Yes, we have no super PACs in Wisconsin
The other day a reporter from Swedish Public Television contacted the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism regarding the role of super PACs in Wisconsin's historic recall elections. "How much...
View ArticleWinners and losers in Wisconsin's 2012 recall elections
As the dust settles on Wisconsin's tumultuous recall elections, let's acknowledge some of the winners and losers with appropriate commendations.
View ArticleWisconsin Department of Administration thumbs nose at state law on outside...
The law could hardly be clearer or more unequivocal: Wisconsin state statute 16.705(8) requires the state Department of Administration to file a report by Oct. 15 of each year regarding the hiring of...
View ArticleWisconsin's congressional delegation is loaded with multimillionaires
The requirement that all members of Congress file annual financial disclosure reports serves a worthy purpose. Passed as part of the Ethics in Government Act of 1978, a post-Watergate reform, it's...
View ArticleWisconsin state government increasingly outsources work to expensive private...
A belatedly issued report on the state's hiring of outside contractors is raising fresh questions about the integrity of the process. "It's no wonder that the Department of Administration tried to...
View ArticleFundraising donations, personal cash flow into Wisconsin congressional campaigns
"This Modern World", the biting satirical cartoon by the pseudonymous Tom Tomorrow, recently proposed streamlining the American political process. "Take elections," mused the strip's narrator. "They're...
View ArticleHope springs eternal for Wisconsin's election reformers
In preparing for a recent interview in which he knew he'd be asked about tilting at windmills, Mike McCabe crafted a T-shirt-worthy reply: "To me, there's always reason for hope, and never much reason...
View ArticleWisconsin's Republican and Democratic party platforms differ sharply,...
Writing in 1993, Colby College political science professor L. Sandy Maisel called political party platforms "the most important document(s) that a political party produces" but also "worthless pieces...
View ArticlePaul Ryan reaps financial benefits from his policies
The respected national media outlet Politico lost no time latching onto an issue that made a brief splash last year and is now sending ripples into the presidential race.
View ArticleWisconsin Realtors make controversial donations to Wisconsin Club for Growth
Newly filed federal tax forms show that the Wisconsin Homeowners Alliance, a WRA offshoot billed as "a nonpartisan, nonprofit advocacy organization devoted to representing homeowners and property...
View ArticleTommy Thompson made a fortune, but not as a lobbyist
Tommy Thompson has been called many things, not all of them flattering. But there's nothing he hates worse than being called a "lobbyist." The former Wisconsin governor and current U.S. Senate...
View ArticleWisconsin wolf hunting bill fares badly in court
For Chris Danou, the temptation is too great to resist. "I hate to say 'I told you so,'" deadpans the Democratic state representative from the village of Trempealeau. "But I told you so." Danou, who...
View ArticleIs Wisconsin competitive in presidential race? Ads will tell
Barack Obama, in accepting his party's nomination for a second term as president, commiserated with the viewers he reached on television screens throughout the nation: "I know that campaigns can seem...
View ArticleState electrical safety code changes tied to Wisconsin Builders Association...
It was an easy conclusion to leap to. A recent "Wisconsin State Journal" report on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's proposal, since aborted, to deep-six building codes requiring electrical safety devices...
View ArticleDane County Judge Juan Colas' ruling on Act 10 draws enraged responses
A Dane County judge who struck down parts of Act 10, the state's law weakening collective bargaining for some public workers, has drawn a spate of letters and phone messages expressing outrage in...
View ArticlePaul Ryan faces well-funded challenger Rob Zerban in Wisconsin's First...
"I would not have gotten into this race if I did not think I could win it," says Rob Zerban, 44, a former Kenosha County Board member who has run successful catering businesses.
View ArticleOutside cash flows to contested Wisconsin races
Forget opinion polling. Ignore endorsements. Never mind how much money the candidates raise. To see which electoral races are truly competitive, look at where the special interests are putting their...
View ArticleWisconsin Coverts Project teaches people how to manage state's woods
From now on, just call me "Mr. Ambassador." For the better part of four days at the end of August, I was among a group of about two dozen people who received intensive instruction in woodlands...
View Article"Citizens United" opens funding spigot for Wisconsin candidates
Jay Heck is clear on who's to blame -- the U.S. Supreme Court. The executive director of Common Cause in Wisconsin, a nonpartisan group that backs campaign finance reform, says the huge and perhaps...
View ArticleGetting politics down to a science
What is it that makes one person vote Democratic and another Republican? Barry Burden, a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, sums up some of the recent research done...
View ArticleA house divided: Can a Democratic/Republican marriage survive in a...
The initial reaction was not encouraging. The couples I learned of who fit the bill did not respond to my inquiries. A message on the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism's Facebook page,...
View ArticleCandidates pour money into new media, even videogames
Modern information technology is transforming society so fast that what was cutting-edge yesterday seems quaint today. Increasingly sophisticated communication methods are being used in all spheres,...
View ArticleWisconsin donors are cheapskates in presidential race
According to the Federal Election Commission, Wisconsin individuals and groups given $8.9 million to the various presidential candidates, through Oct. 17. Of this amount, $4.4 million has gone to Obama...
View ArticleRecord political spending in Wisconsin results in little change
The Nov. 6 election was as exhausting as it was astonishing, especially when viewed from the new ground zero for American elections -- the intersection of money and politics. Records were broken, along...
View ArticleThose hated TV ads worked in Wisconsin this election
On Election Day, capping off months of record spending on federal and state political campaigns, reporters from the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism visited some Madison polling places to...
View ArticleVote tallies suggest redistricting boosted Wisconsin Republicans in 2012 races
In the aftermath of the Nov. 6 elections, words like "fickle" and "schizophrenic" are being bandied about to describe the Wisconsin electorate. How else can anyone explain a group of voters who...
View ArticleAccusations fly about Wisconsin election law violations in 2012 races
A week before the Nov. 6 election, Americans for Prosperity tried to pump up support for GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney. The conservative advocacy group offered $1.84 per gallon gas to...
View ArticleWisconsin Sen. Dale Schultz expects better mining bill, with environmental...
Two days after the Nov. 6 election in which Republicans retained dominion in the state Assembly and regained control of the Senate, a GOP assemblyman interviewed in the state Capitol press room...
View ArticleRedistricting that favored Wisconsin Republicans spurs call for reforms
"The outcome of this year's U.S. House as well as state Senate and state Assembly elections testify to the power of redistricting," Mike McCabe, the executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy...
View ArticleWisconsin Senate race between Tammy Baldwin and Tommy Thompson shatters state...
Candidates and interest groups poured more than $78 million into Wisconsin's recent U.S. Senate race that led to Democrat Rep. Tammy Baldwin's Nov. 6 win over former Republican Gov. Tommy Thompson,...
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