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Politics : Liberalism: Do You Agree We've Had Enough of It? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: FJB who wrote (102475)	4/7/2011 7:05:01 PM
From: CF Rebel	2 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 224749

That is great news if it holds up. They said on Fox News that official numbers won't be finalized until April 15th. Kloppenburg declared victory last night with only a 204 vote lead. Below is an interesting article about the race and election as of yesterday. host.madison.com DEE J. HALL \| dhall@madison.com \| 608-252-6132 \| Associated Press madison.com \| (1037) Comments \| Posted: Wednesday, April 6, 2011 3:10 pm Kloppenburg declares victory over Prosser in Supreme Court race Attorney JoAnne Kloppenburg has declared victory over incumbent state Supreme Court Justice David Prosser. According to unofficial results, Kloppenburg had 204 more votes than Prosser. With 100 percent of precincts reporting, Kloppenburg had 740,090 votes, or 50.01 percent. Prosser had 739,886 votes, or 49.99 percent. Final results could change and aren't official until they are canvassed and certified by the Government Accountability Board. Kloppenburg issued a statement thanking Prosser for his service and vowing to be an impartial judge. Prosser's campaign didn't immediately return a message seeking comment on whether he would seek a recount. The latest such a request could be made is April 20. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported that Prosser told supporters at his election-night party that there was "little doubt" there would be a recount. When she was trailing earlier Wednesday morning, Kloppenburg told supporters she hadn't given up. "We're still hopeful," Kloppenburg said, according to AP. "So thank you all and let's all get a good night's sleep and see what tomorrow brings." The nonpartisan matchup between Prosser, a self-described judicial conservative, and Kloppenburg, an assistant attorney general who has vowed to be impartial on the bench, drew more special-interest money and attention than any Supreme Court race in state history. Tuesday's contest was widely considered a referendum on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's moves to weaken public employee unions and a test of the political strength of the unions to strike back. The fate of Walker's law, currently tied up in Dane County Circuit Court, likely will be determined by the Supreme Court. A Kloppenburg win would be seen as breaking the court's 4-3 conservative bloc, which is expected to be sympathetic to the measure. The race also was being watched around the country as the first test of a coordinated move by Republican governors to cut state spending and undercut public employee unions, traditionally strong supporters of liberal and Democratic candidates. Business and conservative groups favoring Prosser, 68, weighed in heavily with TV ads, spending almost $2.2 million in an effort to defeat Kloppenburg, 57. The liberal Greater Wisconsin Committee poured an estimated $1.4 million into ads attacking Prosser, according to the New York-based Brennan Center for Justice, which has been tracking spending in the race. The commercials accused Prosser of declining to prosecute a sex offender priest in the late 1970s while he served as the district attorney of Outagamie County. The ads also charged Prosser would uphold Walker's political agenda. The incumbent also was criticized for calling Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson a "total bitch." He has said Abrahamson goaded him to anger, and he faulted her for creating a divisive atmosphere on the court. Kloppenburg was criticized for her lack of judicial experience and labeled as a "government lawyer" whose prosecution in a state environmental case landed an elderly farmer in jail. The spending broke the state's previous record for television spending by non-candidate groups, the Brennan Center said. "Once again, costly spending and negative attack ads have raged out of control in Wisconsin," said Charles Hall, a spokesman for Justice at Stake, which opposes special interest spending in court races. "Regardless of who wins this election, public confidence in a fair, impartial court system will inevitably be damaged." Both sides were banking on large turnouts in key areas Tuesday to fuel their candidates to victory in the race for a 10-year term on the bench. Madison has been ground zero for protests against Walker's collective bargaining bill that drew tens of thousands of demonstrators to the Capitol and around the state. Turnout in Madison was on pace to beat records for a spring election, with Madison estimating 70 percent of registered voters went to the polls. Prosser campaign manager Brian Nemoir said he was encouraged by high turnouts around Milwaukee. The counties around Wisconsin's largest city generally vote Republican, helping Prosser, a former Republican speaker of the state Assembly. Until Walker introduced his bill severely limiting collective bargaining for 175,000 public employees, Prosser was seen as a clear favorite. He got 55 percent of the vote in the four-way Feb. 15 primary to Kloppenburg's 25 percent. "Prosser won Milwaukee city and county in the primary, so that needs to turn around - and turn around big-time - for Kloppenburg to have a shot," said Charles Franklin, a UW-Madison professor of political science. Franklin said the heavier than normal turnout favored Kloppenburg because it meant voters who sat out the primary were energized to vote in Tuesday's election. "Prosser would have sailed to re-election if this (controversy) hadn't come up," Franklin said. "I think a lot of the race has become a proxy fight between Walker and the unions." The close results suggest the race may be decided by a recount. Under Wisconsin election law, a candidate has three days after the official results have been tallied to request a recount. The candidate must specify a reason for the request, such as a belief a mistake was made in the counting or some other irregularity. Prosser has been on the high court for 12 years. He was appointed by then-Gov. Tommy Thompson in 1998 and elected to a 10-year term with no opponent in 2001. Kloppenburg has worked as an assistant attorney general for 22 years under both Republican and Democratic attorneys general. She handles a variety of legal matters, specializing in environmental regulation and litigation. Prosser labeled her inexperienced. Kloppenburg criticized Prosser for being a partisan because of his repeated references to himself as a judicial conservative. The nearly $3.6 million in outside spending is for commercials aired through Monday and is expected to increase once Tuesday's ad buys are tallied, the Brennan Center said. Even without a final tally, this race has been more expensive than the 2008 contest that drew $3.38 million in outside spending. Then-Burnett County Circuit Judge Mike Gableman defeated incumbent Justice Louis Butler in that race. The candidates themselves were limited to each spending $100,000 in the primary and $300,000 in the general election under the state's new Impartial Justice Act - a public-financing program Walker proposes to cut. The winner of Tuesday's election will be sworn in Aug. 1. The Associated Press contributed to this report.

To: FJB who wrote (102475)	4/8/2011 7:55:38 AM
From: lorne	2 Recommendations Respond to of 224749

Unions, Muslims unite to demand 'trillions' Protesting U.S. aid to Israel, 'police terror' against blacks, Latinos April 07, 2011 By Aaron Klein © 2011 WorldNetDaily wnd.com The Service Employees International Union, or SEIU, the nation's second largest union, has united with an Islamic "peace" organization to protest everything from Fox News Channel to "corporate, and financial powers" to U.S. military aid to Israel. The duo are also calling for trillions in funds for jobs and "quality single-payer healthcare." The Islamic group is being trained by an acolyte of radical community organizer Saul Alinsky. The acolyte worked for a socialist group that was an offshoot of an Alinsky training academy funded jointly in the 1990s by President Obama and Weatherman terrorist Bill Ayers. Get Aaron Klein's new bestseller, "The Manchurian President," at WND's Superstore! The so-called Muslim Peace Coalition, or MPC, is helping to organize a rally entitled "Rally Against the Wars at Home and Abroad," set for this weekend in both New York City and San Francisco. The rally is being organized under the banner of another group calling itself the United National Antiwar Conference. An advertisement for the event defines the "war makers" that are the subject of the protest as "the government, corporate, and financial powers that wage war, ravage the environment and the economy and trample on our democratic rights and liberties." "[War makers] wage a fake 'war on terrorism' at home – the new McCarthyism – that promotes racism and Islamophobia aimed at destroying civil liberties and democratic rights," stated the ad. The protest will demand an end to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; a halt to U.S. aid to Israel; an end to "the racist persecution and prosecutions that ravage Muslim communities;" and the cessation of "police terror in Black, Latino and Native American communities." Along with the anti-war rhetoric are demands for the government to spend "trillions for jobs, education, social services, an end to all foreclosures, quality single-payer healthcare for all, a massive conversion to sustainable and planet-saving energy systems and public transportation and reparations to the victims of U.S. terror at home and abroad." One of this weekend's slated rally leaders is Imam Abdul Malik Mujahid, who is also a participating leader with MCP. Mujahid in 2008 was named to the Democratic National Committee's credentials committee, which coordinates selection of convention delegates and alternates. The Muslim Peace Council was launched in September 2010 under the banner of the "One Nation" rally in Washington, D.C., which was a counter to an earlier, massive event held there by Fox News host Glenn Beck. The "One Nation" event was endorsed by "Organizing for America," Obama's 2008 campaign website, which morphed into a fundraising arm of the Democratic National Committee. The September event was sponsored by a slew of radical groups, including the Communist Party USA, the Democratic Socialists of America, NAACP, Code Pink, the National Council of La Raza, George Soros' Campus Progress, the International Socialist Organization, the National Education Association, the Gray Panthers, the Soros-funded Institute for Policy Studies and Green For All, led by Van Jones, Obama's former "green jobs" adviser, who resigned in 2009 after it was exposed he founded a communist organization. The MPC, meanwhile, has taken a leadership position at protesting the recent hearings on Islamic radicalism led by Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. The MCP often holds protests in front of the Fox News headquarters in New York, claiming the news network is "anti-Muslim." The group's website dedicates an entire section to what it calls "Protest Fox." The MCP is endorsed by SEIU and its division 1199 health care workers union, which has helped to promote this weekend's planned protest. The 1199 SEIU is the largest, fastest-growing health care union in America. In January, MPC leaders held a training summit for what they called "Muslim peace activists." One of the speakers at the training program was Zead Ramadan of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR. The training program was led by Mike Gecan, who provided "organizing 101" training. Gecan is a community organizer and the executive director of Industrial Area Foundation, founded in 1940 by Alinsky himself. Gecan was personally trained by Alinsky. Gecan started off at the Citizens Action Program, which was founded by socialist activist Heather Booth, who also founded the Midwest Academy. Midwest teaches Alinsky tactics. Midwest Academy morphed into Citizen Action. Booth founded Midwest in the 1970s with her husband, Paul Booth, a founder and the former national secretary of Students for a Democratic Society, the radical 1960s anti-war movement from which William Ayers' Weather Underground terrorist organization splintered. The Woods Fund, a nonprofit on which Obama served as paid director from 1999 to December 2002, provided capital to the Midwest Academy. WND was first to report Obama sat on the Woods Fund board alongside Ayers. In 1999, Booth's Midwest Academy received $75,000 from the Woods Fund. In 2002, with Obama still serving on the Woods Fund, Midwest received another $23,500 for its Young Organizers Development Program. Midwest describes itself as "one of the nation's oldest and best-known schools for community organizations, citizen organizations and individuals committed to progressive social change."