Tag Archives: Ideas section

The Black incarceration rate in Wisconsin may defy belief, but it’s real.

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Protesters outside Wisconsin’s Waupun Correctional Institute after the deaths of three inmates due to reportedly poor health conditions and care. Courtesy Waupun Pioneer Press.

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I count myself a proud Wisconsin native of a beautiful, bountiful state with an embattled progressive tradition. I was aware of a serious state problem of excessive incarceration, but I never realized the radical severity of the problem, which is surely fixable!

Recently in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel‘s Ideas Section, columnist Jeffrey Sommers (a political economy and public policy professor at UWM) reported that we have the highest incarceration rate of Black citizens in not only the country.

Per capita, Wisconsin’s jailing of 2,250 Blacks per 100,000 Black adults exceeds the highest general incarceration rate of any of the world’s 223 countries measured. El Salvador’s 1,659 per 100,000 was second highest. Curiously the United States general rate is “only” 541 (per 100 K). This indicates a serious problem of racial profiling in our state, which supposedly was addressed years ago.

Several sources on this confirmed the global rate information, including the World Population Review. 1

The Wisconsin writer pointed out that the alleged reason for these policies is to lower the crime rate, but the figures show they failed to produce comparably lower rates, if you determine it by people jailed.

I have never been more shocked or disgusted at my own state’s doings. We should hold the too-long Republican controlled legislature primarily responsible for this, though I haven’t heard Democrats addressing it much either.

Not so coincidentally, the next page of the same Ideas Section included Philip Klinker’s  letter to the editor bemoaning that the only way to reduce the state prison population that’s caused so many problems otherwise is to repeal petty criminal statutes. But “no politician in the state is brave enough to advocate to repeal the laws of petty criminal statutes” – a big part of the problem.

Is that true of our officials? Is it an awareness problem, blase governance? Or worse?

A couple of factors are key. Bail jumping in Wisconsin is a common petty crime that involves such innocuous activities as driving to work when the bail said you couldn’t.  If you are accused of a felony, the charge carries a six-year maximum sentence. It doesn’t matter if you are found innocent of the crime, the bail jumping charge still stands. Various factors apply depending on your case.

Then there’s too-common charge of “disorderly conduct” which evidently amounts to anything the police or prosecutor says it is.  A review of the state statutes shows that a vast array of activity or behaviors — even victimless — can be interpreted by officers as “disorderly” and result in a Class B misdemeanor. 2

Think about the fractured or destroyed lives incarceration can produce, especially for those imprisoned for an extended period, or unjustly.

A widely-disseminated 2023 news report said four inmates at Waupun’s aging Correctional Institute have died over the last four months. One death was confirmed as a suicide. The other two deaths remain under investigation. “A group of Waupun inmates filed a federal lawsuit in Milwaukee last week alleging conditions at that prison amount to cruel and unusual punishment. The prisoners allege they can’t get access to health care, with guards telling them their illnesses are ’all in your head’ and they should ‘pray’ for a cure.”

Cameron Williams. (Submitted photo) The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

One 24-year-old black man, Cameron Williams, died of a rare stroke after extended solitary confinement and deprivation which shocked his fellow prisoners, who heard his cries for help to officials and “blood-curdling screams.” He was he was serving a three-year sentence for burglary — he’d pushed a woman to take her purse.  3

All of these problems amount to moral arrogance, or at least negligence, far below this state’s history of honor.

Democratic leaders recently have written a bill to remedy crowded and poor prison living conditions. That hardly goes far enough.

Where are our real leaders on this? It may not be easy in our polarized political climate, but all the more crucial as we’re a key swing state in elections. We need voting citizens. The policies may also reflect increasingly extensive and gratuitous voter suppression efforts.

Make your voice heard, however possible. Let’s repeal these laws or Wisconsin will continue to dwell in immoral disgrace comparable to a wretched prison cell.

Kevin Lynch (Kevernacular)

Milwaukee

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The stench of Musk grows as he heads for Wisconsin and doles out $2 million to two state voters willing to sign an “anti-activist judge” petition

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Note the lock-step brain-lock message on Elon Musk’s cap. This is how authoritarianism works. It typically leads to overt fascism and the death of a democratic government. Photo courtesy Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel 

The smell of musk is an acquired taste, and I don’t mind it alt all. Yet the stench of Elon Musk grows stronger and more wretchedly foul each day, especially as the Wisconsin Supreme Court election nears, on April 1.

Billionaire Musk will hold a rally in Green Bay Sunday evening at 6:30 p.m. at a yet-undisclosed lovcation, less than 48 hours before polls open to give a campaign “talk” for Republican candidate and Trump suck-up Brad Schimel. He’ll also hand out a million dollars to the second preson who commits to having voted agaist “activist judges” by signing a petition of his. He’s already doled to a cool milion to one person. His definition of “activist judges”?

Trump has indicated that would be any who have rued for the illegality and uncontitutionality of any Trump executive action ot destructive acts by his toadie fellows, such as Musk and his DOGE gang.

“Entrance is limited to those who have voted in the Supreme Court election,” Musk wrote, though he did not specify how that would be verified.

Musk also wrote that he would present the second of two $1 million checks “in appreciation for you taking the time to vote.”

Stop to think how corrupt and lame that reasoning is. He’ll have thousands willing to sign and vote for Schimel but only two get the big dough, I suppose as a symbolic gesture of his financial power to do all he can to buy this election for the Trump toadie in waiting.

Sure, the two million bucks isn’t lame in itself, it’s pure financial power. But it is morally depraved, in this action. Unless you think it’s cool for one person to date to donate $20 million to influence for the outcome of a state judicial race. Musk is the richest man in the world in a society where a small handful of billionaires have more wealth than the financial bottom half of American citizens, as Sen. Bernie Sanders pointed out recently .

Schimel resurfaces debunked concerns about ballot counting in Milwaukee

Circuit Judge Brad Schimel. Courtesy AP

The race is being closely watched nationally as an early indicator of mid-term election trends. Locally it will determine the ideological balance of the court, which now has a one-seat advantage for liberals.

Musk, a close ally of President Donald Trump, personally and via two groups has poured about $20 million into the race to back conservative candidate Brad Schimel. Finance law allows unlimited donations of they are given to a group other than the canidate, typically the candidate’s political party (Republican) which then passes it “legally” on to the candidate. How corrupt is that? Thanks also to the Supreme Court ruling on “Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission” of 2010.

We should prepare to act swiftly. As soon as word breaks of where Musk appears in Green Bay, we must go there to protest him.

Here’s the report from the Journal-Sentinel:

https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/2025/03/28/musk-coming-to-wisconsin-ahead-of-tuesday-state-supreme-court-election/82702597007/

Liberal Judge Susan Crawford enters race for Wisconsin Supreme Court with majority at stake | AP News

Dane County Judge Susan Crawford. Courtesy AP

On a more positive note we can do all we can to support and elect Judge Susan Crawford, Schmiel’s opponent. She has an admirable track record of humane, common sense rullings in seveal judicial positions she’s held.

Impressive, to me, is this editorial endorsing her. Why? Because it’s not from some flaming lefty, it’s written by three Wisconsin bsiness leaders who explain how Crawford will be much better than Schimel for the state’s economy. Please check out this editorial, also published in the Journal-Sentinel (Ideas section):

https://www.jsonline.com/story/opinion/2025/03/11/wisconsin-supreme-court-spring-election-judge-crawford-economy/81179495007/

Thanks for reading, caring and voting.

wisconsin supreme court

State Supreme Court candidates Crawford and Schimel before their debate in March. AP

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