Here’s the background. When Gov. Jim Doyle and the state Legislature were whoring out to the ethanol interests, they not only pushed for state mandates for ethanol use but gave tax breaks to developers who wanted to build ethanol plants. The prime spots at the feeding trough were held by central Wisconsin’s ethanol hustler, Paul Olsen, and his brother, Republican state Sen. Luther Olsen of Ripon. The subsidies resulted in massive overbuilding of ethanol plants - a major problem since the only demand for ethanol comes from the mandates. No sane motorists want the watered-down corn mash in their car.

And who pushed the hardest for these mandates? None other than Paul Olsen’s brother Luther. Talk about conflicts of interest. The biggest legislative backer for mandating the use of ethanol was a guy whose family owns a major ethanol plant! Now that ethanol demand has crushed, one of the Olsen brothers’ firms has filed for bankruptcy and a lender is being sued by its lender. But don’t look for the Olsens to lose their dirty shirts. Wisconsin law - stop me if you are confused about Wisconsin supposedly being cleaner than Illinois - says that if farmers are not paid for their grain by an elevator it is the taxpayers who foot the bill. That means the millions of dollars of unused grain contracted for by the Olsens is the responsibility of Wisconsin taxpayers.

What we have here is the following: the state mandates the use of an inferior and overpriced fuel that gets lousy gas mileage ... the state subsidizes the developers who build the plants to process the ethanol ... the state holds the bag when the developers can’t pay their bills.

The Olsens are rather notorious in central Wisconsin. Their company pleaded guilty to a federal felony for falsifying data in a pollution probe. At least six of their firms have received sanctions or are accused of stiffing creditors. One of the companies has been hit with two separate $75,000 DNR pollution fines. Their pet political hack is the disappointing Bob Welch, the former Republican legislator who decided to become a political insider after losing a U.S. Senate bid. Welch, who represented the district now held by Luther Olsen, ran the state ethanol association and pushed for all the subsidies and mandates. There was a time Bob Welch was a sincere guy, but there’s something about ethanol that brings out the worst in every politician.

It’s not just Doyle and the Wisconsin Legislature. Former President Bush was a major ethanol backer and President Obama is even more enthusiastic. The fact that the fuel adds to pollution rather than decreases it, worsens gas mileage and drives up the price of food by creating artificial demand for corn doesn’t bother any of these politicians. Instead, they suck up to votes from farmers and donations for ethanol scamsters. It was all another sick example of political special interests when the economy was booming. Now that we’re in a recession and the ethanol party is over, it is the taxpayers who will pay.

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Everyone who gets involved with the Olsen brothers comes out dirtier than before they got in bed with these political and business skunks. Bob Welch is a poignant example. But Luther Olsen’s chief of staff, the once respected Heather Smith, has seen her reputation tarnished and her melodramatic e-mails about the brothers Olsen have made her a laughingstock. Paul Olsen’s employees have rŽsumŽs trashed with the stigma of DNR fines. BNP Paribas, a European bank that loaned the Olsens $55 million for the ethanol plant, looks like it is going to get stiffed.

With friends like these ...

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Luther Olsen’s district consists of the portion of central Wisconsin that is well west of Lake Winnebago, well north of Madison and well south of the North Woods. With the "biggest" cities being places like Berlin, Green Lake and Ripon, it’s political no man’s land. The Redgranite and Rosendale newspapers aren’t going to do any digging into anything politically messy. This lack of oversight allows politicians to get away with things that would be harder to pull off in parts of the state that have more aggressive scrutiny of political affairs. While a lot of commentators have been blogging about the Olsen brothers, the lack of any real coverage of this part of the state has made it easier for the Olsens to both rise and fall.

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While Olsen’s Mill is filing for bankruptcy, the real demise is that of ethics and integrity in Wisconsin government. That Luther and Paul could get so much money and bring down so many people is a sad indictment of how Wisconsin government has become a giant special interest game.

(Mark Belling is the host of a daily WISN radio talk show. His column runs Wednesdays in The Freeman.)