The GOP Tell On Public Education

By Jeff Simpson  

A tell in poker is a change in a player's behavior or demeanor that is claimed by some to give clues to that player's assessment of their hand. A player gains an advantage if they observe and understand the meaning of another player's tell, particularly if the tell is unconscious and reliable. Sometimes a player may fake a tell, hoping to induce their opponents to make poor judgments in response to the false tell. More often, people try to avoid giving out a tell, by maintaining a poker face regardless of how strong or weak their hand is.

There is an important election coming up on Tuesday.   Unfortunately it is not the Supreme Court election, the Democrats in Wisconsin dropped the ball on that one and far right wing Justice Ziegler is running unopposed.  

The race that matters is for Director of Public Instruction.  where incumbent Tony Evers is facing Lowell Holtz.

The far right wing, led by the unlimited well of money in Bradley Foundation, have been working on taking over the state of Wisconsin, with a combination of stealth candidates, lots of money and dark money groups attacking the opposition.   Their success is unparalleled in WI.  They are so good at winning elections that they have even elected such horrendous people statewide as homophobic hateful Justice Rebecca Bradley and unethical unintelligent Mike Gableman (among others).

The one office they have not been able to touch was Superintendent of Public Schools.   This year, fresh off right wing victories we have not seen since 1984 they were empowered and had momentum, yet the best they could come up with was Lowell Holtz.

Open records requests show us that while Mr. Holtz was a sitting superintendent of the Holman School District, a former State Legislator and former candidate for this very office, Don Pridemore, was emailing and recruiting Mr. Holtz.

Now everyone knows that is off limits, but breaking the law has never been of much bother to the WISGOP because they know there will be no consequences (see far right justices Ziegler, Bradley, Gableman).  The problem is Mr. Holtz was more than willing to spend his work time at the School District planning and working on his campaign using his public email and school time to plan out his run.  

Then when another person, who I forget his name already, decided to also challenge Evers, Bradley Foundation gopher and long time Republican donor, Stephen Einhorn, initiated a meeting between the two challengers.  The purpose of Mr. Einhorn initiating this meeting was to get one to drop out with the promise of a cushy job and power within DPI when the person who stayed in the race won.  

Mr. Holtz, having a lackof desire to do much of his own work, asked for a 6 figure job, the ability to take over some of our bigger school districts in WI, to suppress wages and increase voucher schools in those districts and have the State of Wisconsin supply him with his own personal driver.

Who cares if the kids are being starved and their schools are crumbling, Mr. Holtz has no interest in visiting these schools unless he can ride in style.

Luckily, this situation will never materialize because Mr. Holtz nor his primary challenger will never be Superintendent of Public Instruction in Wisconsin,

However, there is a moral to this story.   It shows how little the state power infrastructure of right wing Wisconsin, understands and feels about public education.  

They have no problem whatsoever recruiting a candidate illegally(they know the rules of no campaigning on public time) and have so little respect for Dr. Evers and our public school system, that they would put someone like Lowell Holtz in charge.

It is not about competence, or ideas, its about having complete power.  

If you will notice, Bradley and the boys have thrown in the towel.   They have decided to stop throwing dirty money after bad and have pretty much conceded this election.  

They know Lowell Holtz will not win, so they have decided to save their money for 2018 where they will bury good public education advocates running for the legislature in Wisconsin and bury them in bullshit with dark money.

We can address that when the time comes but for now we need to send a message.  

Our public schools and our kids education is off limits.  

Please make sure and show up and vote in force for Dr. Tony Evers on Tuesday!

PS:   Also please do NOT vote for Justice Ziegler.   She is guaranteed a win, lets make sure that her under vote if considerable and telling.