Friday, June 28, 2013

Abele Photo Prompts Walkergate Memory

On Wednesday, Summerfest opened up on Milwaukee County's lakefront.  As is the norm, the local politicians wend their way down there for their photo ops on opening day.

So it was not surprising to see photos of Mayor Tom Barrett or County Emperor Abele down there, but this photo was a bit surprising:


What was also mildly surprising was the caption:
Great to be at the opening of #Summerfest with my friend, Mayor Tom Barrett, and the best Corporation Counsel Milwaukee County has ever had, Kimberly Walker.
First, one has to move past asking why in the world the county emperor would need corp counsel at Summerfest, unless he was planning on a legal issue to suddenly arise.

As noted, the over the top comment isn't too surprising.  Abele has kept Walker on as corp counsel even though she solicited the commission of a crime - namely offering her services to try to circumvent open record requests - as Cory Liebmann pointed to a few months ago.  And even if her email doesn't constitute a crime in itself, it most definitely is in violation of the state statutes of the responsibilities of a lawyer.

Since Abele did not want to do his job regarding Walker, it fell upon the Milwaukee County Board to terminate her.

Responding as he usually does when he doesn't get his way, Abele decided to throw another major temper tantrum.  Among other things, Abele is keeping Walker on the payroll - even though she had been fired - until the veto and override process as been completed.

It is insulting and outrageous that he is clinging onto her job despite her incompetence and her corruption, but he was more than willing to fire a dead man for having been sick with cancer.

But this whole farce of Abele's, along with that photo, did remind me of another photo that was commonly seen here during the Walkergate investigation:


For those who are new here or might have forgotten, Tim Russell worked on all of Scott Walker's campaigns for county executive and his two runs at being governor.
In between campaigns, Russell would serve in Walker's cabinet, in several different positions.  One such position was the economic development director.
When the Board denied Russell's confirmation, Walker refused to fire him and moved him to another cabinet level position.

That continued until Russell was arrested and convicted of stealing money from a veterans fund and was eventually sentenced to prison.

But up until the time of the arrest, Walker would often sing the praises of Russell, just as Abele is doing for Kimberly Walker.  This only adds to the growing list of occasions where Abele seems to be following right in Scott Walker's footsteps.

Which makes it no great wonder that this image is quickly becoming more and more popular with many progressives in the Milwaukee area:




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