The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
While most kids learn this soon after breaking down their parents to buy them that overly-expensive Christmas present, too often we adults take “no” for an answer and throw up our hands in defeat.
Some will call it being mature, others might call it the effect of learning that “life is not fair,” and for others, fighting for a “yes” just takes too much work.
Well when it matters, like when our democracy is at stake, we all need to channel our inner child and keeping badgering the powers that be for that Red Ryder BB gun.
It has taken about a month after Rachel Maddow first shined a light on the group of Wisconsin Republicans who fraudulently claimed they were Trump “electors” to START being held accountable for their actions. Just last week the two ringleaders of the group were subpoenaed by the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 attack.
This is GREAT NEWS. However, there’s a lot we should take away from the events leading up to these subpoenas.
- This crime happened over a year ago, and there was a complaint brought immediately afterwords to the Wisconsin Elections Commission and the DA of Milwaukee County. Why did it fall through the cracks for a year?
- Why didn’t our Attorney General Josh Kaul, a member of the Democratic Party and the state's top law enforcement officer, do anything for a year?
- And most importantly, why does it take a national news personality like Rachel Maddow to light the spark that holds Republican bad actors in Wisconsin accountable? Why is our own state media, like the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, or the largest network TV news outlets in Milwaukee and Madison, so ineffective at coalescing public opinion around statewide attempts to assist a presidential coup? Is it because our statewide media is now owned by monopolies like Gannett, who don’t really care about our state, or our democracy, but on profits and ratings?
But…those questions are topics for future essays. Today is a day for celebration. People who committed crimes to undermine our democracy are seemingly being held to account, and for this, we should celebrate.
The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
Law Forward, a non-profit group of lawyers who originally filed the complaint against these fraudulent electors a year ago, need to be commended for sticking their necks out and being good citizens. They are the real heroes.
And everyone who wrote to Congressman Pocan or other powerful politicians after the Maddow program, demanding that something be done, you folks are also heroes. Congressman Pocan helped bring this issue to national attention by asking the Justice Department to investigate . He was on our podcast last week and said that this wasn’t even on his radar screen until his office was bombarded by regular Wisconsinites looking for justice.
The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
And now for Joe Rogan. I have to admit, I’m not part of this mega podcast star’s audience, but a great many young men in America are.
Following an episode of Rogan's podcast in which he interviewed a doctor who baselessly claimed Americans were "hypnotized" into wearing masks and getting COVID-19 vaccines because of what he calls "mass formation psychosis, 270 scientists, healthcare workers, and educators signed an open letter calling on Spotify to stop the spread of misinformation on its platform.
This letter went unheeded by Spotify, so famous musicians Neil Young and Joni Mitchell removed their music from the platform out of protest.
The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
Folks, I don’t need to tell you this, but everyday there is an example of democracy, facts, and truth getting a boost because regular people, non-profit lawyers, or famous musicians stick their necks out to help. And almost every day, we also get a punch to the gut when the likes of Joe Rogan spread misinformation that kills people because it helps ratings and voting rights legislation doesn’t get passed because we’ve got democrats in the U.S. Senate more beholden to their donors than to their own souls.
Well, we can’t let these gut punches make us forget about how we feel when what’s RIGHT gets a win. We’ve got to focus on the positive and keep on trying. It takes a lot of work, but nobody ever said we wouldn’t break a sweat while trying to hold onto democracy and truth.
It’s time for all of us to do what we can to keep our democracy. Call your county Democratic Party office and sign up as a volunteer. If you’re annoyed with the Democratic Party (we understand completely), just remember that we currently live in a two-party system, thus we NEED to be on the same team, and divided we fall.
We promise to keep fighting as long as you do, and hopefully you’ll remember to think of us when it’s time to toast a hard day’s worth of activism with a cold brew.
Thanks for sticking with us. Let’s Make Wisconsin a Democracy Again, One Beer at a Time.
Kirk Bangstad
Owner, Minocqua Brewing Company
Founder, Minocqua Brewing Company Super PAC