Witch-Hunting a Blogger in Whitewater, Wisconsin: Part 2

2. Bold Promises Unfulfilled. Someone warned me, about three months ago, that the city IT worker (excuse me, ‘Administrator’) was helping the police chief learn my identity. I was stunned, but only at first. I was stunned because I had heard Nobling, more than once, address our Common Council about how important it was to comply with the law. (He also wrote me once, in an oddly unctuous email that should have made me suspicious. Nobling wrote me on August 17th, and by that time, he had already been reviewing email to see who I was.)

In fact, the City of Whitewater promises, in its website disclaimer, that “Except for authorized law enforcement investigations, no other attempts are made to identify individual users or their usage habits. Raw data logs are used for no other purposes than those identified in #3 above.”

This disclaimer describes website visits, but you see the problem — if they can ‘investigate’ someone based on lawful political speech, what else will Nobling, Coan, and others track?

I don’t know, of course, but that’s the problem. If you are injured, and want to file an anonymous complaint with the City of Whitewater, for example, how confident can you be of the (empty) promises of the City of Whitewater’s website disclaimer? That’s a real transgression, and a true broken promise.

3. Mostly Wrong! Nobling tells Coan that I may live in Afton, WI (not Whitewater) and that I may be a student or staff member of our local campus. Wrong, both times! As I had written by this time, I am a resident of Whitewater, and I have no connection to our local campus (except once, when I shopped in the campus bookstore, about three years ago!).

Nobling’s speculation makes me seem like a liar. I’m not, but then it was Nobling who spoke to our Common Council recently about the importance of the Public Records Law, and compliance, etc., while violating the spirit of our city’s website disclaimer…

I am a Charter Cable customer, though. Since Nobling seems to be so aware of that, perhaps he could do me a favor. My reception has been a bit spotty lately, and since Nobling seems to have time for tracking anonymous political speech, perhaps he could donate some of that time to ask Charter to make my picture sharper….

4. How to be Right. When the police chief asks you for information, tell him that you don’t think it’s appropriate. That’s hard, but that’s the choice a serious man will make, and sleep soundly for having done so.

5. Credentials. In his internal email, Nobling proudly includes his credentials — “MCP, MCSA, Security +” Impressive. In my experience, most in the IT field have credentials and a respect for lawful, anonymous speech as part of the American political tradition. Most.

When will these gentlemen learn:

It doesn’t matter whether a man is credentialed; it matters whether he is principled.

6. Why Such an Abrupt Beginning? The public records that I received begin in July, with a reply to Coan’s request for information. Are there more records, including memos, etc.? I don’t know, but this is an abrupt start.

7. What about Kevin? Our City Manager is Kevin Brunner. He is generally well-regarded. The record does not say if he had any role in helping with Coan’s request. I don’t know. He may not have known how his IT Administrator was spending his time; he does now.

8. The Junior Police Badge. Too funny. Too sad. It says everything you need to know about these men that they would have an exchange like that. By the way, why does Coan put “junior” in scare quotes? Does he think that Nobling might believe that there is a real junior badge somewhere? Embarrassing, all around.