Dick Golembiewski's Book--Buy It

by folkbum

Dick Golembiewski--occasionally known as Dick Nitelinger--was kind enough to swing by my communications media class today (ably taught now by my student teacher) to talk TV. This guy knows everything--we talked past, present, future, DTV, HDTV, robot cameras (they really are stealing your soul, I would bet), and more. I found it fascinating; my students, less so (teenagers).

Dick's written the book, literally, on the history of TV in Milwaukee. I got a chance to see it, today, and it is incredible. I didn't grow up in Milwaukee, but I imagine anyone who did (and who had a TV) would love to have the book, which is really a channel-by-channel history of TV--personalities, programs, plenty of pictures. Totally worth it.

Dick's doing an event this Saturday at the central library, and if you want to know anything about TV, that's the place to be. I understand the books will even be on sale there.

(See MJS columns about Dick and the book here and here.)

Some Math

by folkbum

80 pounds of dog + 1 high-fiber diet + 2.5 months of snow cover on the backyard = my afternoon. And probably tomorrow afternoon. Maybe all week. Ugh.

Business Looking for the Defibrillators

Keith R. Schmitz

There is an automatic assumption on the part of some that business people walk in lockstep with the Republican party.

That notion of course has always been wrong, and lately more wrong. The US Chamber of Commerce is pressing for passage of the Senate version of the stimulus package. The reliably right wing National Federation of Independent Business is saying that the current version of the bill is not enough.

Guess there are no free market capitalists in economic foxholes.

Below is a copy of a letter (with some edits to keep the writer anonymous) from a friend a mine in which he emphatically pushes Senator Kohl to support the stimulus. My friend makes a lot of sense and with the vote in the Senate pending, lays out real business world reason why we need this plan to pass.

I am a small Wisconsin business owner. I am writing specifically to comment and note my support for President Obama’s stimulus plan.

Because of the current economic conditions and the slowdown my company has experienced, I’ve had to trim my work force in one plant from (12) employees to (6)—letting my Production Manager, a Draftsman, our Secretary and (3) shop employees go. In Wisconsin, I’ve had to eliminate (6) jobs on the manufacturing floor and fire my second Mechanical Engineer.

While times are very tough, I’m encouraged that we have as many projects quoted and pending as we do. We’ll continue to do what’s necessary to persevere and weather this storm.

But I’ve written about the stimulus package. The suggestion by Republicans that it’s more of the “tax and spend” ways of the Democrats is ludicrous. In these difficult economic times, this is exactly what the country needs—programs that will put people back to work, while working toward long term goals such as alternative energy. As well, the package will help those currently out of work by extending unemployment benefits and healthcare.

The Republicans do NOT speak for this business owner. The suggestion that the stimulus package needs more tax cuts is preposterous. First statistics show that providing tax cuts to businesses will not increase employment rolls. As a business owner, I can attest to this. I will not employ anyone else because of a tax break I might get. Why? Because we DON’T HAVE WORK! If our business is down, I cannot afford to hire anyone whether I get a tax break or not. We’re talking survival and cash flow.

As for individual tax breaks, how is a tax break beneficial for someone who is out a job?

Let’s put people back to work and get this country back on track. Please encourage our Democratic Senators to be more vocal in their support. I just read an article on Yahoo that suggested President Obama is “losing message war on stimulus plan”.

If I can help in any way, please let me know. I am very interested and energized as a result of President Obama’s election.

It's Talent Contest Time, Again

by folkbum

Once again, your humble folkbum has been lucky enough to earn a spot in the finals of the Coffee House's Mid-Winter Talent Contest. Seven other lucky folk and I will be rockin' the casbah on 19th and Wisconsin on Saturday, February 21.

I've been in the finals before, and I'm feeling lucky this year. Which is not a reflection on the rest of the field--I had a chance to see all the auditions this year, and the night will be jam-packed with talented acoustic performers. And me.

The skinny:
Mid-Winter Talent Contest Finals
The Coffee House
631 N. 19th Street (19th and Wisconsin), in Milwaukee
Saturday, February 21
8 PM showtime, doors open at 7:30 PM
$3.50 suggested donation (less than 50 cents per performer!)

Part of the score for the finalists comes from audience response--I need you there to cheer me on and, if necessary, throw underpants. See you there!

Tony Evers: "I would be an aggressive state superintendent"

by folkbum

Two things have kind of been bugging me about the present race for state superintendent: One, even though it is not really true, the best candidate, Tony Evers, is going to be portrayed--already has been portrayed--as a part of the problem, a status quo candidate who cannot bring any kind of change to a bloated state bureaucracy. Two, the great eternal challenge of a position like state superintendent is that it has little policy-making authority: The state superintendent does what the legislature tells him or her to do, not the other way around. Sure, there's some pull when the budgets get submitted, but ultimately, the DPI chief enforces the law, not makes it.

When I talked to Evers last week, it was clear to me that neither of those two things--his being a status-quo candidate or his being a weak figure in government--were the least bit true. "I would be an aggressive state superintendent," he told me, emphatically. And immediately he started off listing off the ways in which he's pushed during the last eight years for change--from increases in funding for 4-year-old kindergarten to leveraging more federal dollars for AP programs and more.

Evers, in fact, bristled at the idea that the state superintendent was dependent on the legislature and the governor for policy changes. He told me of how he worked with parents and local schools to build a rural coalition that was too strong for the legislature to look the other way, and how they won categorical schools aids to rural districts for the first time ever. "That's how the bully pulpit works," he said. "The dirty work of the bully pulpit is the most effective."

Now I know that in these times of hopey-changiness, it would be kind of insane to run as the candidate of no change. However, I don't think Evers is just making it up. If anyone can pull off well the kind of large-scale change that's coming in things like school funding, it's Evers. He has a track record of being able to get ideological opponents together in a room and making them compromise. For example, he brought legislators together to craft the compromise expansion and accountability bill for the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program a couple of years ago. Sure, it was in imperfect bill--and believe me, I was all over its flaws--but it didn't have to happen at all.

Evers is even now as we speak working with voucher proponents like Howard Fuller on bringing real accountability, what was missing from that bill two years ago, to the voucher schools in Milwaukee through a public-private school-by-school report card system. "If we will sill embrace choice as an unchallenged value," he said, giving no indication he would challenge it himself, "then we have to help people make the best choices."

When it comes to changes in school funding, Evers, doesn't have his own plan. However, like a few of the other candidates, he sees value in the work done by the Wisconsin School Finance Network, which is in many ways already a compromise solution.

When I asked him about the Milwaukee Public Schools, Evers pointed to the Milwaukee plan (.pdf) on his website. He is serious about both improving instruction in MPS and finding help for MPS's image and funding problems. Bullet point number one demands MPS "increase consistency of instructional practice across all schools," something independent-minded teachers often resist, for example, and he also talks about de-funding programs that don't work in favor of those that do. Several times as we talked he was clear that there must be accountability to the public--setting goals attached to the dollars spent, showing how well those goals were meant, and so on. He does not support dissolving the MPS board or anything like that, but he has all this accountability talk because, as he put it, "we've got to get to the point where the community trusts its elected leaders."

He's also got something called the Education 7 (or E7) he wants to organize, which would be the educational equivalent Milwaukee 7 (M7), the business group designed to promote the region. He wants to bring together educators from all levels in seven counties, public and private, to work together and promote the schools we have. "I don't think we do kids a service by making them think they could do better someplace else," he told me. And I had never quite thought of it that way, but he's right--nothing about the way MPS and its teachers and leaders gets disparaged does one thing to improve the district, but it does tell our students over and over that they are getting a sub-par education. That's not the way to turn a failing district around.

By now--heck, probably since the beginning of this post--you're probably thinking, Jay, why should we care? You're a WEAC thug so of course you're going to support the WEAC candidate. Think what you will; there is just one candidate for state superintendent right now who has a demonstrated record of coalition-building, working with the legislature, and fostering positive change in public schools across the state, and that's Tony Evers. He has my unqualified support, and deserves yours, too.

Cap, Don't Soak

by 3rd Way

John Cole astutely pointed out how the opening monologue from the 2000 film "Boiler Room" perfectly captured the get rich quick mindset that brought our economy to it's knees.

I read this article a while back, that said that Microsoft employs more millionaire secretary's that any other company in the world. They took stock options over Christmas bonuses. It was a good move. I remember there was this picture, of one of the groundskeepers next to his Ferrari. Blew my mind. you see shit like that, and it just plants seeds, makes you think its possible, even easy. And then you turn on the TV, and there's just more of it. The $87 Million lottery winner, that kid actor that just made 20 million on his last movie, that internet stock that shot through the roof, you could have made millions if you had just gotten in early, and that's exactly what I wanted to do: get in. I didn't want to be an innovator any more, i just wanted to make the quick and easy buck, i just wanted in. The Notorious BIG said it best: "Either you're slingin' crack-rock, or you've got a wicked jump-shot." Nobody wants to work for it anymore. There's no honor in taking that after school job at Mickey Dee's, honor's in the dollar, kid. So I went the white boy way of slinging crack-rock: I became a stock broker.

The biggest problem our economy has is shortsightedness. Too many people are interested in making a fast buck. An entire nation consumed with that mindset is a recipe for disaster. Nowhere is this get filthy rich quick at the expense of others mindset more problematic than on Wall Street.

As Robert Reich put it:

Wall Street compensation has been geared to short-term bets on high-leveraged investments, after which players quickly collect any winnings and run for cover. Many Streeters grew rich in the process but most of the rest of us are undeniably poorer.

The delayed compensation strategy Obama instituted this week was a step in the right direction to remedy that problem. The half million dollar salary might be a little too low to attract the most competent leadership for bailed out institutions, but something had to be done to assure that the money we give to failed companies isn't siphoned off by CEO's to maintain lifestyles lavish enough to make royalty blush. Obama's plan didn't institute any "caps" on pay (I would have a serious problem with the plan if he did). He just delayed the CEO's compensation to assure their pay is dependent on long term success.

I don't typically agree with Barney Frank, but I think he is on the right track with his notion that limits should be put on compensation for any firms issuing stock. If there is a minimum wage we should have a maximum wage. The maximum wage should be set somewhere between 300 and 700 times the minimum wage (roughly $5-$10 million/ year). Firms should be free to compensate beyond the maximum wage, but compensation would have to be in the form of stock that can't be redeemed for at least a decade.

Incentives for work and increased compensation should be universal throughout the workforce. All workers from CEO's to janitors should be working towards the same goal: long term success of their employer. Leaders of institutions should not be rewarded for short term success with compensation packages so large that it creates an incentive make huge sums of money in the short term while risking the long term health of the institution.

The long term success of this nation is dependent on us transforming our culture from one that values a get-rich-quick-scheme above all else into one that values others well being ahead of personal profit. Normally pursuing the profit motive has a near universal positive effect on others well being, but the way we compensate the highest earning individuals in this country is screwed up. If the boards of directors that should be overseeing the distribution of corporate profits aren't willing or able to remove the incentive for leaders to raid corporate coffers at the risk of other shareholders the government needs to step in and help ensure that executives managing the firms that keep our economy moving are looking out for the interests of the rest of us as well as they look after their own.

Soak, Don't Cap

By Keith R. Schmitz

As the phase goes, the rich are different from you and me. That's because in this country there are a class of people who are not rich and often far from it, yet think it is a great idea for a minority to make an ocean liner full of money -- at our expense. They celebrate it and they fervently defend it against any attacks. It puzzles the rest of us.

Of course President Obama's suggestion about a cap on the salaries for people in the companies that we tax payers are bailing out brought out the howling -- and not necessarily from those who would be impacted by the sanction.

But on that point there is one good idea that was in the NY Times.

Reed Hastings the CEO of Netflix suggests that a pay cap is not necessarily a good idea, because if a company sincerely wants to get out of a hole they have to attract talented people.

So he suggests how about a hefty tax increase on those making over $1 million to 50%.

Just about all of us have a talent for something and bust our behinds. Grant you there are those who have remarkable ability for making things or making things work better and no one begrudges their reward. Warren Buffett. And he is now in the process of giving it away.

But for large part the way to make huge riches is through leverage. Once many corporate heads get control of the levers of their business they basically arrange it so large portions of the firm's revenue flow into their pockets. Now, exactly how does leverage benefit us?

I agree with Hastings in countering the argument of why would people work harder if they get taxed more. He suggests that people who enjoy the challenge of what they are doing will keep on doing it.

As the new age phrase goes, do what you love and the money follows.

As for those who are strictly in it for the money, society shouldn't enable that kind of pathology.

Précis

by folkbum

Shorter Wild Wisconsin: People who believe in science shouldn't be in charge of science teachers.

Shorter Badger Blog Alliance: A millimeters-small clump of cells is a human; a full-grown adult woman, not so much.

Shorter Dick Cheney: The first terrorist attack on US soil of the Bush administration was Clinton's fault. But the first terrorist attack on US soil of the Obama administration will be all Obama. (Via.)

Shorter Kevin Fischer: When people on the internet write under a name that is not their own, they are cowards. Except when I write Mary Lazich's posts for her.

("Shorter" concept created by Daniel Davies, perfected by Elton Beard, and awesometized by Sadly, No!.)

Power of the Blog

by folkbum

I came home today to find that the recycling had been collected!

I am still waiting for my million dollars.

"Walker: Tosa Ranger," Episode #96--The Takeover

by folkbum

Characters
Walker: Tosa Ranger
Milwaukee County Board
State of Wisconsin
Left Cheddarsphere, Right Cheddarsphere

ACT I
Milwaukee County Board: We have to fund these positions, or else people will go hungry and be denied benefits guaranteed to them by state law.
Walker: Tosa Ranger: [pounding shoe on podium] No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no!
Milwaukee County Board: We aren't listening to you and we will follow the law instead.
Walker: Tosa Ranger: Whatever. I'm going to St. Paul.
Left Cheddarspehere: If Scott Walker doesn't fund these positions, people will go hungry and be denied benefits guaranteed to them by state law.
Right Cheddarsphere: We love Scott! We love Scott!

Act II
Milwaukee County Board: You have to hire people to fill the positions we have funded, or else people will go hungry and be denied benefits guaranteed to them by state law.
Walker: Tosa Ranger: [pounding shoe on podium] Privatize, privatize, privatize, privatize, privatize!
Milwaukee County Board: Actually, state law says private employees cannot access the files that need to be accessed before people go hungry and get denied benefits guaranteed to them by state law.
Walker: Tosa Ranger: Whatever. Look over there! [dashes out the door]
Left Cheddarspehere: If Scott Walker doesn't fill these positions, people will go hungry and be denied benefits guaranteed to them by state law.
Right Cheddarsphere: Look over there!

Act III
State of Wisconsin: You have to hire people to fill the positions your Board has funded, or else people will go hungry and be denied benefits guaranteed to them by state law.
Walker: Tosa Ranger: Why don't you do it, then?
State of Wisconsin: Okay, we will.
Walker: Tosa Ranger: That's not fair! That's not fair! That's not fair! That's not fair!
Left Cheddarspehere: We told you so.
Right Cheddarsphere: That's not fair!

Roll credits.

(Note: This episode will re-run weekly for some time.)

How Refreshing

By Keith R. Schmitz

A president who admits...(regarding the Daschle pick)

"I think I screwed up," Obama said in an interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper. "And, I take responsibility for it and we're going to make sure we fix it so it doesn't happen again."

Quote of the Day

by folkbum

Digby: "Last night I happened to hear Dick Morris lecturing Sean Hannity about John Maynard Keynes which was a lot like the time I accidentally ate a hash brownie."

This Will Make Your Tummy Hurt with Laughter

By Keith R. Schmitz

A self-labelled Christian group asserts that attacking Sarah Palin is an attack on Christianity.

In their Top Ten Instances of Christian Bashing in America, 2008, the Christian Newswire gives us:

INSTANCE #2: Vice Presidential Candidate Sarah Palin Is Attacked

Alaska Governor, Sarah Palin, came under sharp attack by some in the mainstream media because she self-identifies as a Christian. The Washington Post published a cartoon by Pat Oliphant mocking Palin because she has a background as a Pentecostal/Charismatic Christian. A suspicious arson fire at Sarah Palin’s home church recently caused over $1,000,000 in damage.

Everybody duck!

h/t IT

Needle and the Damage Done

By Keith R. Schmitz

Time Magazine reports support for the death penalty is ebbing.

'bout time. America gets smart.

More on Education and Poverty

by folkbum

Far from refocusing the debate at a grand national or state-wide level with my JS op-ed, all I've managed to do is bug myself. Or, rather, allow myself to be bugged by those who will not get it.

I already noted Milwaukee Alderman Bob Donovan, but there were a few others. For example, Kevin Fischer. I do not regularly read Fischer, as I teach freshmen most of the day and don't need to deal with more of that. But Fischer is on lately about some bone-headed project of his whereby he sets about to prove the liberal bias of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. He managed to set the criteria so narrowly he can't help but win. (For example, Fischer writes of one op-ed, "[The author] writes about a bipartisan proposal that has the support of the MMAC" and then calls the piece "liberal." Sheesh.)

The day my piece ran, Fischer of course labeled it "liberal." Which confuses me a little: I remember fairly clearly being in college (unlike some of the people I went to college with, I suspect) and having these debates in my education classes about the proper role of education. I'm pretty sure that the "conservative" position in those debates was that schooling should not be the means to societal change. In my piece, I clearly argued that schools cannot, and cannot be relied upon or demanded to do so, adequately overcome the effects of poverty and other societal ills in the wider community. Which, as I suggested, is in my view a fairly "conservative" notion.

Whatever. Fischer signs off on his description of my op-ed with "It is also insulting to suggest poor children are incapable of learning because they're poor." I suggested no such thing, of course, but it should not really surprise you that Fischer is willing to willfully misinterpret what I wrote.

Monday's paper also featured another letter to the editor on the subject. Our writer here says, "Poverty is not and never will be the cause of poor Milwaukee Public Schools results. If so, we would not have, now or throughout history, the many, many citizens who came out of slum conditions to gain wealth, fame, notoriety or even a good middle-class life."

Like Fischer's deliberate mischaracterizing my piece to suggest I believe that poverty makes children "incapable of learning," this writer suggests that the many success stories of poor students overcoming the odds prove that there is not a strong correlation between poverty and poor educational achievement, and that, as the editors' titling of his letter put it, "poverty is too often an excuse."

Let me be absolutely clear about this: Poverty and its effects create a cluster of challenging conditions that schools, with their present level of resources, cannot overcome for all students at all times, particularly in urban or rural areas with high concentrations of poor students. Furthermore, it is ridiculous and to demand that schools be the institution to fix those conditions and to punish schools when they fail to do so.

And yes, of course there are exceptions, particular confluences of teaching, parenting, and learning that buck the general trend. But such exceptions are simply not easily replicable to all--if they were, don't you think we'd be doing it by now? But the fact is that there is not one single urban school district with high concentrations of poor students that is performing at anything like the rates its suburban neighbors do. No one has found that silver bullet.

And let me also be clear about this part: I am not suggesting in any way that poverty creates an inability to learn, just the conditions under which learning becomes very difficult. Consider this partial list of the effects of poverty on children:

• poor children start school with significantly reduced vocabularies
• poor children's brains develop differently
• poor children are less likely to have private music, art, or foreign language instruction, all of which can increase IQ and achievement later in school
• poor students are less likely to participate in organized sports, which can help children learn appropriate public behavior
• poor students are more likely to have lead poisoning, asthma, diabetes, and other health problems that affect learning or school attendance
• poor students are more likely to change schools more often
• poor students tend to forget more over the summer vacation than do their wealthier peers

And that's just off the top of my head this morning.

Clearly, not every child who grows up poor has to deal with all of these factors, and experience suggests that many poor students will overcome disadvantages to graduate and succeed. But the data are also clear that in general that success is just plain harder to get. That's why I keep saying it's ridiculous that people expect MPS alone to overcome all of these deficits for all of our students, at least not without a significant change in the amount of and how we spend our resources.

And to be even more crystally clear: I am not suggesting, as MPS school board candidate ReDonna Rodgers commented here last week, that any of this is pretense to surrender, or "a nice safe excuse for doing nothing." If I believed that, I would not work anywhere near so hard at my job as I do, and I would not be so passionate about the issue.

Caught up?

by folkbum

My recycling still hasn't been picked up since before Thanksgiving, thankyouverymuch, despite claims that workers were just "two weeks behind in their collections." Luckily, the co-mingled side stays relatively manageable, what with all the aluminum scavengers about.

The difference between liberals and conservatives, part eleventy-billion

by folkbum

Here's what has the conservatives upset: "There isn’t any gray area here. Daschle was cheating on his taxes and only came clean when he realized that it would come up in his confirmation hearings."

Here's what has the liberals (me, too) upset: "But there's no need to withhold judgment on Daschle himself. He embodies everything that is sleazy, sickly, and soul-less about Washington. It's probably impossible for Obama to fill his cabinet with individuals entirely free of Beltway filth--it's extremely rare to get anywhere near that system without being infected by it -- but Daschle oozes Beltway slime from every pore."

They Don't Want to Be Stimulated

By Keith R. Schmitz

For some reason I get emails from the hilariously named American for Prosperity. Or is it Americans for the Prosperity of a Really Tiny Minority?

Maybe because I'm in business and they automatically think that if you are in business, you might be a Republican (with apologies to Jeff Foxworthy).

Any way, it is a great way to keep an eye on them, but on the other hand I just might learn something.

Just got their latest communication titled "no stimulus."

Really? Are they that dead?

Give to Wisniewski online, too

by folkbum

By overwhelmingly popular request, a link to the other blogger running for school board--Zach W (of Blogging Blue) for South Milwaukee School Board.

Give to Mathias online

by folkbum

Now all of you stampless or lazy people--like me--can PayPal your contributions to Mathias for School Board (endorsement post here). Just click through and give away!