Hillary Clinton's History with Black Folks: Lock 'Em Up

Clinton-Thompson-Walker Bond or Black Lives Matter more than Hillary Clinton's Career

Updated - Hillary Clinton is the embodiment of where the Democratic Party went wrong, the abandonment of human rights and decency replaced by passive complacency and careerism.

I wasn't shocked when Clinton defended her mentoring and advice from the war criminal, Henry Kissinger. It was convenient.

This is the same Hillary Clinton who made common cause with former Gov. Tommy Thompson (R-Wisconsin) and an obscure State Rep. Scott Walker (R-White People) in demonizing black folks in the 1990s—capitulating "entirely to the right-wing backlash against the civil-rights movement and (embracing) former president Ronald Reagan’s agenda on race, crime, welfare, and taxes—ultimately doing more harm to black communities than Reagan ever did," as noted in an important piece by Michelle Alexander in The Nation.

Notes Alexander: "In her support for the 1994 crime bill, for example, she used racially coded rhetoric to cast black children as animals. 'They are not just gangs of kids anymore,' she said. 'They are often the kinds of kids that are called "super-predators." No conscience, no empathy. We can talk about why they ended up that way, but first we have to bring them to heel.'

One hopes the inducements of a public salary, health care and pension are worth the deals some black members of Congress have made in their endorsement of Clinton.

But to these members of Congress, I say you know damn well you're selling out the future of a people who still matter, even if they're inconvenient to your political careers.

Bernie in Milwaukee with Irish-Latina

Consider private, for-profit prisons. "[T]here are now about 130 private prisons in the country with about 157,000 beds," notes Michael Cohen in the Washington Post on April 28, 2015, a couple of weeks after Hillary Clinton declared her candidacy for the presidency, (Chozick, NYT).

Six months later, it dawned on Clinton that she should cut her ties with the for-profit prison industry and stop taking money from private prison lobbyists, (Rivas, Fusion).

As for Bernie Sanders, he called for-profit prisons "morally repugnant and a national tragedy," and introduced bills to ban this disgrace, (Gaudiano, USA Today).

Hillary would have no moral high ground against a Marco Rubio or other Republican in the general election in this morally repugnant practice.

Bernie Sanders would and does now.

Bernie Sanders: Remember Eric Garner:

Scott Walker Enters Debate Under Cloud of Criminality

Scott Walker still refuses to
face Wisconsin people

Scott Walker is a scandal-plagued candidate for the presidency who still refuses answers to his clear acts of felonious criminality.

With the exception of Gov. Chris Christie (NJ) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) Walker enters tonight's debate with the most unanswered questions on his conduct in office, raising public integrity questions from which Walker has run.

Don't look for tonight's debate moderators, Fox News hosts Bret Baier, Megyn Kelly and Chris Wallace, to ask Scott Walker the question to which Wallace never received an answer from Walker last year: "Did you have your own private e-mail account?" (Mal Contends) (ThinkProgress)

Walker refused to answer Wallace's question because Walker knew what he did was illegal.

Chris Wallace like the Wisconsin media won't be clamoring for an answer to why Walker was running for governor on an illegal email system on public property and violating Wisconsin's Open Records law he unsuccessfully tried to gut this year. But if Wallace took seriously his profession as a journalist, he would ask Walker the same question. (Mal Contends) (ThinkProgress)

Walker's aborted gutting of the Open Records law earlier this year raises the same issue that Walker's flaunting of the Open Records law raised during Walker tenure as Milwaukee County Executive.

If Milwaukee County workers in Walker's administration (2002-10) were doing nothing wrong, why should they be using a private e-mail account? Did you have your own private e-mail account?

Noted before, Walker used the Milwaukee County Executive's office as a campaign machine for governor because he felt is he was entitled; Walker violated open records law because he felt he was entitled; and Walker won't talk to the press now because he knows as well that he is neck-deep in uncharged crimes.
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From 2014:

Question from Luke, Green Bay, Wisconsin. - A simple yes or no question "Did you Governor Walker know of the secret e-mail system?" Why won't he just answer the question? We are paying his salary. It is a simple yes-no question.

Answer from Daniel Bice, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel - Why won't he answer the question? My guess: He is paying his lawyers very good money, and they have told him, "Do not answer that question."

-- From the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, Columnist Dan Bice's Online Question and Answer February 2014) (Mal Contends)

Say what your will about Chris Christie, unlike Scott Walker, Christie does not run from questions.

From Chris Wallace last year:

Scott Walker—Authoritarian and Vindictive Is Now an American Problem

On the eve of Scott Walker's announcement for the presidency from the white citizens' stronghold of Waukesha, Wisconsin (DeFour, Wisconsin State Journal), it's apt that the New York Times runs a preview of a film on Philip Zimbardo's social psychological Stanford Prison Experiment (Murphy, New York Times).

The capacity of 'normal' human beings to inflict sadistic actions and suffering onto fellow human beings had astonished and repulsed thinking human beings, emphatically after the Holocaust and the United States invasion of Vietnam, and social psychologists have studied this phenomena of systematized savagery.

But for Scott Walker (and political allies, such as former governor Tommy Thompson [1987-2001]), demonizing and inflicting suffering onto disfavored citizens have been the vehicle by which these two Wisconsin governors have launched political careers and presidential campaigns.

Assaults on the working-class citizens of Wisconsin abound in Scott Walker's administration: the right to collective bargain; massive cuts for the University of Wisconsin; bans on abortions after 20 weeks, regardless of rape or incest; drug testing for aid recipients; repeated targeting of the city of Milwaukee, maintaining it as the most segregated urban area in the United States; attacking the open records laws; and avoiding and evading the populations' right to ask him questions about any of these policies (Walker has held no listening sessions for any of this legislation, even though none of it was mentioned in his election, recall, or re-election bids).

Super-max prisons, Thompson's vow to make inmates' lives a "living hell," and former State Rep. Walker's (1993-2002) peripatetic legislative push to create harsh prison sentences, expand the criminal code, create the authority to send nonviolent 'offenders' to out-of-state private prisons went on with little opposition from the Wisconsin citizenry or the Democratic Party.

"Walker pushed dozens of proposals in the state house to lengthen criminal penalties, for everything from perjury to privacy invasion to intoxicated boating. In just the 1997–98 legislative session, Walker authored or co-sponsored twenty-seven different bills that either expanded the definition of crimes, increased mandatory minimums for offenders, or curbed the possibility of parole," notes Scott Keyes in The Nation.

Walker openly bragged about his bill, the infamous Truth-in-Sentencing law, which limited early parole, as having come from the corporate bill mill, the American Legislative Exchange Committee.

Scott Walker is the classic "double high authoritarian" who takes pleasure in deceiving and hurting perceived incarnations of the wrong [black] type of people, while also marked by the inclination and "willingness to submit to established authority, (and) their aggressiveness on behalf of that authority" (Dean, part one, CounterPunch and Dean, part two CounterPunch).

To understand Scott Walker is to comprehend the history of Scott Walker's inclination to lie and evade.

As a profile in racism, Scott Walker presents to social psychologists an experiment in how a superstitious, cruel and callow politician with little understanding of public policy can rise to the level of serious discussion of becoming the nominee for a major party for the presidency of the United States.

Now that Walker is in the national arena, the heartless and senseless changes he has wrought in Wisconsin will be exposed to a wider audience and shown to be consonant with twentieth-century fascism and the "double high authoritarianism" discussed by Dean.

Scott Walker Silent on Clinton and Walker Emails, Walker PAC Blows Message

Scott Walker and other Republican nominal candidates for president are reacting with awkward silence to news Hillary Clinton has called for the State Department to vet and release her emails transmitted during her tenure as Secretary. (Glueck, Politico) (Schmidt, NYT)

But no Republican candidate (as-yet-undeclared) is in as awkward a position as Scott Walker.

That's because Scott Walker's aides and appointees embezzled from military veterans (CBS News) and their families, and during Walker's Milwaukee County Executive tenure (2002 to 2010) Walker's administration installed a secret email-router system that Walker and aides used to campaign on the premises of a public office, a criminal probe revealed, after Walker first stonewalled the criminal investigation. (Bice, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel)

"Did you have your own personal email account," Chris Wallace asked Scott Walker last year. (Mal Contends)

Walker backed down, refusing to answer Yes or No.

Chris Wallace's question among many others remain as Scott Walker's shady dealings look to haunt his faux run for the presidency.

The answer to Wallace's question is: Yes, Scott Walker had his own email address and was in receipt of and sent many emails on this illegal system.

The public release of documents has already established these facts, but Walker won't acknowledge these facts publicly, though he claims he did nothing wrong or illegal.

The Democratic National Committee said, "If Walker wants to talk about emails, let’s look at his history first." (Hall and Savidge, Wisconsin State Journal)

History? That something liberal professors teach at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that Walker is working to destroy.

The Hillary/Scott Walker email story took a strange turn a couple of days ago when the Daily Caller (Pappas) reported Walker's PAC was calling for answers about email questions from Hillary, not Walker:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s political action committee is hitting Hillary Clinton over the recent revelations that she used private email accounts for official business while secretary of state, saying she needs to address questions about the legality of the practice.

“Hillary Clinton’s potential evasion of laws is something she should answer questions about,” Kirsten Kukowski, a spokeswoman for Walker’s new political action committee, Our American Revival, said in an email.

Either Kukowski has an unconventional sense of irony or Kukowski just embarrassed herself out of a job (but that will have to wait).

Writes Dee Hall and Nico Savidge in this morning's Wisconsin State Journal (Madison):

Walker has said that throughout his time as Milwaukee County executive, he had a clear policy that county employees were prohibited from using county resources or county time to be involved in political activities.

But investigative records released in February 2014 indicated Walker was aware his staff was communicating about campaign business using private emails during regular county  work hours.

In one message, Walker aide Cindy Archer wrote to deputy chief of staff Kelly Rindfleisch explaining that she used a private email account to communicate with Walker and his chief of staff, Tom Nardelli.

“Consider yourself now in the ‘inner circle’ :) I use this private account quite a bit to communicate with SKW and Nardelli,” Archer wrote, referring to Walker’s initials. “You should be sure you check it throughout the day.”

In a May 13, 2010, email on which Walker was copied, campaign adviser R.J. Johnson gave the final OK to two county staff members — Rindfleisch and Nardelli — along with campaign officials on what to say about another Walker employee, Darlene Wink, who had been caught posting campaign-related comments online about Walker during work time.

The approved statement: “No one in our office had any knowledge that Darlene was posting any comments during work hours. The county executive and chief of staff expressly forbid staff participation in any campaign-related activity while on county time.”

That is the tip of the spear, as Walker's political allies attempt to shut down and censor deliberations of the Wisconsin Supreme Court's consideration of cases from another criminal probe involving Walker's scheme, John Doe II

Putting aside the questions what shady characters like Tim Russell (embezzled from military veterans) and Kelly Rindfleisch (convicted of misconduct in public office) were doing as top aides to Scott Walker and what this tells us about Walker, note that in 2002 Walker ordered the installation of another secret router to avoid public disclosure and campaign.

"Bob Kiefert said that in 2002, when he was Milwaukee County human resources assistant director, he was called into Walker’s office by then-deputy chief of staff Tim Russell. Kiefert showed Russell how to set up a hard-wired Internet connection using a DSL modem and a telephone line. The network allowed county executive staff to send and receive emails and surf the Web outside the public system set up by the county’s Information Management Services Division in 1998," reported Matthew DeFour last year in the Wisconsin State Journal.

Kiefert broke this Scott Walker corruption story in the Green Bay Progressive.

Writes Kiefert:

During the 1990s, I was responsible for technology in the Department of Human Resources (DHR) and had set up a departmental network with email and a web site with it’s own ISDN line link to the internet. We were one of several county departments who had moved in this direction in the 90s in advance of a countywide system later developed by the central Information Management Services Division (IMSD).

DHR was only one floor below the County Executive’s Office in the Courthouse, and Tim Russell wanted to know how I did it. During our meeting in 2002, I told him.

As I remember, Russell told me that Scott Walker was very appreciative of my help and wanted to thank me personally. Russell took me over to Walker’s office for the meet and greet, but he turned out to be busy and only smiled and waved from his desk as we stood outside his office door.

I have no doubt that Walker knew what he was smiling and waving about. Russell had certainly made it clear that we were doing this at Walker’s bidding.

I have not really talked much about that day over the years and was not contacted about this information during the recent John Doe inquiry. That I assisted other departments within the county on technology issues during this period was certainly no secret at the time.

But I can tell you one thing, if Walker continues to deny knowledge of this email system and its usage, he is giving you a line of baloney.

Baloney is something the rest of America is going to have to get used to as a steady diet if Scott Walker prays more and gets instructions to form a presidential exploratory committee in the coming months.

Scott Walker—Evasive and Dishonest

Scott Walker's evasive style and refusal
to answer questions is SOP

Update: Conniving may be a better word to describe Scott Walker.

"As much as Walker jauntily yearns to go big, his proposed budget is filled with provisions that are small and conniving.

"Walker’s central organizing principle is to permanently cripple Wisconsin government at every level and to undermine public education by manufacturing a budget crisis despite an improving economy. Simultaneously, he is burdening future leaders with unknowable financial crises once Walker is done exploiting the state to bolster his tea party credibility." (Fanland, The Capital Times)
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Scott Walker is trying to project an image of a big and bold leader making decisive calls in his fundraising campaign disguised as a presidential run.

Serious minds in the Republican Party know better than presenting Scott Walker as the Republican Party nominee for president of the United States, so Jeb Bush will get the nomination.

It comes as no surprise to most people in Wisconsin that Scott Walker's top aides, friends and appointees were convicted of an array of felonies and misdemeanors in the public integrity investigation known here as WalkerGate I (or John Doe I). (Bice, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel)

The scandal saw Walker's aides plead guilty to an array of crimes including misconduct in public office, embezzling from military veterans and their families, and revealed a secret email-router system Walker and aides used to campaign on the premises of public office.

Walker refused to answer the question if Walker personally used the system after being asked on GOP-friendly Fox News by Chris Wallace last year, though released emails show Walker did use the illegal system.

As Chris Wallace put it to Scott Walker:

In one email that was released this week, your then chief of staff Thomas Nardelli, let’s put this up on the screen, writes campaign and county workers that you wanted to hold daily conference calls, 'to review events of the day or of a previous or future day so we can better coordinate sound timely responses,' and in another e-mail county administrative director Cynthia Archer suggests that colleagues should use a private e-mail account. 'I use this private account quite a bit to communicate with SKW,' that’s you, 'and Nardelli, the former chief of staff.

Question: if county workers were doing nothing wrong, why should they be using a private e-mail account?

Walker ran away from the question, prompting the following exchange:

WALLACE: Did you have your own private e-mail account?

Scott Walker: It’s one of those where I point out district attorney has reviewed every single one of these issues.

WALLACE: But sir, you’re not answering my question.

Scott Walker: No, because I’m not going to get into 27,000 different pieces of information. (Isreal, ThinkProgress)

Actually, Wallace's question is: Did Scott Walker have his private [and illegal] email account.

The answer is 'yes,' and Walker should have been prosecuted.

The evasive, shifty Scott Walker is typical.

Walker used his taxpayer-financed position as Milwaukee County Executive to secretly run for governor, first gearing up for his run in 2006, aborting it, and then running successfully running in 2010.

Now, Walker is attempting to abort WalkerGate II (or John Doe II), another public integrity investigation, looking into Scott Walker's Recall, a criminal scheme and campaign funded by dark money and illegal campaign coordination, (Marley, Bice and Glauber, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel), as WalkerGate II cases have reached the Wisconsin Supreme Court.

Walker proposes that four GOP-friendly judges on the Wisconsin Supreme Court get to decide their own ethics (eliminating of the Judicial Council, already stacked with Walker-vetted ideological appointees) as prosecutors and constitutional law enforcement officers ask that justices recuse themselves now that consolidated John Doe II cases are before the Court. (Fischer, PRWatch)

We need honest jurists committed to the rule-of-law to hold accountable corruption and criminality in our public officials.

Don't look for candid or even responsive answers from Scott Walker when asked about his public conduct.