 Welcome to the Donahue Group. Delighted that you could join us for another fun-filled, fast-paced episode talking about issues of interest, I think, around the state of Wisconsin. Joining me, Ken Risto, king of social studies for the Sheboygan area school. I've been traded for toner over the last couple of days. We'll get into that. Tom Pineski, professor of mathematics, University of Wisconsin Sheboygan campus, former state senator Cal Potter, and assistant superintendent for library services, and now just a bon vivant retired and traveling the state causing trouble wherever he goes. We have lots to talk about at the state level. I just want to start with the attorney general's race, just because I'm interested in the fact that not much has happened. There's a primary coming up in a month, and there has not been a lot of discussion, at least in our area, I don't think. I think if we went out on the street, true or false, how many people would know that there was a primary, both in the Democratic and Republican side? How many people would know there's an attorney general? Well, now that's pretty cynical. I don't know, I think it's, that's like, exciting race, I think, yeah. Yeah, and this comes from a person who, by the way, has had a wardrobe change. Between episodes. Between episodes. It's a first in our group. No. I feel bad. Yeah. Maybe I should just go shirtless. No. Speras, please. That's a skins game. Yeah, excuse me. You're on the shirt team. Yeah, time out. Time out, way time out, but at least your wardrobe consultant, I think, could work with all of us, and, you know. We need some corporate underwriting. Right, you know, for hair, makeup, you know, the whole thing, because, you know, the show is going places. But in any event, where we're going right now, I was talking about the AG's race, Lautenschlager versus Falk. I was in Madison over the weekend, Kathleen Falk has a campaign headquarters right off the square. Couple people in it. Didn't look like it was a beehive of activity, but it was a Saturday. Lautenschlager, getting into a little hot water on these issue statements regarding the referenda, which we'll get into. Van Hollen is starting, the first guy to use media. As I understand, reading the journal Sentinel Today, he's going to be launching TV ads. Running against Paul Bucher, to my mind, the better-known person. Well, this lawn sign's out. It's a couple in Shibuya. That's right, that's right. And then, and then Hollen? Van Hollen? Hollen, endorsement by former Governor Tommy Thompson. Yeah. Who injected himself in the middle, I mean, in the middle of the primary, but all of a sudden he wanted us to know how he felt. Yeah. There was a, and I wish I could pinpoint it here, there was a voter concern in Milwaukee. If you want to vote in the, you know, your Democratic voter or something, and you want to vote for Bucher or something like that, you can't vote in the Democratic primary and then just go over and vote in for Bucher. And so, what should you do? And they were discussing back and forth on the radio. You know, it's going to split the vote, I guess, because people are going to be trying to decide which way to go. Well, it's interesting to have a primary on both sides. So you don't have, you know, Republicans crossing over to vote for the Democrats and back and forth. Because you folks would know better than I, but Wisconsin is one of the few open primary states in the US. To me, it's a non-issue, but it is an issue amongst the public because I think they should be able to play both sides. Sides, that's right. But actually, this is a nomination process that's created by LaFollets to replace the back smoke-filled room nomination process that the people decide who the candidates are rather than the politicians in wheeling and dealing. So when you put it in that context, that's how it came to be. But a lot of people have not, I guess they've gotten used to the full democracy we have and they just don't see why they can't play both sides. Predictions on Falk versus Slutenschlager. I think it depends on how forgiving the rank and file Democrats are. Because of the primaries that are out there, you're going to see Democrats sticking an air column and Republicans mostly sticking an air column. How forgiving are Democrats for her transgressions, which happened to be most notable is the drunk driving conviction. I think in Wisconsin, maybe she'll get more forgiveness than maybe we'd expect in the Bible Belt, as people do like their brandy and beer and other things in the state. So she may indeed get more forgiveness. I think she's done a competent job as attorney general. She's just made a big mistake by having this drunk driving conviction. I think she's been a good attorney general. Is it true? Doyle's kind of distanced himself from her. Oh, big time. Big time. Okay, well, Doyle supporters want Lautenschlager on the ticket in November. They may not. They may rather run with Falk in November. And so they may, on the Democratic side, vote for her. Professor Risto, any prognostications? I listened to Falk. I didn't hear Lautenschlager on Wisconsin Public Radio. They were doing a series of having the candidates talk. They had their half hour with Kathleen Dunn or whoever it was, I think it was Kathleen. And I listened to Falk. And I was waiting for her to make the case of why her rather than Peg. And my impression was basically what her argument was was some sort of vague thing about priorities and where we're gonna put our money and that didn't really work for me. And the other one was I'm an executive and I've been used to working with police and I've been used to working with getting budgets and prioritizing and making things work even though I didn't have the money. I just don't think that's a compelling case within the Democratic primary. So I don't think, I don't see this going anywhere. I think one of the reasons she isn't and maybe she'll embark upon a more hard hitting primary campaign. But Democrats in the past have had instances where in primaries they've so beat up each other that there's not much left for a Republican to do after September. The classic example was the, was it Carly Schreiber race? When it ended up that Marty Schreiber was done after the primary, Lee Dreyfus didn't have to do very much at all to walk into the office. Not that he wasn't a good candidate, but it was just such a dirty primary campaign that I'm not so sure that people aren't just telling Kathleen Falk, don't bring up too visibly the drunk driving thing in case she does indeed, and stop and stalk or get through the primary. The Republicans that do, they're darned us to make the voters aware of that transgression. You don't have to knock her down two notches before we get into the general election. So that might be part of it too. Didn't Feingold get in that way? Oh, absolutely. He was a big naga and all of a sudden he came in with a few. Yeah, he said he was the clean one. Clean one, whoop, there he is. Well, Moody and Chacota, Chacota, Chacota. Chacota. Chacota, just, really, that was personal and was pretty ugly, so. My, I really don't know. I am just surprised there has not been more of a campaign and, well, I think your points are well taken. At a certain point, Cal, you have to decide I'm running to win. I'm not running to preserve the candidate who's gonna be running against the Republicans. And the only way you can really attack Pegglautenschlager, I think, is the drunk driving and state car use issue, which is huge. And to me is a career ender. And so she hasn't done that, and I give her credit because to me that's, there's some relationship, but it's not defining in my opinion. But Pegg's done a great job. She's a prosecutor. I mean, she's a law and order person. And I think Falk is a very skilled lawyer. I mean, she was the public intervener and I think did quality legal work and it always helps to have an attorney general who's a good lawyer and we've been lucky and with respect to that our AGs typically have been good lawyers. So it'll be interesting and I didn't hear the interview that you were talking about. Those are just issues that are snooze alarms for the public. They just don't grip people. Nope, nope. They don't force people within a Democratic primary to abandon an incumbent. And you're right though, it is a tough wire to walk because you really, you know, everybody knows that those songbites are gonna be later used against the candidate within your party should you not win. And that's what I sense. I don't even, I don't know, Falk for me, I've never met her but I've seen her in lots of different public settings where she's talking. I don't think she's that kind of person temperamentally. I don't get that impression. She's very, very competent, very, when she ran for governor, she ran a very high-minded issues-oriented candidacy. And she may be operating on a premise that people who are gonna vote in the primary, the 20-some percent that come out in the primary are aware of the fact that the Pig Lot and Schlager used a state car for personal use and was convicted of drunk driving and they've made up their mind already. Doesn't everybody, don't all politicians these days run their races based on polling data? And they may have done some focus groups to indicate just what you said, that the likely primary voters know all about this and have made up their minds anyway. So, but interesting. I do think, and I don't wanna beat the AG's race too long, Van Hollen and Bucher is much harder to get a handle on. I don't, I'm not even tuned into that race other than I know they're running. I'll probably, I'm gonna vote in the Republican primary but I'll probably make up my mind and first week in September, read some stuff about it. Bucher couldn't put Chimura in jail so I'm not so sure I wanna turn the keys over. To him. So Jerry. Okay, well if you vote in the other primary don't make any difference what you say. I'm just kidding. Jerry Boyle, Jerry Boyle should be Attorney General then. Yes, indeed. A little controversy out of the AG's office. I had not been aware either statutorily required or just typically the Attorney General will offer a summary of the issue presented in statewide referenda. That has come out of the office on the same sex marriage amendment and the death penalty. The death penalty issue statement has now been retracted and is being redone based on bad information as I understand it that came from the elections board. That sounds a little strange to me. I have no idea what's going on there. Have you read the proposed marriage amendment? That last sentence is very tricky. I have. Well the last sentence I think is the victory of a very fundamentalist group agenda. But it's very vague. Well it's very general. And what the AG's issue statement and they're not retracting this. They're saying this is true. We have spent time looking at this. We didn't get bad information from whoever. And they're saying essentially the last sentence is not clear and it's going to be open to further judicial and legislative interpretation. Well I think if you look at the... That's astonishing to me. Well if you look at the groups that are coming out against the amendment, they're coming out because that last sentence, the medical society and many labor unions and a lot of groups that you would think probably would take a walk on this issue. They wouldn't get involved. But they're getting involved because there's so many contractual things are really gonna be litigated. It's what their conclusion is. It's very interesting to me. It's just one of those. One of the things that we learn as lawyers is before we make our arguments and we run off to court, but my senior partner always said it helps if you read the statute first. And that was a good lesson for me. And it helps to have read the amendment which I had not done carefully, quite frankly, until I had seen this issue statement and... Well even the supporters of the amendment are trying to walk that last sentence away. I mean as I've been watching the debates in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and again in Wisconsin Public Radio and a couple of sources, they're simply, it's sort of like watching The Wizard of Oz where they're saying, well don't look Dorothy behind the screen in that band, just don't worry about that. I assure you. Because we can promise you that there will always be these rights for family medical leave or there always will be these rights for partners in terms of hospitalization and domestic abuse and all that. None of that's gonna be affected. Well then you ask yourself, well what's that second sentence in there for? And when they're pressed I haven't gotten a good answer from them yet. You know, Joel Ivan was in a setting where he was being pressed on that at a forum out in Plymouth a couple of months ago. Yeah, I was one of the first ones who asked him the question. Right. I says we can have an honest disagreement over the applicability of the word marriage but the second sentence clearly says that the contractual agreements that people are entering into may not be legal and I don't, where did this come from? And he was just, he just basically said, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. It's not gonna affect anything. Well, so now we have a constitutional amendment which has got a clause which doesn't have any force and effect in the law beyond maybe to eliminate the word civil unions and not go the route of Vermont. But nobody's saying that out loud. I mean that would be the most narrow interpretation of that statute, of that clause. I concluded that things which are passed in the legislature are usually lobbied by someone and I think it was some of the most conservative homophobics out there who didn't like anything other than the very traditional marriage and male-female setting and they went just a little too far and now they've got a debate on their hands as to what the repercussions are gonna be of throwing out the net so widely. It was interesting. I was down in, I happened to be in Milwaukee Saturday for the Third World Jazz Festival and there's lots of, lots of folks down there and there were some folks doing some flyers and of all different types. But generally, third word, you'd imagine you'd be democratic. And there were lots of discussion along those lines. People were saying, the first part, well, we can agree to disagree, we understand why some people wanna do that, but what's really generating a lot of discussion and what's getting people to sign whatever people's letters of support and the petitions of support is that second sentence. Because most people are still of the mentality that well, we can maybe keep marriage to the heterosexuals, okay, for whatever reasons, but people who are living in certain committed relationships should have at least some civil rights when it comes to at least some issues and they don't believe for a moment that the way this is worded that a future court, we talk about activist judges, whether it be conservative activist judges or liberal activist judges, it's gonna get, that thing's so vague that any court in the land can define it any old way they want to. And interestingly enough, while the marriage amendment has really generated a lot of interest, I mean, there's a local group that's Fair Wisconsin, I think is a statewide group, but there's a local group that I have heard speak and they're working hard on it. I'm not hearing anything about the death penalty. And again, we're in August, this is a November election and I'm sure- People have a vacation, come September, everybody's back in school, everybody's home. I'm just gonna be interested to see what the death penalty discussion is. Some of the traditional more liberal groups that would get involved in this, I think are probably off working on the other amendment too. So I think there is an opportune time for those who are pro-death penalty of trying to sneak this thing in. Yeah, it'll be interesting. And I think some, your faith community, my faith community, those two are different as they are, I think you're gonna see a lot of, as time goes on, a lot more discussion from religious leaders about the death penalty issue. I think there's just a lot of politicians right now running away from the issue because of the Halbach case and nobody has, not a study in profiles and courage. So it'll be interesting to see how that plays out. And it is an interesting campaign tactic to call out your base by giving them something to vote on that is more than just a person, but as an actual issue. And it has certainly worked in recent years. It's a brilliant, let's face it, brilliant political strategy. And I'm cynical enough to think that there has to be at least some of that going on here. But it's interesting to me how the marriage amendment is kind of tending to backfire a little bit. So. I was accused of being cynical just a little while ago here. But I see here I'm an optimist. I don't have any problem with that. I think this generates a lot of great discussion and debate and decide. We decide as a society what kind of society we wanna live in. Yeah. And so I, like I said in a couple of episodes back, bring these debates on. I'm looking forward to them. The only problem is if everything focuses on the marriage issue and people are voting only on that marriage issue and sort of drag, the catch dragon in this last sentence, all of a sudden the repercussions are years of litigation, you're never gonna probably go back and not for a long time to change the constitution again to rectify this. You're gonna have all this litigation to try to sort things out. That's a good thing. That's right. So you can have more shows. You can tell I'm not an attorney. There's not a better way to spend time and money. And similarly you'll hope that the discussion about the death penalty is not gonna revolve around whether we like or don't like Stephen Avery. You know, or whether you should get life in prison, should the jury decide that? Or whether we, you know, you should fry. You know, as I hear some people say. You're hoping that the discussion's gonna be a little bit more high-minded. High-minded in thoughtful than that. Yeah, should you? Never mind. Well, and in cynical times, we tend to lose faith in the voting populace. We tend to lose faith that people can actually listen to issues and make reasoned choices, that they can get the information they need, that they get more than just a 30 second ad that either makes them feel good or paints the opposition as, you know, the devil or Hitler. Speaking of which, I wanna just talk about nasty ads. Oh, okay. I'm sorry, Tom. No, I was gonna say, is that- You know, you put on a new shirt, so I think you should- These two issues are gonna be questions then to all the candidates. Exactly. Yeah. And so we'll see how the candidates answer. How they clarify them in their mind, and then it gives reason for people to vote for them. And I think, you know, so far, I think the discussion about this amendment, the gay rights, gay marriage amendment, and even the stem cell discussion, it's been really reasonably good among the population. I don't know how it's gonna play out with the death penalty. It's maybe a little bit more emotional for some people, but, well, I can't think it's much more emotional than I think about it than, you know, rights of homosexuals in our society, but- I hope you're right, the only downside, one of the downsides is, was it last week there was a Pew Charitable Trust, did the survey and where people get their information from, and they found out that 20% of the people get no news at all. And then there was a 27% get it from the Russian emboss. You know, almost half the people get no news or they get it from some very biased source. That, you know, the old evening news and the newspaper and so on has really gone down as far as the source. So when we talk about enlightened debate on things, are people actually really aware? I can't- Well, then there's the blogosphere, which, of course, is just a whole new, interesting- But the report that came out through public radio was really kind of a shocking change to the way it was 20, 30, 40 years ago and where people got their news. How 20% of people can't get news, I mean, it seems to just wash, it washes over. They're not interested in it. Yeah, they're not interested. They're not interested, that's right. Of course, those folks are probably not voting. Yeah. Well, that would be a likely- Let's hope that they don't. Yeah. Or that their only source of information is not TV ads. It seems to be heating up pretty early in the gubernatorial race. This is not going to be an enlightened debate on issues. As far as I can tell, it is going to be, you know, which candidate is more of a crook. I was just fascinated by the commercial likening Doyle. Well, it wasn't so long ago that he was likened to the Ku Klux Klan. No, to Governor Wallace. And now it's President Nixon. Gee, these are early. I haven't seen any of these. Well, the Nixon one is, to me, particularly vicious. Yep, it's not pretty. I mean, like, where are you going to go from here? This is August. I mean, what's going to come in September and October? What's so disheartening about that ad and the Thompson ad that are also running against the governor is that we're not getting into anything about state finances or highway construction and all the other issues that are sort of bubbling up there and saying, hey, somebody got to look at some of these issues because they're major things the next governor needs to contend with. So, you know, you're right. Not only is it vicious, not only is it expensive, not only is it 30-second ad-oriented, none of it's based on any issues that really the governor for the next four years is going to have to deal with. That's sad. Yeah. And freedom of speech is construed by both the Wisconsin and US Supreme Courts would seem to indicate that this free-for-all that has become our election process is pretty corrupt in my view. It's all for sale to the highest bidder. Is freedom of speech and there doesn't seem to be any way that we can get around it. I think we can have, in my mind, we would redefine freedom of speech in a campaign context in a way that would ensure thoughtful debate and money of interest will always have a place. But, The only ads I've noticed were the anti-green ads and the one that I thought was pretty catchy was the stem cell one where the mother and her child and of course that's misrepresentation of green's position but I thought that- What is green's position? But it's- He's voted against- No, I'm not really, I'm not quite sure in my mind what it is. He's voted against all stem cell research as federal funding for stem cell research. You mean embryonic stem cell. Not adult stem cell research. Correct. Is that what it is? Is that the distinction? I don't, I, okay. In the existing lines that the president originally- He supported that. Supported that. But I thought they have a catchy line, you know? That's a green's position is extreme. Those kind of rhyme. Green is extreme. Green's too extreme. Is too extreme. I thought, oh. Yeah, that's going to be the mantra for the Doyle. Yeah. But in comparison to the Nixon ad, and I've seen that ad and I think it's pretty well done. And I think it always happens that, you know, positions do get misrepresented. They've got to. I mean, you can't do a thoughtful discussion of the intricacies of everybody's positions in a 30 minute ad like that, but- Second, 32nd ad. It's, yeah, 32nd ad. We should be so lucky. Look at you. Look at you. Well- Depending. I'm sorry. Get more sleep though. We'll get them right here and tell them that they can, you know, do their infomercials right here. It was much more of a soft pitch than the Nixon ad or the Ku Klux Klan ad or whatever that they've done in the Doyle. I don't know. No? No. I mean, I'm the guy wearing the red shirt and I shouldn't be wearing, we should be switching shirts here probably, but- Yeah, no kidding. I think if you're really calling Green up, you know, green a kid killer, you know. Basically, the subtext of that is, you know, Green doesn't mind these little girls dying, I mean, for his position. That's pretty tough spot. I think, you know, from my, I think if I were a Republican, I think I'd find that spot a pretty tough spot too. Now, I just don't know why Green's going, I mean, I can understand why Green's going ugly early, but I don't understand using Nixon because first of all, he's a plague on your party. And secondly, you know, he's got money from Abraham. I mean, I just don't, I think most people think all politicians are corrupt anyway, so these charges aren't really gonna go anywhere. I don't think they have any legs, unless all of a sudden somebody indicts the, you know, the governor for, you know, corruption. I don't think they're gonna go anywhere. I think- It's always a question of, we had a fundraiser and five days later, or five hours later, or five weeks later, you know, these people got a government contract. I think most people say, yeah, that's the way it works. You know, fortunately or unfortunately. So I just don't, and plus I said, you know, Green's got money, Green got money from Abraham off. I mean, does he really wanna go down that road? I just don't see that in a very effective campaign strategy. Well, I think he's trying to find very hard-hitting ads to go after Doyle, because not only is a Doyle campaign, but there are all those independent expenditures are entering your fray, citing his vote in favor of drug companies, and the other one was in favor of oil companies. So here you got everything negative against Green, and now it's Green saying, how do you combat that? Well, the political groups say you fight negative ads with negative ads, and so here we come, and it's just piling on as what it's gonna be for the next two months, as what some of the prognosticators are saying, is that it's not gonna clear up, it's just gonna get worse because they've got $47 million to dump into the media, and they're gonna do it by just continuing to have a barrage of negatives, and how long the people will tolerate it. I just turn it off, and I watch public television most often, but some people apparently do watch this, and as long as the polls- It's usually stuck in the middle of a Seinfeld episode, and there you are, you know? You just run to the refrigerator. Well, there you go, look what we're gonna do, DVDs, you just kind of bypass the car, all the commercials. Yeah, we have just a couple of minutes. We only have one minute left, hardly time to get into ethics reform, but interesting, the common cause, the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, and another group, whose name is escaping me, asked all the candidates for their- League of Women Voters, I think. League of Women Voters, yeah. I'm sorry, this'll be for another time when Tom will be wearing yet another outfit, and we thank his wardrobe consultant, it has really clasped up the program. And the rest of us will change clothes between the next one, I'm sure. There we go, thank you. I like the red. I like the red.