Sunday, June 24, 2012

Bob Donovan: Boot Licker, Admitted Failure

Milwaukee Alderman Bob Donovan is a blogger fodder machine.  He just can't keep his mouth shut and ends up putting his foot squarely into it.

His latest reaffirmation of this fact is a press release regarding the controversial reporting by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, which appears to be on a witch hunt for Milwaukee Police Chief Ed Flynn.

In said release, Donovan says the following:
First, I was somewhat taken aback by the negative comments directed toward the Journal Sentinel by some of my colleagues. I find myself in somewhat uncharted waters defending the Journal Sentinel, but what’s right is right. I shouldn’t have to point out that had it not been for the Journal Sentinel’s investigation, we would not have been sitting there yesterday in the first place discussing admitted failures, errors, and shortcomings of our crime reporting procedures. On the other hand, the Journal Sentinel has been criticized for not doing a thorough enough investigation – yet the only way that can be accomplished is by gaining access to the very information they’ve been denied.

Because we seem to be up to our necks in the discussion of audits – from the police department to the Fire and Police Commission to the Comptroller to the FBI – please allow me to comment first on the FBI audit. Until very recently, I was not aware of this audit, and quite frankly I am having difficulty finding anyone who was aware of it. It seems to have been Milwaukee’s best kept secret. Yet in the Chief’s own testimony he requested it almost two years ago. Yet to the best of my knowledge, no public mention of concerns (which must have existed) regarding the validity of crime reports (which led to the audit request) was ever brought forward. In my mind, there are still questions that remain as to the scope and intensity of this audit. Since it’s been described as a periodic audit encompassing more than several jurisdictions, one can easily assume it is of a more cursory nature.
In the first paragraph, he's trying to curry favor by undercutting his fellow aldermen and alderwomen, who called out the corporate media for their false reporting. This in itself isn't surprising since Donovan is a media hound who loves to hear the sound of his own voice.  The conservative paper loves to give him attention since he espouses the same values they're trying to promote.

The irony is that while Donovan is whining about the not knowing about the internal audit that Chief Flynn had asked for two years ago, he fails to mention that until this past spring, he was the Chair of the Public Safety Committee.  Which again makes one wonder what he was doing all that time - sleeping?


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