No Runny Eggs

In the last 5 days, 3 entities have released polls on the governor’s race (listed in order of dates taken, hat-tips to Kevin and Peter for finding these first):

• August 10 – Rasmussen – Doyle 49%, Green 41% (Doyle gained 2 points since the July Rasmussen poll, Green held steady, and the 3-month rolling average remained Doyle +6%). Rasmussen notes a certain lack of “loyalty” for Green among Pubbie voters, but without a breakdown of where that lack of loyalty is, I can’t agree with Kevin’s analysis that it’s Belling telling us SE Wisconsin Stormtroopers to not vote for him. It could just as easily be SW Wisconsin RINOs thinking that Green is too much of a conservative.
• August 11-13 – Strategic Vision – Doyle 45%, Green 44% (both candidates improved 2 points since the July Strategic Vision poll, Doyle’s disapproval at 50%). Strategic Vision has always been much more favorable to the Pubbies in this race, though you can hardly consider this a conservative-friendly poll; RINOs take the top 3 spots in the straw poll for the 2008 Pubbie nomination.
• August 12-14 – Research 2000 for WISC-TV – Doyle 48%, Green 38% (no previous polls to compare to and no numbers other than what WISC decided to feed us). Most-noteworthy of those limited numbers is that 34% of the respondents had no opinion of Green.

Before Xoff and the rest of you Doylies break out the champagne, do take a couple of notes:

• All 3 of these polls were finished just before Green finally got on the TV airwaves, but after a round of Doyle TV ads and several rounds of Doylie TV ads.
• There has yet to be a major poll that puts Doyle at or above 50%.

I strongly suspect that this is the high point of the Doyle campaign, now that new polls will start reflecting the Green Team’s on-air response. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the next Strategic Vision poll has Green up, with Rasmussen reducing Doyle’s lead to 4 points or less.

In short, the election will turn on what close Wisconsin elections have turned on the last several election cycles – whether the Pubbies can turn out enough enough voters to overcome the ‘Rat vote fraud (or conversely, whether the ‘Rats can manufacture enough votes to overcome the Pubbie turnout).

Mash here for the first extreme commercial, set to hit Wisconsin’s airwaves tomorrow.

Revisions/extensions (11:28 am 8/15) – Jim McGuigan has raised some serious questions about the veracity of the Sullivan report. I am looking into this, and hope to have the original voter registration information, specifically from Whitefish Bay, by the end of the week. Once I do, I will scan that, without any enhancements, into a file and go from there.

We have a pair of multiple voters seeking office under the DPW banner. I’m sure you know all about Donovan Riley, who was imported from Illinois by the moonbats who felt that Jeff Plale’s conversion to hard-core lieberalism wasn’t complete enough, voted twice in the 2000 fall primary, and basically laughed it off. Who you may not know about (if you don’t read Boots and Sabers, that is) is the saga of James O. Sullivan, who the ‘Rats hope unseats Tom Reynolds. He did the same thing 4 years earlier. You’ll have to forgive the FIB for not realizing a few things that Sullivan knew all about:

• Keep your fraud in Milwaukee County. Sullivan did his personal fraud-for-Clinton campaign in Whitefish Bay and Wauwatosa, communities mis-served by E. Michael McCan’t, a DA who never met a political corruption case he would pursue. Riley chose to do his Wisconsin half of his personal fraud-for-Algore campaign in Oconomowoc, which is served by a hang-’em-high DA, Paul Bucher (who has to be hitting his knees thanking God for this plum case right now). Bucher isn’t wasting any time in launching an investigation.
• Don’t cross state lines, especially if your federal candidate loses – Once again, Sullivan didn’t leave Milwaukee County. Riley spread his scheme across two states, and the guy he committed fraud for lost the Presidential election. Crossing state lines easily opens up the federal hooks, and because George Bush won instead of Algore, there are pit bulls in the Milwaukee and Chicago US Attorney’s offices.
• Let the statute of limitations run out before your scheme is discovered, just in case the prosecution situation changes between the time you commit the fraud and the time it is discovered. I’m not positive on the federal statute of limitations, but the state has a 6-year one. It’s been just short of 10 years since Sullivan committed his fraud, but less than 6 years since Riley committed his.

Of course, there is one thing or two that neither Sullivan nor Riley counted on; the rise of blogs and the anger of informed voters. I have another reason to jump on the far side of the primary, because as much as I’ve called Plale “East Side”, he’s nowhere near as bad as Riley (and thanks to gerrymandering, there’s no way a Pubbie is taking a district dominated by UWM and a couple of union towns in Cudahy and South Milwaukee). Meanwhile, folks on the west end of the county (which will include my sister in a couple weeks) will have to wait until November to hold Sullivan accountable by denying him the state Senate.

This is the Emergency Blogging System. Even though steveegg isn’t here, through the magic of WordPress and a helpful Badger Carnival creator, we have a Carnival post, even if it does suck because it was pumped into the pipeline on a keyboard broken by repeated crashes by a tired forehead.

The Senate race just isn’t getting the attention or respect it deserves. Frankly, it deserves no respect, but it does need some attention. Let’s bring in Michael Buffem….

In the gray corner, weighing in at no accomplishments in 3 terms in the Senate, a man whose idea of campaigning is to buy a spot in the NBA playoffs once every 6 years, Nobody’s Senator, Herb Kohl.

In the red-and-blue corner, weighed down by a sexual abuse allegation that, despite being filed in December, only came to light after nobody else showed up at the “R”PW headquarters to try to carry the RINO banner, the Rodney Dangerfield of Wisconsin politics, Robert “The Lawyer” Lorge.

In the Commie red corner, and the first challenger for Nobody’s Senate seat, knocked down by Madison police for attempting to gather signatures after hours, sponsored by the KOmmies and dope-smokers nationwide, Ben “Potted Plant” Masel.

In the other red corner (Oh, that’s green? I can’t tell the difference), carrying the water of the battiest of the moonbats, Rae Voegler.

Skydiving his way directly into the general election, stupidly refusing to accept the benefits of a straight-party ballot, Ben “Don’t call me the other one” Glatzel.

When the bell rings, the man in charge will be Kevin Kennedy. For the tens in attendance, the hundreds that give a damn, and the millions that will vote anyway, let’s get ready to rrrrrumbllllllllllle!

This morning’s Journtinel reports that executives with HNTB gave Gov. Jim “Craps” Doyle (WEAC/Potawatomi-For Sale) $17,684. I suspect that it’s for future considerations because their second-biggest payday (a no-bid $685,000 contract to build mchange.org) came before Craps came to town, and their biggest (co-design of the Marquette Interchange) straddled the timeline.

Oh, and this fresh $17,000+ comes less than a year after the #2 official at WDOT held a highly-questionable barbeque fundraiser for Craps that HNTB officials attended.

Revisions/extensions (1:36 pm 7/24) – Brian reminds us that while the original $600,000 contract was indeed approved under the McCallum administration, it was under the Craps administration that gave final approval to the overrun-plagued site.

The Lawgivers-In-Black (LIBs) of the Craps-packed Wisconsin Supreme Court just ruled that the state Constitution once again is worth nothing more than toilet paper, saying in a 4-3 decision written by Loophole Louis Butler (the packee) that no portion of the Constitution or previous SCOW decisions apply to Indian casinos or Governor Jim “Craps” Doyle (WEAC/Potawatomi-For Sale). To wit, Craps and the Indians can offer whatever games they agree to, including new ones never before contemplated.

Tell me again why the “R”PW didn’t oppose Pat Crooks.

Standard disclaimer; this was not coordinated with the RealDebate for Senate campaign. The worth of this post is $0.02

Fred reminds us that he has a nose for breaking slime. Well, there’s a LOT of slime to be broken in DC.

So, go vote for Fred in the BBA primary, and remember that both Aaron and Cosmo (Jonah Goldberg’s dog) are too young to be Senators.

Note to the federales; this post is worth exactly $0.02, which by my rough calculations leaves the RealDebate for Senate campaign about $4,900 short of having to register.

Fred has launched the Write In RealDebate campaign, and it seems I’m an unofficial campaign advisor. I do agree with the “vote early” half of the slogan, but I draw the line at “vote often”.

Just broken on Mark Belling’s show – a federal jury has convicted Georgia Thompson on 2 federal felonies for steering a travel contract to a company run by Doyle campaign contributors because the officers of that company donated to Doyle.

Nice knowing you, Craps.

Revisions/extensions (10:40 pm 6/12) – Part of the instant local presstitute spin is that “(t)he indictment does not allege a pay-to-play scheme in which the contract was awarded in exchange for the donations.” However, Steve Schultze explodes his own spin by pointing out that the indictment stated that “Thompson steered the contract to Adelman ‘to cause political advantage for her supervisors’ and to bolster her job security.” With the jury returning guilty verdicts on all counts in that indictment, that is now a matter of fact. There are but 2 people above Thompson in her organizational chart that stood to gain a “political advantage” – Marc Marotta (now Doyle’s campaign chair) and Jim Doyle himself.

A question for the Doylies out there; just why did Georgia Thompson feel it necessary to illegally inflate Adelman Travel’s scores to cause a political advantage for her supervisors to keep her job? She didn’t feel it necessary to conduct illegal acts for either political advantage for her supervisors or job security when Scott McCallum was governor.

James has the rules. Just make sure you bring a laptop because the parking lot of the DPW convention will almost certainly be full of state- and municipal-owned cars, and those who wait until getting back home to send in their cards will be at a distinct disadvantage.

3-2 – Tommy jumps into the governor’s race to push Mark Green out
3-2 – Tommy doesn’t appear on any ballot
4-1 – Tommy takes on Nobody’s Senator, Herb Kohl

If Tommy announces his decision Sunday like the Journal Sentinel is reporting he likely will (even-money odds on that), look for it to be to enter the governor’s race. If he does, I’ll bet that 3/4ths of the original Green Team will abandon Mark Green and call him “too conservative” (remember, they already did that to Scott Walker successfully).

For the record, I do not want Tommy anywhere near the governor’s section of the ballot. He’s a great campaigner, and he did have some decent ideas (W2, School Choice), but he’s a tax-and-spender first, last and always. Wisconsin doesn’t need one of those, especially now.

…I may as well let you know about the asshats who decided that the same profit level that ExxonMobil is getting ripped to shreds over must continue to be mandated to gas-station owners (which includes ExxonMobil):
Roger Breske
Russ Decker
Mike Ellis
Jon Erpenbach
Scott Fitzgerald
Dave Hansen
Sheila Harsdorf
Bob Jauch
Dan Kapanke
Julie Lassa
Joe Leibham
Mark Miller
Luther Olsen
Jeff Plale (who has turned into my biggest disappointment)
Fred Risser
Judy Robson
Cathy Stepp
Lena Taylor
Bob Wirch

If you see any of these asshats complaining about either high gas prices or “excessive” profits, shove their votes to continue to mandate a 9.18% profit for gas stations in their faces and serve them a tall, frosty glass of STFU.

He whacks Jim “Craps” Doyle (WEAC/Potawatomi-For Sale) but good with the Exxon tiger. Random quote from the piece – “According to Wisconsin Elections Board records, Doyle raised a total of $1.2 million from contributors between July 1 and December 31st of 2005, while spending only $421,000 to raise that money. Doyle’s $800,000 profit amounts to a 200% profit over those six months.”

Tucked at the end of the piece is something that is interesting, but got ignored by the Milwaukee/Madistan presstitutes. The Appleton Post-Crescent reports that Doyle has been using state planes for campaigning without reimbursing the state for the cost. The paper cites a 11/17/2003 trip to Milwaukee during which Doyle appeared at a campaign forum for then-Senator and Presidential candidate John Edwards (D-North Carolina). The cost of the flight; $1,500. The amount the Doyle campaign reimbursed the state; $0.00 as Doyle flack Dan Leistikow called the Edwards event “absolutely” a public event, even though it was run by the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. Say, does anybody remember Doyle making hay out of McCallum’s use of the state airplane fleet? I sure do.

I might not be a professional political consultant, but waving off the little photo-op and waste of state Internet resources on a meaningless online petition really should have been a no-brainer. Oh well, time to deconstruct it, with some help from JSOnline’s Daywatch because I was a bit busy counter-protesting (side note-PSP ROCKS!!):

Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle today called on federal lawmakers to cap oil company profits, return “excessive” oil profits to Americans and repeal $10 billion in tax breaks to oil companies, saying the moves would lower gas prices for struggling Wisconsin families.

Craps admit it; he’s a socialist. Of course, I knew it all along.

Moving to the “return” of “excessive” oil profits, how exactly is that going to happen? There’s no way of knowing how many miles somebody drove, even with intrusive vehicle emission inspections. Even if that could be determined, there’s no way that Craps and his merry band of ‘Rats would allow a proportionate share to be “returned” to owners of gas-guzzling SUVs. Indeed, the ‘Rat proposals for a windfall profits tax (already whacked by the pro, Brian Fraley) out there have the “excessive” oil profits going not to drivers, but to more gubmint spending.

Similarily, removing tax breaks would only further encourage the abandonment of American oil wells and foreign wells owned by the oil companies themselves in favor of buying oil from the likes of Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. Of course, since those revenues go in large part to enemies of the United States, the ‘Rats seem to be perfectly fine with that.

Doyle also announced a joint Web site with the state of Michigan,… (website removed, but it is a wisconsin.gov site) and urged residents of both states to sign an online petition urging President Bush and Congress to make the changes.

Craps just can’t stop spending our money on wasteful and worthless gestures. If Craps and Jennifer Granholm the Canuck want to lobby the feds, let them do it with their campaigns’ money, not the state treasuries.

“We are struggling here in Wisconsin as are people all over the country,” Doyle said at a news conference outside a BP service station in Brookfield where regular unleaded fuel was selling for $2.89 a gallon — about 62 cents higher than a year ago….

I was so hoping that Craps would show up in front of one of the 4 Mobil stations in Brookfield; I would have had to go out and get a video capture card just so I can add some visual to this. Let’s see; take away the 9.18% markup from the daily average terminal price mandated by the state at the pump mandated by the state (more on that in a bit), and that drops the price to $2.65/gallon. Take away the 3% markup mandated by the state at the terminal from that and the price falls to $2.57/gallon. Take away the $0.31/gallon in taxes levied by the state and the price falls to $2.26/gallon. I know, the stations and terminals do have to have some markup to stay in business, but that’s 63 cents in state-mandated costs, which is more than the increase over last year’s price.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that, by schlepping the 135 miles round-trip to Brookfield instead of finding a gas station near either the governor’s mansion or the Capitol building, he enriched the very oil companies he’s fighting against. Of course, knowing Craps, he probably had the tank topped off at Citgo so the money goes to his soulmate in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez.

…Doyle said he did not know at what dollar amount or percentage increase oil profits should be capped, saying he would leave that to Congress to sort out.

“Let them make decent profits,” Doyle said.

Time to bring back that 9.18% state-mandated markup to the debate. If a profit margin that starts with something less than a “9.” isn’t good enough for a gas station, it stands to reason that a profit margin that starts with a “9.” isn’t too good for ExxonMobil and company.

He also did not stake out a position on how excess oil profits should be returned to citizens.

I guess that if he did stake out a position, he would sound as stupid as his fellow ‘Rats, who would “return” the “excess” oil profits in the form of gubmint health care.

Doyle said he did not believe lowering Wisconsin’s gas tax would lower gas prices because he believed oil companies would raise prices to offset the reduced tax.

Typical socialistic lieberal – tax cut bad, tax hike good. I call bullshat part 1: Just who does Craps think pays those taxes? Hint; it isn’t ExxonMobil/BP/et al.

I call bullshat part 2: Back during the Algore Memorial Gas crisis of 2000, Illinois suspended collecting sales tax on gasoline sold there. Gas was that much cheaper on the other side of the toll booths.

He said he supports eliminating the state’s minimum gas markup but said he also doubted such a repeal would ease gas prices.

If he thought that cutting ExxonMobil’s/BP’s/et al’s profit margins would drive down prices, why won’t eliminating the minimum markup law?

Doyle accused oil companies of intentionally — and unpatriotically — raising prices to record levels after natural disasters such as Hurricane Katrina “because they could.”

As an economist, Craps makes a bad trial lawyer. Oil and gasoline prices (as well as natural gas prices) are driven not by the oil companies, but by traders acting on market forces, both real and perceived. Since the petroleum markets operate at tight-supply/high-demand extreme edge of the market curve thanks to OPEC’s quota system, growing global demand, and the unwillingness of both the DemocRATs and RepubicRATs (as well as Sensenbrenner) to allow proper exploitation of American oil reserves through refusal of new drilling rights, the 26-year-and-growing moratorium on new refineries, and umpteen blends of Algore Memorial Gas, any disruption whether real or preceived has a magnified effect.

Of course, because we’re talking about a ‘Rat, the presstitutes will more than gladly try to ignore these holes. Heck, the Journtinel sure did. Only one small problem; that monopoly is gone, and the herd of sheeple who blindly swallow the ‘Rat/Presstitute line is shrinking.

(H/T – Chris)

JSOnline’s Daywatch is reporting that Gov. Jim “Craps” Doyle (WEAC/Potawatomi-For Sale) will be appearing at a Brookfield gas station at 10 am this morning to announce a plan to limit oil company profits. Please tell me that it will be at one of Brookfield’s 4 Mobil stations; it would be fun to note that the state of Wisconsin mandates essentially the same profit margin (9.18% above that day’s average terminal price, unless that is less than 6% above what the station paid for it) for the station than ExxonMobil received last year (depending on the source, anywhere between 9 and 10%). Ah heck, I just noted it anyway. I just want the photo to go with it.

Brian Fraley points out that this goes against the May Day pro-illegal-invader boycott of commerce. Some days, Craps just can’t win. Hopefully, another one of those days will be November 7.

Revisions/extensions; multiple sources have differing profit margin numbers for ExxonMobil.