Start your day by reading Bill Kraus' excellent guest Blog focused on the GOP, then read the NY Times editorial on the corrupt campaign funding system in New York. Good start to your week.
The weekend news reports on efforts to hire Afghans away from the Taliban. Jobs not guns. The' [...]
Before the behavioral huns overran the party, the biggest thorn in the side of the big-tent moderates who used to run the Republican Party were the “true” conservatives.
Or to put it another way, even if the people who run what remains of the party and the more powerful and numerous [...]
Bishop Tobin of Rhode Island is again in attack mode. Patrick Kennedy must repent and disavow his position on the right of a woman to seek or not to seek an abortion. If not? Then no communion for Patrick.
Bishop Tobin of Rhode Island is again in attack mode. Patrick Kennedy must repent and disavow his position on the right of a woman to seek or not to seek an abortion. If not? Then no communion for Patrick.
Headline in NY Times: "In Dublin,700 Pages on the Church's sins." The [...]
The President will take ownership of the Afghan war on Tuesday in a speech to be delivered at West Point. Yikes. (I'm not kidding.) The War Council and the other hawks have him in their talons.
I'm reminded this morning of FDR. He spoke at Chautauqua, New York, in 1936: "I" [...]
The NY Times article's second paragraph says it all. The White House said Mr. Obama had completed his consultations with his war council. I'm not making this up. "His War Council." (The Times did not say if Robert McNamara, McGeorge Bundy and Henry Kissinger were in attendance.)
We should give thanks that Obama has not caved (yet) to the military request for thousands of new troops for the graveyard called Afghanistan. Bill Moyers just devoted an entire program to LBJ's decision to bomb North Vietnam and send tens of thousands of troops to fight and die.' [...]
Looking forward to a mild start to a new week? Don't read the NYT story, "Executives Kept Wealth as Firms Failed." Who says so? Three profs at Harvard Law School. At Lehman, the top five executives received cash bonuses and proceeds from stock sales totaling $1 billion between 2000' [...]
Churches are exempt from property taxes and sales taxes. In exchange for that privilege they are not supposed to be involved in partisan political activity. Churches routinely break this rule, and [...]
Alan Borsuk, JS cheerleader and occasional education columnist for the paper, is scared. He is, needless to say, in favor of elimination of the elected school board governing Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS). Alan is so in favor of the Duncan/Doyle/Barrett plan he writes as if panicked now that it [...]
Alan Borsuk, J-S cheerleader and occasional Education columnist for the paper, is scared. He is, needless to say, in favor of elimination of the elected School Board governing Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS). Alan is so in favor of the Duncan/Doyle/Barrett plan he writes as if panicked now that it appears [...]
Three weeks ago, Bill Moyers suggested that if the "governing class" in America, insists on fighting (unwinnable) wars, then it should share the sacrifice--bring back the draft. Moyers argued that no one should be forced into service to get health insurance or because of a lost job. I agree. [...]
I never heard of "pink sheeting" and suspect you haven't either. NYT carried a disturbing account of the practice. A union, Unite Here, has been accused of this outrageous practice. "Union members and staff were brought to high-pressure meetings where they were brought to tears as supervisors pushed them'" [...]
Or do they? Take a look at the "640,000 jobs created or saved" by the Obama $160 billion stimulus spending. Challenged by ABC, the network took a harder look and concluded that 60,000 jobs should be culled from the list.
"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet," wrote Shakespeare. "A rose is a rose is a rose," said Gertrude Stein. President Reagan told us there was no "hunger" in America. So we changed the name not the reality. NYT headline: "49 Million Americans Report a Lack" [...]
Jim Doyle has been very consistent when discussing the proposal to return the appointment authority of the DNR secretary to the DNR board of directors. For 14 years he never wavered. Not as attorney general nor as a candidate for governor. Never, that is, until it mattered.
Gubernatorial candidate Tom Barrett is, apparently, taking advice from Jim Doyle on schools and the gubernatorial race in 2010. That's a little scary. We can only hope that the mayor will quickly establish his own path on all issues.
To name a few: Fundraising now but public funding of' [...]
Before education researcher Jerry Bracey died last month he issued a report that should serve as a dismissal of the Doyle-Barrett plan to take over Milwaukee's public schools. [...]
We begin with a quiz and the good news. The Puffin Foundation/The Nation gives a Creative Citizenship award to one who has challenged the status quo through distinctive, courageous, imaginative and socially responsible work of significance. Guess who won the award this year, along with $100,000? Jim Haney of WMC [...]
Feed me some soft balls and I'll try to knock 'em out of the park. OK? Q. Who is Bishop Tobin? Before yesterday I would have shrugged and said "dunno." Now I know. He is the Bishop (Catholic not Anglican) of Providence, Rhode Island (suburb of Boston), and likely [...]
Feed me some soft balls and I'll try to knock 'em out of the park. OK? Q. Who is Bishop Tobin? Before yesterday I would have shrugged and said "dunno." Now I know. He is the Bishop (Catholic not Anglican) of Providence, Rhodie Island (suburb of Boston) and likely soul-mate [...]
What does it mean that Jim Doyle calls himself a Democrat? Peek at Education policy. Jim Doyle promises to call a special session of the Democratic-controlled Legislature (with an hour or two of debate) to take up his bill that would "cede control of Milwaukee Public Schools to the mayor" [...]
Our nation has had one crisis after another. Katrina, 9/11, war in Iraq, war in Afghanistan, depression/recession, torture by American troops, Gitmo...it has not been an easy couple of years, so, the argument goes, cut Obama some slack.
I agree, but it must be said that the administration has not [...]
A reminder--the free lecture at the Law School is this Friday at 4:00. Professors Walter Dickey, Cecelia Klingele and Michael Scott will join Bob Kastenmeier to "Re-Imagine Criminal Justice." Call (608) 262-5918 for reservations. Join this vital discussion. See you there.
Milwaukee commute? Dan Bice, JS columnist, called the other [...]
Nearly every article informing us of the poor prospects for daily newspapers includes a plea to save the newspapers because, unlike blogs, papers are reliable. Well, those who write that don't read Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel education columnist Alan Borsuk. Borsuk believes to the core that Milwaukee schools need mayoral control;' [...]
Joel McNally once again pins the tail on the donkey in today's Cap Times. His thoughts on the odd Doyle/Obama/Barrett rush to destroy the coalition that brought victory to Obama and Wisconsin Dems just a year ago mirrored my own when I waited to speak at the anti-Doyle/Duncan/Barrett rally' [...]
Impartial Justice. Close your eyes and say it slowly. You can almost feel reform hitting the Supreme Court of Wisconsin. The vote--19-13 in the Senate and 51-42 in the Assembly. It is not perfect but an old friend once stopped to assure me that "perfection is for the next world--mistakes" [...]
Everyone was excited to see President Obama in Madison. Arne Duncan, his Secretary of Education--not so much. Things change quickly in politics. Prior to Tuesday's election results, Obama's advisers could argue that they don't need the base because the base (you, me, poor people, particularly African Americans, struggling to' [...]
Drove to an anti-Barrett rally at City Hall in Milwaukee yesterday to hear what our friends are saying about the proposed (by Governor Doyle and Mayor Barrett) takeover of Milwaukee's public schools. You know, the system Tommy, Howard Fuller, John Norquist and the Bradley Foundation "saved" with vouchers--the system they' [...]
For 60-odd years, some form of "war" has dominated the American agenda. Never content to permit the U.N. the resources to settle disputes, we have fought the Koreans, indirectly China, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Grenada, Iraq, Afghanistan and, of course, wars on drugs, terrorists, poverty, the Cold War...and on and on. [...]
Think about it, Tom. Is Jim Doyle setting you up to fail? Are you sure he is on your team? If you listen to him and run for governor, fundraising will be your full-time occupation. Why? Because Doyle has done nothing to control the cost of campaigns. Nada. To win, [...]
The Republican death spiral started with the unintended consequences of the Watergate reforms. The party went from the main slater and funder of the campaigns of Republican candidates to a sideshow. The money got loose from what Ody Fish described as “the kinder mistress” and campaigns became entrepreneurial. The new [...]
I didn't realize that the reason some schools are not doing better is and has been right in front of your eyes and mine. I feel kind of embarrassed that it took me so long to figure out that we spend way too much time worrying about the impact of' [...]
