Cosh Provides Comic Relief
Former ARC staffer, Bill Cosh provided a little comic relief in the courtroom today.Cosh said he was not happy about having to testify or forking out $200 an hour for an attorney to represent him, and he referred to his first two meetings with investigators as "six hours of my life that I'll never get back."
It may not have been worth the price of admission, but Cosh did manage to get in a few licks at prosecutors and the media alike.Despite attempts by the prosecutors to shut him down, Cosh mentioned campaign activities in the Assembly Democratic Caucus at least three times.
Referring to a campaign check list, Roy Korte asked Cosh what it meant to "tailor" a nomination paper. Cosh said that the elections board provides the official form for nomination papers and both the Republican and Democratic caucuses would tailor the form for individual candidates by adding their picture and other information. If Korte really wanted to know about tailoring nomination papers, he should have asked Brian Blanchard.
Cosh told jurors he once took a Democratic candidate over to the Assembly Democratic Caucus so he could get the assistance he needed with his campaign. The prosecutors were not amused.
Of course no state examination would be complete without a question regarding Packer Badger schedules. It was here that Cosh offered valuable information not previously available to jurors. Due to the geographic location of the Butler campaign, the standard Packer/ Badger schedules were replaced by Packer/Badger Viking/Gopher schedules.
And Cosh took a shot at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s own Carey Spivak and Dan Bice. Cosh told Korte they were not reporters, but rather, “political gossip columnists.” I emailed the boys to find out how they felt about that characterization. Their response: “We've been called much worse ... just in the newsroom."
During cross examination, Cosh said there was a great deal of crossover between policy and campaign related activities, and that he has no doubt the state got more than its 2000 hours a year from him.
I don't doubt that for a second either.
posted by DJordahl @ 9:21 PM
8 comments
8 Comments:
Why is it relevant to point out that these state employees put in 2,000 hours a year? It's OK to break the law as long as you get your legitimate work done first? Did Sherry Schultz spend 2,000 hours a year doing anything other than fundraising in her taxpayer-funded office?
As a salaried employee, staff are paid for 2,000 hours of work per year. If they satisfy that requirement - the time they spent on campaign work would not be considered on "state time." Staff are not paid overtime - they are only paid for 2,000 hours of work per year.
I don't get your point.
Most of the case is based on employees doing campaign work on state time. If an employee puts in 2000 hours of work on state work - their activities the rest of the time are not subject to that time issue.
This case is based on that fact that state employees were using state resources (time, equipment, offices, etc.) for campaign work. And Jensen's team isn't disputing the fact that this occurred. They're argument is that they inherited this system and thus, shouldn't be punished.
Very true - but your question was the relevance of the 2000 hours. While certainly not the only issue - it is a major one.
Getting back to your point, any work done on state equipment, in state office buildings - by any definition - is "state time."
So now who do we believe? A former Jensen hack, or a former investigator and current head of the Wisconsin State Troopers. This just proves Scooter is a big fat LIAR.
The next witness is Dave Collins, now head of the Wisconsin State Troopers. He helped conduct an interview with Jensen about the investigation on Sept. 18, 2001.
Collins said in the initial interview Jensen refuted all the claims in the Wisconsin State Journal article that campaign work was being done on state time, and said Schultz had legitimate legislative assignments.
Jensen assured them that no campaign work was being done on state time and with state resources by ARC staff or any of the speaker's office staff. He told the investigators that if he heard other legislators had staff who were doing campaign work in that fashion, "He said he would clearly tell the legislator to make sure that wasn't being done and should not be done," Collins said.
The investigators asked Jensen where Schultz's office was. He said he had heard that she was not in Foti's office, but that she had space in the same building as ARC, although not in the same office, Collins said.
According to Collins, Jensen said Schultz had a good overall knowledge of Assembly Republicans. He said any fundraising discussions he had with Schultz were during the lunch hour or at the RPW office.
Collins also said Jensen made reference to meetings at state Republican HQ to talk about fundraising. Attending those meetings, Jensen said, were himself, Schultz and Reps. Foti, Ladwig and Gard.
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