Republicans taking us back a century or two

Wow, where do these guys come from? Today I’m talking about Tom Tiffany and Andre Jacque, two of the most misguided legislators to hold office in Wisconsin in many years.

Let’s start with Sen. Tom Tiffany (R-Hazelhurst). The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel published a piece about him recently, calling him a “lightning rod on environmental issues.” It’s a good article, well worth your time, and chronicles Sen. Tiffany’s efforts to “ease” environmental regulations (make that erase) in order to allow GTAC to mine in the Penokees, his role in overriding county-level shoreline zoning protection in the budget, and his successful effort to cut funding for scientific research in the DNR, including reducing the number of scientists who work there. Richard Thiede, the president of the Iron County Lakes and Rivers Alliance covers these issues much more thoroughly in a guest post at the Woods Person blog. The details show Sen. Tiffany’s absolute disregard for the people he represents.

But the most interesting part about the MJS article is Sen. Tiffany’s response to his placement on the 2014 “Dishonor Roll” of the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters. “‘That’s a badge of honor,’ Tiffany said. He dismissed the League as ‘out of the mainstream.’ The award hangs on the wall of his Capitol office.”

What a statement! A badge of “honor” to be noted as one of the worst legislators in the state in terms of protecting the environment. Most people, even conservatives, want to be seen as protective of the world around us, but not Tom Tiffany. Of course, this attitude squares with Sen. Tiffany’s views: the EPA is “radical,” the role of humans in global warming isn’t settled, natural resources (i.e., mineral and forest resources) must be “fully utilized” no matter the impact on air and water quality (and tourism). (Interestingly, Tiffany and his wife ran an excursion boat on the Willow Flowage for twenty years, on water where the DNR spent millions of dollars on land purchases. Seems he’s all done with that.)

Now Tom Tiffany sees himself as an “agent of change,” and believes the state should curtail conservation land purchases, embrace sand mining while limiting local governments’ ability to regulate it, increase logging in state forests, and “discipline” the scientists in the DNR. In other words, Wisconsin should go back to pre-statehood days.

Rep. Andre Jacque (R-De Pere) only wants to send Wisconsin back to the 1930s.. He has introduced a bill that would curtail significant portions of Wisconsin’s biological research, and would force scientists from the University of Wisconsin and the Medical College of Wisconsin to take their research, and their research dollars, outside the state. As described by the Legislative Reference Bureau, Jacque’s bill, which is scheduled for a hearing on Tuesday, August 11, at 10:00 am, “prohibits a person from knowingly and for valuable consideration acquiring, receiving, or otherwise transferring a fetal body part in this state. A fetal body part is a cell, tissue, organ, or other part of an unborn child who is aborted by an induced abortion. The bill also prohibits a person from knowingly providing, receiving, or using, for experimentation, a fetal body part in this state, regardless of whether the provision, receipt, or use is for valuable consideration.” (Emphasis added.)

Two points are critical here.

  • Federal law already prohibits the sale of fetal tissue for profit.
  • Fetal cells and fetal tissue have been used in scientific research since roughly the 1930s, and in federally-funded research since the 1950s. Federally-funded research is subject to review by an federal ethics panel. This bill as written prohibits such research. At UW alone the cells are used by more than 100 scientists in $76 million worth of grants.

Rep. Jacque does not seem to understand what his bill does. A similar bill did not pass the legislature in 2011. According to an article in the Wisconsin State Journal  Rep. Jacque “said he changed the bill to allow use of the cells,” but the plain language of the bill does not do that. (This is the proposed language: 146.345 (1) (ag) “Fetal body part” means a cell, tissue, organ, or other part of an unborn child.”) Playing mad scientist, the representative also concluded that if researchers want to create new cell lines, they can use tissue from miscarriages. (He should try asking a woman who has just miscarried for permission to use that tissue … ) Rep. Jacque also callously dismisses the claims of the University of Wisconsin as to the extent of research performed using fetal cells and fetal tissue. “For his part, Jacque said of UW’s estimates on potential lost research dollars, ‘I’m sure that’s exaggerated, but they can use any numbers they like.'”

Now Rep. Jacque has suggested that there might be changes to the bill to make it more acceptable, but if he doesn’t understand what he has done, how can he make meaningful changes?

Remarkable. Rep. Jacque wants to set back research to the pre-1930s, and Sen. Tiffany wants to turn back environmental protection to the 1850s. Where do these guys come from anyway?

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11 thoughts on “Republicans taking us back a century or two

  1. Left and Margaret Sanger believe that killing black babies is not enough, they want to use them for research, like Dr. Mengele.
    Letting black babies be born alive, then whacking them so as not to poison the parts and then auctioning them off to the highest bidder fro some rich lefty banker to use. Then I hear they fry up the re
    st like in the Silence of the Lambs..

    1. WI Con, the biggest problem with you forced birthers is your laziness. Why aren’t you “saving babies?”

      Who is stopping you from contracting with the Ob/Gyn and the mother to adopt the fetus? Raise money for the neo-natal unit and find caring parents.

      If you want government forcing birth, you’re no friend of the Second Amendment.

      If you really think it’s murder, why aren’t you advocating for a homicide investigation after every miscarriage?

      Ask the Medical Examiner to issue a death certificate, then give the remains a decent burial. There’s no statute of limitations on murder. At any point, anyone can come forward and accuse the mother of causing the death of her unborn child.

      “Pregnant Woman Fights with Wisconsin’s Fetal Protection law”
      http://www.jsonline.com/news/crime/pregnant-woman-fights-wisconsins-fetal-protection-law-b99127289z1-229077121.html

    2. It’s called sundowning Bobby. If you remember the term, talk about it with your care-giver ASAP. There are ways to cope successfully and slow the progression.

      Best of luck, but you aren’t doing your reputation any favors by commenting on the blogs.

      1. The left is not doing itelg many favors by defendign the slaughter of almsot full term infants in the womb for boy parts, leeting them be born alive and then whacking them to make money plus running this ciunty tillions of dolalrs in debt making us like Greece, PR, Venezuela. Barely gettign enough jobs to replace the jobs tehyt lost us when they came into office.

  2. On the attack on women portion of your piece Joanne, let’s not forget Kleefisch, and can anyone name a more peerless example of waste, fraud and abuse in WI government than these two clowns, Andre, the (crime lord) Hutt, Jacque and Joel, ribeye in the sky, Kleefisch? Waste of taxpayer’s money, fraud with their purported reasoning to bring this forward and abuse, well this bill is out and out straightforward psychological and physical abuse of women and their human rights.This is not a response to new “evidence,” of crimes reported as a, justification to act now or ever. These are outright liars as to their motivations. This “legislation,” is simply another, in Jacque’s continuing attempt to demean women and to control them according to his religious beliefs. His form of sharia law for this majority of US citizens whom he sees as inferior human beings compared to himself. Many on the left side are familiar with or should look up the term, “Dominionists.”

    Kleefisch, who is entirely incapable of “birthing,” (pun intended) a single original idea, does what he does best, hops on the bandwagon for attention to attempt to compensate for his vast personal intellectual deficit.

    To think that these two feel free to attempt to criminalize women and their health care providers, that these two misogynist jerks make more money just checking their state capitol mailbox with the pay raise they gave themselves to a $138 per diem, than any female fast food worker makes on a ten hour shift is where anger about big government should be focused in seeking the absolute ouster of these two, “representatives,” and any legislator that supports them here, out on the street, minus retirement benefits of any kind.

    Tiffany is simply a political whore with a chip on his shoulder, who is apparently incapable of any other behavior than to be joyfully abusive to others and the natural environment, our heritage, if we could protect it for future generations. It’s as if he sees his limitations as to what he can acquire, control or own, influence to his advantage, or become (as a potential human), and if he can’t have what he wants now, screw the rest of us. Nobody else gets any of it either. A pathetic and dangerous loser.

  3. Gotta love how the neo-con trolling in this thread immediately seized on the abortion angle, and conveniently ignored all the environmental stuff.

    “Let’s make sure all babies are born…but who cares if they have clean air to breathe and water to drink!”

    1. Will remind you. Nixon created teh EPA, now they have gone nuts want to run everythign inout life. Knowles and GOP the Conservtion dept and DNR. LBJ created VietNam, rest of dems jsut creates bills and debt.

    2. Thanks MM. I agree and strongly suggest any blatant attempt to “change the topic” such as has happened here should be denied And if such abuse continues, he or she should be excluded from commenting in the future.

  4. My congratulations to Tom Tiffany and Andre Jacque on their qualifications to deny reality and look backward constituting automatic eligibility for them in any or all of the following renown organizations:

    The Flat earth Society

    Friends of the Loch Ness Monster

    The Koro, or Genital Retraction Syndrome Believers

    Advocates for “Serfdom is the Solution for Replacing Unions.”

    Aliens from Outer Space Anonymous

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