Whither MKE Cnty: Bud Selig Is A Magnificent Hypocrite

After getting just about everything he damn well wanted from the county for Miller Park, former Milwaukee Brewers owner and current baseball commissioner Bud Selig is raising money to stab the county board in the back:

“…as the Greater Milwaukee Committee mounts a lobbying campaign to pass the measure. An arm of the group called Smart Government Inc. is holding a fundraiser at 5 p.m. Jan. 24 in the office of baseball commissioner Bud Selig on the 30th floor of the U.S. Bank building at 777 E. Wisconsin Ave., according to an invitation.

It is being hosted by a group of Milwaukee business leaders, including retired Northwestern Mutual CEO Ed Zore, Fiduciary Management Executive Chairman Ted Kellner, private investor Sheldon Lubar, Badger Meter President Rich Meeusen and Selig, along with each of their wives..”

And exactly how does Mr. Selig get away with using the commissioners office for an essentially local political function?

And as a footnote: along with each of their wives? What the heck is that? Is the GMC still a 19th century patriarchy?

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9 thoughts on “Whither MKE Cnty: Bud Selig Is A Magnificent Hypocrite

  1. You portray Mr. Selig as a partisan. While Wisconsin Assemblymen and Senators are certainly lining up in partisan ways on this issue, I wonder. Mr. Selig certainly has a history of supporting Democrats and their causes, for instance. His nearly $100,000 of lifetime campaign contributions have almost all gone to Democrats like Feingold, Dodd, Levin, and the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee. Selig is a lifetime friend of Herb Kohl, afterall They played stickball together on the streets of Milwaukee, roomed together in college, etc.

    I’m thinking this isn’t really a partisan issue, but because of the situation here in Wisconsin, the Republicans have decided to make it a partisan issue.

  2. Ed, I might have missed one of your earlier posts but are you upset with the way its being done or are you defending the necessity of retaining a full time board? After all the voters of the county will ultimately decide via referendum.

  3. The referendum is a hoax…it doesn’t actually give the voters say in how their county government will be structured or run. And it panders to those who want to cut government costs regardless of the results.

    I am not defending the necessity of a full time board nor an eighteen member board. The county may need and want the full time board it has, may want a smaller full time board, or a part time board. But I think they should get to decide…which is why I suggested a county convention. I don’t think the State of Wisconsin has a right to impose this on Milwaukee county residents neither ethically nor constitutionally.

    1. If the legislation were written to reduce the County Board’s budget regardless of the outcome of the referendum, then it is a slap in the face to the whole idea of “local control.”

      Any cuts to the County Board’s budget should be contingent on the outcome of a referendum, as opposed to being mandated to happen regardless of the outcome.

  4. Nothing in the referendum is changing how the Board is structured or run though. It’s lowering the pay.

    I would also echo what Steven said. It doesn’t make him a hypocrite any more than the 70% of people in Shorewood who lean D are hypocrites for voting for a similar measure last April. There are a lot of liberals/Democrats/progressives who are behind this, they’re not hypocrites either in my opinion.

    1. Dan brings up a point about the 70% of folks in Shorewood who voted in favor of shrinking the size of the county board. Here in Cudahy, voters supported the same measure by a very big margin, and the last time I checked Cudahy wasn’t exactly a bastion of conservative values, having supported Tammy Baldwin, Barack Obama, Chris Sinicki, and Gwen Moore in the 2012 elections.

  5. How would you get the board to come to the table at this “convention” you want? Do you honestly think the likes of Weishan and others would ever agree to participate in something that has even a remote chance of eliminating their position, their pay and/or their bennies? I remember Weishan staunchly refused any such cuts directed at himself and other board members at the same time regular Joe Shmoe county workers took cuts/furloughs. That’s a mark of a true hypocrite, BTW.

    Selig is not a hypocrite on this issue. Yes, he did get county assistance in the form of a piece of sales tax revenue. Such revenue comes from the people, not the board. Trimming the fat from Milwaukee County government is an appropriate way to do a solid for the taxpayers in return.

  6. Ed,

    Your post on the 15th is what we should be doing. We should be beefing up the board and getting rid of the other 19 municipal governments. One board as the the single government body and one police and fire and so on. How people can not see this for the power grab it is is beyond me? The first draft wanted to gut the budget which would have allowed them to clearly take over the county and maybe even the city not to mention Lubar is involved in this and he deosn’t hide the fact that he wants county government destroyed. This is another shot being fired in the privitization effort that was started twenty years ago when the Bradley Foundation started pushing voucher/charter schools.

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