Barrett-supporting filmmaker releases a ridiculous lopped off video of Scott Walker saying "divide and conquer."

You would think after the firings over the badly edited George Zimmerman 911 audio that a journalist who cared about his professional reputation would resist putting out material like what we're seeing coming from Brad Lichtenstein, a documentary filmmaker (who has contributed to Tom Barrett, Governor Walker's opponent in the recall election). The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports:

In the video shot on Jan. 18, 2011 - shortly before Walker's controversial budget-repair bill was introduced and spawned mass protests - [Walker donor Diane] Hendricks... told Walker she wanted to discuss "controversial" subjects away from reporters, asking him:

"Any chance we'll ever get to be a completely red state and work on these unions -"

"Oh, yeah," Walker broke in.

"- and become a right-to-work?" Hendricks continued. "What can we do to help you?"

"Well, we're going to start in a couple weeks with our budget adjustment bill," Walker said. "The first step is we're going to deal with collective bargaining for all public employee unions, because you use divide and conquer."

You've got to watch the video clip at the link to hear how starkly it's cut in the middle of a sentence. Very inflammatory. Fortunately, the Journal Sentinel reporters were able to get access to the raw footage:

"So for us," the governor continues, "the base we get for that is the fact that we've got - budgetarily we can't afford not to. If we have collective bargaining agreements in place, there's no way not only the state but local governments can balance things out. . . . That opens the door once we do that. That's your bigger problem right there."

He goes on to talk about curbing liability lawsuits and government regulations.

The inflammation goes away when you let Walker natter on. (Also at the link is new video from Walker stating, today, that he's not seeking right-to-work legislation.)

Lichtenstein said he did not accept any funding for his film from labor or Democratic groups in filming his documentary because of the ethical standards required by the Public Broadcasting Service, which is expected to air the film in the fall, getting his funding instead from groups like The MacArthur Foundation and the Sheldon and Marianne Lubar Family Foundation.

"I have no political agenda with the film and I'm not releasing the trailer to have a political impact in Wisconsin," Lichtenstein said Friday.

Really? Why did you edit the clip like that?

Lichtenstein said he was still talking with his lawyer about a request by the Journal Sentinel to allow the newspaper to post the raw footage of the Walker comments. Reporters for the newspaper have been able to review the raw footage and make a transcript of it to get the context of the conversation.

Pathetic. Still talking with his lawyer. Put up the full clip. You are serving a political agenda. Shame on the Public Broadcasting Service.