Ray Cross, Flickr CC
Anyone who cares enough about the rights of citizens in a democracy to know what their government is up to had to be pleased when the media rose up to defeat a sleazy attempt by Gov. Scott Walker and Republicans to destroy public access to government records.
The amendment, inserted into the state budget by Walker and Republican legislators in the middle of the night, suddenly aroused media organizations that had never before had the courage to speak out about the damage Walker’s extreme right-wing agenda was doing to democracy.
My God, not only was Walker passing legislation denying union rights for workers, women’s rights to make their own health care decisions and the right to vote for people who might not vote Republican, but now he had gone too far. He was cutting off media access to public information.
It became a full-blown media crusade. Write and call the governor and your legislators! Here are their addresses and phone numbers! This could be the end of democracy as we know it! Sure, destroying all those other people’s rights was pretty bad, too, but now we know just how evil these guys really are!
The media were like those Republicans who suddenly realize lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people have human rights when they find out their own kid is gay. They’re not wrong, but why didn’t they care until it affected them personally?
It turned out the media still had power when they cared to use it. Within days, Walker and Republicans withdrew their attempt to hide public information. Walker said trying to drastically rewrite open records laws to hide politicians’ actions was a “huge mistake.”
Easier to Break the Law Than Change It
So Walker has learned his lesson, right? This will make Walker a much more honest and open politician from now on. All’s well that ends well.
|
|
Wait a minute. This is Scott Walker we’re talking about. This is the governor who said during his campaign he wouldn’t support making Wisconsin a right-to-work state and that decisions about abortion should be between a woman and her doctor.
That was the same Walker who’s now running for president boasting about signing legislation making Wisconsin a right-to-work state and passing cruel new restrictions on abortion that allow no exceptions for rape, incest or protecting the health of the mother.
When Walker said rewriting the open records law restricting access to public information was a mistake, he really meant it wasn’t necessary. It’s a lot easier just to break the law.
For months, the governor’s office and his Department of Administration have sent letters to news organizations denying access to public documents because it “would inhibit the free exchange of ideas, opinions, proposals and recommendations among those involved.”
That is not a valid reason for withholding public information under Wisconsin’s open records law. In fact, it’s the same language Walker and the Legislature unsuccessfully tried to add to state law in their “huge mistake” of a budget amendment.
The Center for Media and Democracy and The Progressive magazine have filed suit against Walker for denying access to public records without a legally valid exception under state law.
Walker’s media relations are deteriorating as he is about to be challenged by a far less docile national press corps as a presidential candidate.
The concerted media screams of “Bloody murder!” when their own rights were being attacked only helped to call attention to how few objections had been raised by much of the local media when the rights of nearly everyone else in the state were being dismantled.
Any candidate who plays as fast and loose with the truth as Walker does would be hard-pressed to create a friendlier media fact-checking operation than The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s PolitiFact.
To balance the number of times PolitiFact is forced to admit Walker’s frequent public misstatements are False, it goes out of the way to accuse Walker critics of lying, too, whether they have or not.
Recent example: Labeling as False a statement from the Wisconsin State AFL-CIO that Walker’s budget eliminates the weekend for workers. It does that. Factory and retail workers can now be worked seven days in a row without a day off. PolitiFact claims it’s voluntary, but when employers can fire workers without union protection for no reason, workers can easily be coerced.
After pretty favorable initial stories based on vague impressions and misimpressions from afar, national reporters are now realizing Walker’s extreme positions on immigration, abortion and marriage equality aren’t just fleeting appeals to Iowa’s religious right. Walker’s best political trick has always been justifying offensive laws in deceptively bland tones.
The national media also are beginning to notice a lot of what Walker says simply isn’t true.
The irony of Walker’s escalating war on his home state media is it’s the softest, friendliest, least critical press he’s likely to face from now on outside of those blithering fools at Fox.
