In re Gableman: A guest blog

by Sachin Chheda

The justice who made it okay for judges to lie

Wisconsin media are reporting (see here and here) that State Supreme Court Justice Mike Gableman is fighting hard against the Judicial Commission action to discipline him for lying during last spring’s Supreme Court election. As the manager for the incumbent, Justice Louis Butler, I saw firsthand the sleazy tactics and the lack of accountability of the Gableman campaign.

And it wasn’t just Butler partisans who complained about Gableman’s tactics. Universally, observers condemned the Gableman campaign. While we stood by our pledge to run a positive campaign, Mike Gableman was roundly criticized, not just by progressives, but by conservatives and by national publications, for the unbelievable ad he ran falsely attacking Justice Butler’s work while a public defender.

Gableman now makes the argument that he should be allowed to lie, because the First Amendment requires allowing it. I’m not a lawyer, but I’m an American, and I would be very concerned if our basic rights under the First Amendment were threatened for political purposes. But that’s not what’s happening here in the Judicial Commission’s case against Gableman, nor in the criminal complaint that has been filed against him in Polk County (which the Polk County DA is sitting on).

The way I see it, the First Amendment says the government cannot punish Gableman for lying in his capacity as a private citizen. In a general sense, he’s free to lie about anything he wants, and if he's just a regular guy off the street, like Joe the Plumber (who also fudged the truth, but I digress), he shouldn't be arrested, put in jail, or fined. He should be able to lie freely, as long as he's just a regular American like the rest of us.

But once he stands for public office, we, the people, have every right to expect him to not lie. We can, and should, create consequences for when public officials lie. After all, we’re the “bosses” of public officials, right? You can be fired for lying to your boss, right? You can be docked a day's pay, right? Does anyone believe that a boss shouldn’t be able to fire a worker for lying to the boss?

Mike Gableman lied to the people of Wisconsin, and he did it to get a promotion. He was a sitting judge, and he violated the ethical constraints of his job — of his profession.

At its core, Gableman's counterclaim is that he wants to get rid of the rule that judges can't lie. Does that mean that there is no accountability for judges, save an election that can be manipulated by lying? It's patently ridiculous.

I think his actions defending the right of judges to lie call into question Mike Gableman’s fitness to be a judge, let alone a member of the state's highest court. Those who supported him should be embarrassed by his continued defense of this racist, shameful and untruthful advertisement, and his legal machinations to end accountability for lying judges.

Sachin Chheda is a consultant in Milwaukee who works primarily with political campaigns and nonprofit organizations. He served as campaign manager for Justice Louis Butler’s bid to retain his seat on Wisconsin’s Supreme Court in April, 2008.

Gableman then and now

Then:

Louis Butler worked to put criminals on the street. Like Reuben Lee Mitchell, who raped an 11-year-old girl with learning disabilities. Butler found a loophole. Mitchell went on to rape another child.

Now:

Justice Gableman denies the Advertisement states "that Louis Butler had any responsibility for or involvement in Mitchell's release from prison in 1992 or that any action by or work of Louis Butler had anything to do with Mitchell's commission of the subsequent criminal molestation referred to in the Advertisement."

At the very least, the Advertisement most certainly does "state" that Louis Butler worked to put Reuben Lee Mitchell on the street. And the clear suggestion is that Butler's work did put Mitchell "on the street," which is where he committed the subsequent offense.

Gableman Answer* (.pdf; 13 pgs.).

* Short version: Justice Gableman denies violating the Wisconsin Supreme Court Rule and even if he did, the Rule itself is an unconstitutional abridgment of his freedom of speech.

Talk about lazy

Today I saw a sign on a pick-up truck that read, "AAA batteries delivered and installed." Cheaper to just buy another remote.

Against the person

Apparently there has been a lot of chatter over this article about local squawk radio that appeared last week in Milwaukee Magazine. And at least one of its subjects reportedly devoted a considerable amount of energy to responding (read: gesticulating) in its general direction.

But as Bruce Murphy sums up today,

rather than addressing [the article's] specific observations, Charlie Sykes mostly heaps scorn on [its author].

That should come as a surprise to nobody.

Erratum

I mentioned yesterday that while Jefferson County Circuit Court Judge Randy Koschnick managed to deploy the several magic Republican code words "judicial conservative," "activist," and "legislate from the bench," he left out "restraint."

Seems I was mistaken:

"A judicial conservative like myself believes in judicial restraint," Koschnick said.

And, for good measure, "Scalia" and "Clarence Thomas."

Also, this intriguing observation:

Koschnick said that his record as a public defender may be used against him in the campaign.

By whom, and for what purpose, one has to wonder. I think I can guarantee that it won't be used against him by Chief Justice Abrahamson. Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, perhaps?

Or maybe Judge Koschnick's own (no pun intended) campaign team.

The University of Wisconsin Badger Herald's report describes the spring 2008 judicial race as being "marked by intensely negative campaigning from both campaigns." If this is supposed to be a statement of equivalency, then it's ridiculous. It's also a trope that was uncritically foisted locally by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.

Let's hope they pay closer attention this time around.

Après le deluge, Prince

When asked about his perspective on social issues — gay marriage, abortion — Prince tapped his Bible and said, "God came to earth and saw people sticking it wherever and doing it with whatever, and he just cleared it all out. He was, like, 'Enough.'"

And then it never happened again.

Answers in Genesis.

Loophole Randy

Jefferson County Circuit Court Judge Randy R. Koschnick, who today announced his upcoming challenge to Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson, worked as a public defender for 14 years prior to securing his present occupation.

As we all learned last spring, being a public defender involves "looking for loopholes" through which to set hordes of indigent criminal defendants loose on the streets so they can reoffend.

Even decades after the public defender has become an appeals court judge, he's still doing it.

Looks like Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce may need to retool its multi-million-dollar advertising campaign and their fluffers like Charlie Sykes will have to fabricate a whole new schtick.

In another sense, however, we could be in for more of the same:

Judge Koschnick said he was a judicial conservative and that his opponent was an activist who legislates from the bench.

The only missing magic word there is "restraint."*

His consultant is Darrin Schmitz, a Republican who ran Gableman's campaign for the court earlier this year.

That's one busy consultant.

I must say, Schmitz is an excellent choice and should serve well to erase any residual cynicism left over from that most recent contest.

:rolleyes:

* Please see Erratum, supra.

McAdams takes on ladies' underwear

It's been awhile since I've checked in with local professor and crankpot John McAdams to see what he's upset about. Today's outrage: t-shirts and baggy sweatpants with college logos.

"It’s disgraceful and appalling," said Boston College graduate C.J. Doyle, who runs the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts. "This is just one more example of the university’s callous contempt for Catholic sensibilities and its complete indifference to what remains of its Catholic identity."

This is what they're on about, if you can believe that. Unless "Catholic sensibilities" means 'You must be nuts to pay 55 bucks plus tax for a hooded sweatshirt,' in which case, Bless me Father.

You can have a look at Victoria's Secret's horrifying and blasphemous collection of university-themed items here. (Work- and school-safe.)

Full disclosure: This post composed whilst clad only in boxer shorts.

Number 5, number 5, number 5 ...

Reserve not met.

Revolution 1 (Side 4, Track 1)

Sexy Sadie — Paul Weller

Dear Prudence — Siouxsie & The Banshees

Happiness Is A Warm Gun — The Breeders

Cry Baby Cry (Side 4, Track 4)

Clearly erroneous

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel this morning reports on the decision of a Wisconsin Court of Appeals yesterday which reversed a lower court's denial of a petition for conditional release from custody brought by a man who killed three people at a church in 1985.

Bryan J. Stanley was found not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect and has been in institutions since.

La Crosse County Circuit Judge Ramona Gonzalez denied Stanley's release in November 2007. The appellate court can overturn such decisions only if the judge's decision was "clearly erroneous."

More specifically, if the circuit court's interpretation of facts is clearly erroneous.

The appellate court, in a unanimous decision written by Judge Burnie Bridge in Madison, found that Gonzalez had ignored the evidence.

No, that isn't what the appeals court found and this is an unfair characterization. Judge Gonzalez certainly hadn't ignored the evidence, which was primarily the unrebutted testimony of physicians in support of Stanley's request for conditional release.

According to yesterday's opinion (.pdf; 12 pgs.), what the lower court did was place undue and ultimately erroneous emphasis within the record of Stanley's history of taking anti-psychotic medications.

For the past 15 years, Stanley has been on a drug called Clorazil. Prior to that and since his trial, he was on Prolixin, which he refused to take for one day in 1993, when his prescription was changed to Clorazil. By all accounts the latest regime has been successful.

More important to Judge Gonzales, presumably, was that before the killings Stanley was on a third medication which he stopped taking on three occasions, during one of which he committed the crimes.

Judge Gonzalez inferred from these facts the future likelihood of Stanley going off his current medication and denied the petition. The appeals court found that the factual basis for this inference was lacking. It did not find that Judge Gonzalez "ignored" any evidence.

Quite the opposite, in fact. If anything, she erred on the side of overly cautious attention to — not ignorance of — evidence.

The fundamentalists are strong

This video is making the rounds, featuring financial analyst Peter Schiff getting mocked and derided by a variety of Fox News "journalists" and commentators over the last couple of years.

Appropriately, it's a footnote to the Wikipedia entry on Arthur Laffer, a prolific writer and long time Reaganite trickle down supply-sider. In the clip, it is he who gets the Laffing started.

Intelligent design fluffer Ben Stein recommends his stock picks, including Merrill Lynch, which he describes as "an astonishingly well run company" and a great bargain. He predicts stocks to be "a heck of a lot higher a year from now" in August 2007, when Merrill Lynch was trading for 56 dollars per share. MER closed yesterday at less than 14 bucks. Subprime mortgages? Merely a blip, says Stein.

Another Fox business prophet foresees the DJIA at 16,000 points. It's about half that this morning. Laugh, Cavuto, laugh.

Wild Bill Donohue

Goes berzerk. What a festival of non sequiturs.

"Gay terrorists!" "Jeffrey Dahmer had a conscience too!"

WGOP in Milwaukee

"Activist judges" are the scourge of the earth when they rule it is unconstitutional to deny same-sex couples the rights heterosexuals receive. But judicial activism is needed to stop the husband of a woman in a persistent vegetative state — say Terri Schiavo — from removing her feeding tube to end her suffering.

The author of this entertaining article about the local radio squawkers calls that effective debating. I call it rank hypocrisy.

The Seven Aphorisms of Moses

The indispensable SCOTUSblog has a thorough discussion of Pleasant Grove City, UT v. Summum, the oral arguments in which the U.S. Supreme Court will hear this morning.

While it involves the Ten Commandments, it isn't a First Amendment religion clause case — that is, it (supposedly) doesn't directly implicate the "separation of church and state" — but rather turns on a number of questions involving freedom of speech.

Summum wants to erect its "Seven Aphorisms" alongside existing Ten Commandments monuments in a couple of Utah public parks but televangelist/weightlifter Pat Robertson's associate Jay Sekulow doesn't want them to.

Of course Sekulow is a big fan of plastering some version of the Ten Commandments in every available square and cubic foot of public space, but when it comes to the Seven Aphorisms, not so much.

Pleasant Grove, UT didn't want them to either, arguing that Summum lacks a longstanding association with the community, even though the Fraternal Order of Eagles set up the Ten Commandments in 1971 following two whole years of local incorporation.

And the federal government acting as a friend of the Court is afraid that, depending on the breadth and slope-slipperiness of the Supreme Court's ruling, a town with a monument to 9/11 might be forced to accept one from admirers of Osama bin Laden.

I'm sure the Summum people appreciate that analogy.

Unfortunately the Court won't be entertaining arguments related to the competing legitimacy of either party's claims as to which god said what things to someone called Moses and how and when and why.

Insensatez

Only a lawyer could entitle a point-form guide to raising a client's mental incompetency as a potential defense "Nuts and Bolts."

Astrud Gilberto — How Insensitive

Palin "frantically" rummaging through wardrobe

One of the more ridiculous elements in the endlessly ridiculous saga of AK Gov. Sarah Palin consists of reports from last week that Republican lawyers were to visit Alaska to take inventory of the tens of thousands of dollars worth of clothes and accessories purchased for or by the former candidate and her family.

Although Palin denied that any lawyers are "coming to her house," there really is an inventory underway, but it isn't clear whether or not underwear has become a legitimate campaign expense.

emptywheel has the poop.

North African Free Trade Agreement

If there are allegations based on questions or comments I made in debate prep about NAFTA — about the continent versus the country when we talk about Africa there — then those were taken out of context.

Jerks.

Pizza sauce

The Journal-Sentinel asks, 'Who serves the best pizza?'

The Critic
Friday Nov 07, 2008 2:58 PM
If you want real pizza, try DiGiorno's.

Anonymous
Friday Nov 07, 2008 3:10 PM
Blow me, Critic.

Either the Journal-Sentinel has stopped moderating its reader comments or else that's a vote for Organ Piper in Greenfield.

Ensuring Obama's second term

When asked to choose among some of the GOP’s top names for their choice for the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, 64% [of Rasmussen poll respondents] say Sarah Palin.

They still have a couple of years to regain their senses.

But see: Serious conversationalists favor Newt G.

He confessed to me his presidential desires for 1996 [and] never abandoned the personal dream. — R. Novak

Mitt 2012: "Ready, when you all come crawling back."

RFK Jr. should keep his day job

When I first heard that Barack Obama was reportedly considering Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for a cabinet level position, my first thought was 'You have got to be kidding me.' Having heard him speak a few times, he strikes me as a conspiracy theorist and a hyperbolic nut.

Apparently it's quite a bit worse than that, and the science blogger who calls himself "Orac" has much, much more here.

Obama should think about re-appointing Christie Todd Whitman to head up the Environmental Protection Agency. She had the position early on in the first G.W. Bush administration but resigned rather than genuflect in obeisance to Dick Cheney.

Not only is she smart, competent, and experienced, but the political benefit would be great, considering that Obama owes much of his victory to dissatisfaction with the likes of Cheney.

This is funny, though

Proposition R would change San Francisco's Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant to the George W. Bush Sewage Plant.

But, too costly.

Obama's first feeding frenzy

Joking about former First Lady Nancy Reagan holding séances may be funny to some people, but it's not the sharpest presidential move.

At least Obama needs to force the screeching Malkinoids to work for their table scraps, and not spoon feed them from a silver platter.

Items RNC does not want back

Todd Palin's silk boxer shorts.

Greta's video highlights: First Dude.

The stupid party

Let a conservative say it so you don't have to:

Sarah Palin is now the heroine of the Republican base. Scary. During the campaign it became obvious that she is completely ignorant on the principal issues. It never became widely known that she is a religious nut: she believes in the imminent End of Days and the "Rapture," in which the saved will be suddenly wooshed up to heaven — a notion that has no basis in scripture or anything else. She believes she was elected governor because of a laying-on-of-hands by an African clergyman who had run a witch out of town for causing automobile accidents.

This stuff makes William Jennings Bryan look like Martin Heidegger.

— Jeffrey Hart, Reagan speechwriter.

Obama to declare martial law

Just as soon as his terrorist plots come to fruition.

Remember, Cynthia Dunbar, Esq. told you so.