Free Republic

MILWAUKEE – Tom Barrett presides over a $1.42 billion budget and a “company” with some 8,300 employees, but with all that responsibility the Milwaukee mayor only ranks seventh on the list of top paid city employees with $145,635 annual earnings. Perhaps more striking, his estimated $2.86 million lifetime pension also ranks seventh among his Milwaukee peers, according to a new report by Taxpayers United of America. Those figures demonstrate how the public pension system is simply unsustainable, say members of that group. BIG MONEY: Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett stands to collect millions in from his public retirement pension. TUA estimates...

A saxophone player has claimed that she was assaulted as she played a jazz song in the street by three African American women who said a white girl shouldn't play that sort of music. Cassandra Struve, 26, was performing in the street outside the Summerfest grounds in Milwaukee, Wisconsin around 11pm on June 26 when the three women approached her. 'I was playing Minnie the Moocher, classic Blues Brothers song,' Struve told WITI. 'A lady with a child in her hand came up to me, smacked me in my face and said, "Don’t play that".' They added that a white...

MILWAUKEE (AP) — As more victims of clergy sex abuse came forward, then-Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy Dolan oversaw a plan to pay some abusers to leave the priesthood after writing to Vatican officials with increasing frustration and concern, warning them about the potential for scandal if they did not defrock problem priests, according to documents released Monday. Dolan’s correspondence with Vatican officials and priests accused of sexual abuse was included in about 6,000 pages of documents the Archdiocese of Milwaukee released Monday as part of a deal reached in federal bankruptcy court with clergy sex abuse victims suing it for fraud....

In Niagara Falls, a black mob of 20 attacked a mother and her family on a picnic. They hurled racial slurs and told them they did not like their “Puerto Rican (expletive) music.”The Niagara Gazette described what happened next as a “fight,” although many would call it an assault: “Her son was punched and kicked by several people and fell to the ground. When her son picked himself up, the woman said a man from the group pulled out a pistol and pointed it in her son’s face. She said someone in the group was yelling, ‘Shoot him … shoot...

A saxophone player was assaulted outside the Summerfest grounds near Chicago St. on Wednesday, June 26th around 11 p.m. 26-year-old street performer Cassandra Struve became a target on opening night while she was playing an old jazz song. “I was playing Minnie the Moocher, classic Blues Brothers song,” said Struve. ”A lady with a child in her hand came up to me, smacked me in my face and said ‘don’t play that.’” Struve says three African American women confronted her and shouted that a white girl could not play the song. After being hit, Struve says she was shocked and...

Wisconsin --(Ammoland.com)- This past spring, many of you may have heard of, or viewed news reports pertaining to Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke’s public service announcements that made national news. Sheriff Clarke has, in the past, gone to radio advertising to make public service announcements about drunk driving, distracted driving and other issues.With this most recent public service ad campaign the Sheriff took on the important topic of self-defense. You can hear his public service announcement that went “viral” here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8TCx-sM1vw In what can only be taken as discrimination against the 2nd amendment and the right to self-defense, the Milwaukee County...

Sailors on Lake Michigan know they're approaching the south side of Milwaukee when they spot the Allen-Bradley Clock Tower. But the building beneath the tower acts as a marker of another sort: the structure originally built to be a manufacturing plant is now filled with white-collar professionals. As the global headquarters of Rockwell Automation, the Allen-Bradley building provides office space for 3,100 employees who range from product development engineers to sales and marketing teams and corporate executives. They're in the manufacturing business, but it's not quite the same business that once made Milwaukee prosperous. Rockwell Automation sold over $6 billion...

Last Friday’s cross-dressing day at a Milwaukee elementary school proved contentious. The school-sponsored event was one of the theme days during school spirit week at Tippecanoe School for the Arts and Humanities. While the themes for each of the other days were sufficiently milquetoast, Gender Bender Day — as it was originally named — raised a few parental eyebrows. Members of the school’s student council chose the transvestite theme, reports WITI-TV. The idea was straightforward: boys were encouraged to dress like girls and girls were encouraged to dress like boys. Deidri Hernandez, the mother a second-grader at Tippecanoe, found out...

B. Todd Jones, the acting director of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is scheduled to receive a confirmation hearing on June 4, an aide with the Senate Judiciary Committee said Friday. Jones' nomination has been stalled over a series of questions including about a bungled ATF sting in Milwaukee. The Milwaukee case, known as Operation Fearless, is expected to be one of the issues to come up at the hearing, according to the aide. The ATF has been without a permanent director since 2006 when then-Director Carl Truscott resigned after spending lavishly on a new headquarters....

Milwaukee County Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr. said in a television interview Wednesday night that he agrees with the views of an anti-federal government group that recently gave him an award.During a interview on a range of topics with WISN-TV (Channel 12), Clarke was questioned about being named "sheriff of the year" by the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association and an image of Journal Sentinel columnist Daniel Bice's recent article about the award flashed in the background.Bice first reported that the association is the brainchild of Richard Mack, a former Arizona lawman who believes a sheriff's primary duty is...

In Milwaukee, the homicide rate for black residents is 27.9 per 100,000 compared to 9.7 for Latinos and 1.7 per 100,000 white residents. Of known 2011 homicide suspects in Milwaukee, 93 percent are black, while 4 percent are white and Latino. The city itself is 40 percent black, 17 percent Latino, and 37 percent white, according to Census figures. {SNIP} Milwaukee is among the 20 most violent cities in America. The largest number of homicides in Milwaukee occurred in the 53206 Zip Code. {SNIP} In 2011, 17 of the 86 homicides in Milwaukee occurred in 53206. Between 2005-2009, there were...

ATF agents let a man armed with a gun and threatening to shoot someone walk out of their storefront sting operation in Milwaukee last summer, failing to arrest him or take the weapon, the Journal Sentinel has learned. The suspect, Bobby Ball - a felon with a violent history - promised to return to the store and sell the agents that gun and others but he never came back, according to sources familiar with the case. Instead he spent four months on the loose, until he was picked up in Minnesota on a drunken-driving arrest. He is now awaiting sentencing...

Shortly after Barack Obama won reelection in November, New Jersey governor Chris Christie pointed out that Republicans’ cloudy political prospects had a bright silver lining. “One of the reasons you have 30 Republican governors in America, and why we’re the only organization to add Republican strength,” Christie said, “is because people see us getting things done.” Christie’s stance countered most of the elite postelection commentary, which gleefully pronounced the Republican Party’s political irrelevance. But the governor was right. Since Obama first took office in 2008, Republicans have picked up a net nine governorships, bringing their total to 30 states,...

More Muslims than Jews. A nondenominational frenzy. A city brought up on Catholicism and the Lutheran way is reinterpreting its relationship with God.At noon, cars begin rolling into the parking lot behind the Islamic Society of Milwaukee, a plainly clad building at South 13th Street and Layton Avenue. Women wearing flowing jilbab clothes and hijab head coverings enter through the far-right door at the entrance to the ISM and climb a staircase to a balcony looking out over the mosque’s white-walled prayer hall. Men, some wearing ornate taqiyah hats and crochet skullcaps, enter to the left, walk into the hall...

Milwaukee County's David A. Clarke Jr. apparently is far from the only sheriff taking a stand against tougher gun control measures proposed in the wake of the Newtown school shooting. A group called the Constitutional Sheriff and Peace Officers Association says 408 sheriffs have "vowed to uphold and defend the Constitution" against President Obama's proposals. A group called the Second Amendment Sisters linked to the CSPOA list, which includes a posting by Clarke saying those who want gun control have "the mindset of sheep." Two other Wisconsin sheriffs are on the list: Dale Schmidt of Washington County and Jeff Rickaby...

Ever wonder why police chiefs from big, crime ridden cities are always chosen to testify before the Senate about gun control while sheriffs are often ignored? Police chiefs are appointed. They simply serve as politicians and mouth pieces for their city councils and liberal mayors. This is the case in anti-self defense Philadelphia, Chicago, Washington D.C. Milwaukee etc. Sheriffs on the other hand are elected and represent the voices of the people they serve. On Monday Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke, the sheriff who sent out a public service announcement encouraging residents to learn how to use a firearm in...

Forbes put Detroit Mayor Dave Bing on its cover in 2011 for a story with the optimistic headline: “City of Hope.” The premise was that the city had hit rock bottom and was poised for a turnaround. “Right now, it’s all about survival,” Bing told Forbes. Two years later, Detroit’s problems continue to multiply, sadly. It is still dealing with high levels of violent crime and unemployment. Home prices, already at historic lows, plummeted a further 35% during the past three years to a median of $40,000 as net migration out of the city continued. The latest blow was Tuesday’s...

Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke is calling proposals to seize firearms unconstitutional and warns of dire consequences if such plans are enacted. “This is about attacking the Second Amendment, it’s about going after the wrong crowd,”. Clarke blasted gun-control proposals triggered by presidential executive orders and said he would not enforce unconstitutional laws. “First of all, to me that would be an act of tyranny,”. ‘So the people in Milwaukee County do not have to worry about me enforcing some sort of order that goes out and collects everybody’s handgun, or rifles, or any kind of firearm and makes them...

As we’ve reported several times before, one of the leading proponents of the teacher/political activist model is Bob Peterson, president of the Milwaukee Teachers' Education Association. The outspoken union leader recently laid out his educational strategy during remarks to a gathering of the British Columbia Teacher Federation. His words are plain and his intentions are frighteningly clear. He wants schools to stop teaching kids how to think and start teaching them what to think. “We do care about people,” Peterson told his audience near the end if his presentation. “We wouldn’t have gone into teaching if we didn’t care about...

The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has launched an internal investigation into a flawed storefront sting in Milwaukee marred by a series of missteps and failures. The review was launched this week after a Journal Sentinel investigation exposed a 10-month federal operation during which an agent's Colt M-4 machine gun was stolen and burglars ripped off $35,000 in merchandise from the agency's phony store. U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) on Friday joined a chorus of public officials from both parties demanding accountability from the ATF. Two other congressional letters were sent to the agency Thursday, including one...