WPRI

Following the money behind ‘right-to-work’

The watchdog group One Wisconsin Now released research on the Milwaukee-based Bradley Foundation, headed by Gov. Scott Walker’s campaign co-chair. [Wisconsin Gazette]

S is for Shill

This report exposes the web of right-wing funders advancing a radical school privatization agenda through the use of Wisconsin-based front groups, with special focus on the Bradley Foundation, headed by Scott Walker's campaign co-chair Michael Grebe.

Conservative groups create own news outlets

And when, several years ago, WPRI hired UW-Madison professor Ken Goldstein to conduct polling on a variety of political issues, liberal group One Wisconsin Now filed an open records request that revealed emails between Lightbourn and Goldstein in which Lightbourn urged the professor to downplay results showing poor support for school choice around the state.”I’m […] [Capital Times]

Memo: Follow the Money

You've also probably seen the ads paid for by the special interests benefitting from tax giveaways, consumer protection rollbacks and lax public safety regulation enforcement by the Walker administration.

Scott Walker’s Rhetoric Versus Reality

MADISON, Wis. — Governor Scott Walker failed to tackle Wisconsin’s jobs crisis – posting six straight months of job losses here while nationally jobs are being added – and is now poised to take on “the truth” in his second State of the State address. In Gov. Walker’s one year in office he has failed […]

More Lies from the GOP Noise Machine on Cronon Attacks

Never  allowing facts to get in the way of its smears, the right wing is trying to create a false moral equivalency between retaliatory actions taken by the Republican Party of Wisconsin against UW-Madison Professor Bill Cronon and a completely different kind of request for contract information made by One Wisconsin Now. After Professor Cronon, […]

Will MJS give Conservative WPRI, WISTAX Same Treatment as Public Citizen?

Today’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel “Politifact,” in its analysis of a unfair trade deals cited by U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, makes this note about the sourcing by Feingold’s campaign of Public Citizen: “Public Citizen is a leading critical voice on trade deals, so it comes to the issues from that perspective.” Fair enough. Unless you consider […]

Bailed out banksters hatched callous overdraft scheme

While millions of Americans are fighting for survival ‘€“ whether it’€™s to keep their homes or keep their jobs ‘€“ it appears financial industry banksters have been lining their pockets through a heartless scheme that capitalizes on financially struggling folks.A Vernon County, Wisconsin resident has filed suit against Green Bay-based Associated Bank for ‘€œrearrang[ing] the […]

Beil Calls Out WPimpRI

Marty Beil, never one to mince words when it comes to standing up for working men and women across Wisconsin, responded to the continuing assaults by the GOP shills at the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute against our dedicated public employees: ‘€œIf Scott Walker wants to communicate with me, I would think he’s man enough to […]

Shameless, WPRI prepares new poll

Just days from embarrassing national media exposure questioning its ethics and credibility, WPRI is back with another poll, coming your way soon. WPRI is the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, although some suggest it is We Push Republilcan Ideas, like school choice, which didn’t look as good in the last poll as the numbers WPRI decided […]

Take action today against the UW-WPRI right-wing propaganda polling project

When the University of Wisconsin-Madison Political Science department announced a new polling partnership with the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, one of Wisconsin’s most prominent right wing think tanks, we were immediately worried about the credibility of the poll — and more importantly, the credibility of the UW. And when through a public records request, we […]

Media Alert: WPRI Junk Polling Project to Continue

MADISON, Wis. — The controversial polling project between the conservative, pro-corporate Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (WPRI) and the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Ken Goldstein, will continue to generate suspect and manipulated polling information, according to news reports this weekend. Goldstein confirmed in a weekend investigative story by the Associated Press that he would be continuing the […]

Your State Pension Under Attack

A great retort from AFSCME’s Marty Biel about WPRI’s attack on the state pension system that their president, George Lightbourn, a 20-year public employee himself who managed and now receives benefits from the system, posted by Sly this morning: Your State Pension Under Attack Executive Director Beil Blast’s Opponents of State Pension PlanDefends Public Sector […]

We do take issue with the facts of WPRI study, Lightbourn

So ‘€œWisconsin’€™s Free Market Think Tank’€ released yet another report reinforcing the pro-corporate agenda of conservatives. Big surprise.In its latest report, the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (WPRI) wants the public to be outraged at the government for offering pensions that are too ‘€œrich’€ compared to the private sector. OWN and other progressive leaders have called […]

Flaws Riddle Private School Voucher Report

The favorable private school voucher study paid for by the state’€™s leading private school voucher advocates is riddled with fundamental research flaws, implying the “study” was designed to reach a pre-conceived conclusion in favor of a particular political agenda. That the state’s leading private school voucher gang funded a study that supports the private school […]

Intellectual honesty is not manipulating the data

The polling project between the UW-Madison Political Science department and the states shrillest right-wing, corporate-friendly think tank has turned out to be as suspicious as we first feared. Documents obtained by One Wisconsin Now through the states open records law reveal that political considerations were front and center in the decision making surrounding the polling […]

Records Suggest WPRI-UW Poll Materials Deliberately Removed References to Statewide Opposition to Private School Vouchers

MADISON, Wis. — A University of Wisconsin polling project downplayed opposition to private school vouchers after a conservative think tank paying for the polling raised political concerns, documents obtained by One Wisconsin Now show. The poll is an on-going project between the state’s leading conservative think tank, the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, and the University […]

WI Environment debunks false claims by WPRI

Wisconsin Environment slammed the right-wing Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (WPRI) yesterday about their inaccurate and misleading report about the Governor'€™s initiatives to grow the renewable energy industry and create green jobs.

WI Poll: 86 Percent Want Government Help to Provide Universal, High Quality Health Care

A graphic in a front-page story in Monday’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel including a stunner of a question from the most recent UW Badger Poll, which may give pause to elected officials who put health insurance gangsters ahead of the people. The question: “How responsible should the federal government be in making sure that all residents […]

More Jobs Coming to Wisconsin: WMC scare tactics = #epicfail

Once again despite the efforts of the states most notorious corporate tax loophole lobby group, Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, more jobs are coming to Wisconsin. Republic Airways to add up to 800 jobs in Milwaukee This isnt the first company to do so either ” as I pointed out earlier, there have been quite a […]

Shocker: WPRI-UW Right Wing Propaganda Polling Project Concludes GOPs Message about Doyle

There it is on the front page of the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute’€™s website. Almost 800 words from George Lightbourn about ‘€œpolling’€ that concludes Gov. Jim Doyle’€™s Democratic backers in the state legislature are in peril. It’€™s an amazing coincidence. Somehow, the sciency-stuff keeps working out for conservatives in the WPRI-UW Right Wing Propaganda Polling […]

WPRI Opposes Public Option for Health Insurance Reform, Supports Public Option for Its Polling

Using typical back-of-the-envelope, context-free math, the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute’€™s is claiming that since the cost of the extraordinarily successful bipartisan BadgerCare program has increased since it was created, that we shouldn’€™t have federal health insurance reform that includes a public option to end the stranglehold insurance companies have on our entire nation. The ‘€œevidence’€? […]

WPRI’s Cadre, John Torinus and the Myth of Liberal Media

Bopping through the Wisopinion.com list of blogs of the day, I was amused to see not one, but two posts from the conservative and oft-error-plagued Wisconsin Policy Research Institute featuring former members of the so-called liberal media. Right there from Charlie Sykes’ yap tank, a post from Ken Lamke, former reporter with the Milwaukee Journal […]

With Advisors Like These…

George Lightbourn is the former budget advisor for Governor Scott McCallum. Now he is a glorified shill for corporate interests at the right wing Wisconsin Policy Research Institute. Thursday corporate interests attacked the $2-billion-saving ‘€œHealthy Wisconsin‘€ plan through their chosen outlet. Before taking WPRI’€™s rantings too seriously, perhaps one should first consider the source, because […]

Beware of Lightbourn Budget Advice

George Lightbourn and his minions at the right wing WPRI have been lecturing Governor Doyle and the legislature on sound budgeting. Lightbourn hardly seems to be the person to give advice on difficult budgets since he has helped cause his fair share of them. George Lightbourn was the Secretary of Administration under two Republican governors. […]