RIP, Judicial Ethics

by folkbum

Sigh:

A panel of three appeals judges recommended Thursday that state Supreme Court Justice Annette K. Ziegler be reprimanded by her colleagues on the high court for mishandling cases when she was a Washington County circuit judge. [. . .]

Ziegler should have known not to handle those cases, the panel said in its unanimous recommendation.

"Red flags of danger were prominently flying," the panel wrote. "Justice Ziegler did not see them."

But the panel also found Ziegler acted "without moral culpability" because she did not mean to violate the ethics code and did not benefit herself or her family by ruling on the cases.

Well, gosh, officer, I didn't mean to speed by so much, and, I mean, it's not making me rich or anything . . . how about just a warning?

Our local media, pt. 1

by Bert

Since I was rambling by, I thought I’d drop in for a couple of rants.

The scion of Milwaukee’s right-wing belly-achers, Charlie Sykes, routinely insults his listeners' intelligence. Take, for example, his defense offered more than once this past week of the crooked behavior of state Supreme Court Justice Annette Ziegler. Ziegler has presided as circuit court judge over civil cases involving banks where her husband works.

Charlie was outraged. And he snarled at media outlets for writing about Ziegler when reporters are not blasting a similar salvo at politicians such as Superintendent Elizabeth Burmaster for the influence that the teachers union exerts on her decisions.

If you’re cocking your head right now like a confused dog and saying “huh?”, you’re right in being befuddled. It's apples and oranges.

I may not relish the influence that organizations -- through their lobbying and their campaign contributions -- exert on politicians, but that sort of influence is an ingrained element of our government. Ziegler’s worst iniquity could not be more different. If Burmaster were a judge, or if she were ruling on whether her son or daughter should be given a diploma, or whether her agency should locate a new state building on land her husband owns, then we might be comparing apples to apples.

Exhibit 1: folkbum's rambles and rants

by folkbum

I've done a lot of things and met a lot people that I never would have had I not started blogging way back when. It has almost always been a positive experience for me, and there's very little of it I would trade in given the chance.

One thing I never expected, however, was to be dragged into court.

I haven't been sued or anything yet--don't get me wrong. But I discovered today that apparently I have been a key ingredient in an ongoing State Elections Board complaint filed against a different Wisconsin blogger. Some highlights as narrated by Owen's buddy Jed:

Sitter’s complaint stated as follows:

I visited Boots and Sabers blog located at: http://bootsandsabers.com/. When on the blog I saw under the heading “Promos” an advertisement that stated “Blogs for Ziegler” with a picture of a laptop showing “Annette Ziegler Supreme Court” on its screen. I believe this is advocacy for a candidate for an election. Nothing in this ad identifies who sponsored and paid for the ad. When I clicked on the ad I was redirected to Annette Ziegler’s website for her campaign for Supreme Court of Wisconsin.

Ziegler’s campaign then broke out the clue bat.

[. . .] 4. On information and belief, the practice of posting “Blogs for” pictures that link to a candidate’s Web site is a common practice by blog administrators to show support for a particular candidate. See example of “Linda Clifford” logo from the blog folkbum’s rambles and rants attached as exhibit 1.

[. . .] To get around the obvious fact that the “Blogs for Ziegler” button was the responsibility of no one other than your humble hosts, Sitter came up with this load of crap:

Judge Ziegler argues that the Boots and Sabers “Blogs for Ziegler” is not a paid advertisement and was not placed on the website by Ziegler’s campaign. Ms. Sitter concedes that no violation has occurred by Ziegler’s campaign if the website owner chose to “endorse” Judge Ziegler and place his or her endorsement on the website. See Wis. Stat § 11.30(4) stating, “This chapter shall not be construed to restrict… editorial comment or endorsement.”

Wis. Stat. § 11.30(4) reiterates that “[n]o owner or other person with a financial interest in a communications medium may utilize such medium in support of or in opposition to a candidate or referendum except as provided in this chapter.” Endorsements of candidates for office are an exception. However, promotions acting in support of a candidate are not. [. . .] The Ziegler promotion on Boots and Sabers website is an advertisement, not an endorsement, and therefore is a violation of Wis. Stat. § 11.30 by the owner of Boots and Sabers website or any party who paid for the promotion. [. . .]

The webblog folkbum’s rambles and rants endorsement of Clifford attached as exhibit 1 to Ziegler’s answer is an endorsement. It can be found with other endorsements under the heading: “folkbum’s rambles and rants officially endorses.” This communication would constitute a Wis. Stat. § 11.30(4) exception to the requirements of Wis. Stat. § 11.30. Folkbum’s rambles and rants blog has unequivocally placed its endorsement within a section designated for endorsements. Therefore, folkbum’s rambles and rants endorsement need not comply with Wis. Stat. § 11.30 reporting and “paid for” requirements.

There's a lot of legalese in there, but I think in the end both sides--the Annette Ziegler campaign attorneys and the attorneys for Monica Sitter--are using this blog as an example of how to do things it right. Sitter's side noted that I clearly separate paid ads from editorial content such as endorsements (when I finally get moved to the new template, they won't even be in the same sidebar anymore). Ziegler's people argued that whatever I did was cool. It kind of would have been nice to know all of this was going on, though. I was quite gobsmacked to see it last night for the first time.

In a way, I feel kind of dirty being used by Ziegler's people and in defense of my sworn nemesis; but Sitter's complaint is, indeed, crap. It's crap for several reasons, not the least of which is something I've maintained all along: Blogs, at least locally, are just not as powerful as some people think they are. Even though Owen has traffic to die for, the number of people--specifically, Wisconsin residents likely to vote--visiting his site is still very small compared to the number of Wisconsin voters generally. Moreover, the subset of his traffic last spring who didn't already have their minds made up about the Supreme Court race was undoubtedly much, much smaller. The amount of people swayed by that "Blogs for Ziegler" graphic was probably somewhere near zero, and had Ziegler's campaign actually paid for it, they would have been throwing money away. For me, the same is true, but on 1/10 the scale.

More importantly, though, I thought Sitter's complaint was crap because any attempts to restrict Owen or me (or any other blogger) from making endorsements and promoting candidates and causes we like would place bloggers into a category or media all by themselves. Broadcast and print media do not suffer from restrictions on who, what, when, or how they endorse, and bloggers should not be treated any differently. This was a key element in the fight bloggers fought a year or so ago and won at the federal level. You can read at the Net Democracy Guide what the Federal Election Commission expects of bloggers, including this:

Q: My blog is closely associated with several candidates. I link to campaign web sites and republish campaign material on my site. I even have links directly to the candidates' donation pages. Am I still exempt from the rules?

A: Yes. The rule is clear that these ordinary Internet activities do not constitute an in-kind contribution to a campaign or trigger other campaign finance requirements, provided that the blogger is not being compensated for these activities. If you are compensated for these activities, as discussed more fully below, the primary campaign finance obligations would rest on the campaign that is paying you.

Had Annette Ziegler been a candidate for federal office, everything Owen did would not only have been legal, it would have been explicitly explained as such in existing FEC regulations. However, because the state of Wisconsin has not considered bloggers and electronic media in its campaign-finance legislation, the question remains up in the air. Owen's case here is the test case, and the State Elections Board's Counsel George Dunst has recommended tossing Sitter's complaint. (And we all know what value Dunst's opinions have anymore, eh?)

All of this brought to mind an email I got last fall from James Wigderson, asking for my reaction to a potential post of his. He never pulled the trigger and published the post, but here's a taste:

I'm going to pick on Jay Bullock for a moment because I like the additional traffic. Defending his presence in a Jessica McBride column, Bullock declares his blog, folkbum's rambles and rants, is not affiliated with the Democratic Party. Fair enough.

Um, Jay? I count seven ads that are either uncoordinated independent expenditures or else undocumented campaign contributions. They are for: Steve Kagen, Bryan Kennedy, Doyle/Lawton, Kathleen Falk, Feingold for President, Fair Wisconsin and No Death Penalty Wisconsin. On top of that, Jay has a box asking for contributions to the Democratic National Committee and the sister organizations Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

Not a big deal, except Jay charges for advertising. [. . .]

As the blogosphere becomes more visible, they will become increasing targets of scrutiny by campaigns looking to silence them. I strongly suggest any blogger that charges for ads take a serious look at the campaign finance rules before they plug their favorite candidates.

I wrote Wiggy back that I felt safe on the federal campaigns, given the FEC's stance, and that I was willing to risk it with the State Elections Board, figuring that I could argue that I was still following the FEC, and acting in good faith that way.

In addition, I pointed out in response, months before the SEB arguments detailed above, that I had clearly labeled the ads, and clearly labeled the endorsements, and didn't pretend one was the other. I've always tried to play it relatively safe with this blog, and drawing as bright a line between those two things just always seemed like a no-brainer to me. I'm not suggesting that Owen was wrong to label his endorsements "Promos," given that Sitter's argument there relied on an internet dictionary to make its point. (Really!) But perhaps a better choice of words would have, in the end, avoided all the mess.

Of course, there's still a chance I might get dragged further into this; I'm hoping my new favorite attorney would be willing to help, if need be. Either way, at least I get to go down in history as something: Exhibit 1.

Ziegler's first skate

Who has time to review the whole sordid story? Well, you might, that's why I provided the link. But here's all you need to know now:

State Supreme Court Justice-elect Annette Ziegler agreed to pay the state about $17,000 in a settlement that said she violated the state ethics code by ruling on five cases involving a bank her husband helps run. [. . .]

By settling the matter, Ziegler avoids a hearing in the matter today that could have seen her called to the witness stand. Nonetheless, she remains under scrutiny as the subject of a separate investigation by the state Judicial Commission, which is looking at a broader group of cases.

In the settlement, Ziegler acknowledged she violated the ethics code by handling five cases in recent years involving West Bend Savings Bank, where her husband, J.J. Ziegler, is paid about $20,000 a year as a member of the board of directors. The state ethics code says public officials cannot act on matters in which they have a financial interest.

The board determined that Ziegler did not gain financially from her rulings.

Got it? No Ziegler under oath today. She won't be forced to detail in open court what her thinking was as she repeatedly violated the state's code of judicial ethics. She won't have to make any statements on the record that could be used against her when she runs for re-election in a decade.

There's still the Judicial Commission, but anything that Commission says will be non-binding unless acted upon by the state Supreme Court. While I think the Commission will probably scold Ziegler, I'm betting the Court will not do a thing about it. Ziegler skates once today, and will again when her new colleagues choose to let the Commission's recommendations slide.

Ziegler: "Don't Look at Me! I'm Hideous!"

by folkbum

I was never convinced that the state ethics board had a very great case against ethically challenged Annette Ziegler: The range of breaches they are charged with punishing is too narrow to cover the specific difficulty following the rules that Ziegler suffered from.

But don't you think it's just slightly bad form for Ziegler leverage her new position to get the ethics board off her back?

Incoming state Supreme Court Justice Annette Ziegler asked her soon-to-be colleagues today to rule that the state Ethics Board has no jurisdiction to levy sanctions against her for violating the state ethics code. [. . .] Ziegler's request draws the other justices even further into the issue, amplifying what was already an awkward situation.

I mean, how hard is it to mount a vigorous defense of yourself and, if necessary, appeal? I'm not entirely certain what she thinks she'll be hiding from, given that the board with the strong case--the Wisconsin Judicial Commission--is on the trail. I've written before how Ziegler quite clearly (and she herself has never denied it, though campaign manager Mark Graul was out there spinning and lying about what she did and did not do in her courtroom) violated both the spirit and the letter of the state's code of judicial conduct, including precedent set by this same Judicial Commission. She has everything to fear from that investigation, and I am hopeful that she will finally own up to her poor ethics.

In other, related news, the state senate is on the verge of proving the old adage that if there's a rule in place, no matter how obvious or stupid it may seem, it's because someone did what the rule prevents. I'm not saying this rule is stupid; rather, it seems so self-apparent Ziegler ought to apologize to the state for making it necessary:

A week after regulators put state Supreme Court Justice-elect Annette Ziegler under scrutiny for not revealing alleged conflicts of interest, Democrats who control the state Senate announced they are pushing a bill requiring court clerks to advise people involved in civil suits of what judges must disclose.

Under the bill--which has not yet been introduced--circuit court clerks would have to give plaintiffs and defendants written notice that the presiding judge must tell them of potential conflicts of interest and withdraw from the case, unless the parties agree to let the judge stay on. The clerks would also have to tell them they could request the judge's statement of economic interest, Sen. Pat Kreitkow (D-Chippewa Falls) said at a press conference this morning.

Someone asked me at Drinking Liberally the other night how it could be possible that Annette Ziegler won her election with such a wide margin when, for those of us paying attention, there is such a clear pile of evidence of her ethical wantonness. And the answer, as I will remind you all Saturday at the Blog Summit (you've registered, right?), is that blogs don't vote.

Additionally, the people who voted for her have been trained over the last couple of decades to believe that they are in a culture war, and the courts are the front lines. For them, it was more important to get a judge like Ziegler elected to the court, even if they have to settle for Ziegler herself.

Still, I hope that when future judges get caught violating the law about informing parties before them about conflicts, we run them out of town for violating "Annette's Law." That seems a fitting legacy.

Who's "sloppier," Ziegler or Zellner?

by folkbum

I was originally working on this as an update to the post below, but it kind of grew too big. And since I'm really curious for an answer to the question above (and as phrased below), I thought I'd pull it out and give it its own post.

I'm not sure how Patrick McIlheran can say that Judge Ziegler's ethical lapses are just "evidence of her sloppiness" and that we merely "conflate[d] it into a scandal." This is not sloppy, unless you mean that kind of sloppy wherein someone deliberately chooses not to follow the rules--think McGuire and steroids, Troha and campiagn finance, Paris Hilton and good taste.

An interesting parallel might be the case of Robert Zellner, the Cedarbug teacher who violated his code of conduct, once, for 67 seconds, on a weekend. There is no question that Zellner was wrong, and yesterday a circuit court agreed that the school district should have fired him.

Ziegler has violated her code literally scores of times, in the direct execution of her duties--not just on a weekend with no one around. But to the righties commenting on Zellner's case--and to many at the same time defending Ziegler--he should be run out on a rail.

So here's my question: Are those defending Ziegler willing to give Zellner a pass for his sloppiness? Or, conversely, are people condemning Zellner willing to accept that Ziegler deserves the scrutiny that Zellner got?

Quick Reactions

by folkbum

• Well, Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce (and the Club for Growth) have now shown us their playbook. As disappointing (and frustrating) as Linda Clifford's loss was last night, we can feel somewhat reassured by knowing that the balance of the court has not shifted (Ziegler's win maintains the status quo), and we now the hand WMC will be playing next year against Louis Butler. (See Jim Rowen.)
  
  There also remains the possibility of the complaints against Ziegler working their way far enough up that she may have to resign; remember, we're talking now upwards of 100 or 150 cases in which she violated both the spirit and the plain letter of the state's judicial code of conduct. I realize that chance is remote--and, if it happens, it will look unfortunately like partisan wrangling rather than a necessary step against an unethical judge--but that's one small light we can cling to.
  
  UPDATE: Welcome, McIlheran readers. My response to him is here.
  
  
• Not all of the school board races turned out as I wanted them too, but the one I helped with did (and that never happens). The next few weeks, before the new board is seated, will be interesting just in terms of what kind of maneuvering will be done before the old board expires. And the new board will have quite a challenge, integrating three newbies (and one oldbie) into the game. My prediction for new board president: Peter Blewitt, again.
  
  
• The folkbum endorsement proved to be the kiss of death as well for Vicky Selkowe in a Madison city council race. Maybe I should just endorse Rudy Giuliani now?
  
  
• There's some very interesting discussion about the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's last-minute hating on Linda Clifford. I don't have a lot to add to what Michael (twice), Xoff, and the Brawler have to say, though I'm curious what you all think.
  
  
• You may have noticed the list of guest-bloggers is getting longer. I'm hoping at least one more person will accept my invitation. I need to rest up my blogging muscles between now and when the state budget fight heats up, so you'll see more posts from other people in the coming weeks. Be nice to them.

April Fool's headlines

by folkbum

ZIEGLER ENDS CAMPAIGN, ADMITS ETHICS VIOLATIONS

That one's a hoot, no? Of course that would never happen. Despite years of violating both the spirit and the letter of the state code of judicial conduct, Ziegler campaigns on. Wisconsin Manufacturer's and Commerce is dumping more than half a mil on this race in the last week, and who knows how much the Zieglers' $2m loan from West Bend Savings Bank is going to end up in race, too. Linda Clifford could use your help this weekend.

Also, see Mike Plaisted.

MMAC SENDS OUT TRUTHFUL MAILER

If I were Terry Falk, I would sue for libel. The mailer that arrived at my house yesterday from the Metro Milwaukee Association of Commerce about the 8th district Milwaukee Public Schools is incredibly misleading. It reads,

As a Milwaukee teacher's union member, Terry Falk filed a grievance against the Milwaukee School District. Why? Because a memorial service celebrating the lived of two Juneau High School students who had passed away happened to cut into Falk's lunch break by minutes.

If that makes you scratch your head, there's good reason--and not just because MMAC doesn't seem to know the name of the Milwaukee Public Schools and is playing dumb about how every MPS teacher is a member of the union. No, if you actually read the decision (.pdf) by the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission referenced in the mailer, you'll see that the grievance Terry Falk filed over the lost lunch time was resolved without resorting to a WERC hearing, and Falk, in the "Findings of Fact" section, is found to be right about the contract violation. What did go the the WERC was the subsiquent retaliation Falk suffered by the principal after that grievance. Apparently Charlie Sykes and Mark Belling have been hyping this, too.

Speaking of misleading about Terry Falk, the incumbent Joe Dannecker's latest mailing trots out both a misleading statement about Juneau High School (debunked by Alan Borsuk) and a misleading statement about what Terry said concerning a tax cut Joe voted against. Terry said the board (of which Joe is president, remember?) never should have let the budget get to the point where it needed a 7.7% tax increase, but with a gun to his head he'd rather have programs than not.

This is one reason why I will not run for office: People suck.

TOMMY! GETS REPUBLICAN NOD

An article not written by Kathy Skiba tells us that Tommy! is making his entry in the presidential race official this week. Good luck with that.

Wednesday Briefs

by folkbum

Speaking of Michael Mathias: You must read this post.

There's Drinking Liberally tonight.

Question: In the state supreme court race, you have one candidate who has repeatedly violated the code of judicial conduct over the last decade, perhaps more than 100 times; and you have another candidate who hired someone who sent a couple of photographers (that the candidate never hired or met) to Washington County where they (allegedly) lied to the cops about why they were there. Guess which one Jessica McBride thinks is "The real ethical scandal"?

And as long as we're talking about ethical standards and the state supreme court, the person who incurred the biggest campaign finance penalty ever for the way he ran his last campaign--the retiring Justice Wilcox--has endorsed Ziegler.

For the record, while I was the first (media?) outlet to run the Annette Ziegler conflict-of-interest story, I didn't get it from this guy. Never met him, never want to.

McIlheran Watch: What's the "plain meaning" of this?

by folkbum

Patrick McIlheran writes today about the state supreme court race, and he throws in this:

Ziegler has gone to pains to say she'd stick to the law, saying it's courts' job to interpret laws "according to their plain meaning."

This is another way of saying that Ziegler won't be an "activist" judge, which, of course, is the cruelist insult a conservative could hurl at a judge. Ziegler insists, and McIlheran believes her, that she will follow only the "plain meaning" of the laws as written.

So here's my question: What's the "plain meaning" of this (scroll to .04 (04) )?

(4) Except as provided in sub. (6) for waiver [when the parties to a case are informed of a conflict and agree to waive the judge's recusal], a judge shall recuse himself or herself in a proceeding when the facts and circumstances the judge knows or reasonably should know establish one of the following or when reasonable, well-informed persons knowledgeable about judicial ethics standards and the justice system and aware of the facts and circumstances the judge knows or reasonably should know would reasonably question the judge's ability to be impartial: [. . .]
(d) The judge knows that he or she, individually or as a fiduciary, or the judge's spouse or minor child wherever residing, or any other member of the judge's family residing in the judge's household has an economic interest in the subject matter in controversy or in a party to the proceeding or has any other more than de minimis interest that could be substantially affected by the proceeding.
(e) The judge or the judge's spouse, or a person within the third degree of kinship to either of them, or the spouse of such a person meets one of the following criteria:

1. Is a party to the proceeding or an officer, director or trustee of a party.
2. Is acting as a lawyer in the proceeding.
3. Is known by the judge to have a more than de minimis interest that could be substantially affected by the proceeding.
4. Is to the judge's knowledge likely to be a material witness in the proceeding.

That's the text of a section of the state's code of judicial conduct. I think the "meaning" in both (d) and (e) that I've quoted here is pretty "plain": If a judge has anything other than a "de minimis" financial stake in the outcome, or--and this is more damning, I think--if a judge's spouse is on the board of directors of one of the parties, the judge must step aside. "Shall recuse" herself is the wording, and that leaves no room for wriggling.

We can wriggle over the definition of "de minimis," since the code's definition actually leaves a lot to be desired: "an insignificant interest that does not raise reasonable question as to a judge's impartiality or use of the prestige of the office." But you can wriggle too far; I think Dad29 misses the boat here when he tries to define "de minimis" in terms of a benefit to the company, rather than the judge.* He also misses the boat here when he points out that a small-claims case here or there isn't going to make Judge Ziegler--who may or may not own any shares of West Bend Savings Bank--or her husband--who is on the board of directors of that bank--any richer. I'll concede that, but Dad29 ignores the second part of the definition of "de minimis": Does judge Ziegler's financial ties to West Bend Savings Bank "raise reasonable question as to a judge's impartiality or use of the prestige of the office"? I say yes, Dad29 and Patrick McIlheran may say no. If that were all, we could just leave it to the voters to decide.

But there's so much more. For one, there's a (non-binding, but still) decision from the state's Judicial Conduct Advisory Committee a few years back defining "de minimis" as owning $20,000 in stock. judge Ziegler ruled, by the Wisconsin State Journal's account, in 22 cases in which she owned at least $50,000 in stock in one of the parties. And while many people, including Patrick McIlheran in the column that set me off today in the first place, will point out a Milwaukee Magazine study showing that a lot of judges don't disclose their financial ties, don't you think someone running to be a justice on our state's highest court should be held to a slightly higher standard? And how many of those judges send their campaign managers out to lie about it?

Oh, but there's still so much more, and it's paragraph (e) that I quoted above. (Dad29 helpfully critiques me for not quoting the code previously, ironically forgetting to quote paragraph (e) himself.) Read it again:

(4) [A] judge shall recuse himself or herself in a proceeding when the facts and circumstances the judge knows [. . .]
(e) The judge or the judge's spouse, or a person within the third degree of kinship to either of them, or the spouse of such a person meets one of the following criteria:

1. Is a party to the proceeding or an officer, director or trustee of a party.

Okay, I stopped after number one, since we don't need to go beyond it. Got it? A judge shall recuse herself from a case when her husband is on the board of directors of a company in her court. Her husband is on the board of West Bend Savings Bank. The "plain language" of the code--which was adopted a decade ago, right around the time she was appointed to the bench so you know she was probably paying attention as the code was being formulated--says a judge shall recuse herself.

The code says nothing about a "gut check." The code says nothing about other judges' doing it making it okay. The code says nothing about how we should overlook it if we don't like a judge's opponent's judicial philosophy. The code says a judge shall recuse herself. Period. That's the "plain language."

How can we trust a judge who says she'll follow the "plain langauge" of the law when she has a history of violating it? It's that simple. Vote Linda Clifford on April 3.

Update: See the Motley Cow.

* Dad29 points out that a $10,000 claim is only .4% of West Bend Savings Bank's worth. But Ziegler withdrew herself from a case concerning Wal*Mart, and I have a hard time believing the stakes in that case are anywhere near .4%--maybe not even .004%! If we apply the Wal*Mart standard and Dad29's logic, Judge Ziegler should have recused herself.

Supreme Court Updates

by folkbum

I've been meaning to do an update on the state supreme court race, but I've been busy. It's probably happened to you a couple of times, so, you'd better not start with me. Okay?

I want to get under way with the Capital Times. They ran an editorial Tuesday that really laid down a gauntlet for Washington County Judge Annette Ziegler:

In particular, the Ziegler camp is objecting to the fact that researchers associated with the [Linda] Clifford campaign have reviewed the judge's record on the bench.

What is absurd about that complaint is the fact that Ziegler has framed her entire campaign around the argument that voters should elect her because she has served as a judge. In such a circumstance, it would be ridiculous to assume that rivals would fail to ask the question: If Annette Ziegler's sole claim on the support of Wisconsin voters is the fact that she is a judge, then what kind of judge has she been?

What Ziegler really objects to is not the scrutiny. What bothers her is that the scrutiny has revealed damaging details about her disregard for basic ethical standards. [. . .] Wisconsin voters have a right to know whether candidates for seats on the state's most powerful court are ethical. To have denied the voters information they need to make informed choices about who should sit on the court would be reprehensible.

It's true that these charges have gotten Ziegler and her allies really, really worked up. Ziegler's latest campaign commercial, in fact, is probably among the worst decisions manager Mark Graul has ever made (and that's saying a lot!). It features, as the AP describes it, "black and white video of Clifford cast against a full moon, words in a horror movie-style font on the screen note Clifford is an 'immigration lawyer.' " Who is Ziegler's constituency again? And who on earth could think that a commercial like that would attract voters?

But the cockroaches are scrambling trying to deal with what is apparently a very scary set of facts for the Ziegler campaign to deal with. Linked yesterday from WisOpinion.com is not one, not two, but three opinion pieces that spend significant verbiage minimizing what is a pattern of repeated clear violations of the state's code of judicial ethics. Calling it variously "small-fry," "sloppy," and "a complete non-story," these writers mange to hit the conservative commentator trifecta: They assuage their reader- and listenership that they do not see what they think they see; they imply that the liberals pursuing the story are petty, nuts, or both; and they manage to pat themselves on the back for being so clever. (This is much less true for Rick Esenberg than for Charlie Sykes and Jeff Wagner, but Rick has a dog in this fight and it shows.)

(In the interest of fairness, I should also point out that WisOpinion did also link to a couple of anti-Ziegler pieces, including this excellent one from Ken Mobile. And they also linked to this pro-Ziegler blogger who wrote about Monday night's candidate forum without once mentioning ethics, conflict, West Bend Savings Bank, or even husband or stocks. Well done, Daniel!)

Wednesday the Cap Times handed over op-ed space to the two candidates themselves, offering both Clifford and Ziegler the opportunity to go directly to the voters with their messages. Both candidates played up their experience, with Ziegler, as usual, reminding us of her past as a prosecutor and present as a judge, and Clifford reviewing her experience as an assistant attorney general and appellate lawyer who has actually argued in front of the court she now wishes to sit on.

You should read both pieces, of course, but it's in that discussion of experience where I think Clifford and Ziegler show clear differences that have nothing to do with any candidate's ethical issues. A decade of sentencing criminals or awarding small claims is no substitute for three decades of litigation, working in the attorney general's office, and chewing on the legal questions of the day on a regular basis. At every opportunity Ziegler tells us she's been tough on crime, but there is little in her experience to tell us whether she can handle the job that the supreme court actually does. Clifford, on the other hand, clearly has the background necessary to understand the role of the court. (See also Kristen Crowell's reaction to Ziegler's op-ed.)

I mentioned there was a candidate forum last Monday; it was at Marquette and the Milwaukee journal Sentinel has the video. There's another forum tonight to be aired live on Wisconsin Public Television and Radio, and re-aired around the state.

But before that forum on Monday, Linda Clifford was in town to do an event at Bryan Kennedy's place. It was so nice to meet both Linda and her husband, who both seem like genuinely nice and smart people. (And I totally forgot to bond with Linda about our both being Beloit College alums!) I ran into a number of other swell people there, too, inlcuding State Senator Jim Sullivan, former folkbum guest blogger "krshorewood," BIll Elliott, some old fellow Howard Dean groupies, and even Boris and Doris. There, Linda reminded us that at any moment, the Zieglers can drop a very big chunk of their personal fortune into the race to try to buy away the ethical problems dogging Ziegler's campaign. I've said it before and I'll say it again: blogs don't vote. What wins elections is still money and feet on the ground, and if you can help in either of those ways, please do.

This is now way too long, so I'm not even able to get into the complaint filed against Ziegler by the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, or the brazenness of responding to an open records request with blacked out pages (image from this week's Shepherd Express), the latest revelations about the timing of Ziegler's rulings and comapaign contributions from West Bend Savings Bank officials, or even the endorsements Clifford has received from mayors across the state as diverse as Larry Nelson and (former Tomah Mayor and popular libertarian) Ed Thompson. So, more later, I'm sure.

Are we swiftboating Annette Ziegler?

by folkbum

The political lexicon lacks a great deal of flexibility (the -gate suffix's being attached to every potential scandal a generation later is just one example of how stale the vocabulary is), but swiftboat, I think, is a welcome and reasonable addition to the party. If used correctly, that is.

The word, of course, comes from the "Swiftboat Veterans for Truth" organization, a group ironically dedicated to spreading demonstrably false stories about John Kerry during the 2004 election season. I like Wikipedia's definition: "By using credible-sounding sources to make sensational and difficult-to-disprove accusations against an opponent, the campaign leverages media tendencies to focus on a controversial story." In other words, as happened in the 2004 campaign, gather a bunch of veterans who, though they served in Vietnam on a switftboat never actually served with Kerry; have them question Kerry's service; then let the media's faux-balance desire for "he said-he said" journalism take over, thereby legitimizing the false statements.

In the end, swiftboating is just a media-savvy version of "When did you stop beating your wife?" It's all about smear, and not so much about truth.

Washington County Judge Annette Ziegler has--on this blog, elsewhere on the internet, and in the traditional media now, too--been severely criticized for lapses in her ethical judgment. Some of the criticisms, such as perhaps the Wal*Mart case flap, are pushing it (which is why I haven't touched the Wal*Mart flap lately, since I tend to dwell in the realm of Things That Matter). But other allegations, in my opinion, have merit. Consider, for example, some of the non-Wal*Mart examples listed by One Wisconsin Now:

According to Ziegler's own Statement of Economic Interest filings with the State Ethics Board, Ziegler's husband J.J. Ziegler has worked for West Bend Savings Bank as a paid director and she has claimed income from the bank for renting property to them. (3) (4 [pdf])

In addition, state and Washington County Register of deed records show that Ziegler has received $3.1 million in loans from West Bend Savings Bank, including a $2 million loan during her campaign for our highest court. (2 [pdf]), (5), (6 [pdf])

Ziegler has also heard 46 cases involving West Bend Savings Bank.

In the cases involving her husband's bank, Ziegler has ruled in favor of West Bend Savings Bank with well over $100,000 in cash settlements, home foreclosures and seized vehicles.

When questioned by the Wisconsin State Journal, Ziegler's campaign manager Mark Graul, initially told the paper that Ziegler's practice in cases involving the bank was to disclose the conflict and "offer to the parties to recuse herself" or to have them waive the requirement and allow her to continue. (7)

The Wisconsin State Journal reported that, "He insisted she had notified the parties and gotten approval to continue presiding over the cases." (7) [. . .]

[I]t wasn't the truth. A Wisconsin State Journal report revealed that in 46 cases involving West Bend Savings Bank where Ziegler was the sitting judge, there are "no indications that Ziegler withdrew from West Bend Savings cases, and no notices to the parties of any conflict." (8)

The defendants in 4 cases looked at by the Wisconsin State Journal told the paper the Washington County Circuit judge did not withdraw from the cases - nor did she disclose her conflict - as required by Supreme Court rules governing the conduct of Judges in Wisconsin. (7) [. . .]

To date, Ziegler has offered no evidence that she disclosed the conflict to any of the parties in the cases. Instead, Ziegler has said she relied on a "gut check" rather than court rules about conflicts in deciding to hear the cases. (8)

Or consider this specific story, from a Linda Clifford press release:

Jeanie Kidd appeared before Ziegler last year as a defendant against West Bend Savings Bank. Kidd's case is one of 46 that Judge Ziegler has heard that involved the bank. Ziegler's husband is a paid member of the bank's board of directors and the Ziegler family leases the bank space. In addition, the bank has loaned Ziegler over $3 million.

Because Kidd resided out of state, she requested a postponement of the hearing on seizure of her automobile. Judge Ziegler denied the request and ordered Kidd to appear at the hearing by telephone. At the time of the hearing, the bank failed to show. Although a statute allowed dismissal for the bank's failure to appear, Ziegler instead adjourned the hearing for the benefit of the bank. At the adjourned hearing, judgment was awarded to the bank.

In at least nine cases, Ziegler faced the opposite scenario where a defendant failed to appear while West Bank Savings did. In each of these instances no continuance was granted, Ziegler instead ruled in the bank's favor.

Setting aside the source of that information, the underlying facts of this and other cases are not in distpute--not by Ziegler, not by Graul (any more), not by the documentary evidence available from the courts. What is described here is accurate and true to the greatest extent that everybody involved can prove.

Which is why I'm surprised to see someone call this a swiftboating, particularly someone who tends to run to the liberal side:

What I really hate, and have to suck it up anyway is the way professional journalists, strategists, career statesmen and good old boys are masquerading as "citizen bloggers" to orchestrate old-fashioned mud-slinging campaigns. Okay, so some party people were freaked out at the "new Power" that bloggers had with the Dean business and the Dan Rather thing and all that. Even if it works in your favor, it's a rogue element - uncontrollable if it genuinely comes from The People.

So get a bunch of Good Old Boys in there - not the shaggy t-shirt crowd that bloggers were to start, but established journalists and seasoned power boys in their 50s and 60s who know the ropes and can hopefully steer things in a coordinated direction. But most importantly, protect the status quo. Edge out the uncontrolled rogue elements with flashier sites and greater posting frequency and that so-lovely air of entitlement. Whatever.

Funny thing is - I wonder how long till the Republicans get a private investigator to set up a blog where s/he can disseminate the stuff they dig up about Democratic candidates. The guys who did the swift-boating of Kerry believed they were following a higher cause too, that they had a sacred mission to keep an Undesirable out of office. They would have said they were just "telling the truth". Yet, though I am a "liberal" I think it is quite obvious that the Republican judge in this "non-partisan" race is being swift-boated too from the point of view of HER supporters. The definition you use depends on the side you are on and all words have no solid meaning anymore. All wars are sacred, all words are partisan - it's quite a gift we have all been given by the power-obsessed among us.

I think that somewhere in there Jody's making a point about groups like Progressive Majority or even One Wisconsin, which I think might distill, as Dave Diamond suggests, into something like a complaint that bloggers are being ruined by partisan influences, or something. But it's the accusation of swiftboating that hangs in my craw: I have not heard "HER supporters" toss around that word and, in fact, the more considered (and more lawyerly) among them concede that Ziegler was wrong on many of those cases.

So are we swiftboating Annette Ziegler? Does what's happening here rise (sink?) to the "When did you stop beating your wife?" level of political discourse?

Perhaps I'm biased and defensive, as one who broke parts of this story, but I say no. For starters, unlike the claims of the "Swiftboat Veterans for Truth," the only allegations I have made--and the only allegations made in the media, as led by the Wisconsin State Journal--are ones supported by the evidence at hand. There is no crime or shame in, as the Journal Sentinel editorial board did, saying, "Here's what we know based on facts in evidence; can you explain it?" to a campaign or to a candidate--a far cry from the insinuations or falsehoods of a true swiftboating.

In fact, the only aspersions I see being cast around are things like Jessica McBride's laughable "media bias" claims. (And I mean laughable; McBride reprints her shockingly indignant email to the managing editor of the Wisconsin State Journal and his answers. I was embarrassed for her.) That and Jody's assertion that me and my baggy-shirted colleagues are getting strung along by The Powers That Be.

Until someone can show me that somehow every shred of documentary evidence we have is wrong, that every defendant now complaining that Ziegler never disclosed her conflicts is lying, or that Ziegler somehow doesn't own stocks in the numbers that put her in violation of a judicial ethics review panel's ruling, I will not back down from this, and I will not assent to being called a swiftboater.

I won't go so far as Gregory "Deke Rivers" Humphrey and call for Zielger to drop out of the race. I won't even go so far as Bruce Murphy and suggest that now she's unelectable (I won't underestimate the power of the state's business lobby and all the TV airtime they can buy). But I also won't let clear ethical lapses and clear violations of an enforceable code of judicial conflict go without comment. Even if it means trading in my baggy shirt.

Ziegler's Conflicts Multiply

by folkbum

I'm going to slightly disagree with my friend Ken about Jessica McBride's comments on Judge Annette Ziegler. My instinct is to agree that somewhere along the way the Wisconsin State Journal should have noted that Madison attorney and Supreme Court candidate Linda Clifford had done some work for them. But I don't think that changes for one second any of the facts now on the table, facts largely put there by the WSJ. What they reported (both previously and this past weekend) is no less true than if it had been reported somewhere else; it's just that WSJ did the legwork first.

I will agree with Ken's second contention, though, that McBride's "everybody does it" defense of Ziegler's conflicts of interest is no defense at all, especially since Ziegler seems to have done it more often than others.

I do believe that this will be the make-or-break issue for the race, since there's just no way Ziegler can get away from the issue now. Couple that with the fact that Linda Clifford actually used to sit on the judicial ethics panel, and you've got some clear choices to make.

On a side note, while we were in between TiVos last week, we caught a Wisconsin Manufacturer's and Commerce commercial for Ziegler, which tried to say she was tough on crime. It included the line, "In fact, Ziegler sentenced one sex offender to 60 years in prison." My wife laughed out loud and said, "Just one offender? That doesn't make her look very good."

Gut Check? Gut Check?

by folkbum

That's where the truth comes from, ladies and gentlemen—the gut.

Did you know that you have more nerve endings in your stomach than in your head? Look it up. Now, somebody's gonna say “I did look that up and it's wrong.” Well, mister, that's because you looked it up in a book. Next time, try looking it up in your gut. I did. And my gut tells me that's how our nervous system works.

That, of course, is Stephen Colbert defining "truthiness" for you--rather than reliance on, say, facts, you rely on your gut. This is not to say that you should never trust your gut on anything; usually, though, you do a "gut check" on matters that mostly just affect you.

Judge Annette Ziegler, apparently, uses the "gut check" in her courtroom:

In two campaign stops Monday, Supreme Court candidate Annette Ziegler repeatedly defended her choice as a circuit judge to preside over dozens of cases involving a bank with which she had personal and financial ties.

Ziegler said she uses a "gut check" to decide if she has a conflict of interest. Her husband's position on the bank's board of directors didn't affect her judgment in the cases, she said.

"If someone took an objective look at any of those cases, any judge ruling on those would've ruled the exact same way," Ziegler said. "There's no difference who hears those cases. It would've been the exact same outcome."

Trouble is, rules governing judicial conduct don't allow for "gut checks." And I for one am glad that those rules exist: If I am appearing before some judge, I don't want to know that she's done her "gut check" to decide whether she can hear a case fairly. I want to know that there's no chance at all that she might rule unfairly.

There's something particularly galling in these cases where she's got a conflict of interest (and the number of cases keeps growing; if you read to the bottom of the article linked above, you'll find she's got conflicts with United Health Care, in addition to the West Bend Savings Bank cases, first reported by your humble folkbum two weeks before the media got ahold of it). It's not that I question whether, as she stated, "any judge ruling on those would've ruled the exact same way." That may very well be true, and as I'm not privy to everything that went down in all of those cases, I simply cannot judge whether they were decided correctly. Rather, it's that Ziegler didn't bother to make the parties aware of her conflicts at all.

As I said, this violates rules of judicial conduct, period. It bothers Ben Brothers, too, and he points to another disturbing aspect of the article linked above:

The law doesn’t necessarily require recusal, but it does require that a judge with a conflict of interest reveal that conflict to the litigants, and give them the option of waiving the recusal. Needless to say, Ziegler didn’t follow that rule, either. [. . .]

In Dodgeville, the most pointed questioning came from Elsa Greene, of Barneveld, a former deputy of the agency that regulates attorney conduct. She held a copy of the Supreme Court rules.

Said Greene: “Do you consider the rule applicable to you?”

Ziegler responded, “I am a good judge.”

Well, I’m glad we cleared that up. Ziegler, by the way, is the “strict constructionist” in the race. It seems to me that, at the very least, a commitment to strict construction--as opposed to a commitment to movement conservatism--would require one to follow the letter of the law, and not rely instead on a “gut check."

Any judge, no matter what their political perspective or understanding of constitutional theory, has to answer Yes to a question like “Do you consider the rule applicable to you?”

Mobile's Take and Xoff also have problems with this, as does the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's editorial board. Both Jim Rowen and Dave Diamond caught the Colbertiness of Ziegler's statement, and Dave reminds us that Ziegler's campaign manager is Mark Graul, who seems to be repeating a losing strategy here. Which is fine by me.

Ziegler's misconduct: I was right

by folkbum

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about how Judge Annette Ziegler, the non-partisan Repulican candidate for state supreme court, suffers from a big fat conflict of interest. I wrote:

Since 2002, Judge Ziegler has presided over nearly four dozen cases involving [the West Bend Savings Bank, from whom her husband draws a paycheck]. An intrepid correspondent of mine actually took a tour around the Washington County Courthouse and checked the casefiles on about a dozen of the most recent cases, and there was no evidence of notice given to the defendants in those cases of the possible conflict of interest. This, of course, leads to speculation that the three-dozen prior cases were also filed away without any mention of such notice.

The comments to that post were rife with know-it-alls telling me that it was No Big Deal. (I was even accused of perpetuating a smear!) Despite that, twixt then and now, the charge picked up steam, with the Milwaukee Labor Council and One Wisconsin Now piling on. Still, those of us who raised concerns were told we were wrong about Ziegler.

Enter the Madison's conservative newspaper, today:

Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Annette Ziegler failed to disclose a conflict of interest in at least four cases over which she presided as a circuit judge in the past year, interviews and court documents indicate.

Failing to disclose a conflict would put a judge in violation of rules enforced by the high court.

All four cases in 2006 involved people sued by West Bend Savings Bank, where Ziegler's husband, J.J. Ziegler, is a paid member of the board of directors.

The defendants said the Washington County Circuit judge did not withdraw from the cases--nor did she disclose her conflict--as required by Supreme Court rules governing the conduct of judges in Wisconsin. [. . .] James Alexander, executive director of the Wisconsin Judicial Commission, said the rules governing judges' conflicts of interest are designed to ensure the credibility of the judiciary.

"An impartial judge is a cornerstone of the judicial system," Alexander said. "It's protecting not only the impartiality of the judicial system, but also the appearance of impartiality."

Read the article; we're not just talking about small claims petty business here. In at least one of the cases, the judgment was over $10,000. This was not, as some of my commenters tried to reassure me, "foreclosures and loan defaults [that] often proceed by default." The defendant in that $10k case is now mighty steamed that at no point in the five months of appearances in her courtroom did Ziegler say, "Oh, by the way, I may have an interest in how this turns out." I don't know what that guy's options for appeal may be, but I hope he makes one.

So what does this mean? Besides my being right, of course. It really calls into question the ethics of Annette Ziegler. Mark Graul, her campaign manager, refused to let her speak to the Wisconsin State Journal reporter doing the story. Graul's no dummy; there's probably a reason why the candidate can't speak about this.

Say what you want about (folkbum-endorsed) Linda Clifford's philosophy--and, believe me, people are--but no one has yet found any examples of Clifford engaging in the kind of iffy ethical practices that we see Judge Ziegler clearly exhibiting here. Remember this on April 3.

If Linda Clifford's Math is Right

by folkbum

. . . when she says . . .

she was pleased with the results as well. "I think it's especially exciting I made it through the primary, despite the fact (Ziegler and outside groups) outspent me about 10 to 1, spending over half a million dollars on the votes she achieved," Clifford said.

. . . that means Annette Ziegler, the Club for Growth, the Chamber of Commerce, et al. spent about $3.25 for every vote received. (I know robocalls are cheap, but did I really need five or six in the week before the election?) Linda Clifford, on the other hand, spent less than 75¢ per vote.

Given that their filings show them at parity--and that undoubtedly, some third-party will be spending money on Clifford in the next month the way the anti-consumer and anti-choice goups will for Ziegler--Clifford's poised to get a much better return in the general than she did here.

In the meantime, there's no reason for you not to go show some love yourself.

OhMyGod! WeAreAllGoingToDie! IfLindaCliffordGetsElected!!!!!!

by folkbum

So I get home from work tonight to a blinking answering machine. When I press play, I hear a Serious Female Voice:

This is an important pulbic safety message . . .

Oh no! Maybe there's some nut on the loose with a gun!

. . . from the Wisconsin Chamber of Commerce . . .

Maybe the peanut butter can kill you!

. . . Judge Annette Ziegler has the exp--

Next! Puh-lease! Can we be for real?

Well, eventually I listened to the rest of the call. It was all "Ziegler is tough on crime" and whatnot, and, as you can guess by the title of this post, it was clearly designed to give the impression that, were Linda Clifford (you know, the one without the exp--) to be elected, chaos would break out all over the state.

And that's Ziegler's primary campaign theme: She, like JB "Batman" Van Hollen before her, is running for an office other than the one on the ballot. Lindsay Buechel in the La Crosse Tribune explains:

Annette Ziegler presents a misleading assumption about the race happening this spring. She states that being a trial judge makes her a better candidate. [. . .] The Supreme Court needs a seasoned practitioner who knows how the decisions it makes directly impact the people of Wisconsin more than it needs another trial judge.

Deke Rivers elaborates:

Ziegler keeps mentioning that she is the only judge in the race, and therefore better suited for the Supreme Court. But she seems to forget that our long tradition in Wisconsin has voters respecting diversity of profession when voting for Justices. Just a decade ago the majority of those serving on the bench came from outside the court system. As an example, it is clear that Chief Justice Abrahamson is a remarkable member of the Court. On the conservative side the same argument can be made for former Speaker of the Assembly Dave Prosser, who all must admit is a much-respected jurist. Therefore one can make a strong case for placing a judge on the bench with real life-problem solving skills. Clifford brings those skills, along with her decades of experience in government, private practice, and State Bar involvement with her as she seeks our vote. Her involvement in a whole series of federal and state cases makes her more than qualified for the job.

Being "tough on crime" is really not a bad qualification for a prosecutor or a municipal judge (notice, no one ever runs for DA with a "soft on crime" platform). But on the state's Supreme Court, you want someone who can provide a thoughtful approach to substantial matters across a wide spectrum of judicial theory. "Tough on crime" tells us nothing about a judge's ability to weigh matters of constitutional consequence; a strict lock-em-up, throw-away-the-key mentality is not necessarily a good fit on the high court.

To imply that if we don't elect her, that we'll have criminals leaking out of prisons and "public safety" will be endangered is absurd. And offensive.

Annette Ziegler and Conflicts of Interest

by folkbum

Judge Annete Ziegler, running for Wisconsin's Supreme Court, has made a big deal of her experience on the bench, mostly playing up, as far as I can tell, a "tough on crime" stance that is not necessarily applicable for the job she wants (well, hey, it worked for JB Van Hollen). But it puts Ziegler's work on the bench on the table, which is good news for those of us who occasionally dig for dirt.

We already know that blog and activist scrutiny shamed her, late, into recusing herself from a case involving Wal*Mart, a company in which she owns a ton of stock. [UPDATE: Per comments below, her timing may not have been late at all on the Wal*Mart thing.] But there's more in the conflict-of-interest department.

Careful observers will note that Judge Ziegler filed the appropriate formage with the state to indicate that she might have a conflict when it comes to West Bend Savings Bank. For good reason: Her husband, JJ, is on the WBSB board, and has been since 2002.

Here's the kicker: Since 2002, Judge Ziegler has presided over nearly four dozen cases involving WBSB (just check). An intrepid correspondent of mine actually took a tour around the Washington County Courthouse and checked the casefiles on about a dozen of the most recent cases, and there was no evidence of notice given to the defendants in those cases of the possible conflict of interest. This, of course, leads to speculation that the three-dozen prior cases were also filed away without any mention of such notice.

Two questions: If Judge Ziegler had given notice to these defendants that her husband was on the West Bend Savings Bank's board, shouldn't that notice be somewhere in the case paperwork? And, two, even if, perhaps, she did notify the defendants--or if she assumed the defendants or their attorneys might by default check the state ethics website linked above to learn the news--why would these defendants accede to letting the case go forward under someone with such strong ties to the plantiffs? That's the sort of thing that suggests to me that the absence of a paper trail regarding that notification is probably representative of an absence of notice.

A further question: Why has it even come this far? In other words, should not Judge Ziegler have looked at the parties involved in these cases and without having to be asked recused herself because of the conflict of interest? I know that it took scrutiny before she did the right thing in the Wal*Mart case, and this is an issue that has gotten no scrutiny until now, but why should it take scrutiny at all? Shouldn't someone who thinks she's qualifed to sit on the state's highest court have a slightly greater sense of ethics, of right and wrong, than that?

Now, I know you may also be thinking that I'm relying too much on someone I've labeled "my intrepid correspondent." Fact is, this source has not yet steered my wrong in several years of providing me with information. Besides, the Washington County Courthouse records are public records, so you don't have to take my (or his) word for it. In fact, I would hope some enterprising reporter could take a drive over there and follow this story wherever it may lead, since it seems to raise a lot of uncomfortable questions for Ziegler about her conduct on the bench--conduct that she is using as the very basis for her campaign. It wouldn't be hard to contact the people who have lost these cases to West Bend Savings Bank, ask them how it feels to know that the woman who ruled against them is married to a member of the bank's board.

So, Judge Ziegler, what's the deal? What's the threshold for recusing yourself? What's the minimum it takes to inform the parties in front of you about a conflict? And how on earth can you stand on this record as qualifications for Wisconsin Supreme Court?

Vote in One Week

by folkbum

Some election-related bits:

• In Milwaukee, city-wide school board candidate James Koneazny has dropped out due to illness. His name will still be on the ballot, but don't vote for him.
  
  
• In other school board news, Terry Falk is organizing "Cell Phone Parties" at his house for this weekend to support his run down here in District 8. If you can help out by bringing your cell phone and making calls to voters before the February 20th primary, call Terry (744-4598) or email (tfalk@wi.rr.com) in advance if you can make it for a couple hours Saturday, Sunday, or Monday. If you don't have a phone, you can use Terry's land line or work on a few other things there.
  
  
• Also for some Milwaukee voters, it looks like the Michael McGee recall is back on, but on a different timeline, with an initial vote coinciding with the general election on April 3. A lot of very smart people that I know and trust are supporting Una Van Duvall for that position; I don't know enough to offer a full endorsement, but I just wanted to point out that she's garnered some impressive backers.
  
  
• Annette Ziegler is first on TV with an ad in the state Supreme Court race. Though the spot is not quite as "tough on crime!" as her previous radio ad, I do have to wonder if her campain isn't taking a tip from JB Van Hollen, and running on the crime issue even though prosecutorial experience is not necessarily helpful on the high court. But I guess she, like Van Hollen, knows what her voters want to hear, even if it's not relevant to the job. I'm still voting for Linda Clifford.

Any votes in your neck of the woods you want to talk about?

Graul says Ziegler's not "partisan"; really, she's just hiding it

by folkbum

Well, we all had some fun with the Judge Ziegler photoshop contest. But the race for the open seat on Wisconsin's Supreme Court is actually a serious matter. People on the left and the right seem to recognize that the election this April (with a cursory primary before that) will have implications for years to come.

Supreme Court Justice is, technically, a non-partisan race. But like a lot of our "non-partisan" races, there are obvious partisan overtones. So far, they've mostly centered on Ziegler's opponent, Madison attorney Linda Clifford, and her being up-front about her politics. Democratic politics, that is.

This post at Letters in Bottles, for example, quotes extensively from Clifford's bio at her law firm to warn that she's "Wisconsin's Own [David] Souter." (And warns, ominously, that Clifford plays the harpsichord.) The Spice Boys can barely write a sentence about Clifford without throwing around "ties to Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle" or "lifelong Democrat" and so on.

I'm not entirely sure what the big deal is; Clifford makes no secret about her politics. I mean, check out Clifford's supporters page--it's Democrat after Democrat after Democrat among the hundreds listed there, including people like Tammy Baldwin, Jon Richards, Tim Carpenter, and Dave Hansen, people not known for their political moderation. Clifford just doesn't try to hide it.

Zeigler's endorsement page, on the other hand, has seven names on five endorsements. And I doubt that the list of citizens who support Ziegler's candidacy is really as, um, empty as her website would seem to indicate:And it's not just missing from Ziegler's site; while people will write about Clifford's contributions from "Doyle budget director David Riemer," for example, no one seems to be writing about Ziegler's contributors, like prominent Republicans Russ Darrow or John Torinus. While every story ever has to include information about how much money the Cliffords have raised or given to Jim Doyle, no one is writing about the money flowing from various Zieglers to Republicans--including from Judge Ziegler's husband and father-in-law to the Thompson-McCallum administration that gave Judge Ziegler her current job.

Bernard Ziegler, the father-in-law, gave many thousands before and after--though more after--Annette Ziegler got the post. Her husband's contributions follow a similar pattern. (Ziegler was appointed in May, 1997.) And while those two kept their wallets out of the Mark Green campaign, many in the Ziegler family businesses weren't so restrained.

All of this is not just to point out problems with the way the media are reporting the race. The title of this post is all about Mark Graul, who cannot be called anything but Republican, having worked for Mark Green's congressional office before engineering Green's spectacular loss to a relatively unpopular incumbent. Graul is working for Ziegler. It was Graul, for example, who had to explain that it was just some over-eager staffer who did the photoshopping we all had a good larf about. Graul is trying madly to spin his candidate's partisan history:

Ziegler's campaign adviser Mark Graul, who was the campaign manager for the Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Green, denied that the race would be partisan. He said Ziegler had a conservative view on judicial philosophy, which means she does not intend to legislative from the bench. [. . .] Graul said he didn't know whether Ziegler has a history of voting for Republican candidates.

That's laughable. Either Graul has no frickin' clue who he's working for, or he's lying through his teeth.

What's most frustrating is that the writer of the AP story--Scott Bauer, a regular on the Madison beat--didn't bother to fact-check this. He cops out by saying he couldn't get a comment from Ziegler, but he didn't at all need to rely on the judge herself when he has access to the same records that I did in coming up with the links all throughout this post. He lets Graul's absurd-on-its-face spin go by without a word, despite his having been careful to tell us of Clifford's support for Jim Doyle.

I'm not saying that the Spice Boys need to tsk-tsk Ziegler for the way money clearly tainted Tommy Thompson's decisions (since you know as well as I they'll only do that against Democrats). Rather, I'm asking for the media to notice when Graul is lying to them about his candidate's supposed non-partisan nature. I'm asking Graul himself to stop the lying, since it only makes him look stupid--or like a liar.

Mostly, I'm asking for someone, somewhere, to notice, perhaps, that while Linda Clifford is completely upfront and open of her partisan past, Annette Ziegler seems to be so ashamed of hers that she'll scrub her website and send out lackeys to lie for her.

Maybe I'm biased, but, for my money, that's the bigger story.