Thug Holloway – No Runny Eggs

It’s good to be king…just for a while – Milwaukee County edition

steveegg — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 03:46:40 +0000

Noted slumlord and abuser of fellow Milwaukee County Supervisors Lee Holloway is now acting Milwaukee County Executive, and he hasn’t disappointed those who expected new lows to be set. Despite the 30-day tag on his rule (or at least this stage of his rule), he wasn’t satisfied with just one judge administering the oath of office, inviting disgraced former County Executive F.(U.) Thomas Ament (the guy who signed into law the multi-million-dollar pension grab in 2000 that, when it finally came to light in 2002, cost him and several supervisors their jobs in recall elections) to the ceremony as an honored friend, or summarily firing the housing director (highly ironic since Holloway and his wife are facing legal action from the city of Milwaukee for numerous code violatoins on rental property they own), or laying out a massive tax-and-spend agenda that will by necessity take far more than either the 30 days he has before he has to name an “interim” County Exec (most-likely himself because he temporarily gave up the Board Chairmanship) or the 3 1/2 months before an elected replacement takes office (yes, he’s running). The latest is the revelation that he assembled a 32-member transition team.

Revisions/extensions (7:03 am 12/30/2010) – In the 5 o’clock hour, WISN-AM’s Jerry Bott and Ken Herrera pointed out that, in Holloway’s announcement that he was running for the remainder of the term, he used street putdowns on his potential challengers, conservative and ultra-liberal alike. Since nobody hit the poll yet, I simply added it to the poll.

I guess it’s time for a new NRE Poll…

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

It’s also time for some appropriate music…

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvIz_GXKUss[/youtube]

More infamous thugs

steveegg — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 16:20:26 +0000

Guess I must have missed the memo that a certain local lefty put out about “thug” being limited to a certain race. Funny thing is, Merriam-Webster also missed this, as their definition of “thug” is “a brutal ruffian or assassin”. I don’t seem to see any mention of race here, but Lee Holloway’s repeated use of physical violence against other members of the County Board qualifies him as a ruffian and thus a thug.

Since that local lefty seems to think that “thug” only applies to African-American gangsters, I decided to put together a small gallery of those that cannot be declared “thugs” anymore, at least if we listened to that local lefty instead of the fine folks that put together Merriam-Webster:

Eugene “Bull” Connor, racist who ordered the
Birmingham, Alabama Police and Fire Departments
to brutally break up civil rights demonstrations.

Members of the Birmingham, Alabama Police
Department, who used dogs and batons to
brutally break up aforementioned civil rights
demonstrations.

Members of the Birmingham, Alabama Fire
Department, who used fire hoses to brutally
break up aforementioned civil rights
demonstrations.

Salvatore “Sammy The Bull” Gravano, former
Mafia Underboss who killed at least 19 people.

Idi Amin Dada, former leader of Sudan who
oversaw the mass murder of hundreds of
thousands.

Pol Pot, former leader of Cambodia who
oversaw the creation of the Killing Fields.

Adolf Hitler, former leader of Germany
who oversaw the creation of numerous
concentration camps and the near-
extermination of the Jews in Europe.

Iosif Stalin, former leader of the
Soviet Union who practiced his
“(T)he death of millions is a statistic”
quote many times over.

I think I’ll stick with Merrian-Webster. By the way, thanks for finishing my initiation into the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy.

Thug Holloway wins and wins and wins again; and how you can help stop the win streak

steveegg — Fri, 07 Apr 2006 23:57:12 +0000

A day after No-Ethics Milwaukee County Board Chair Lee “Thug” Holloway got 4 of his cronies to starve the County Ethics Board of funding into the continuing prosecution of a 90-count indictment against him in the Finance Committee on an allegiance-line vote, the chair and vice-chair of the Ethics Board, John C. Carter and Maria Monreal Cameron, resigned in protest. Charlie has a mid-morning interview with Carter, a mid-morning interview with supervisor Roger Quindel (whose violent replacement on the Finance Committee allowed Thug Holloway to get away with this), and the text of the resignation letters over at Sykes Writes. Also, Brian Fraley has the best collection of Thug Holloway news and commentary around.

However, there is one more shot to keep this investigation alive. Our friends at Citizens for Responsible Government have announced a rally and fundraiser to continue the investigation into Holloway to happen at 6 pm Wednesday, April 12, at Serb Hall (S. 51st St. and W. Oklahoma Ave. in Milwaukee). They will have additional details at a press conference on Sunday, April 9, outside the County Courthouse. I’ll keep you posted.

Thug Holloway trying to eliminate the chance for a “for-cause” removal as well

steveegg — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 12:03:45 +0000

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that ethically-challenged Milwaukee County Board chair Lee “Thug” Holloway is going to try to cajole 6 fellow supervisors into voting to deny additional funding to the Milwaukee County Ethics Board for the prosecution of a 90-count civil ethics violations complaint against him (to allow the Ethics Board to spend additional money from the county contingency fund, the County Board must approve the request by a 2/3rds vote). The gist of the complaint is that Holloway used his position as a supervisor to vote to approve contracts with the defunct Opportunities Industrialization Center of Greater Milwaukee (OIC) while receiving $165,000 from OIC for a property he owned that never changed hands, with many counts alleging that Holloway failed to disclose ownership of that and other properties. If convicted, Holloway can be removed from not only his chair position, but from office entirely.

I don’t often praise John Weishan, best known before this year as being ousted County Board chair Karen Ordinans little brother, but he has the money quote – “Trying to starve them for dollars so he personally can get a better settlement is another example of him misusing his office.”

Thug Holloway wins and wins again

steveegg — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 18:37:09 +0000

(H/Ts – Brian and JSOnline’s DayWatch)

Milwaukee County board chair Lee “Thug” Holloway, Milwaukee County corporation counsel William Domina, and the local chapter of the NAA(L)CP managed to intimidate 2 of the 10 supervisors seeking to replace Holloway as county board chair, Ryan McCue and Roger Quindel, into joining the Thug Nine to vote to “lay over” an attempted vote to elect a county board chair. Supposedly, the Board will take this up again if Peg Lautenschlager’s formal opinion on the matter matches her informal opinion that the board could proceed with the vote and potentially replace Holloway with a simple majority vote.

A message to those 2 cowards, as well as Richard Nykelwicz Jr, who once supported the idea of Thug Holloway stepping aside until the idea became serious: if Holloway is removed from his chairmanship, he will sue no matter how it is done. It won’t matter if the vote is 10-9, or 18-1 after a finding of cause. If you have learned nothing about Holloway, he will do anything and everything necessary to hang onto his power and unilaterally punish anyone who gets in his way. Just ask Orville Seymer and John Weishan.

In a blow against a strong Ethics Board, which has an open 90-item investigation against Thug Holloway, and against citizen involvement in watching government, Holloway cajoled 12 of his fellow board members into rejecting Don Uebelacker’s appointment to the Ethics Board. Uebelacker co-founded Citizens for Responsible Government, and had participated in a recall effort against Holloway (which likely would have forced his recusal in any vote on Holloway).

Like sands through the hourglass, so go the days at the Courthouse

steveegg — Sat, 18 Feb 2006 01:19:16 +0000

(H/Ts – Brian Fraley and JSOnline’s Daywatch)

Peg Lautenschlager issued today a preliminary, informal opinion that, despite Milwaukee County corporation counsel William Domina’s informal opinion to the contrary, the Milwaukee County board could proceed with a special session to elect a replacement for county board chair Lee “Thug” Holloway (side note; he decided that discretion was the better part of valor and didn’t remove the 6 members of the Group of 10 that still had committee chairmanships/vice-chairmanships). The full opinion from WisPolitics is here. A few notes:

She bases her opinion on the facts that because the vote would be to remove Holloway from his board chairmanship rather than from the board itself and that the chair is elected by the board rather than appointed by anyone or elected by the voters, neither statute that says that a “for cause” 2/3rds vote is required to remove certain officials applies. Rather, she states that the statute that says that the board chair serves until the board elects a successor applies.
Her opinion is counter to a 1923 formal Attorney General’s office opinion on this subject, but that 1923 opinion “…inexplicably ignored the plain language of the statue providing for the election of the chairperson as well as its own recognition that the chairperson is elected.”
Due to the conflict in opinions, she will undertake a formal review to either clarify or reverse the 1923 AG’s opinion.

I thought I would never say this, but Peg is right.

Six Milwaukee County board supervisors won’t resign over vote

steveegg — Sun, 12 Feb 2006 13:54:19 +0000

(H/T – Brian Fraley, who’s been keeping up the skeer on Lee “Thug” Holloway)

The Journal Sentinel reported in yesterday’s editions that 6 Milwaukee County board supervisors, Paul Cesarz, Dan Devine, Lynne De Bruin, James Schmitt, Joseph Rice and Ryan McCue, who were among 10 supervisors that asked for a special board session on Monday, February 20 to elect a new county board chair and were subsequently asked to resign by Monday, February 13 from various chair/vice chair positions by county board chair Lee Holloway, will not resign. In their letter to Holloway, they restated their position that Holloway step down as chair until his ethics case is settled, stated that they will continue to serve in their committee roles “faithfully and in the best interests of the citizens of Milwaukee County,… to whom we owe our allegiance,” and challenged Holloway to remove them if he disagreed with that statement.

The second part of the story deals with the legality of that election. After issuing a non-binding opinion that while the supervisors can hold the meeting, Holloway will continue to serve as chair unless 2/3rds of the supervisors vote to remove him for cause, Milwaukee County Corporation Counsel William Domina asked Wisconsin Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager for a second non-binding opinion. The group of 10 are contending that state statutes do not preclude removing a county board chair outside of the normal 4-year cycle with a simple majority.

This is going to get VERY ugly, and the ugliness will start tomorrow. I expect Holloway to remove all 10 supervisors from every committee they serve on, chosing to run county goverment with himself and the 8 supervisors that still support him.

Lee Holloway to Milwaukee County Board – “You f* with me, I f* you up.”

steveegg — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 18:15:15 +0000

(H/T – Brian Fraley)

Embattled, ethically-“challenged” (more like “lacking”) Milwaukee County Board Chair Lee Holloway isn’t taking the request of a new vote for county board chair lying down. He’s demanding that those of the 10-member “putsch” that filed paperwork to re-elect a board chair on Monday, February 20, that he hasn’t already removed from power to take a blood oath supporting him, resign any chairmanship/vice chairmanship on any committee they may be on, or face firing on Monday, February 13. The text of the form letter sent to Supervisors Cesarz (Personnel vice-chair), DeBruin (Parks, Energy, and Environment chair), Devine (Parks, Energy, and Environment vice-chair), McCue (Finance and Audit vice-chair), Rice (Judiciary, Safety and General Services vice-chair), and Schmitt (Personnel chair):

You recently signed a petition to the County Clerk to hold a special meeting of the County Board to elect a Chairman. In addition, I appointed you to serve as (insert position: e.g. Chairman of Parks)

Because of this situation, as well as the need for continued cooperation and communication between the County Board Chairman and the Chairs and Vice Chairs of standing committees, I am requesting that you inform me as to whether you can continue to work with me in your leadership capacity under the current circumstances at the County Board.

As you know, I believe I am exercising my constitutional rights of due process in defending myself against what I believe to be unfounded and unfair ethics charge.

You have even expressed your opinion that I have the right to do this.

I am now asking you to inform me whether you feel you can continue to work with me given this situation.

If you believe you cannot continue to work with me, I would request that you resign from your current position as (insert position) until due process has been completed.

I would like you to give this your careful thought and give me an answer by Monday, February 13.

Thank you for your response.

This thug cannot be removed from office fast enough.