Cory Tomczyk and other Vicious Wisconsin Pricks

Bad Yelp review
Nicer than Cory Tomczyk though

“If you took Madison and Milwaukee out of the state election formula, we would have a clear majority,”

- Robin Vos

Wisconsin is a beautiful state, it's only drawback are Republicans.  This is the chief complaint for many states today.  This wasn't going to be a post about Wisconsin Republicans but instead about grass burs which often evade a cursory glance over a field, lawn, or pasture, but make themselves readily apparent when you feel the long spines stick you.  Yow! Ouch! Aye Yai Yai!

Longspine Sandbur Cenchrus longispinus (Hack.) Fern are some mean little bastards and once stuck on you, the only real way to deal it to gingerly pluck them from your socks/pants or worse dog paws :(

But, then Wisconsin Public Radio ran a story about Cory Tomczyk and his on-going efforts to destroy the Wausau Pilot & Review for accurately reporting what he said in 2021.

A Marathon County judge dismissed a lawsuit filed in 2021 by Mosinee businessman Cory Tomczyk, who's now a Republican state senator representing the 29th District, accused the Wausau Pilot & Review of defamation after it reported that he was overheard using an anti-gay slur against a teenager while in the audience at a Marathon County Executive Committee meeting. 

Despite the publication's victory in circuit court, Pilot & Review Publisher Shereen Siewert said it's racked up between $150,000 and $200,000 in legal bills. Those expenses were enough to put the small news outlet in danger of shutting down, Siewert said.  "But then we realized that even if we win, we lose."

Worse than a Pyrrhic victory, Siewert pointed out the legal bills from Tomczyk's baseless lawsuit are in danger of shutting down the Wausau Pilot & Review.  It's baseless because in deposition Tomczyk admitted to calling the 13 year old boy a "Faggot".  Tomczyk defended this action by claiming he has friends and a brother who are gay.

"I have a brother who is a gay guy, and I've certainly out of joking and out of spite called him a 'faggot' more than once," Tomczyk testified in a deposition resulting from his lawsuit. "I have a couple of friends who are also gay, and in that community, that term, I don't, I don't feel in that community that term has the same negative connotation (as) in a straight community. The guys that I know laugh it off."

I have a black friend defense who I also call a terrible slur too now adapted and repackaged for bigots to smear the LGBTQ community!  Tomczyk's efforts are plain to see, use his money to win despite being guilty of what was reported,

Robert Drechsel, a professor emeritus of journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "In many cases, plaintiffs aren't really suing to win, but they win by suing."

When you face the reality that Republicans have NOTHING to offer the American people it can be pretty bleak.  This seems to be why the Corporate Media writ large refuses to face it.  In fact, in Wisconsin Racist Robin Vos, Drunken Van Orden, Russian Ron Johnson, Slimy Scott Fitzgerald, Bigoted Becky Bradley, Vile Terf Cory Tomczyk and many other Fascists have enjoyed improper and illegally obtained political power due to voter suppression, gerrymandering, and political chicanery.  And have gotten away with their using the awesome power of Government at the local, state, and federal level to harm people and ensconce repressive and unpopular hatreds and bigotry into law.

The new liberal aligned Wisconsin Supreme Court is going to reverse a lot of the damage Fitzgerald and Scott Walker did during their tenures, expect more vitriol and threats from rightwingers.  And when Trump loses Wisconsin in 2024 conservatives will probably declare civil war and attack the United States again...