FactCheck.org Slams Greater Wisconsin Committee's Slime

The campaign ads for the Wisconsin Supreme Court race between Judge Annette Ziegler and attorney Linda Clifford are getting national scrutiny.

FactCheck.org puts the Greater Wisconsin Committee's smear job on Ziegler under the microscope and exposes its lies.

You remember the Greater Wisconsin Committee. It was responsible for many of the misleading ads sliming Mark Green in the 2006 gubernatorial race.

From FactCheck.org:

No Prison Time for a Sex Offender?

The Greater Wisconsin Committee, a state-wide political action committee funded by labor, education and healthcare PACs, attacked the tough-on-crime image that's been a staple of Ziegler's own ads with a spot claiming that Ziegler gave a convicted sex offender a lighter sentence than even his own defense attorney asked. The ad is true only if the sentence is measured strictly by years in prison. The whole story is more complicated.

In December 1998 a jury found Gary Tate guilty of sexually assaulting his step-daughter repeatedly during a three-year period. Ziegler sentenced Tate to 25 years in prison but stayed the sentence, instead giving him a year in county jail and 20 years' probation conditioned upon Tate successfully completing a treatment program for sexual offenders. At the time, admission of guilt was a requirement of the treatment program.

According to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, Ziegler made this comment at the sentencing:

MJ-S: "I want very much to punish the defendant for what he did," Ziegler said. "I want very much to protect the community." Equally important is providing treatment "so this never happens to anyone else again," Ziegler said.

Tate filed a motion asking for a new trial, but Ziegler denied it. Tate refused to admit he was guilty, which meant he automatically flunked his sexual-offender treatment. His probation was revoked as a result, and he began serving his 25-year prison sentence.

In November 2002, Tate appealed his probation revocation. The case went to the state Supreme Court. Tate's lawyers argued that since his sexual-offender treatment required him to incriminate himself and thereby forfeit any possibility of future appeals, the revocation of his parole was unconstitutional. The Supreme Court ruled in Tate's favor. He was released from prison and is living in Wisconsin, according to the Wisconsin Sex-Offender Registry.

FactCheck concludes:

The ad is misleading in implying that Ziegler sentenced Tate to nothing more than a year in county jail. It would have been accurate to say that Tate became a free man just four years after his conviction as a result of Ziegler's sentence.

I don't think Ziegler can be blamed because the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled in Tate's favor.

It seems to me that the ad is even more misleading than FactCheck claims.

FactCheck debunks three more ads, one from the Clifford campaign and two from the Ziegler camp.

Read more here.

FactCheck finds fault with both candidates. "We think there's plenty of blame to go around for the nasty tone of this race."

Overall, I think FactCheck's arguments criticizing the anti-Ziegler ads are much stronger than its case against the anti-Clifford spots.

Ziegler had to respond. She had to hit back hard to counter the Greater Wisconsin Committee's dirty work.

Its lies helped elect the king of scandals and corruption Governor Jim Doyle.

It should come as no surprise that Clifford would resort to slime tactics.

Clifford's list of supporters is a Who's Who of libs.

Pretty sad, especially compared to Judge Ziegler's impressive list of endorsements.

What's most important to me is judicial philosophy. Unlike Clifford, Ziegler's a constructionist, meaning she believes her role is to interpret the law, not write it.

I believe that a judge has a definite and modest role. The Court’s duty is not to determine what the law should be or to negate laws in order to arrive at a desired outcome. A Supreme Court Justice must act with restraint. The role of the Supreme Court is to interpret the spirit and the letter of the law and to apply that law consistently, fairly and impartially. It is imperative that a Justice rely on legal precedent, the Constitution, and the language of the applicable law. In other words, a Supreme Court Justice must not legislate from the bench.

This is not a difficult decision.

Ziegler has my vote.