[TomOfTTB]

Not if you're trying to act quickly. I'm not saying it's how I would react but he's clearly trying to take immediate action and a long, drawn out process isn't conducive to that.

Any government bidding program is going to take several years to complete. It's going to involve a committee to evaluate the bids. That committee will have to be formed meaning there will be politics involved in deciding who is on the committee. Once that's all done you'll have to put out the request for bids and wait for those bids to come in. Then comes the evaluation by the committee and so on.

Again I wouldn't disagree if you said he's acting rashly but it's consistent with his public stance to push these things quickly.

[michaelcampbell]

> a long, drawn out process

It doesn't have to be that, either. A fixed, short to medium time frame will do for bids; it doesn't have to be all or nothing.

And honestly, perhaps he's 100% on the up and up (like every other politician), and Koch Industries is honest to a fault (like so many other corporations) and really DOESN'T want utilities at potentially criminally low prices; this non-bid clause give a huge appearance of impropriety. With nothing else anywhere to show that there isn't any, would it not be prudent to either explain his actions or change them accordingly?

[tzs]

> Any government bidding program is going to take several years to complete.

I doubt this. Governments routinely sell assets, such as property seized in criminal cases, tax foreclosures, and surplus equipment at auction and it doesn't take years. There doesn't seem to be anything about the proposed sales in Wisconsin that would require a long procedure.

[easp]

Well, since they got caught trying to slip this through, I'm going to bet that it makes this and any other asset sale they are contemplating even more drawn out.