Free Republic

Meet Judy Faulkner. She is the founder and CEO of Epic Systems Corporation in Wisconsin. She is also a member of the GAO Health Information Technology Policy Committee and an advisory board member of the Journal of Healthcare Information Management. She is also politically active. In 2008, Faulkner gave at least $110,000 to political organizations and candidates, including $57,000 to the Democratic National Committee and $2,300 to then-Senator Barack Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. After Obama’s election, Faulkner continued giving to the Democrats, giving at least $85,000 through the 2010 midterm election. In 2010, Faulkner gave $60,000...

Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin has had his political obituary penned and published so many times that Badger State civil courts are probably flooded with copyright infringement lawsuits, yet he stubbornly remains in office. 2014 may wind up being his Waterloo if liberal union enthusiasts have their way – and a delicious win it would be for them indeed – but the Left side punditry is preparing for the worst and seem to have identified where to affix the blame. Obviously, it must be those racist voter ID laws. On September 12, Wisconsin voting-rights groups began to scramble when the...

he Supreme Court has turned away appeals from five states seeking to prohibit same-sex marriages, paving the way for an immediate expansion of gay and lesbian unions. The justices on Monday did not comment in rejecting appeals from Indiana, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin. The court's order immediately ends delays on marriage in those states. Couples in six other states should be able to get married in short order. That would make same-sex marriage legal in 30 states and the District of Columbia. But the justices have left unresolved for now the question of same-sex marriage nationwide.

Wisconsin couple a bit in awe to be invited by pope as synod auditors By Denis Downey Catholic News Service MENOMONIE, Wis. (CNS) -- Alice and Jeff Heinzen will not only be serving as auditors for the extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the family at the Vatican Oct. 5-19, they also will make a presentation before the general assembly. In their main role as one of 14 married couples from around the world selected to serve as auditors for the synod, the Heinzens will observe general assembly sessions and participate in group discussions with the English-speaking delegates. "During the general...

MADISON, Wis. — One year ago, about an hour before dawn, police surrounded the homes of several Wisconsin conservatives and then hit them with floodlights. Police didn’t draw their guns. They didn’t have to. Garish light blinded the groggy targets of the secret probe, startling neighbors. The uniforms, the lights, the early hour got everybody’s attention. One of the targets says police threatened to use battering rams to break down the front door, but the targets let them in. Armed with warrants approved at the request of prosecutors, investigators searched the homes for evidence of a political crime. The fact...

Teri is the face of an infamous Wisconsin case in 2004 where an estranged husband beat his wife with a baseball bat on a bitter January day and stuffed her body in a garbage can that was half full of snow, leaving her to die in an unheated storage unit. Teri has joined the campaign to re-elect Scott Walker, and here is what she has to say: http://www.scottwalker.com/teri So, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, is that really how Scott Walker "gives women the back of his hand"?

Opponent Mary Burke weighed down by jobs plan plagiarism allegationsMary Burke weighed down by jobs plan plagiarism allegations. Gov. Scott Walker is casting himself as a turnaround artist, seeking re-election with a pitch to voters that he revamped the state’s spending and business climate in just four years. For a governor with presidential aspirations, it’s a case he’s likely preparing for a national audience as well — but first he’ll have to get through a tighter-than-expected re-election race against Democrat Mary Burke, a former state secretary of commerce. As if that wasn’t enough, analysts say that his race could also...

MADISON, Wis. — The plagiarism scandal surrounding Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mary Burke may be affecting Wisconsin voters. The latest Marquette University Law School poll, released Wednesday, shows incumbent Republican Gov. Scott Walker has opened up his lead against Burke by 5 percent among likely voters. Of the 585 likely voters who participated in the Marquette poll between Sept. 25-28, 50 percent said they would vote for Walker; 45 percent said they would be voting for Burke. The poll’s margin of error is 4.1 percent. Information for Marquette’s previous poll, which had Walker ahead of Burke by 3 percent, was collected...

Opponents of Wisconsin's photo ID requirement for voters took their case to the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday, seeking an emergency halt to the state's implementation of the law before the fast approaching Nov. 4 election. ~snip~ In their petition, voter ID opponents told the Supreme Court that there's not enough time to properly implement the law in the month remaining in the tight race between GOP Gov. Scott Walker and Democratic challenger Mary Burke. "Thousands of Wisconsin voters stand to be disenfranchised by this law going into effect so close to the election. Hundreds of absentee ballots have already...

MADISON, Wis. — On the eve of the one-year anniversary of sweeping raids in Wisconsin’s politically charged John Doe investigation into conservative activists, Eric O’Keefe, one of the targets of that probe, is going public in a big way. Speaking at length for the first time O’Keefe, a director of the conservative Wisconsin Club for Growth, tells Wisconsin Reporter he was shocked by the prosecutors’ tactics: predawn, paramilitary-style raids on the homes of conservatives, and the confiscation of their papers and electronic equipment. “We ran a meticulous political operation; not only did we comply with Wisconsin’s laws — we were...

On Monday, first lady Michelle Obama swooped in to Milwaukee to help reinvigorate a struggling Mary Burke for governor campaign. Weighed down by accusations that her staff plagiarized large portions of her jobs plan, Burke called upon Obama to do a little cheerleading for the Democratic base. "We need to be just as passionate and as hungry as we were back in 2008 and 2012," Obama told the crowd. "They're assuming we won't be organized and energized. And only we can prove them wrong." Well, not quite. Perhaps the first lady can be forgiven for not following Wisconsin politics that...

Wisconsin’s tense race for governor got some political star power Monday, with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie urging Republicans to step up their support for a potential presidential rival, Scott Walker. First lady Michelle Obama, meanwhile, campaigned for former state commerce secretary Mary Burke. Christie and Walker sidestepped any talk of a 2016 nomination fight against each other. “He would do good at any executive position he wanted to pursue,” Christie said of Walker. “I know this much — because I’ve spoken to him about it — he’s not interested in anything beyond November 4th and neither am I. Whatever...

Meg Kissinger is a seasoned reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Wisconsin’s well-known newspaper. She’s seen a lot in her days. But what she said happened at a speech by Michelle Obama in the state on Monday left her utterly “creeped out.” Kissinger took to her Facebook and Twitter page to describe what happened. In short, she said, aides for both the first lady and Wisconsin Democratic candidate for governor, Mary Burke, told her she was banned from talking to members of the crowd. Kissinger was in Hudson, Wisconsin, covering the first lady’s speech in which she was stumping for...

First Lady Michelle Obama will rally with Democratic candidate for governor Mary Burke in Milwaukee on Monday, September 29th. Last-minute preparations were underway Sunday at the Wisconsin Center in downtown Milwaukee. That’s where Michelle Obama will join Mary Burke Monday for a Milwaukee rally in the very close race for governor. “We want to give the first lady a big Wisconsin welcome,” Burke for Wisconsin Communications Director Joe Zepecki said. Volunteers were busy Sunday at the Wisconsin Center — setting up for the first lady’s visit. “There`s always a lot of set up — little details big details. They`re handling...

Three Republicans rumored to be considering presidential runs for 2016 headed to an Iowa religious banquet to push conservatives to vote in this year’s midterm electionsAs they courted voters in the first state to hold a formal presidential electoral event every four years, Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas), Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Rep. Paul Ryan (Wis.) made slightly different cases for voting, The Associated Press reported.The three spoke at a Saturday fundraiser for the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition.Cruz railed against ObamaCare and Democratic proposals to allow some undocumented immigrants to stay in the country legally, promising that a Republican-controlled...

When Wisconsin governor Scott Walker signed a law curbing the power of public sector unions in his state in 2011, Democrats warned that public schools would suffer terribly. But one year after the law had taken effect--and in the midst of a recall campaign that was driven entirely by the backlash to the law--Democratic candidate Tom Barrett could not name a single school hurt by Walker's reforms. When Mary Burke, the Democrat challenging Walker in 2014, was asked last month by THE WEEKLY STANDARD if she could name any schools hurt by Walker's reforms, she replied with an anecdote about...

Democrat Mary Burke told education officials Friday she would fight as governor to stop the expansion of voucher schools but would leave alone the long-standing program in Milwaukee. "This is something that may sound like a good political sound bite, but it is bad public policy," she said of expanding the voucher program. "I think it is the thing that most threatens a vision of a public school system and an education for students in Wisconsin to be the leaders in our country." Her comments drew applause from her audience at a Wisconsin Association of School District Administrators conference at...

Wisconsin avoided yet another challenge to its voter photo-ID law as a U.S. appeals court panel split evenly on a request to reconsider an order allowing the measure to be in force for elections on Nov. 4. The 5-5 vote Friday by judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals in Chicago let stand a Sept. 12 three-judge order allowing the state to keep the 2011 provision in place.

Gov. Chris Christie plans to visit Wisconsin next week to campaign with Gov. Scott Walker — one of his likely rivals for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination. Mr. Walker is locked in a tough re-election battle with Democrat Mary Burke. On Monday, Mr. Christie, chairman of the Republican Governors Association, plans to tour a manufacturing firm and GOP field office in Hudson with Mr. Walker before traveling to Ohio to attend an early vote rally with Gov. John Kasich, another possible White House contender, in Independence. He also plans to appear at local GOP dinner in Akron. The latest Real...

Democratic candidate for governor Mary Burke stumbled Thursday when asked to define plagiarism and said she had not violated her principles with a jobs plan that includes nearly word-for-word sections that also appear in other candidates' plans. Burke, who is running against GOP Gov. Scott Walker in the Nov. 4 election, also stressed the importance of providing citations in her plan, but an aide said later no changes to the plan would be made. Asked by reporters to define plagiarism, Burke said: "This, this probably, using words, exact words, from a source that doesn't, that isn't cited and isn't attributable."...