Political Heat

If you view both candidates as "biased," surely one of their biases is worse than the other's. There is a stark difference between supposed conflicts of interest held by the two candidates for state Supreme Court in this year's spring elections. Liberal-leaning Lisa Neubauer reportedly attended a climate march , a political action to be sure, done in support of the scientific consensus that human-caused global warming is negatively impacting the world. Conservative-leaning Brian Hagedorn's bigoted beliefs and actions in support of them have turned heads, and resulted in right-wing business groups denouncing him. He has financially supported a private school that discriminates against LGBT faculty and students (including inflicting punishments on them if their family members are gay). He has also accepted money from and spoke to a known hate group in recent years. Both beliefs by the Wisconsin Supreme Court candidates are political, and represent actions t...

At what point will the GOP walk away from Trump? The Republican Party is hedging all of its bets on a president whose past is catching up with him. At some point, they'll have to make a decision: will they remain tied to Donald Trump, or will they see the writing on the wall and make moves toward discrediting him? Following the testimony of Michael Cohen to the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday — during which Republican members of the committee frequently attacked Cohen's credibility rather than ask any pertinent questions about the president's behavior — I was reminded of a small lesson that was taught to me when I was in college many years ago. "The First Rule Of Wing-Walking," which referenced wing-walkers of the 1920s and 30s who would walk on the wings of small aircraft to entertain hundreds of onlookers below, was that you don't take a step in a new direction unless you are certain it's a safe move to make, one that will leave you in...

AG William Barr must release Mueller's final Russia report, when it is finally submitted A recent poll demonstrates that the American people, by-and-large, want an impending report from Russia special counsel Robert Mueller to be made public once it is submitted to the attorney general. By law, Attorney General William Barr, who will receive Mueller's final report, will determine whether it becomes public or not. Democrats have said they will subpoena the report to make it public should Barr decide not to do so. If Barr does indeed decline to release the report, it would be a serious injustice to the American people. We've been aware since 2016 that Russia worked to interfere with our nation's elections, to sow doubts in voters and to prop up Donald Trump to win the presidency. An investigation into that matter deserves to be seen and scrutinized by the public. Much more than that, however, Americans deserve to know what role their president played in the e...

After more than a year away from the site, Chris "re-opens" Political Heat A little more than a year ago, I stepped away from Political Heat because I was pursuing projects elsewhere. I had separate writing gigs focusing on political issues at the national stage as well as on state matters. It was time to "retire" from this blog and move onto these other projects. After giving it some thought, I think it's time to bring Political Heat back. My writing on the site may not be as frequent as it once was — I still have other paid writing projects to tend to — but there's still a need to discuss local, state, and national issues from a Wisconsin perspective. I'm happy to "re-open" Political Heat after this hiatus. I'm hopeful that, if you're a returning visitor, you'll be equally happy to read it again — or that, if you're a new reader of mine, you'll enjoy what I have to say on myriad topics affecting the state and e...