Is a state budget compromise close?

Here are some of the issues:

"Proposals to fix it include delaying a $125 million payment of state aid to schools, refinancing bonds from tobacco settlement payments and taking money from the state's transportation fund to be replaced with increased borrowing."

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‘Don’t worry about the result; just tell me what the law is.’

Such a directive ought to be the mission, objective and goal of every justice of the state’s top appellate court, the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

If one were to ask candidates for the Wisconsin Supreme Court their commitment to the above principle, one can expect a declaration of absolute fidelity.

But you would not deduce the presence of this judicial ethos from the campaigns of the two leading candidates for the seat in the current election, Justice Louis Butler and Judge Michael Gableman.

Assuming the GOP nomination is not settled by Wisconsin's primary on Feb. 19, one might believe that born-again frontrunner Senator John McCain would be a great fit for Wisconsin.

Self-proclaimed straight talker, with a reputation as a maverick, McCain has a lot of appeal.

But today's Wisconsin GOP is not that of 20 years ago, and McCain's appeal to political independents would fail here as his straight-talk express is revealed as another media creation lacking substance and conviciton.

Democrats, and the vast majority of Americans not adherring to rightwing ideology are looking forward to a John McCain GOP nomination for president, because it would come up way short.

McCain faces the impossible task of disentangling himself from George W. Bush and the close-to-impossible task of bringing along the religious right in a general election.

Via Mal Contends - Even as the U.S. Justice Department arrogantly stonewalls requests by the House Committee on the Judiciary for documents pertaining to politically-charged prosecutions in Alabama, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin (the Georgia Thompson affair), Wisconsin’s U.S. Atty. Stephen Biskupic volunteered to offer transcribed testimony under oath before the Judiciary Committee.

From Dan Bice in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.

"If they (the House Judiciary Committee) want to hear from me, I'm happy to do it."
Even if the testimony is transcribed and under oath?
"It really doesn't matter to me," said Biskupic.