I spoke with Mike Schramm, the managing editor of Wispolitics.com, and this was following two e-mails from Dennis Shook under whose byline the story appeared. I’ve managed to piece together a story, but I’ll leave it to journalists, journalist wannabes, journalism professors and journalism school dropouts to decide this case.
In his first e-mail to me (in response to an e-mail I sent to his Waukesha Freeman editor), Shook indicated he was asked by Wispolitics.com to indicate what he expected to happen. When Finley announced her “surprise” and endorsed Vrakas, Shook said he was called by Wispolitics.com and he told them what really happened and they corrected the piece under his byline.
I responded via e-mail his article was in the past tense and it clearly stated Finley was in fact running. There was nothing speculative about the following:
The wife of Waukesha County Executive Daniel Finley announced today she will now seek to succeed him.I also pointed out how absurd it was to write an article like this ahead of time when the internet was abuzz with the probability of a “surprise” at Finley’s announcement.
Finley announced her run in a 9 a.m. press conference this morning in front of the Waukesha County Courthouse.
Shook then sent me a second e-mail indicating the “wispolitics people had a deadline and were trying to meet it”. When they called him he told them the biographical information was good but what actually happened at the announcement wasn’t. “I guess nobody is perfect.”
Before I could e-mail him back, I got an e-mail from Mike Schramm, managing editor at WisPolitics.com, asking me to call him. I shot back an e-mail to him,
Mr. Schramm: According to Dennis Shook, he was asked to write the article
ahead of time in order to meet a deadline. Is that correct? James Wigderson
He then sent me another e-mail asking me to call him. After a day of playing phone tag, I spoke with Mike Schramm and he told me the Shook article was only supposed to be the start of an article, the background, waiting for the quotes from the conference, and it was not to see the light of day until he had a phone call from Shook. Wispolitics.com, because of its subscription service, does have a deadline of around 9:45 am (good for bloggers to know), and yes they were trying to beat the clock. But the story was not supposed to get published until the phone call from Shook. Until then, it was part of “production”. Schramm indicated if anyone is at fault, it was him. Somehow the story mysteriously appeared on the site.
He said I still sounded skeptical and I pointed out that I would’ve let the matter drop (having gotten a good laugh out of it) until I got the first e-mail from Shook with the odd story, which was followed by another odd story, which was now followed by a third version of events. I then brought up the Mitch Albom case, and Schramm said this was nothing like the Albom case. Albom wrote the story on a Friday for publication Sunday. What happened with the Finley announcement was the story was written ahead of time, which he then assured me was a common practice, with the intent of publishing after the event after he received a call from Shook with more details from the event.
Schramm claims he thought only the incorrect headline had made the “front page” of wispolitics.com when they pulled the article at 9:20am. The corrected article was up at 9:45 am. I pointed out I was able to read the whole thing, that I had not done any special search, that the article was there in its entirety and listed in the side bar. He seemed bewildered how that could’ve happened, but volunteered he “must’ve hit the wrong button.”
As I said, I now leave this to a jury of their peers – and their bosses. By the way, everyone should be proud of me. I didn't ask Schramm to list me in their blogroll.
