From the homepage of newstalk1130.com:

Milwaukee’s second largest AM radio station has a website promoting soft porn images. That seems more appropriate for a college frat house Facebook page than a radio station which promotes itself as a voice of “conservatism”.

What am I talking about? How about:

Pictures of half naked volleyball players, guys dressed like women, half naked Hooter’s waitresses, dreamy Sarah Palin, half naked 70’s women, half naked music women, half naked college girls, “rednecks”, half naked women on TV and Sarah Palin pornography.

Wholesome. On one hand you can tune in to 1130 AM to hear it’s radio hosts promoting themselves as conservatives who position themselves as the only firewall left between “good honest people” and “godless immoral anti-family liberals”. On the other you can check out the WISN 1130 homepage for a daily dose of half naked women, tasteless pictures and soft porn.

They even have a section in their photo gallery called “Guess the Cleavage”. Seriously.

Stay class(less)y 1130 WISN-AM Milwaukee.

Since it’s nearly the end of the week I thought I’d keep the mood light and share this funny spoof trailer of “The Ring” since I’m still unable to pry “Saved by zero” from my mind. If I must suffer, so must we all.

“I’m troubled by these drawings…” Hilarious.

It’s heartening to see that I’m not the only one who is being driven up a wall by Toyota’s “Saved by Zero” ads.

Peter King of SI (towards the botom)
Time.com
Ad Rants

Dear Toyota ad executives: I understand there’s no such thing as “bad publicity”, but please, P-L-E-A-S-E, make it stop because any time I even see a Toyota on the highway these days, I try to preemptively get myself to stop from repeating the jingle in my head, usually to no avail.

Even writing about it, I’m cringing.

I’ve got a few things to follow up about yesterday’s post regarding the County pension backdrop payment to Mr. George Brotz.

When I wrote about this subject yesterday, the point I was making is that the media, right wing blogs & talk show hosts and the County Executive tend to lump all Milwaukee County workers into the same group when taking them to task for these huge pension payoffs.

The goal in doing so is to try to paint all workers as “lazy and overpaid” in their attempts to trash unions. According to their argument, if it weren’t for these darn unions and their massively damaging and over generous pensions, this County wouldn’t be in the financial mess it is.

So every time we hear about the “pension scandal” these days, a lot of people just automatically start up with the anti-union, “if only it weren’t for those fat cat labor pensions” rhetoric.

As I alluded to yesterday, there’s a small problem here.

Mr. Brotz, the latest retiree to be singled out and ridiculed for the $850,000 pension payout he’ll receive, wasn’t a member of any union while employed by Milwaukee County.

I was able to dig through the still terrible Milwaukee County web site and discover that in working for the Sheriff’s office under the title of “Accting Mgr”, Mr. Brotz was a “NR” or non-represented employee as you can see from the screenshot of the Milwaukee County position spreadsheet below.

As a non-union employee of Milwaukee County, he could have signed a waiver any time in the past 6 years to give up his right to take part of his pension in a lump sum. (I’m not trying to pass judgment on Mr. Brotz or ridicule his decision regarding the lump sum payment, I’ll leave that to “watchdogs” at the local paper)

While County Executive Walker may have publicly expressing outrage over Mr. Brotz’s payout, he knows full well that the waiver could have been signed, or Mr. Brotz could have been made to retire at the appropriate time and avoided the large payout.

But Sheriff Clarke and County Exec. Walker did nothing of the sort. Nor are they doing anything now with the number of non-union employee’s of Milwaukee County who are also lining up to collect their fat lump sum payments.

I’d argue that if the Sheriff and County Executive had any serious consideration for the financial future of this County, they’d be sitting down with all of their non-union employees near or past retirement and asking them to either sign the waiver or retire “on time” so we could avoid hearing about more stories of half million dollar payouts in the paper.

But they aren’t taking those steps now, and I doubt they will because these payouts are politically advantageous for them.

Every time another one is reported in the paper, they can drum up the faux outrage and position themselves as the only people who will stand up to these massive payouts that the unions don’t deserve and are bankrupting… etc, etc.. DESPITE the fact as I’ve explained above that these massive pension payouts are to non-union employees.

If the County Executive has the power to limit these lump sum pension payouts and chooses not to, he should be held accountable instead of allowed to place the blame on those who don’t deserve it… and reporters like Mr. Bice of the Journal Sentinel should perhaps spend a little time asking about that then harassing the wife of a recent retiree about the value of their home.

Whenever the local media establishment finds itself in a slow news cycle, it’s good to know we can count on them to dredge up another story about a County worker cashing in for a big pension payout.

It’s a huge drain on the resources of this County to be sure, but of all the people making out through this deal - including the latest, George Brotz who will pull in $850,000 - has anyone else noticed that nearly all of them are administrators in the County?

They’re hardly the “rank and file” workers who are routinely lambasted for being “lazy” or “overpaid” or who commonly get the blame when we talk about the pension problem. In fact County Exec. Walker makes a common point that this needs to be addressed through privatization in spite of the fact that those “rank and file” workers who’s jobs Scott Walker wants to privatize in the name of “savings” are rarely the ones we read about in the paper.

There’s a difference between the pension the maintenance gal who pulls in $40,000 a year will receive and the one the accounting manager who made $75,000 a year will get.

If we really wanted to save money in this County, maybe we should be talking about privatizing the jobs in management that are bleeding us dry, not only those among the rank and file workers.

I’ve been wondering how long it would take for this to happen:

President-elect Barack Obama is taping Saturday’s weekly Democratic address not just for listeners, but for YouTube viewers, his office said Friday. And he plans to keep videotaping the radio addresses after taking the oath of office on Jan. 20.

Before then, the videos will be posted on Obama’s transition Web site, http://www.change.gov.

Obama is turning the radio address into a “multimedia opportunity” to communicate directly with the American people, his transition team said in a statement. - AP

The entire process of the “Saturday radio address” has always been a dinosaur in my opinion. It was a great use of an emerging technology by FDR back in the 30’s to communicate directly with the public, but it’s something that has completely outlived it’s usefulness and efficacy.

An insightful article in this month’s Milwaukee Magazine about what makes right-wing radio tick caught my attention, not so much because it’s confirming what most people know, but doing it in a well known media publication like Milwaukee Magazine.

A couple key excerpts from the article by a former WTMJ talk radio program director Dan Shelly:

In the talk radio business, this concept, which must be mastered to be successful, is called “differentiating” yourself from the rest of the media. It is a brilliant marketing tactic that has also helped Fox News Channel thrive. “We report, you decide” and “Fair and Balanced” are more than just savvy slogans. They are code words signaling that only Fox will report the news in a way conservatives see as objective and truthful.

Forget any notion, however, that radio talk shows are supposed to be fair, evenhanded discussions featuring a diversity of opinions. The Fairness Doctrine, which required this, was repealed 20 years ago. So talk shows can be, and are, all about the host’s opinions, analyses and general worldview. Programmers learned long ago that benign conversations led by hosts who present all sides of an issue don’t attract large audiences.

There is no way to win a disagreement with Charlie Sykes. Calls from listeners who disagree with him don’t get on the air if the show’s producer, who generally does the screening, fears they might make Charlie look bad. I witnessed several occasions when Sen. Russ Feingold, former Mayor John Norquist, Mayor Tom Barrett or others would call in, but wouldn’t be allowed on the air.

This is something I and others have been pointing out for years now so it’s somewhat vindicating to have our worst assumptions confirmed by someone on the inside.

The real losers in all of this aren’t the phony talk show hosts in the article, but the people of Milwaukee who want to move this community forward but constantly run up against the considerable, if not questionable, power that those screaming into the microphones hold.

While they’ve claimed to be standing up for the “regular guy” in their constant attempts to block progress on everything from transit to affordable health care for years now, the amount of influence they hold in this community continue to diminish as the real motives for their actions - increasing ratings - become clearer.

So what is a County Executive doing hanging around with the nations Republican Governors in Southern Florida??

The Politico is reporting that among the attendees at this weeks Republican Governors Association meeting in Southern Florida is none other than Milwaukee’s very own Scott Walker.

At a time when the County he supposedly represents is fighting through a budget deficit, increased crime on County buses and losing State aid because we were so ineffective at using what we were getting, Scott Walker is chumming it up at the Intercontinental Hotel in Miami Florida.

And to what end other than to rub shoulders with top Republicans? What is the actual benefit to the County he was elected to represent at this meeting? Check out the schedule of events for the next two days while you think about that:

THURSDAY:

9:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. AMERICA’S FUTURE LEADERS BREAKFAST (All Conference Attendees)
Featuring Rising Stars in the Republican Party

10:00 a.m. – 11:45 a.m. PLENARY SESSION II (All Conference Attendees)
Looking Towards the Future: The GOP in Transition

12:00 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. GOVERNORS LUNCHEON & DISCUSSION (All Conference Attendees)

2:30 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. OPTIONAL ACTIVITIES (All Conference Attendees)
BOAT CRUISE
Guests will enjoy a leisurely cruise on the waters of the Atlantic.
DAY OF BEAUTY
The Professional Beauty Association will offer an afternoon of pampering to include manicures, pedicures, neck and shoulder massages. Participants will also learn about new products and beauty secrets.
ART DECO TOUR
The Art Deco District is America’s only 20th Century historic district listed in the US National Register of Historic Places.
A certified guide will lead guests on a ninety-minute walking tour to include the late, Gianni Versace’s villa on Ocean Drive and historic hotels. Guests will observe the outside design elements and lobbies along with secluded courtyards. The tour will conclude at the Oriente in the Cordoza Hotel with the restaurant’s signature cocktail.

6:30 p.m. – 7:15 p.m. STATE RECEPTION & WILL CALL (All Conference Attendees)

7:15 p.m. – 9:00 p.m. STATE DINNER (All Conference Attendees)
Hosted by: Governor Rick Perry, RGA Chairman

Post State Dinner LATE NIGHT PARTY
Hosted by: Blank Rome Government Relations
Location: The Delano

FRIDAY:
9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. 2009 RGA CHAIRMAN’S BRUNCH (All Conference Attendees)

11:30 a.m. RGA GOLF OUTING (All Conference Attendees)
Location: Miami Beach Club

So a grueling schedule for Scott Walker and some tough choices on Thursday. After breakfast, there’s a whole 90 minutes of speakers before lunch. Then he’ll have to make the tough choice between the leisurely boat cruise, getting “pampered” with a mani/pedi and massage, or a tour of Gianni Versace’s place followed by a cocktail. He’ll need some of that pampering to rock through the night at The Delano though, so don’t judge too harshly.

Tough work if you can find it!

Then on Friday, another grueling day for Scott Walker. Brunch followed by a round of golf at the Miami Beach Club.

Contrast that to the way hundreds of County workers who Walker handed pink slips to this week will likely spend their Friday: in the unemployment line or updating their resumes.

One of the big stories over the past week has been about how the Republican Party is in search of new leadership in light of recent losses.

How does that square with the consevative base who continues to push Sarah Palin as the front runner in 2012?

There’s new leadership and then there’s the candidate who just helped lose the most recent election.

On the heels of Milwaukee County residents supporting a 1% sales tax that would be used in part to fund transit in Milwaukee County, more good news for mass transit today from the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Transit Authority (RTA).

This morning the RTA voted 6 to 1 to approve a report that recommends seeking a sales tax increase of 0.5% in Milwaukee, Racine, and Kenosha counties to provide a dedicated and sound funding source for mass transit in Southeastern Wisconsin, including the “KRM” line that would link Milwaukee, Racine, and Kenosha to Chicago’s high speed Metra commuter rail system.

While these recommendations will need to go to the state legislature for approval, it’s an encouraging sign that we’ve finally broken through the stalemate that has been keeping the Milwaukee metro area from joining the rest of the Country in implementing and enjoying the benefits of a modern mass transit system.

The one “No” vote? Naturally it was Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker’s appointee to the RTA.

The County Executive has been a major roadblock to the progress of Milwaukee’s mass transit infrastructure over the past six years. While you’d think that the County Executive of a major metropolitan area would be in favor of creating jobs, building it’s infrastructure, and expanding economic opportunity for the residents of his County, that hasn’t been the case with Scott Walker.

Thankfully, his ability to remain a roadblock on the road to progress in Southeastern Wisconsin has been limited with the events of the last week.

Pardon the break in political blogging while I post some pictures of Carter’s first haircut for friends and family.