The Milwaukee Post

May 16, 2014 • Milwaukee County Post • 9 Federal Judge Rudolph Randa's legal smackdown of the witch hunt into Governor Walker and conservative organi- zations is more than just an affirmation that Americans have the right to engage in political speech. It is an exposing of an obsession with Walker that has led to abus- es of power and preposterous "investiga- tions." Randa isn't alone. The very judge over- seeing the John Doe investigation into conservative organizations and the Walker campaign during the 2012 recall elections has also ruled that what the prosecutors are looking into is not a crime. That ruling months ago from Judge Gregory Peterson said that it simply isn't illegal for individ- uals advocating issues to work with or "coordinate" activities with government officials who share the same beliefs. Given that the prosecutors still wouldn't back down, Randa felt compelled to stop the investigation to end this brazen violation of cherished constitutional rights. The Randa ruling, which cited numer- ous U.S. Supreme Court precedents, stated that while it is legal to put some limits on how much individuals and groups can give to candidates, it is not legal to restrict the abilities of these individuals to work and speak out on American issues. That the John Doe prosecutors and five Wisconsin district attorneys felt they had the power to raid homes and essentially steal private property to target people for exercising their most basic American right – free speech – is an indication of how far some are willing to go to take Walker down. They couldn't use the bullying protests of 2011 to block Walker and his ground- breaking reforms and the 2012 recalls flopped just as badly. The remaining tactic is to try to find some scandal. The problem is that Walker is literally as clean as an Eagle Scout. There's no dirt to find. The result has been to focus on perfectly legal activity and call it dirt. Both Randa and Peterson, in their rulings, have blown the whistle. It's pretty clear that Walker has been a culture shock to the institutionalized pro- gressivism that was killing our state. Overpaid public employees, including unionized assistant district attorneys (more in a moment), teamed with Democrat politicians to put us on a spend- ing death spiral that created a budgetary nightmare and structural deficit. In other words, we were becoming what Illinois is now. Walker has fixed it but in doing so he went after the most entrenched power structure ever. The empire has been fight- ing back ever since. In the process, there has been a frighten- ing trampling of the constitutional rights of hundreds of conservative activists. For the mere act of working on behalf of Walker's reforms, law-abiding citizens had their homes raided, computers seized and were then ordered not to talk about it. Groups like the Club For Growth were ordered to turn over essentially all of their records for four years (it's chilling to even write the words). In the process, in an elec- tion year these groups were essentially put out of business and denied the ability to function as American citizens. Randa's ruling was necessary to save a basic free- dom. He is virtually certain to be upheld if an appeal gets to the Supreme Court. Among the losers are the assistant DAs who were racking up overtime working on the Doe. Stung when Walker reined in obscene employee benefits, these prosecu- tors were able to use their illegal investi- gation to line their own pockets. Rationalization is the second strongest human drive and it has led to a grotesque quest to "get" Walker at literally any cost. For attempting to stop this, Rudy Randa is a hero. * * * I've become convinced the only way to stop this assault is for Republicans to play the game as dirty as the Democrats. They just can't do it. No Republican district attorney will trump up charges against a Democrat. Most are like Waukesha County DA Brad Schimel, who can't even bring himself to criticize a Democrat Assembly candidate who broke state law in Schimel's county. So, the Democrats get to play hardball while the Republicans, as I argued here last week, are playing an inept game of tiddlywinks. But let's imagine the following dream. Schimel could have responded to Milwaukee's John Weishan using tax dol- lars to send out a politically motivated screed on his November election oppo- nent, Assemblyman Joe Sanfelippo, by publicly demanding a multicounty John Doe of Weishan. This would have forced the hand of the Democrat DA in Milwaukee, John Chisholm. Republican Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen could have joined in by offering to head the Doe. It borders on excessive use of prosecutori- al discretion but pales in comparison to what Chisholm and the Democrats have done to Republicans. The point is that timid Republicans like Schimel and Van Hollen could never do it. They don't want the feedback from the media and they don't want controversy. State Republican leaders have the same attitude. The response of the party leader- ship like Chairman Brad Courtney to the outrageous probe of Walker has been stun- ningly meek. The truly amazing thing is that Walker and conservatives are winning the war in Wisconsin despite fighting with water pis- tols against the Democrats' use of germ warfare. (Mark Belling is the host of a daily WISN radio talk show. His column appears week- ly in the Milwaukee Post.) MARK BELLING STANDING UP for MILWAUKEE OPINION Randa takes heroic stand for freedom Judge's ruling a strong blow against liberal tyranny Question of the week Did the judge make the right decision to halt the John Doe probe into the Walker recall? "No, it should have been allowed to go for- ward. Completing the investigation would have put an end to speculation and accusa- tions one way or another.Truth has a way of doing that." – Sandy Sue Szanderek Milwaukee *** "Yes, I think the judge has made the right decision. This has gotten past ridiculous. How long is this going to go on, and the only reason it is is because the Democrats are afraid of Governor Walker? I've traveled from east to west in the last couple of years and I hear people say they have a lot of admiration for him because he says what he's going to do and does it in spite of being threatened to recall and in spite of all this. When are the Democrats gonna stop whin- ing and crying and carrying on? Get some business done instead. And hey, how about investigating the Democrats? What about that John Weishan? What about him?" – Marilyn Fedrin Milwaukee *** "Yes, the judge did make the right decision in the John Doe probe. In fact, it probably should have never have started because it just got done with one about a year ago. What they should do instead is start one with John Weishan for using county taxpay- er money to run for the seat held by Joe Sanfelippo." – Terry Nardelli Milwaukee *** "It is way past time this ended. I hope the Club for Growth and others targeted sue for obvious trampling of their rights. This hyper-partisanship needs to stop, with "any- thing goes" on the liberal side and timidness on the conservative side. The district attor- ney greatly exceeded his authority. It's been too long yielding very minor infractions." – Noah Borkenhagen Franklin This week's question Should the Southridge Mall bus stop be moved back to its original spot? Editor's note: When responding to the Question of the Week, please include your full name with spelling, phone number and city where you live. Phone numbers will not be published. Anonymous responses are no longer accepted by the publication. Call 744-6370, Ext. 15 and leave a brief answer. Readers may also send an email with a brief answer to: dbutler@conleynet.com.

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