So-called Merit Selection Is GOP Fraud

The Wisconsin State Journal continues its years-long advocacy of 'merit selection' of Wisconsin supreme court justices, to replace direct citizens' election.

The State Journal's idea is deceitful, and the text even in its latest editorial belies the intent to install more GOP justices onto the Court.

Writes the State Journal: "(J)udicial elections are turning Wisconsin’s best judges into the worst of politicians. The candidates routinely take campaign money from the same attorneys and special interest groups that eventually will come before the court, seeking favorable decisions. That creates conflicts of interest and deep distrust in court decisions."

Yes, GOP judicial candidates take campaign money from special interests in obvious conflicts of interests on whose cases the GOP justices rule—that's the "Roggensack Rule," in which the four GOP justices alone "accepted verbatim a rule suggested by Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce and the Wisconsin Realtors Association, which stated that a campaign donation by itself could never require a recusal." (Murphy)

Yet, the State Journal editors refuse to advocate the defeat of the GOP justices.

Ed Fallone has campaigned against the Roggensack Rule, so the State Journal will endorse Fallone, right?

No. The State Journal wants Roggensack and the other three GOP justices and their rubber stamp votes on Scott Walker's agenda. Where's the merit in that?

If the State Journal were really concerned about conflict of interests and money, they would be opposing the four GOP perpetrators on the court.

The State Journal's editorial is composed mostly of criticism of all the special interest money in the race.

Not surprisingly, Scott Walker and the GOP killed public financing for candidates to the state Supreme Court in 2011, a move that nevertheless earned the GOP the State Journal's editorial support.

The State Journal's editorial is entitled the "The no-comment campaign," because the candidates rightfully refuse comment cases in which they are likely to rule ... sometimes.

But even the title is misleading as Roggensack has made clear her intention to uphold the GOP's Act 10 (passed with unanimous GOP support and no Democratic support) and the GOP's voter obstruction law (again passed with unanimous GOP support and no Democratic support): "Roggensack said that if Fallone is elected he would 'chip away' at the powers of the other two branches of government (currently held by the GOP in secretly gerrymandered districts)," notes Jud Lounsbury.

Chip away. How's that? By overturning unconstitutional laws?

The four GOP justices are corrupt. The State Journal editors know this, and refuse to point out the GOP corruption.

The State Journal had rather adopt a reformist pose and advocate taking away public scrutiny of the third branch of Wisconsin government.

Transparency is not the GOP and State Journal's way.

By the way, Chief Justice Abrahamson's proposal for open deliberation of the Supreme Court was opposed four-to-three with all four GOP justices voting to block transparency to the State Journal's approval.

Fallone opposes secrecy. Roggensack voted for secrecy. Where's the merit in that?

David Prosser Has Lost It

David Prosser - Can we recall this guy?

Even for David Prosser, GOP justice on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, it's getting weird now.

And it's those pesky women justices behind it all.

First, Justice Ann Walsh Bradley runs throat-first into Prosser's unsuspecting (Lueders, Golden, Halsted, and Shipley), and Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson has the temerity to witness the assault, along with most of the Court.

They can't judge me, says Prosser.

The Journal-Sentinel (Marley) notes yesterday:

The state Judicial Commission filed allegations last month that said Prosser had violated the ethics code for judges when he put his hands on Bradley's neck during a confrontation in June. Prosser contends Bradley came at him with fists raised and that his hands touched her neck when he put them up in a reflex.

Prosser said in his filings that Bradley had to recuse herself because of her involvement in the incident and that Abrahamson had to recuse herself because she witnessed it and is biased against him.

As ludicrous as the Court rules are for judging ethical conduct, maintained by the four GOP justices of course, Prosser is unstable and has a thing against his betters, especially when they are female "total bitch(es)," in the words of Prosser.

"It is unfortunate -- some might even say absurd -- that each individual justice is the final arbiter on the question of whether she or he ought to accuse," Abrahamson wrote. (WisPolitics)

Prosser sure hates women like Abrahamson and Bradley; but it is his position as a voting justice—bought and paid for by the GOP—that ought to concern us as well.

When Prosser was running for reelection last in March 2011, he campaigned openly telling special interests how his past votes advanced their interests, not even bothering to declare himself an impartial jurist ascertaining the law and impartially applying it to cases that come before the state's top appellate court.

As reported in March 2011 (Sandler):

Speaking to the Rotary Club of Milwaukee on Tuesday, Justice David Prosser highlighted several of his decisions that he said had benefited Milwaukee County businesses ... With one week before the election, Prosser said Milwaukee County was crucial in the campaign. Then he listed several Supreme Court rulings in which he had joined in decisions that he said were 'very helpful' to local interests ...

At the time Prosser's opponent, Assistant Attorney General JoAnne Kloppenburg [who just won a judgeship in the Spring election on the District Four Court of Appeals], "called [Prosser's] statements inappropriate for a judicial contest. ... Kloppenburg said a judge shouldn't use his rulings to seek political support. ... Prosser 'has this partisan approach to being a judge.'" (Sandler, MJS)

What a bitch, right David?

Republicans Want to Alter Constitution to Oust Chief Justice Abrahamson

Republicans despise Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson's independence and fidelity to the rule of law

From Daily Kos

There is no doubt that Wisconsin Republicans dislike progressive Wisconsin Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson. As the longest sitting jurist on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, appointed first in 1976 and winning reelection four times since then, she has been Chief Justice since 1996. Wisconsin state statute makes the Justice with the most seniority the Chief Justice, and Abrahamson has filled that role with intelligence and levelheadedness, even in the face of overt hostility from Justice Prosser and difficult issues before the court in recent months.

Chief Justice Abrahamson's tenure as Chief Justice is going to end, if the Republicans have anything to do with it. Another hastily designed, written, and soon to be passed item circulating in the legislature is a change in the State Constitution article VII, which speaks to the position of the Chief Justice.

See Daily Kos.