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KochGate?

Alferd_Packer

Philosopher
Alferd_Packer
Joined
Jul 3, 2007
Messages
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A caller, posing as billionaire David Koch, managed to get on the phone with Scott Walker, Governor of Wisconsin.

Among the revalations:

Governor Walker says he is planning to issue between 5,000 and 6,000 "risk notices" to state workers announcing that they are at risk of being laid off. He makes this statement in the context of what he is planning to do to put pressure on Democrats to cave into his demands, not what is necessary due to the budget crunch. "If they want to start sacrificing thousands of public workers to be laid off," he says, "sooner or later there's gonna be pressure on Senators to come back. We're not going to compromise."
. . .

Walker describes a plan created by his chief of staff to call Senate Democrats back to "hear what they have to say." While he is discussing the issues with the Democrats, the Senate would be in recess. In actuality, once Democrats come back to the state assembly, Republicans would be able to pass the bill eliminating collective bargaining rights while Walker is in discussions with Democrats.
. . . .

David Koch says that they are considering "planing some troublemakers" among the crowd of protesters. Walker responds with, "we thought about that." He expresses no moral objection to the plan, but says that he thinks it is the wrong strategy, because a "ruckus" would make people think he should compromise.
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Source

This is better than Blago.
 
sounds like the call was recorded unlawfully. But then, I don't care how many right wing whackadoodles get their panties in a twist after what their attack mutts did to ACORN and Planned Parenthood and SEIU.

If any of the right wingers whine about it, I will tell them to go slap Breitbart for setting himself up as a role model for journalists.
 
leftysergeant said:
sounds like the call was recorded unlawfully. But then, I don't care how many right wing whackadoodles get their panties in a twist after what their attack mutts did to ACORN and Planned Parenthood and SEIU.

If any of the right wingers whine about it, I will tell them to go slap Breitbart for setting himself up as a role model for journalists.
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Depends on the state. Some allow recordings if one side knows about it. Others require both sides to know. (That's what tripped up Linda Tripp, Maryland requires both.) I don't know where Wisconsin stands.
 
Spindrift said:
Depends on the state. Some allow recordings if one side knows about it. Others require both sides to know. (That's what tripped up Linda Tripp, Maryland requires both.) I don't know where Wisconsin stands.
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It appears to allow this type of taping:

http://www.rcfp.org/taping/quick.html

But, I'm sure a more thorough analysis is underway at law firms firms across Wisconsin . . . .
 
besides for the issue of how the tape was made, does anyone have any comments as to the substance of the tapes themselves?
 
Alferd_Packer said:
besides for the issue of how the tape was made, does anyone have any comments as to the substance of the tapes themselves?
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Pretty embarrassing, but I'm not terribly surprised.

Walker wants to slash and burn, he makes no bones about it and doesn't care about niceties.
 
On a prank call that quickly spread across the Internet, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker was duped into discussing his strategy to cripple public employee unions, promising never to give in and joking that he would use a baseball bat in his office to go after political opponents.

The two talked for at least 20 minutes — a conversation in which the governor described several potential ways to pressure Democrats to return to the Statehouse and revealed that his supporters had considered secretly planting people in pro-union protest crowds to stir up trouble.

He also floated an idea to lure Democratic senators back to the Capitol for negotiations and then have the Senate quickly pass the bill while they are in talks.

The caller suggested he was thinking about "planting some troublemakers" among the protesters, and Walker said his administration had thought about doing that, too, but decided against it.



......true Tea-Bagger scumbag.
 
Realistically, most of the stuff in there was cringe-worthy, but not long-term politically damaging. I think the most damaging/controversial things he said were regarding planted protesters and agreeing that Mika Brzezinski was "a hot piece of ass."

But then again, he has plausible deniability on both fronts, since he never explicitly said either thing, so this will most likely just become a non-issue, unless he starts publicly apologizing for it or something.
 
The title to the thread does not describe the topic.

Here are some suggestions:

WalkerGate
What Goes Around Comes Around

and my favorite:
The Left Pulls an O'Keefe and uncovers a Real Crime
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
The title to the thread does not describe the topic.

Here are some suggestions:

WalkerGate
What Goes Around Comes Around

and my favorite:
The Left Pulls an O'Keefe and uncovers a Real Crime
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What was the real crime? I missed that in there. I saw some typical sleazy politics that one would expect any governor to engage in, but what was the crime?
 
A Laughing Baby said:
Realistically, most of the stuff in there was cringe-worthy, but not long-term politically damaging. I think the most damaging/controversial things he said were regarding planted protesters and agreeing that Mika Brzezinski was "a hot piece of ass."

But then again, he has plausible deniability on both fronts, since he never explicitly said either thing, so this will most likely just become a non-issue, unless he starts publicly apologizing for it or something.
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Mother Jones reports there might have been a law broken:

Did Gov. Scott Walker Break the Law During Prank Call?
In his conversation, Walker says that GOP lawmakers in "swing areas" will need support for their decision to back Walker's controversial budget repair bill, which would cut collective bargaining rights for public-sector unions, among other changes. Walker appears to hint that the fake David Koch could be the one to provide that outside support to those swing-district Republicans. Here's the full exchange:

Gov. Walker: "After this in some of the coming days and weeks ahead, particularly in some of these more swing areas, a lot of these guys are going to need, they don’t need initially ads for them, but they’re going to need a message out. Reinforcing why this was a good thing to do for the economy, a good thing to do for the state. So to the extent that message is out over and over again is certainly a good thing."

Ian Murphy (pretending to be David Koch): "Right, right. We’ll back you any way we can."

"If Wisconsin law forbids coordination with political donors similar to federal law, Gov. Scott Walker is not just in political trouble, but in legal hot water," said David Donnelly, national campaigns director for the Public Campaign Action Fund.
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BTW, recording the call was legal in WI and in NY. Both states allow recording as long as one party consents.
 
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A Laughing Baby said:
Well, we will see how that plays out, then. With all the focus on the other things (namely the plants and the bait-and-switch), no one brought that up that I had seen. Mea culpa.
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Well you can bet a defense attorney will try to claim the request was sufficiently disguised in generalities.

But something tells me, given the publicity for this embarrassment and the publicity of the ass squirting vodka drinking security guard picture, Walker's chances of re-election are slim to none. Unfortunately that won't help WI workers in the short run. That is, unless it gets bad enough a few of the state Repubs who still think they can be re-elected decide to throw Walker under the bus.
 
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Has it been shown that it actualy is walker?
 
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