEDAL krivedal@madison.com 608-252-6106 If anyone came looking for compromise at Thursday night's public debate between animal rights activist Rick Bogle and UW-Madison professor Eric Sandgren, they picked the wrong venue.
For 90 minutes, Bogle -- who leads the Madison-based Alliance for Animals -- and Sandgren, who heads a university committee that regulates research on animals, butted heads over issues as basic as whether such research does any good and as nuanced as whether the suffering of animals in experiments merits more consideration than a simple cost-benefit analysis.
The discussion, moderated with the precision of a presidential debate and played out before a crowd of more than 200, produced little that has not been argued before by both sides in this long-contentious issue, locally and nationally.
But the extent of the gulf between the two speakers, on a few issues in particular, at times was still stunning. Bogle, for example, said he would reject a cure for AIDS if it meant testing on animals and that it was appropriate to test drugs for childhood diseases directly on children.
"We should skip the animal model because it's misleading," said Bogle, whose group is trying to buy a piece of land near the university's primate research buildings for a protest hall. "Every drug out there that has killed people has been tested on animals first."
Bogle also stressed that he was not looking to make progress on the issue in "little steps," but wanted to end all research testing on animals as soon as possible.
"If it's wrong, it's wrong," Bogle said. "I'm not looking for larger cages, more fruit (for the animals), kinder care. All the primate centers in the United States should be closed."
Sandgren, meanwhile, said he could not picture a time when animals wouldn't be needed for at least some types of scientific research.
"As long as there's anything we don't know about how a body works," Sandgren said, animal stand-ins will be necessary.
Sandgren, a professor of pathobiological sciences in the School of Veterinary Medicine, also acknowledged that UW-Madison has made mistakes in its animal research and protocols, including recent violations involving the death of animals due to negligence.
"We strive to be perfect," Sandgren said. "We don't reach that, nor does anyone else."
At the same time, though, Sandgren twice rejected even the possibility that some federally funded research could be needlessly repetitive. Sandgren said granting agencies studied proposals closely to make the right decisions.
"(The researchers) have to be able to justify the use of animals," Sandgren said. "It's extremely competitive."
The debate, sponsored by Isthmus and a student-programming board, marked the first time animal rights activists and researchers had sparred on campus in the past eight years. It was moderated by UW-Madison journalism professor Deborah Blum, who won a Pulitzer for her reporting on primate research, and by Isthmus news editor Bill Lueders.
Blum and Lueders took turns posing questions to Bogle and Sandgren, who made opening and closing statements and had time limits for responses and rebuttals. Audience members listened raptly, but politely, offering warm applause for both speakers at different points.
Reflecting their surroundings, Sandgren was generally soft-spoken and deliberative during the debate, while Bogle -- while more direct and provocative in his comments -- also maintained a civil discourse. But hostilities simmered below the surface, as when Sandgren told the audience that researchers had received death threats from animal rights activists and were harassed outside their homes by protesters.
Bogle said he knew nothing about the death threats and said the demonstrations at researchers' homes were needed to make the university debate the issue publicly.
Bogle also didn't deny that in 2003 he sent several e-mails to university researchers calling them "slime" and making other insulting comments. Bogle said he sent the messages after drinking "a bottle of Chardonnay" due to his frustration over the lack of reforms on campus.
Debate watcher Kyle Fischer, a UW-Madison junior who works part time in the university's primate research center, said he thought both speakers made some good points but thought Bogle made a big mistake with the wine comment and by swearing once.
Dan Cox of Madison said he thought the debate showed the need for a neutral third-party to investigate the issues.
"I'm for animals," he said. "I'm for all species. We have to co-exist with each other."
Submitted by WNPJ executive committee member Barbara Boehme
The Capital Times
Saturday, March 25, 2006
Barbara Boehme Middleton
Dear Editor: I don't think any of us are going to know for sure why the president and his advisers decided to invade Iraq.
Right now I think it is very important that Republicans, in particular, try to stop the president from invading Iran. His recent statements on Iran sound very much like his statements regarding Iraq before the war.
Iran does not have the military capability to invade or bomb our country. It may be a threat to Israel. We have armed and prepared Israel for a threat. Israel may be in a cold war status with Iran, but we cannot control all the problems in the world. We have enough with Iraq and Afghanistan.
So please, Republicans and other citizens, call and write the president and your senators and representatives.
Submitted by WNPJ executive committee member Bonnie Block
The Capital Times
Saturday, March 25, 2006
Bonnie Block Madison
Dear Editor: One of the first steps in obtaining peace with justice is to find the truth. Therefore I find it troubling that every time someone is critical of the Israeli occupation of Palestine, some members of the Jewish community become irate and engage in obfuscation rather than dealing with the hard facts. (The ones I cite below are from www.ifamericansknew.org.)
1. Since Sept. 29, 2000, which marks the beginning of the second intifada, 1,084 Israelis (including 123 children) have been killed by Palestinians, and 3,831 Palestinians (including 716 children) have been killed by Israelis. Injuries during the same period show the same disparity -- 7,633 Israelis have been injured while 29,630 Palestinians have been injured. In his letter, Steve Morrison says "acts of violence that deliberately seek to kill and maim civilians including children must be confronted at every opportunity." I agree, so what is he doing to confront the Israeli violence that results in three or four times more deaths and injuries?
2. Israel holds 9,184 Palestinians as political prisoners and has demolished 4,170 Palestinian homes while continuing to build Jewish-only settlements on confiscated Palestinian land. This is "actively searching for peace"?
3. Israel is in violation of 65 U.N. resolutions and yet the U.S. government provides over $15 million a day in aid to Israel's government and military while providing a little over $232,000 a day to Palestinian nongovernmental organizations. I'd say this should alleviate the anxiety over Israel's "right to exist."
4. Former President Carter says there are currently 209 Israeli settlements honeycombing the entire West Bank and taking up much more than 5 percent of the land. Does letter writer Daniel Greenspan think that's a "diatribe" too? And is it "grossly inaccurate" to point out that Israel is building a huge wall that has destroyed 600,000 Palestinian olive trees and divided many Palestinian villages?
It seems to me that just as the United States is finding in Iraq, military occupations are not the path to peace with justice for any parties to a conflict.
Donations Made After Firms Won State Contracts
Outside Firms Jump Into State Politics
The Capital Times
Monday, March 27, 2006
By David Callender The Capital Times
Months after landing lucrative state contracts, executives from two out-of-state consulting firms gave donations totaling nearly $45,000 to Gov. Jim Doyle's re-election campaign.
The donations to Doyle marked the first time that anyone from either company -- Chicago-based Equis Corp. and Indianapolis-based Crowe Chizek -- gave significant cash to any candidate in Wisconsin, according to an analysis of campaign finance records by the nonpartisan Wisconsin Democracy Campaign.
In the case of Equis Corp., the firm's president and his wife gave Doyle nearly the maximum contribution allowed under state law -- $10,000 each -- less than a year after the state approved a contract amendment potentially worth millions to the firm.
The firm's chief operating officer and three other top executives gave Doyle a total of more than $7,000 in the same period.
Crowe Chizek officials, meanwhile, gave Doyle a total of $17,500, beginning with a donation of $2,500 from one of the firm's executives only months after the firm won a $6.7 million contract.
Both contractors submitted low bids for their work, but Wisconsin Democracy Campaign director Mike McCabe said the donations renew questions about so-called "pay-to-play" practices in state government.
"This is a classic pattern where campaign contributions flow in after a company wins a contract, where before you didn't see any big donations from folks and then all of a sudden they give these huge amounts," McCabe said. "It could be coincidence, but it creates the appearance that government is for sale," he added.
McCabe noted that only a small fraction of Wisconsin residents ever give money to campaigns, "so it's even more unusual for someone from out-of-state who has given no money before to suddenly jump in with both feet and give the maximum possible."
A spokeswoman for Gov. Jim Doyle's campaign denied any relationship between the approval of the contracts and the donations.
"People support this governor because of the great work he has done in this state," said Doyle's campaign press secretary Melanie Fonder. "There is a firewall between the campaign and state government."
Company officials in both firms said they had never contributed to Wisconsin candidates before because they had never done business in Wisconsin before. The officials said their firms were impressed by Doyle's leadership.
Doyle's aggressive fundraising tactics -- and the volume of donations from firms that do business with the state -- have been under scrutiny since last year.
Federal, state and local authorities are investigating the relationship between key administrative decisions -- including the awarding of state contracts -- that benefited major campaign donors to the governor.
A federal grand jury in January indicted Department of Administration procurement officer Georgia Thompson on charges that she allegedly steered a $750,000 state travel contract toward a Milwaukee-based firm whose executives gave money to Doyle.
Investigators are also examining donations from executives of two utility firms to Doyle that came just as the state Public Service Commission was acting on the sale of the nuclear power plant in Kewaunee.
Doyle has maintained that there was no wrongdoing by any top officials in his administration in either decision and that neither he nor any of his top aides played a role in the outcomes. The governor insists that there is a clear line separating campaign activities and governing in his administration.
The two contracts now under fire are both part of Doyle's Accountability, Consolidation and Efficiency Initiative.
The initiative aims to save taxpayers $200 million over the next four years by consolidating some state functions -- including information technology services, purchasing, human resources and real estate management -- that have been scattered over a host of state agencies.
Critics have warned that although the program may promote greater efficiencies by consolidating state contracts, it also reduces the number of vendors involved and increases the value of those contracts, which in turn may make decisions about awarding the contracts subject to more political pressure.
Lucrative amendments: Both the Equis and Crowe Chizek contracts were approved in April 2004.
The state hired Equis to review all of its property holdings and leases for possible savings and sales, said Sean Dilweg, executive assistant for the Department of Administration.
The current state budget calls for $36 million in sales of state property and $4.2 million in lease savings over the next two years. Equis is primarily responsible for meeting those targets, Dilweg said.
Following a request for proposals, Equis was the lowest of three bidders, Dilweg said, coming in at $572,000 compared to $3 million for accounting giant Deloitte & Touche and $1 million for CB Richard Ellis.
Equis came in lowest "because it has a lot more experience with other states on this," said Dilweg. "They know what they're handling."
The two other firms outranked Equis on other selection criteria in the bidding process, with Ellis coming ahead on general qualities, including organizational capabilities, and Deloitte ranking highest on technical aspects.
The critical variable in awarding the contract appeared to be cost, at least according to CB Ellis officials who offered a modified bid at the last minute. The firm proposed deferring 50 percent of their fee until they could demonstrate their promised savings to the state.
Equis also had better Wisconsin connections, bringing in First Weber Realty, the J.P. Cullen & Sons construction firm, and the Madison-based law firm of La Follette Godfrey & Kahn as "advisers" on the contract.
But Equis' $572,000 bid has now grown to a contract worth more than $2.5 million, according to the state's own estimates.
In December 2004, the state approved the first of two amendments to the contract, which requires the state to pay Equis a commission of up to 25 percent of the gross on all sales of state property it arranges. Dilweg estimated that agreement is worth at least $1 million.
Then in March 2005, the state agreed to pay Equis another $1 million for developing a governance plan and inventory of all state-owned properties.
The checks from Equis officials to Doyle's campaign began showing up in June 2005, three months after the second amendment was approved.
On June 30, Equis President Michael Silver, and his wife, Mary, gave Doyle $5,750, while Chief Operating Officer David Montross and Executive Vice President John Niemi each gave Doyle $1,000.
Four months later, on Oct. 12, Silver and his wife gave Doyle another $14,000, raising their total contributions to the governor to $19,750, just $250 shy of the maximum a couple can give to any gubernatorial candidate in Wisconsin.
Three other Equis executives gave Doyle a total of $5,500 on the same date, for a total of $27,250 from company officials after winning the $2.5 million contract.
In an interview, Montross, the firm's chief operating officer, said Equis has a policy not to contribute to officials in any state where the company is bidding on a contract.
But after Equis won the contract, Montross said, "we were asked and invited to participate in a couple of events." He recalled two Chicago fundraisers Doyle held in mid-May and mid-October 2005, which roughly correspond to the dates of the donations.
Equis spokeswoman Christine Peterson said the Doyle campaign mailed the company invitations.
"Our standard line is we tell our folks, it's your decision and it's not condoned by the company," said Montross. He added that he was unaware of how much employees had donated to Doyle.
"We do a ton of operational work in Wisconsin. We do work for Ameritech, we have people working out of Milwaukee, and we do a lot of work in the state of Wisconsin," he said. "We're asked to participate in campaigns all over the country. It's a personal decision by the individual about what they think of the politician and their politics."
Montross said "a couple of our management team members" attended the events "because the governor doesn't want to go into empty rooms."
Fonder, Doyle's campaign spokeswoman and former gubernatorial press secretary, confirmed the dates of the two fundraisers but suggested that one or both of the firms might have played a role in organizing them.
"It's not unusual for businesses large and small to offer to support the governor because of his strong pro-business record," she said in a statement today.
"They worked with us to put together events -- which is not unusual for businesses that support the governor and appreciate the great progress he's made in Wisconsin for business," she said.
Montross praised Doyle as "a wonderfully nice man and a very smart man. When I've had interactions with him on our real estate work, he is a very, very bright man."
Computer savings: Crowe Chizek was hired as part of an effort by the Department of Administration to consolidate the number of computer servers used by state agencies.
DOA executive assistant Dilweg said there are more than 2,400 servers scattered among different state agencies, compared to roughly 300 for private-sector firms with roughly the same number of employees. The state aims to reduce that number to 1,500 servers by 2007.
The reductions should produce savings of about $8 million annually when fully phased in, he said. The state has already paid Crowe Chizek more than $6.1 million on the contract to oversee that reduction.
Dilweg acknowledged that the server cuts will also result in the elimination of some jobs in state government.
In addition to Crowe Chizek, six firms bid for the server consolidation contract: BearingPoint, Deloitte & Touche, SBC, Inacom, MaryVille and AE.
As with Equis, the firms' bids were evaluated on three measures: general requirements, technical requirements and cost.
But this time, Crowe Chizek and Deloitte tied on cost and technical requirements, but Crowe Chizek won on general requirements. On that basis, the state awarded Crowe Chizek the contract, Dilweg said.
Money from Crowe Chizek began showing up in Doyle's campaign reports roughly two months later.
According to the Democracy Campaign's database of campaign donations, Robert Lazard, an executive in Crowe Chizek's Indianapolis office and a partner in the Crowe Group, the holding company for Crowe Chizek, gave Doyle $2,500 in June 2004.
A year later, on June 21, Lazard and another Crowe Group partner, Kevin Ohl, each gave Doyle $1,000.
In December 2005, again at about the same time as Doyle's Chicago fundraiser, Ohl and Lazard each gave Doyle another $1,000, for a total of $4,500 from Lazard and $2,000 from Ohl.
Six other Crowe employees -- including two managers for the server project who are now listed on the Department of Administration's staff list -- gave Doyle contributions totaling $10,000 at the same time.
Crowe spokeswoman Suzanne Robinson said executives from the firm have not contributed to Wisconsin candidates before because the firm has not previously done business in the state.
"Once we started working in Wisconsin, individuals had seen firsthand Gov. Doyle's leadership in transforming Wisconsin's government and they as individuals wanted to support him," she said.
\ E-mail: dcallender@madison.com
A panel discussion of war veterans on the University of Wisconsin campus became a little more contentious than planned Tuesday, resulting in police removal of an anti-war activist.
The UW College Republicans brought the panel together at Grainger Hall to discuss referendums in cities and towns across the state — including Madison — to "bring all military personnel home from Iraq now."
Members of the UW Stop the War! movement attended the meeting to voice their support of the referendum. However, when Stop the War! member Chris Dols became too "disruptive," two UW police officers asked him to leave.
"It is a little hypocritical for them to publicly denounce Stop the War! when they won’t even debate us," Dols said.
However, College Republicans Chair Jordan Smith defended the formation of the panel.
"It was a ‘vote no’ panel, so we wanted all panel members advocating ‘vote no,’" Smith said.
The panel consisted of Marine Kevin Lewis, Army soldier Greg Seidlitz, Army Reservist Mike Hahn, and Bill Richardson, treasurer of the "Vote No to Cut and Run" organization.
The overall opinion of the panelists was that they love the people of Iraq, and that the response from Americans has been overwhelmingly positive since returning home.
"The response has been very good to me," Hahn said. "People have been kind, polite and gracious when I tell them that I am a veteran."
Hahn added that he was "a little bit surprised" when he heard that the referendum was on the ballot.
Lewis echoed Hahn’s sentiment, saying that it "broke his heart" that Madison was considering passing this referendum.
The panelists also all agreed that if American troops immediately withdrew from Iraq it would not be good for the Iraqi people.
"If we leave tomorrow, the country will go back to hell in a hand-basket," Seidlitz said.
There are currently 130,000 troops in Iraq and, according to Richardson, it would be "chaos" if they were pulled out now.
"If we pull out of Iraq right now, the terrorists win," Richardson said.
The dialogue went back and forth for a majority of the meeting on whether or not the troops should leave.
"We are all for getting these soldiers out of harm’s way," Dols said. "I want you and all your friends home."
This was one of the only topics that the two sides agreed on during the meeting.
The College Republicans set up the "Vote No" panel to educate students on their views on the issue. Dols requested to be on the panel but was denied because he had views opposing the College Republicans’ stance.
Dols and his constituents came into the meeting and called the College Republicans "cowards" for not debating him, which set off a yelling match between the panelists and Dols.
Despite the differing opinions, Smith said she thought the meeting went well.
"It is good for debate and discourse," she said.
She said she decided ahead of time that debate between the two sides would not be productive, however, as she said a "token conservative" at a Stop the War! meeting would just be "shouted down" and "attacked."
by Drew Hamm
Wednesday, March 29, 2006
The Capital Times
Thursday, March 30, 2006
As it becomes increasingly clear that we were taken into a war we can't win, on false premises, most people wish we weren't in Iraq.
Knowing this, the argument has changed again. Now it's we can't "cut and run" or "we broke it, so we have to fix it." Those and similar comments have some appeal.
In fact, many of us who have been against this war from the beginning hope that the U.S. will try to find a way to involve other nations in repairing much of the damage and helping avoid chaos. This cannot and will not happen as long as we are still building bases and planning to use Iraq as a base to control Mideast oil.
Bringing a few troops home just before the election may fool Americans, but not the people of Iraq.
A "yes" vote on bringing the troops home now is the only way we in Madison can send a message to our government that we must reverse course and end this war. Even saying "as soon as possible," they will say "of course" but "it isn't possible."
The referendum gives us both an opportunity and a responsibility to tell our government we want to end this disastrous war.
A "yes" vote on bringing the troops home is our chance to influence the course of the war.
See you at the polls.
Dear Editor: War is the most important, far-reaching decision that a country makes, but the citizens rarely have a chance to register their opinion.The Capital Times
Thursday, March 30, 2006
Dear Editor: The Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce and the local businesses that have threatened to leave Madison if the proposed sick leave policy is made law should be ashamed. And Madison residents who support the most basic human rights should be furious, and should wield their power as consumers accordingly.
The most recent version of the bill -- which the Economic Development Commission last week decided not to recommend to the larger City Council -- would mandate that employees who work more than 12 hours a week and have worked at a business for two months would gain one hour of sick leave for every 30 hours worked. Let's do the math on this. A full-time worker would work 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year, for a total of 2,080 hours annually. Divide that by 30, and you get just over 69 -- the number of hours of sick time a full-time worker would receive in a year. Based on an eight-hour workday, that is about 8.5 sick days per year -- not even one a month.
Safely assuming that not all workers will use all of their available sick time, and that many of these workers are less than full-time and would earn fewer days, this hardly seems excessive.
The people who do not currently have sick leave are already those who are among the most vulnerable in our community -- low-wage workers, with little to no job security, and few resources to assist with health crises in their families. The least we can do as a community is to guarantee them paid sick leave, which so many of us already enjoy, and which should be a basic right for all.
Wisconsin State Journal
Friday, March 31, 2006
I write regarding last week's under-reported rescue of three surviving Christian Peacemaker team members in Baghdad by U.S. and U.K. forces after they had been held for 118 days. The body of the fourth member, Tom Fox, the only American, was found in early March.
I wish this event had received more media attention. And in the coverage I've seen, the tone often suggested they were naive, foolish or crazy to go to Iraq. This could not be further from the truth. Members of groups like this know the risk, just as members of the military do. But they take the risk in a spirit of service, wishing to put their values into action.
Popular culture suggests that people who join the military to serve their country should be supported and viewed as heroes. Surely the heroism of people who voluntarily go to Iraq in the name of peace is deserving of respect as well. Why do we honor the courage of the military soldier and ignore the courage of the peacemakers?
Groups such as Christian Peacemaker Teams, the Nonviolent Peaceforce and Peace Brigades International deserve the support of people who want a more nonviolent world. Violence leads to more violence, but we have much more to discover about the power of nonviolence. People like the Christian Peacemakers are putting their bodies on the line to continue Gandhi's great experiment in active nonviolence.
-- Jean McElhaney, Lone Rock