As we all know, the State Elections Board in August said that Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Green couldn't spend $467 k and change he had shifted from his congressional fund.
As we all know -- despite the best efforts of the state's biggest paper to report on only one side of the story -- the AP reported RPW Chairman Rick Wiley called SEB Chairman to get his read on the situation the day before the vote cast. But Wiley insists theydidn't discuss strategy. The JS, which of course missed that angle, now is using his denial as boilerplate when they mention their big scoop.
Here's what Savage said when the JS reported on the SEB vote (8/31/06):
Board chairman John Savage, a Republican member of the board, was critical of its actions. Green is "still walking around, we might want to do something about that," said Savage, referring to how the loss of the PAC donations would hurt Green's campaign.
Here's what Wiley had to say:
Rick Wiley, executive director of the state Republican Party, called the Elections Board's actions a partisan move.
"The fact that they have singled out Mark Green and not demanded that Tom Barrett return his cash shows how vindictive Doyle's appointees to the Elections Board (have) become," he said in a statement.
it's interesting how the two of them spit out the same spin: The SEB's decision was a purely partisan call without any grounding in the law. (That'd be news to the Wisconsin DOJ.) Did they coordinate the post-decision messaging on that phone call? Well, Rick Wiley says they didn't talk strategy, so of course not!
Still, ain't it weird neither would have mentioned the innocent phone call at the time?
(And isn't it weird how a phonecall from the governor's mansion is sinister while one from the chairman of the RPW is just makin' conversation?)
And it goes without saying, but I'll say it: The AP made the JS look like a bunch of chumps with its scoop -- apparently brought about by the hard work of actually calling Rick Wiley -- about the Republican contacts. The JS got schooled. But we can assume only its readers will pay the price.
(Part of post rewritten for clarity.)
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