Carl Gibson, arrested July 30 in the Wisconsin State Capitol rotunda for singing, puts the Walker administration's crackdown on dissent into valuable context over at Reader Supported News. Excerpt:
While Gov. Walker prides himself on his supposed frugality with state tax dollars, it's important to point out the discrepancy in his saying there's not enough to go around for public employees to have a job that guarantees a living wage and adequate benefits, but there's apparently enough for capitol police, state troopers, and conservation officers from the Department of Natural Resources to arrest political dissidents, all paid at an estimated $25 an hour. There are also hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on the court process, for assistant attorneys general to handle the prosecution (paid anywhere between $17 and $55 an hour), and the state to provide public defenders for all the protesters who can't afford an attorney or find a pro bono civil rights attorney, not to mention tax money to pay all the judges needed to handle each case. There are also numerous staffing needs for each case, like court reporters, bailiffs (at least one of each gender), file management, copying, witness fees, investigation costs, police reports, and time off work for all defendants. Those costs well exceed the $200.50 fine given to each protester, meaning the state of Wisconsin is losing money hand over fist to go through this process for each case, when most of them are dismissed outright.
A good read, even a must-read, which can be seen in its entirety here:
http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/275-42/18680-scott-walkers-crack...