At least one Texan may care quite a bit about helping Wisconsin State Senator Randy Hopper keep his seat. Flyers recently surfaced in District 18 encouraging voters to cast votes for Zombie candidate and anti-Wisconsin businessman John Buckstaff in the Democratic primary against Jessica King on July 12. Buckstaff is running at the behest of the Wisconsin GOP which has also donated $750 to the fake candidate.

The flyer, posted by Greg Sargent at the Washington Post, says Buckstaff will "roll up his sleeves and work with Governor Walker to eliminate special privileges for government unions."

Obviously this flyer must have been created by a deeply concerned Wisconsin taxpayer, right? It certainly looks like it was put together using Microsoft Paint. Likely not.

According to the disclosure on the bottom it was paid for by a group called Patriot Advisors which is registered out of a PO Box in Cobb, Wis. However, they do their banking at Bank of America in Austin, Texas. According to the Shepard Express, not much information is available regarding Cobb's Patriot Advisors.

Something we do know about, thanks to Karoli at Crooks and Liars, is a conservative Texas group that shares the very same name and also banks in Austin. Coincidence, perhaps, but let's take a look at that organization anyway as it has many Texan tentacles (and Chicago and DC) that are all over Wisconsin. The Texas-based Patriot Advisors is run by Denis Calabrese and Tim Dunn. Below is how this flyer goes full circle.

1. Calabrese is also a former board member of the Sam Adams Alliance

2. The Sam Adams Alliance is a major funder of the Tea Party via it's training arm, American Majority. American Majority's Drew Ryan once estimated that 75 percent of American Majority's funding came from the Alliance

3. The Sam Adams Alliance and American Majority were the primary backers of the pro-Scott Walker rally in Madison on February 19.

4. Sam Adams Alliance founder and CEO Eric O'Keefe lives in Spring Green, Wis. (thanks to Abe Sauer of The Awl for this additional information - updated 2:30 p.m. 7/8/11). O'Keefe's home is a 30-minute drive to Cobb, Wis.

4. The Sam Adams Alliance provided a significant investment of funds to help start the Franklin Center for Government and Policy Integrity.

6. The Franklin Center is affiliated with the State Policy Network, which touts a long list of conservative think tanks, including Wisconsin's MacIver Institute, as members.

Why are all of these connections important? Note the quote on the flyer from a publication called the Wisconsin Reporter. That publication was founded by the Franklin Center in January of 2011.

The first individual the Wisconsin Reporter hired to write commentary was Senator Ron Johnson's former research director, Kevin Binversie. His current colleague is the Freedom Foundation's Scott St. Clair who made this cherry quote to the Daily Caller when it looked like JoAnne Kloppenburg had come out on top in the Supreme Court race: “I wouldn’t put it past somebody in Wisconsin to be selectively revealing ballots or conveniently finding ballots because this is the kind of stuff we’ve seen in the past before. I think it’s also important to note that Wisconsin and Illinois are neighbors and how they vote in Chicago doesn’t necessarily stop at the state line.”

The most recent list of "Latest News" headlines at Wisconsin Reporter pretty much speaks for itself.

The above isn't likely a surprise to anyone. That's how, sadly, political funding works in the United States. If you think about it our campaigns are a lot like the Internet. Anyone with the right amount of money can hide behind an anonymous PO Box, not owning their words.

Jesse Russell

Co-Editor

Jesse was born and raised in Connecticut, began blogging in 1997, and moved to Madison in 2003. In 2005, he co-founded dane101 along with Kristian Knutson and Shane Wealti. In addition to helping nearly a dozen contributors run this website he's helped launch various events in the city including What's Your Damage?!, the MadPubQuiz of Awesomeness, the Fire Ball Masquerade, Dane101's Freakin' Halloweekend, and more.