Posted on Friday, 26th March 2010 by Bruce
Prolific liberal blogger, union representative, and Milwaukee County Employee Chris “capper” Liebenthal levels bold allegations of “corruption” and “cronyism” against Milwaukee County Executive and gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker in a published piece at several of his blogs today, suggesting that former Deputy Chief of Staff at the county exec’s office, Tim Russell, “doubled his salary” when he recently accepted the position of Director of Housing for the county’s Department of Health and Human Services.
Sounds like juicy stuff, doesn’t it? Juicy enough to be picked up and regurgitated as fact by several other online news outlets, including WisOpinion.com.
Here’s the problem: Liebenthal made it all up. His allegations are lies and misrepresentation, masquerading as a “bombshell” revelation.
Liebenthal admits in his published writing that his allegations are nothing more than an “assumption,” based on previously published salary data for Russell’s predecessor. And the facts prove that Liebenthal would have to go to great lengths to be more off-the-mark.
BadgerBlogger spoke to Russell, who tells us he was never contacted by Liebenthal (or anyone else) seeking details on the salary for his new county assignment, and that, since his salary is publicly available information, he would have been happy to discuss it.
Russell tells BadgerBlogger that his Director of Housing salary, $75,866.13 - a full $37,201.00 less than that of his predecessor - dealt him a raise of $2,496.13 over his previous county exec’s office salary of $73,370.00.
That’s a raise of about 3.4%. A nice raise, but not exactly “huge,” and significantly less than the “raise in the neighborhood of $50,000.00″ that Liebenthal alleges.
Not to mention, a far cry from Russell “doubling his salary,” as Liebenthal suggests.
BadgerBlogger has confirmed with officials at the county executive’s office that Russell’s $75,866.13 pay represents the extreme low end of the job’s $75,866.13 to $112,398.71 salary range. Russell’s predecessor in the position, James Hill, who retired last year, was paid $110,571.00 annually for the job at the time of his retirement.
BadgerBlogger asked Russell whether he believed that his work history and previous county government assignments afforded him proper qualifications for his new position. Russell defended his qualifications.
“My background includes significant experience with the programs and functions of the [Housing] Division, including Section 8 Voucher, Community Development Block Grant and HOME programs, and in addition, I have worked in the housing and mortgage industries for more than 20 years.”
For the record, BadgerBlogger was able to pull all of this confirmed, factual information together in less than an hour. We’re guessing Liebenthal could have done the same, had he wanted; but Liebenthal has never let the facts get in the way of serving up criticism and inaccuracies regarding Walker in the past.
Posted in Home | Comments (10) |
10 Responses to “More smear, lies, and distortions from the anti-Scott Walker crowd”
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March 26th, 2010 at 1:01 pm
Nice job Capper.
March 26th, 2010 at 2:44 pm
I’m surprised anyone would take any of capper’s blogs seriously. It’s the same as believing a tobacco company employee who tells you cigarettes are not harmful.
March 26th, 2010 at 2:48 pm
Amen
March 26th, 2010 at 4:21 pm
They don’t call the Social (socialist) workers hack CRAPPER for nothing.
Have you ever seen him??? Turd in a punch bowl ugly too.
March 26th, 2010 at 5:13 pm
Bruce, I wouldn’t call Russell’s new salary a “raise”. I’d call it a promotion. His prececessor made much more, proving the move actually was a savings for Milwaukee County.
March 26th, 2010 at 5:49 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by seanhackbarth and BadgerBlogger, Corey Kopenski. Corey Kopenski said: RT @BadgerBlogger: Did you all see Bruce destroy union goon Chris “capper” Liebenthal's lie filled posting? http://is.gd/b11Tv [...]
March 26th, 2010 at 5:55 pm
Does anyone but villiage idiots listen to the babbling idiot?
March 26th, 2010 at 6:50 pm
When Scott Walker wins, Crapper had better run because the full weight of State Government will fall on him like SpaceLab. Milwaukee County will suffer until he’s unemployed.
March 27th, 2010 at 3:54 pm
[...] don’t expect him to utilize any. A problem that recently landed Liebenthal in a little rhetorical hot water. Rather than jump out of the boiling pot, he inexplicably prefers the continued [...]
March 28th, 2010 at 12:13 am
[...] Even if they refuse comment, you can always say they refused comment. Because you will look really stupid if you don’t ask. Prolific liberal blogger, union representative, and Milwaukee County Employee Chris [...]