This after concerns have been raised by victims of domestic violence and other crimes expressed concern that doing so could allow their attackers access to their personal information and addresses. Others have express concern of having their information placed in a search-able database as the Journal intents to do, will be used against them by those who do not share their person political ideology.

To post links to the signatures as a matter of public interest is one thing but ask an untrained readership with unknown motives to search for “issues”, pay for “verification” and then post information can only be seen as a failure in ethics. Furthermore, there is no attempt to ascertain the intent of a fraudulent signer. Can one reasonably think that a signature of “Mickey Mouse” would be counted and not caught? Who stands to benefit from obvious fake signatures…those who support the recall or those who wish to discredit the process…in any investigation is it not the case that he who stands to benefits the most, is usually found to be the one who commented the crime? As the individuals at the Journal are clearly of reasonable intellect one can only surmise that there is a mindful effort to ignore this and the above concerns to promote the idea that any “issue” is a attack on the Republican’s right to due process.

Already we are seeing retaliation from those who oppose the recall including Facebook pages named “We Are Firing Employees Who Signed Wisconsin Recall Petitions” and posts that state “now we know who you are”.

The fact that the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has put sales before ethics (“Minimize Harm – Show compassion for those who may be affected adversely by news coverage…”) is truly sad and should be drag out into the light.