Boots & Sabers

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Owen

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1815, 21 Dec 17

Doe Investigators Looked for Way to Use Illegally Seized Materials Against Republicans

MacIver points out this nugget in the DOJ’s report.

Shane Falk, the GAB’s lead attorney on the John Doe probe, responded the question had been a concern from the beginning.

“…(I)f we know that the Judge is unlikely to allow use of records, or it will take too much time to release them publicly, or that any immunity may negate potential civil claims,” Falk wrote to Landgraf. But Falk knew then that the John Doe judge wasn’t likely to allow illegally seized records to be used.

Here is where Falk looks for an end-around.

“Can we solve the records problem by just issuing new subpoenas from the GAB based on the information gleaned from the JD investigation? Just thinking,” he wrote to Milwaukee County Assistant DA David Robles. Again, the John Doe judge months before had quashed John Doe subpoenas.

Anyway, the short answer was no. Such emails illustrate the kind of scheming that went on to keep the abusive probe alive.

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1815, 21 December 2017

24 Comments

  1. Kevin Scheunemann

    We need to throw the top 5 people running this investigation in jail for a long, long time.

  2. jjf

    A fellow on Reddit points out:

    And in that report Schimel regurgitated the Walker lie that the now-Governor himself asked for the investigation which became John Doe I, when it was in fact Tom Nardelli who did so.

    Schimel points to the statute regarding John Doe secrecy orders in his report as being a statute that may have been violated by GAB staff. But he doesn’t have sufficient evidence of that, and using the precedent of his failure to prosecute Eric O’Keefe for publicly and clearly violating exactly that statute Schmiel cannot prosecute anyone for it without overturning the rule of law through selective enforcement.

    Indeed, through publicly talking about a “John Doe III” that had not previously been revealed, Schimel is violating that exact statute himself.

    Even if there were truly any ‘there’ there, it is clear that Schimel has proven incapable of handling the investigation in either a professional or nonpartisan fashion.

  3. Paul

    Nobody cares.

    Your side has a newspaper with an idiotic tag line of “democracy dies in darkness.”

    Put your money where your mouth is. Make a citizens arrest on Schimel for bringing light to an unethical investigation. Just let me know where to send you the KY. You’ll need it where you’re headed.

  4. jjf

    Wow, Paul, you’re quite off-base.

    “Democracy dies in darkness” is the motto of the Washington Post, which isn’t quite relevant here, is it?

    The Maciver Institute is an advocate for government transparency, which is the essence of that quote.  I’ve volunteered hours – well, actually, more than that, days – standing shoulder-to-shoulder with them before the public on that cause.  So where’s the “your side” in this?

    Let Schimel investigate all he wants. If he can’t get convictions, so be it. If he wants to accuse others of partisanship but isn’t willing to apply the same standards to himself, we’ll all be able to see that, right?

     

     

  5. Paul

    Sure it’s relevant.

    Just because you’re not bright enough to understand is solely your fault, troll.

  6. jjf

    Feel free to explain.

  7. billphoto

    I suppose Nardelli could have asked DA Chisholm to investigate the missing money without Walker’s knowledge and I suppose Obama’s Cabinet could have initiate countless illegal activities without letting the ex-President know but I find either supposition problematical.

    The real issue here is what started as an investigation into missing funds warped into an unconstitutional, illegal partisan witch hunt.  No matter one’s political stripes, purging the responsible people from government, at a minimum, should be job one.  Prosecuting them should follow.

    It seems almost daily we learn of another misuse of government irregardless of party affiliation.  It starts at the local level with what appear to small favors like approving or denying rezoning based on personal reasons only to learn of money and favors exchanged.  This ‘training ground’ for both elected officials and bureaucrats is the root of the rot destroying our democracy.  It extends from Main Street to Washington DC. Even when caught, their is no penalty for their actions.

    Could real prison time for their crimes deter future abuses?  I don’t know but would like to give this solution a try.

  8. Paul

    And Bill stomps the troll.

  9. jjf

    So you’re saying we all agree that Walker was using County workers on County time in County offices to run his first campaign?

  10. Paul

    (Citation missing)

  11. kjanz1899

    Jjf it is confusing when you use the royal form of we.

  12. jjf

    In the report, Schimel declared “Republican staffers, campaign workers, and fundraisers were diligent in separating their state work from their campaign work” and he did not provide any evidence of that, and apparently refuting the timestamps of thousands of emails that show that wasn’t true. Remember the “secret router”? (A mobile hotspot.)

  13. billphoto

    One may present an argument about REPUBLICAN staffers and how or if they separated campaign work from county work to try to deflect attention but the DEMOCRAT GAB’s abusive, illegal, secret witch hunt is the type of activity we are now seeing exposed.  Activity ‘we’ can all agree that threatens the core of our democracy.

    IF SOMEONE TOLD ME THIS HAPPENED IN NAZI GERMANY or RUSSIA, I WOULD BELIEVE IT BUT IN THE UNITED STATES??!!  These Gestapo wannabes should be removed from our government and prosecuted to the fullest extend of the law.

  14. dad29

    Convictions for illicit emailings were obtained.

    But convictions for completely illegal “investigations” have not been obtained.  If I were Mr. Falk, I’d be looking for work in a State far, far, away from here.

  15. jjf

    I can understand the grave concerns about the John Doe process. It’s something that “we” as Wisconsinites created a long time ago, like it or not. It was a legal process in that sense.

    It’s as legal as, oh, the more recently created WEDC process, where the process for giving taxpayer-funded government handouts was deliberately hidden from view.

    The WisGOP may have adjusted the John Doe law to eliminate its use in the political arena, but they’re apparently still happy with it being used in other ways.

    What I don’t see here or from the WisGOP in general is a detailed blueprint for replacing these systems that were created. If you don’t think there should be any oversight over elections and campaigning, just say so. If you do, tell me what it should look like, and how the government can attempt to police itself and police a necessarily political process.

    So far I just here complaints that it’s been too partisan one way or the other, and that we should replace these oversight agencies with someone even more partisan so that the ruling party is never implicated in the things they do, unless of course it’s someone that the ruling party would like to rid from within their own ranks. Is that less Nazi or more Nazi?

  16. billphoto

    OMG can you say partisan?

  17. dad29

    JJF you lost all credibility when you shifted the topic here.  WEDC has nothing to do with Doe, and elections have nothing to do with the health condition(s) of Vukmir’s daughter.

    Schmitz, Chisholm, Falk, et al. chose the sword and they are going to die by it.

  18. Paul

    Shouldn’t we expect trolls to stop linking malware?

  19. billphoto

    Should ‘we’ try a different source for information? Maybe the Huffington Post or Salon.  How about Politico?  Here’s a doozy from the left leaning publication, https://www.politico.com/interactives/2017/obama-hezbollah-drug-trafficking-investigation/

  20. Le Roi du Nord

    petite paul:

    And a Merry Christmas to you as well.  Maybe for New Years you can turn over  a new truthful leaf.

  21. Paul

    Do us all a favor, and leave.

    Racist anti-Semite.

  22. Le Roi du Nord

    Guess you won’t .

  23. Pat

    “Should ‘we’ try a different source for information?”

    Like from the Ladies of Liberty?

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