Free Republic

The embattled town of Campbell police chief pleaded no contest Friday to a misdemeanor that accused him of using a tea party activist’s information online during work hours to retaliate for a federal lawsuit brought against him. “I understand that there is a political context to this case, but my view of it is not political,” Monroe County Circuit Judge David Rice said. “I view it as a criminal case.” After months of conflict between the town, police and tea party activists, Chief Tim Kelemen in January and March used La Crosse tea party activist Greg Luce’s name, address, phone...

Dead heat. That's what Wisconsin is staring at in the race for governor, with Gov. Scott Walker and Democratic challenger Mary Burke neck-and-neck heading into the November election, according to the latest Marquette University Law School poll released Wednesday. Among registered voters, Walker led Burke, 46% to 45%. Among likely voters, Burke led Walker, 47% to 46%. "The bottom line is that nothing has statistically changed from May to July," said Charles Franklin, the poll director. "We're seeing a dead heat in the race, well within the margin of error." "As the race really heats up with advertising and back...

Many American colleges and universities are in the thrall of “diversity,” but none more so than my institution, the University of Wisconsin. This spring, the university adopted a new plan that, according to Board of Regents policy, “[p]laces the mission of diversity at the center of institutional life so that it becomes a core organizing principle.” That is, promoting diversity appears to be more important than teaching students. This Framework for Diversity and Inclusive Excellence sailed through our Faculty Senate without the least bit of attention, much less the “sifting and winnowing” on which it prides itself. Although much of...

Barring any groundbreaking new developments, Congressional Republicans have no intention of trying to impeach President Barack Obama, despite calls for the commander-in-chief’s ouster by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin. “The Constitution is very clear as to what constitutes grounds for impeachment of the President of the United States,” House Judiciary Chair Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., told ABC's George Stephanopoulos last week. “He has not committed the kind of criminal acts that call for that.” Other establishment Republicans have similarly dismissed impeachment talk as little more than blowhards seeking headlines. “No responsible Republican elected official has called for impeachment,”...

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Politifact.com have been tracking Gov. Scott Walker’s election campaign promises through an online feature they call the “Walk-O-Meter” and can be found online at PolitifactWisconsin.com. There you will find that Walker has kept an overwhelming amount of his campaign promises out of the 65 they are tracking.

A prosecutor plans to charge a western Wisconsin police chief with a misdemeanor for allegedly registering a tea party leader on gay dating, pornography and federal health care websites. Monroe County District Attorney Kevin Croninger told The Associated Press he plans to charge Town of Campbell Police Chief Tim Kelemen with misdemeanor unlawful use of a computerized communication system Thursday afternoon. Kelemen would face up to $1,000 in fines and 90 days in jail if convicted, but would still be able to stay on as police chief. Only those with felony convictions or misdemeanor convictions related to domestic violence are...

Many American colleges and universities are in the thrall of “diversity,” but none more so than my institution, the University of Wisconsin. This spring, the university adopted a new plan that, according to Board of Regents policy, “[p]laces the mission of diversity at the center of institutional life so that it becomes a core organizing principle.” ......................................................... It calls for “proportional participation of historically underrepresented racial-ethnic groups at all levels of an institution, including high status special programs, high-demand majors, and in the distribution of grades.”

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) called on state lawmakers Thursday to pass a bill in January that would repeal the Common Core standards and replace them with “standards set by people in Wisconsin.” According to the Wisconsin State Journal, Walker released a statement Thursday afternoon, just hours after two Republican state senators, Leah Vukmir and Paul Farrow, issued a joint press statement calling for a delay in the use of the Smarter Balanced Assessments (SBAC) that are aligned with the Common Core standards. Earlier in the year, Walker helped draft a bill that would create a state board to replace...

MADISON, Wis. - The city of Madison may be called on to shelter between 150 to 250 unaccompanied and undocumented children who’ve come into the country through the Mexican border. Mayor Paul Soglin told News 3 the city is working with several community organizations to find a facility to shelter the children. The city is looking for a facility of at least 90,000 square feet, like unused grocery stores. The federal Department of Health and Human Services is asking all cities with more than 200,000 people to consider hosting children. All expenses would be paid by the federal government. Soglin...

A new warship to be named the USS Detroit will be commissioned in a 2016 ceremony along the Detroit River. The 389-foot long, 7.5-million-pound littoral combat ship, shown here in a June 27 photo, is being built in Marinette, Wis. It will sail after the Detroit ceremony to its home port in San Diego. (Lockheed Martin) (more details and a slideshow at link)

Local school districts in Wisconsin are opting out of the onerous school lunch guidelines that have been pushed largely by First Lady Michelle Obama as part of her campaign to fight obesity, choosing instead to make their own guidelines about proper food nutrition at the local level. As the Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel reports, Rick Petfalski, school board president of the Muskego-Norway School District, said, “We believe that proper food nutrition and meal portion guidelines are best decided at a local level.” Petfalski’s school district’s decision to opt out of the National School Lunch Program means it will no longer receive...

BURLINGTON, VT – The cities of Burlington, Vermont, and Madison, Wisconsin have opted to suspend enforcement of their laws requiring pro-life sidewalk counselors to stay away from abortion facilities. Burlington City Attorney Eileen Blackwood said today the Supreme Court's ruling last week striking down a similar Massachusetts law convinced her that Burlington's ordinance – which requires counselors to stay 35 feet away from abortion facilities – violates the Constitution.

COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) - A Richland County Sheriff's Department K-9 attacked a dog on Wednesday. According to Sheriff Leon Lott, the incident happened on Emsworth Drive when the K-9 jumped a fence and attacked a neighbor's dog.

WEST ALLIS, Wis. -- A former police officer charged in the deaths of two women -- one from the Twin Cities -- whose bodies were stuffed into suitcases and left on a rural Wisconsin highway met his victims online, according to police and a criminal complaint. Steven Zelich, 52, a security officer, was charged Thursday with two counts of hiding a corpse. He was arrested Wednesday, when detectives wearing hazmat suits removed large bags of evidence and a refrigerator from his apartment in West Allis, a Milwaukee suburb. Highway workers discovered two suitcases containing female remains June 5 in the...

<p>Back in November I wrote a post about the war on Scott Walker, the man democrats fear the most. It hasn't gone well for liberals, and so they have resorted to outright slander and libel.</p> <p>Demented democrat prosecutors in Wisconsin have been conducting a John Doe probe for the last few years, bottom feeding in an effort to find something with which to try someone on the right. Anything.</p>

Last week, a Wisconsin special prosecutor set the political world on fire when he alleged, and a variety of venues credulously repeated, that Gov. Scott Walker was at the center of a “criminal scheme” involving the illegal coordination of conservative groups and fundraisers when he faced a recall election in 2011-2012.“The governor and his close confidants helped raise money and control spending through 12 conservative groups during the recall election campaigns, according to the prosecutors’ filings,” the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported on June 19. Special prosecutor Francis Schmitz wrote that Walker was involved in “criminal violations of multiple elections laws,...

MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A pedestrian bridge over Interstate 90 has linked the two sides of a western Wisconsin burg for decades, providing a test of courage for bike-riding children and a symbol of home for travelers returning from Minnesota. Over the last year, the town of Campbell’s overpass has become the front line in a Hatfield vs. McCoy free-speech clash between a tea party activist and the police chief. The fight was spurred by last summer’s national push for tea party overpass protests calling for President Barack Obama’s impeachment. Nowhere, though, has the protest caused as much of an...

Welcome to a genuine phony scandal. You may have caught a glimpse of the lurid headlines this morning, which were splashed across thefront pages of many of America'sleading newspapers -- and, indeed, on our own website: "Prosecutors Say Scott Walker at the Center of Criminal Scheme." The resulting impression is that the Wisconsin governor is embroiled in a serious new scandal, in which charges may be imminent. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the media's breathless coverage of a recent document release has largely promulgated the opposite of the truth. On that score, Gabriel Malor, an attorney...

(CNSNews.com) – In response to a federal judge’s ruling that Wisconsin’s ban on homosexual marriage was unconstitutional, Bishop Robert Morlino, head of the Catholic diocese of Madison, Wisc., said the judge had “shaken one of the most precious and essential building blocks of our civilization,” and that when this “first ‘domino’ of civilization’” – man-woman marriage – is toppled, then “all subsequent ‘dominos’” of civilization fall.The bishop also said that in felling this first domino, “everything that is good, true, and beautiful, which is rooted in the natural family, is seriously threatened.”Back on June 6, U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb...

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, a potential 2016 Republican presidential candidate, took part in a nationwide criminal scheme to coordinate fundraising with conservative groups, prosecutors said in court documents unsealed Thursday. No charges have been filed against Walker or any member of his staff. The documents were filed in December as part of an investigation into alleged illegal fundraising and campaign coordination by Walker and his campaign, the Wisconsin Club for Growth, the state Chamber of Commerce and other groups.