Finally, Doyle will stop the scourge!

by folkbum

One of the big stories of the day is that in the budget Governor J-Dizzle submitted to the legislature, there's no funding for yearly vehicle registration stickers. I think this is a great idea.

See, it would stop one of the greatest scourges known to Wisconsinites. And no, it's not the problem named in the story:

But criminals have been slicing off stickers, then reattaching them to the plates of unregistered or stolen vehicles, police say. Sometimes the thieves break off the corner of a plate or steal the whole plate to get the sticker, Rowe said.

Last year, 4,951 thefts of stickers and plates were reported to police, [MPD Capt. Diana] Rowe said. That was 92% of thefts of vehicle parts and 25% of Milwaukee thefts, running ahead of shoplifting and pick-pocketing and just behind thefts of vehicle contents, she said.

No, the scourge I mean is one you've probably noticed: People who do not know how to apply the stickers correctly.

You know what I'm talking about: People who, because they don't know any better or because they feel the need to do this, decide to display every single sticker they've ever had. They put them around the perimeter of the plate, between the letters and numbers, anywhere there's room, except where the instructions tell them to put the stickers--in the lower right-hand corner over the previous year's stickers.

I googled for a picture of what I'm talking about. If I had the time to go out driving in the day today to find one, I'm sure it wouldn't have taken long. (If any of you have such a license plate--or a photo of one you'd like to share--you know where to find me.) In the meantime, Gov, Doyle's measure will put an end to this menace.

Illinois Rejects Conceal and Carry

By Keith R. Schmitz

Good news for those who dig civilization.

A bill for conceal and carry in Illinois died in a State Senate committee.

So that means people of Illinois -- 1, the NRA and gun industry which sorely needs a market -- 0.

Looks like Illinois is as smart as we are.

How do we pay teachers?

by folkbum

The Journal Sentinel has not just ended its community education bloggers program, but has, at least as far as I can tell, let all the content disappear, too. But since Barack Obama announced yesterday his education agenda, including merit pay for teachers, I wanted to re-run something I wrote for them some time ago. Good thing someone invented the Google cache, eh? Here it is in full, with most of the links fixed, even.

--

How do we pay teachers?
By Jay Bullock
Tuesday, Oct 23 2007, 05:10 AM

The tentative agreement between MPS and its union -- the biggest collection of teachers in the area -- means that now is as good a time as any to talk about how we pay teachers. I'm gearing up to vote on the thing, and there's a lot in there that I like: For example, there's the return of a mentoring program killed for budget reasons six or seven years ago now. Many schools have informal mentoring systems set up for new teachers, but that can be hit-or-miss, so bringing back the systemwide mentors is a good idea. I like the additional push for using the union's TEAM program, which, if used effectively (that means you, principals!), could be a national model for dealing with ineffective teachers. There is some good, solid revision to discipline and safety measures, some of which will be abetted by the assistance of the Milwaukee Police Department and the DA's office.

But when you get to the pay, there's just a percentage increase. Nothing interesting, innovative or delightfully surprising involved there at all.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm not opposed to getting paid more. I am, however, famously on record as saying that I am not asking for more more money for myself. Just a few weeks ago, in fact, I commented at a local conservative's blog that I would be willing to take a salary cut in exchange for smaller class sizes. (Class size is not a subject of bargaining, though.)

The blog post in question above followed shortly after the recent news that a whole lot of teachers, many of them young, out in Waukesha were hitting the top of the pay scale. Waukesha and MPS take two very different approaches to paying their teachers, both at heart supported by the research. There are a few factors researchers can positively correlate to student achievement, two of them being teachers' experience and teachers' educations. The achievement increases plateau before the pay scales typically do, but MPS rewards experience (or, given our turnover, perhaps we should say perseverance) and Waukesha rewards education.

In general, conservative blog reaction to the Waukesha story was typically spiteful, even though the district's pay scale changes came at the insistence of conservatives tired of paying teachers for mere longevity. One moderate blogger, though, quite rightly diagnosed that problem: Conservatives just want to be unhappy about teacher pay, even if they pay scale is the one they wanted.

Just because we do pay for longevity and learnin', we do not have to keep doing it that way -- or at least not solely that way. The trouble, though, is in figuring out a way to pay teachers that is both fair and that fairly rewards teachers who do the kinds of things that encourage student achievement. State Superintendent Elizabeth Burmaster has proposed paying teachers in high-need subjects or in hard-to-staff schools more, for example; that would create an incentive for the best teachers to seek those jobs first. That plan never made it into any iteration of the most recent state budget, though. The new MPS contract does not contain higher pay for such situations, but does include some provisions that will make it easier to get good teachers into exactly those roles.

But perhaps the Third Rail -- or, depending on your perspective, the Holy Grail -- of teacher pay would be some kind of merit-based system. The difficulty in designing any system is designing one that is both manageable and fair. I often tell the story of my first year teaching, when I still didn't have my stuff together. I was awful, and I carry around a lot of regret for how that year went. (This is not an uncommon feeling among teachers.) However, because of where I taught then -- an exurban Milwaukee district -- and the students I taught, undoubtedly the test scores of those students were as good or better than the test scores of my students any year that I've taught in Milwaukee. Did I merit better pay then? I've also had principals whom I would not trust to fairly evaluate me -- during my tenure as a union rep, I butted heads with them for reasons wholly unrelated to my classroom performance. My first three years in MPS, my evaluations were based entirely on about 20 minutes of classroom observation -- total, not per year. So, again, I'm not sure that's the best way to judge my merit, either.

But there is something intriguing out there that bears watching, and that's Denver's "ProComp," or Professional Compensation System for Teachers. That system actually combines all of the above elements into one pay system -- experience, professional development, test scores, administrative evaluations and consideration for teachers in high-needs or hard-to-staff schools. It is just one year old, but initial reports seem positive:

If merit pay for public school teachers ever takes off in the U.S., the first successful launchpad will be Denver. After one start-up year under an incentive plan, the city's schools are marking early success – thanks in large part to the teachers union.

One triumph for this accountability tool is that hundreds of additional teachers have applied to work at the city's worst schools, drawn by new higher pay. And even though teachers already on the payroll didn't have to participate in the "ProComp" bonus pay program, nearly half have signed up. (Those hired since 2006 are automatically enrolled.)

The biggest test is yet to come: whether teacher rewards will lead to better student grades and higher test scores. The pilot program suggests they might.

The Denver plan was developed collaboratively between the union there and the administration (and supported by voters, since it means millions more in spending for teacher pay). And that is likely why it will succeed if it succeeds -- it has the buy-in of the people affected by it. I can't suggest that MPS or the state of Wisconsin copy wholesale what Denver has done; it is a Denver plan developed there for there. But I think that the collaborative process they followed and the care taken to reward teachers for many different kinds of merit are two things Wisconsin policymakers and educators should consider.

It's time to look at the way we pay teachers, and if we can work together to change the system, everyone will benefit, especially the students.

--

Back to the present, again: As I noted back in that original post, the difficulty in any merit-pay system is in finding ways to satisfy the unique situations of every school district. My fear is that a new emphasis on merit pay nationally will push states to implement one-size-fits-all systems that will not make teachers or administrators happy and, worse, will do nothing to spur achievement.

The Denver system, now another year-plus older, still seems to be doing well, especially after a contract settlement in 2008.

At any rate, the coming debate will be long, difficult, and important.

People Like Their Radio Fat Free

By Keith R. Schmitz

The right luvs Rush. But for other reasons so does the left.

A recent poll shows that of respondents overall, 45 percent, view Limbaugh very, very negatively. Among independents the number rises to 3 to 1.

Yeah, the Democrats are dumb keeping the spotlight on Limbaugh, as people such as Pat Buchanan say.

Real dumb.

But at the same time Limbaugh is doing all he can to focus attention on himself. He is as addicted to being the center of the universe as he is on, well, you catch the drift.

It would be interesting to see a similar poll run on our local princes of the sullen and resentful.

Time Magazine Hearts the 17th Amendment

By Keith R. Schmitz

Karen Tumulty on Time's Swampland site this morning gives Russ Feingold's idea to elect senators rather than appointing them to open seats, especially after some of the recent debacles.

George Will hates it, which makes it a really good idea.

Again, as they say in the slogan, Something Special from Wisconsin.

Sure some of the elected Senators haven't worked out, but a least for the people of that state they are Their Senators.

Sykes fails to check sources ... quelle suprise surprise

IRONIC UPDATE: Quelle horreur! Imagine the egg on my face when I got an email correcting my French! Well, at least I admit it when I fix my mistakes, unlike some people I could name.

by folkbum

Even though other fashionable people have already arrived at this party, I'd still like to offer my take. Charlie Sykes offered a post yesterday titled, and I am not making this up, "The 25 Worst Peforming [sic] Public Schools."

He links to what Tom Foley calls an "autobot-blog" named WalletPop, which has a feature on these schools, as compiled by a real-estate website called Neighborhood Scout. Sykes says of these schools, "And, yes, we[*] are represented. MPS has Numbers 3, 4, and 25. Grim." MPS is, of course, the Milwaukee Public Schools, so this is of interest to me.

Here's the problem: One of the three schools Sykes claims as MPS schools, the School of Humanities (third worst in America, according to the list), has been closed for nearly three years. The remaining two, HR Academy of Business and Global Awareness (the list cannot seem to get the name right) and Milwaukee Spectrum, are "partnership" schools. MPS defines "partnership" schools this way:

MPS offers a wide array of partnership schools for students who are identified as being at risk of dropping out or who are experiencing difficulty in the traditional school setting. The schools are included in the listings and are identified as “partnership” schools.

In other words, these schools are A) designed to attract and deal with the most challenging students in the city, so you kind of expect low test scores, and B) not run by MPS itself, but rather contracted out to, in both of these cases, religious entities of the kind that Sykes and his ilk are always promoting as being better than the education bureaucracy in the first place.

(LUNCHTIME UPDATE: Apparently, someone has edited Sykes's post to correct the typo in the title--this is why I screen-capped--but not the misinformation in the post. Oops!)

In fact, just a few minutes with WalletPop's list and you find that same pattern repeated over and over. Number 20 on the list, for example, is the Welcome Center at Mifflin Middle School in Columbus, Ohio, which is a "transitional program designed to meet the needs of students from any country who have recently arrived in the United States and have little or no literacy skills in English or in their native language. Welcome Center students are generally at the Beginner Proficiency Level, as determined by the English as a Second Language (ESL) Assessment Center." By definition this school is for low-achieving students.

Even if Sykes had bothered to check up on the worst school, the Tomorrow's Builders Charter School in East St. Louis, he would find that this school was run not by the public school district (it's not even on their list of schools) but by an outside agency. Number seven on the list, Spring Creek Elementary in St. Francis, SD, is a small school on the Rosebud reservation--could there be issues affecting that school, I wonder? Number 11, the Circle of Courage Center in Poughkeepsie (I just wanted to type Poughkeepsie!) is another alternative program designed for the low-performing and bad-behaving kids in the district.

So it seems that the WalletPop list--if you can believe this!--is not necessarily a true and reflective list of the "worst" of anything.

This is not hard, folks; I'm doing this over breakfast. You'd think Charlie Sykes and his staff of however many would have thought to do just the most basic checking of facts. But I guess that would have cut into their ideology--and you know how much Sykes-n-them hate it when facts get in the way of ideology.

* Charlie Sykes does not live in Milwaukee. I resent his attempt to associate himself with us good folk who do.

Why I'm a MAC, Not a PC

By Keith R. Schmitz

Had my day pushed back three hours because of problems loading Norton Anti-Virus on my wife's Dell and dealing with Hari the tech's extremely thick Indian accent.

MacGyver Updates

by folkbum

A couple of updates related to my post below.

One, the badly written blog post about that inaugural poll from the MacGyver Institute's inaugural poll has been updated--with no notice that a correction has been attempted. Compare before (above) and after (below). Of course, the correction is still misrepresenting the results of the poll, at least according to the group's own press release (.pdf). That claims, "35% of residents blame the state’s budget woes on the downturn in Wisconsin’s job and economic situation." Which is not what the updated post says.

It may also not be what the poll says; the poll was conducted with 500 likely voters, not 500 residents. The likely voters screen in a poll provides a different set of responders than just plain-old residents. No doubt the pollsters probably weighted the results, but as the full poll seems not yet available, including crosstabs and weight information, we won't know.

Also, still no ability for me to log in there and comment.

Two, Cory Liebmann at Eye on Wisconsin answers a complaint raised by James Wigderson in the comments to that original post. Wiggy quotes MacGyver spokesperson Bob Reddin as saying that the convicted criminal Scott Jensen "will take no formal role with the organization." Wiggy adds, "Be nice if someone actually asked someone involved first."

But Cory notes this neat trick:

If you take a look at the properties of the last two press releases that have been sent out by The Maciver Institute, the author of those pdf files is none other than Scott Jensen! I would say that writing multiple press releases for an organization qualifies as a "formal role."

That sounded like fun so I thought I would check it myself, and sure enough:

That's the above-linked press release, if you're interested, and Scooter's name prominently in the "Author" field.

Of course, it might just be that the MacGyver folks are using Adobe software illegal copied from a legitimate version owned by Jensen. But that's as bad as lying about Jensen's role with the group.

See DPI Candidates in Milwaukee Tonight, Next Week

by folkbum

In one of a long series of joint appearances, the candidates for state superintendent of public instruction (Tony Evers and Rose Fernandez) will be discussing issues related to children and adults with disabilities here in Milwaukee tonight. They'll be meeting at 7 PM at Independence First, 540 S. 1st St. More information is in this .pdf from Disability Rights Wisconsin.

I also had a note in the inbox this morning that the two will be facing off in a forum sponsored by the Educators' Network for Social Justice on Monday, March 16, 7 PM at the Gordon Park Pavillion, 2828 N. Humboldt Blvd. More information is on the ENSJ website.

Unfortunately, tonight I have to pick my wife up at the airport (she's picky about not being stranded places), so I cannot attend. I'm hoping to get a first-hand report from someone who will be there. Next week's, though, I hope to make in person.

Kill the union. Yeah, that'll work.

by folkbum

Dad29 points us to Marquette Professor John McAdams's blog, where he's running with a study on teachers unions. Conservative hatred of teachers unions is a happy--for them--confluence of their hatred of unions, distrust of the public sector, and general freakishness about educating children. We're the trifecta, if you will. And they're always on the lookout for reasons to toss us aside.

The study cited by McAdams (not available online except as a .pdf file on McAdams's Marquette University server space--good thing he's at a private university, no?) is a study only of California school districts and their contracts. Teacher contracts are always governed by state law, including often what is and is not a mandatory or possible subject of bargaining. The applicability of this study to Wisconsin and elsewhere is already suspect.

But McAdams pulls out a paragraph from that study:

The unions use their power—their basic work-denial power, enhanced by their political power—to get restrictive rules written into collective bargaining contracts. And these restrictions ensure that the public schools are literally not organized to promote academic achievement. When contract rules make it difficult or impossible to weed out mediocre teachers, for example, they undermine the most important determinant of student learning: teacher quality (Sanders and Rivers 1996). And when contract rules guarantee teachers seniority-based transfer rights, they ensure that teachers cannot be allocated to their most productive uses (Levin, Mulhern, and Schunck 2005). Much the same can be said about a long list of standard contract provisions. This is to be expected. Except at the margins, contract rules are simply not intended to make the schools effective.

This seems to be the nut of the study, that there are three, maybe four things about teachers unions that make bargaining with them harmful to kids' educations. And you know what? None is true for Wisconsin's largest school district and the one with the greatest non-white enrollment, the Milwaukee Public Schools. This poses a problem for McAdams and the theory that, as another paragraph he quotes puts it, "in large school districts, restrictive labor contracts have a very negative impact on academic achievement, particularly for minority students." Let's look at those four things.

• The unions use their power—their basic work-denial power . . . By law, teachers in Wisconsin cannot strike--though teachers in California can.
• . . . enhanced by their political power . . . McAdams asks, "We might wonder, for example, whether heavily black districts with a lot of Democratic voters elect liberal school boards that readily cave in to the teachers’ union." Please note, non-Milwaukeeans and locals who haven't paid attention (i.e., McAdams himself): In the last Board election, the union-backed candidate lost 4 out of 5 contests. In the one before that, it was 1 out of 4. I could go back further, but suffice it to say, the Board has not been in control of the union-backed candidates for some time now. In the next go-round April 7, out of four contests, two of the union-backed candidates didn't even make it out of the primary (and one was unopposed, hardly making for a fair fight). That means after the new Board is seated, union-backed candidates will still be in the minority.
• When contract rules make it difficult or impossible to weed out mediocre teachers, for example . . . MPS actually has an easy way for principals to deal with bad teachers, designed collaboratively between the union and the administration, called the TEAM Program. I've seen it work, as a union rep. I've also seen principals refuse to use it when they should have--hardly a black mark against the union.
• when contract rules guarantee teachers seniority-based transfer rights . . . MPS also does not have seniority-transfer rights, at least not for the vast majority of movement of teachers among schools. Those decisions are site-based, with individual schools seeking the best fit for themselves.

So if those things are not screwing up Milwaukee, what is? (cough, cough) Maybe the study's author should come here to find out. Better yet, McAdams. I've occasionally wondered how McAdams, professor of political science, would fare teaching an MPS freshman civics class. If he wants to spend a day or two with my freshmen, he knows where to find me. Alas, he has tenure (something he would likely wish to deny public school teachers) and is unlikely to leave the academy for the glamorous life of an MPS teacher.

More importantly, though, this notion that if we could just get rid of the union, everything would be all right--or at least a lot better--is dumb. Consider how probable this chain of events really is:

1. Show teachers that you're not afraid to fire a bunch of them en masse (the "bad" ones, presumably)
2. Slash pay and benefits for those that remain (a common proposed benefit of killing the union)
3. Eliminate the remaining teachers' ability to bargain together, as well as any job protection they may have had been counting on after seeing #1, above
4. Then, magically, good teachers stay in, and more good teachers flock to, the most challenging district in the state to raise achievement

I don't believe it for a second. Look, I know people do not choose a life of public service like teaching for the money. But there is only so much you can take away from good teachers before they start bailing on you. We already hear, including--mostly, even--from conservatives, how many good teachers are turned away from MPS because of the residency rule. How many more will walk away when you take away job protection and bargaining rights? When you cut pay and benefits to make MPS the lowest-paid, hardest assignment in Southeastern Wisconsin?

Good luck with that.
--
Aside: I bet McIlheran blogs on this study before the week's out.

Lost your house? Job? Pension? National economy? Our bad.

by folkbum

Wisconsin's conservatives, tired of being recruited as WILFs, have a new and exciting toy, called the MacGyver Institute. Its inaugural blog post* is about a poll the institute is releasing today. Among the shocking findings:

The public by 35% blames the current economy on the State's budget problems.

I read that over several times, and as best as I can tell, the blogger is suggesting that a majority of those polled (X+35% vs. X%) believe that the sucky economy is the fault of the Wisconsin state budget.

Well! As a number of conservatives have opined lately (one local example, although a different local con disagrees, mostly), Barack Obama seems to be running out of things and people to blame for the burst housing bubble, record unemployment, tanked stocks, crunched credit, and global meltdown. But, thanks to MacGyver's official blogger, we know that, in fact, it looks like it's all Wisconsin's fault.

Whoops!

To be fair, I think that blogger must be new at the whole blogging thing, because he does not even link to the press release his bosses put out about their poll. Maybe he didn't have the results in front of him at all, so he didn't know that the right answer was "35% of residents blame the state’s budget woes on the downturn in Wisconsin’s job and economic situation." Which is, you know, a totally different thing.

I wanted to point all of this out at the new blog to their new blogger, but the MacGyver blog seems not to be accepting comments at this time. I mean, there's a "comments" link, but I followed the directions and I, at least, am not allowed to post any comments. Maybe I've been pre-banned from their site, I don't know.

* I do wonder how a blogger on record thinking this about Scott Jensen feels about working for a group that really, really wants Jensen to be its leader.

Oh, what a tangled etc.

by folkbum

Rose Fernandez seems sincere enough in her efforts, but the people around her ...

More.

Deep Thought

by folkbum

It's a good thing Jim Burkee lost last September, or else he'd have to apologize tomorrow.

Fernandezistas: Hey, look over there!

by folkbum

The (blog) headlines are scary with two es: "Tony Evers' Scandal?" reads one. "CRG files complaint in DPI race" reads another. The writers are near giddy with the idea that there's a there there that will sink the campaign of Tony Evers for state superintendent. McIlheran, the former newsman of the group, at least sounds newsy: "Fund-raiser e-mail on Evers' behalf was wrong, official says"--although it still implies there's something Evers himself did that was wrong, which is not true.

In the end, despite the noise they're making, the reality of the situation is quite banal: A Tony Evers supporter, like thousands of others around the state in the last few months, got an email from the campaign promoting an event. The supporter, Jeff Dickert, made the bone-headed move of using his work email--he works for CESA7, a state education agency--to forward information about the event to the school officials he works with.

What Dickert did, by his own admission, was wrong, but understand this: The Tony Evers campaign had nothing to do with it.

Because the Rose Fernandez supporters know they have a weak candidate--anemic fundraising and limited experience on the issues, for example--the Dickert email has been the hot topic for the last five days, consuming the blogs and talk radio. And the Fernandezistas are not shy about throwing around unfounded and often clearly false charges. Mark Belling, on his radio show (mp3 link), said, "I have learned that the campaign of Tony Evers, candidate for Wisconsin Superintendent of Public Instruction in the April election, is using state resources to campaign to state workers to try to raise money for the campaign." This is false. The campaign had nothing to do with Dickert's email, as Dickert made clear himself. Belling later goes on about "the Evers campaign and the apparent decision to use the best target list they have"--again accusing the campaign of directing Dickert to send the email, which did not happen.

"What is not clear at the moment is if Jeff Dickert is real player in Evers' campaign. Based upon the email, we know that Dickert is a coworker and supporter of Tony Evers," wrote one blogger. Dickert is not a "player" in the campaign, real or not, just one of Evers' many supporters. And as an Evers campaign staffer told me, the campaign wouldn't recognize Dickert if they saw him.

"Both Dickert and Evers are long time liberal bureaucrats in the educational system, and thay know this law [against using state email for campaign purposes], but Evers, at least, blatantly violated it and a criminal investigation should begin immediately," wrote another blogger, offering up a bald-faced lie. Evers and his campaign violated no laws at all here, just Dickert.

"What remains unclear is whether Evers will forgo any of the money [from] the meet-and-greet promoted by an apparently illegal bit of campaigning," adds another, in an attempt to taint a perfectly legitimate event planned and promoted by the Evers campaign, and any dollar fundraised from now on. I guess when your own candidate can't raise the funds herself, this is one way to try to level the playing field.

In sum, rather than talk about the issues of the campaign (unlike some of us) or ponder why the "liberal" candidates outpolled the "conservative" candidates in the February primary almost 3-2, Fernandez supporters would rather waste time spreading outright lies about Evers. Way to go, guys!

Hey GOP. They're Just Not That Into You

By Keith R. Schmitz

In an updated version of Lord of the Flies, the CPAC convention this weekend in grasping for all the straws then can put in their mitts are agog over a 13 year old. The kid's book outsold Sam the Unlicensed Plumber.

But this might be as good as it gets for conservatives/Republicans. A just released report found that 75% of the teens surveyed are optimistic that the administration can solve our current economic problems, and 81% are interested in finding out the causes of current problems.
Conservatives course already believe they know the problems and won't solve them.

Looks like the kids are alright.

Weasel Speak Hits Wall Street

by capper

Milwaukee County Executive wrote an editorial piece which was published in the Wall Street Journal. The editorial was nothing more than a revision to his campaign stump speech which he pretended was his State of the County address. I do find it bemusing on why he would choose to put in the Wall Street Journal, as opposed to a local paper, or several local papers, like most politicians seeking a higher state office would have done. But then again, Walker doesn't have a lot of support outside of the southeastern corner of the state, so he may have tried, and failed to do that.

Most of the Posse Comatose gave it no more than a passing mention in a post, although Kevin Binversie did come out gushing a little:

With a message like this, Walker can turn what is going to be Doyle and the left’s argument “Walker Made Milwaukee County a Mess,” and turn it on its head. Try as they might, liberal bloggers will eventually have to turn the cannons inward and defend the fiscal policies of Governor Jim Doyle - a wholly-owned subsidiary of WEAC - before the 2010 Governor’s election. Try and say all you want of how “Walker screwed up Milwaukee County,” I will forever throw down my trump card in this political game of sheepshead:

Jim Doyle Screwed Up Wisconsin. A state is much, much, much bigger than a county.

But let's take a serious, factual look at this message of Walker's, shall we?

A great deal of Walker's editorial on why he thinks the stimulus package is so bad is nothing more than a blatant attack on Governor Jim Doyle.

But when Walker gets to his own bragging points, that is when the Weasel Speak kicks into high gear:

My county, however, finished fiscal year 2007 with a $7.9 million surplus and will break even for fiscal year 2008 when the books are closed next month. Why? Because we made tough budget decisions demanded by the taxpayers.

By the way, that's it for his bragging points. He apparently couldn't find anything else positive to say about himself.

But for the 2007 budget, and the surplus that he is claiming, isn't his to claim. As I pointed out at the time, and was thoroughly reported by the local paper, Walker took himself out of the budget process by vetoing the entire budget, due to his displeasure of all of the amendments the County Board had put to his original proposal. The County Board then overrode his veto, making the entire 2007 budget their own. That is why there was such a large surplus. The adults took over and ran the show, leaving Walker without anything to do but pout.

Likewise, his claims for the 2008 budget is less than honest. Walker claims that the budget will break even, but that is not a guarantee. As was reported deep in the body of a story on a different matter, we find that the County, as it stands right now, is facing a deficit (emphasis mine):

The gift to the county makes an even bigger splash, given its much smaller budget. A $1.1 million check from Allen's estate was sent to the county in December and about $1 million more is expected later this year, said county Corporation Counsel Bill Domina. The County Board's finance committee is being asked next week to approve placing the first check in the county's contingency fund.

County Budget Director Steve Kreklow said the Allen cash will be used to pay down the county's 2008 year-end deficit. The county was projected to end the year with a $1.7 million deficit, in a tally done Oct. 31.

The first payment from the Allen estate "came at a great time when we certainly needed it," Kreklow said. Unusually high overtime costs and the failure of the county to sell any of its Park East Freeway parcels have been blamed for the potential year-end shortfall.

By law, the county must operate with a balanced budget. In practice, that means if there is some red ink after all the bills and checks for a year are processed, money from the next year's budget must be first spent on balancing the prior year's budget.

As can be easily seen, Walker is lying. The 2008 budget is currently in a deficit. It is only if the County Board approves his proposal to use that windfall inheritance that it has even a chance of breaking even. As of last week, the County Board still hadn't done so, and it is not clear if it will.

Later in his article, Walker again went on with his tired and already spiel that the only way to create jobs is to give laid off workers tax breaks. But what I would like to know is Walker really knows of job creation. He had no advanced education on it, since he is a Marquette dropout. He has no personal experience since he has been a career politician his entire life. He has no professional experience, as evidenced by his losing control of the entire public assistance department, losing control of the Private Industry Council, and losing state contracts on a jobs training program.

I would be also remiss if I failed to point out that under Walker's reign, Milwaukee County's parks are falling apart, the transit system is in critical condition and about to fail next year without extraordinary efforts to keep it solvent, and many other services have steadily decreased, all of which has threatened the safety and well-being of the citizens. And even then, the county tax levy has increased 17% since Walker first took office as the County Executive.

There were 717 fully funded but unfilled positions across the county last year. Where is all that money going? It's certainly not to the workers, and it's certainly not to the citizens who need services.

There are a couple other points that Walker screwed up. One of them is the fact that, as much as the right would like to deny it, the fact is, Ronald Reagan, did indeed raise taxes as well as ballooned the deficit.

Another thing is that Walker apparently conveniently forgot that the position of County Executive is non-partisan.

In plain English, Walker is not only unfit to be a governor, he is not even fit to be a county executive.

Cross posted at Cognitive Dissidence.

Outrage Machine in 3 ... 2 ...

by folkbum

It seems that a major print publication has once again identified a Republican who holds non-partisan office, but who has done something stupid, by party affiliation. As the outrage machine likes to tell us, they never do that to Democrats.

Abstaining from Intelligence

Keith R. Schmitz

What do you call people who have their kids follow abstinence only sex ed?

Grandparents.

More and more studies are finding that yet another conservative fairy tale fails to play well in the real world. As usual this is a their answer to a complex problem that this simple, straightforward...and wrong.

Many of you recall the Bristol Palin interview on Fox News a few weeks back, where she maintained her mother's approved mode of sex education is "not realistic at all."

People are taking back their government and reinstating common sense. The Pittsburgh School Board this week voted to replace A-O with comprehensive sex ed and no doubt more will follow.

In the usual case of money well wasted, the Bush administration spent $176 million the last year W had the budget on this bit of alchemy.

Unfortunately things have not changed in the House of Representative, oddly the Democratically controlled House, which despite the Senate Finance Committee’s recommendation to cut $28 million in funding for abstinence-only until marriage initiatives cut only $14 million. Why the lapse of guts is hard to explain, and why the party does disappoint from time to time. A penny spent on this program is a penny too much.

Write David Obey and tell him to rethink this bit of miss-allocation of funds.

Haloscanned

by folkbum

UPDATE: I believe you can make comments now. I just can't go in and fix your typos for you.

Haloscan is having its quarterly (ish) FUBARing at the moment. If you have something really important to say, go bother capper.

But for the Grace of God

By Keith R. Schmitz

I am getting tired of reading the smug, callous and yes, brutish accusations against those who have found themselves in a fix -- often a terrible fix -- during this housing crisis. You know. Calling those left with the short end of the stick losers, lazy and worse.

You don't have to go far to find stories about people who are at the risk of losing their house because the loss of a job, a gash in their pay, a major medical hit, death of a spouse or other economic calamity. I'll start you off with this article from Time.

This is not only ignorant, but in some cases whistling past the graveyard.

Wonder why Obama is so popular? A vast majority of people have jobs, but realize that it could be yanked out from under them in a flash.

The cold icy fingers of the bad economy are finding their way into every neighborhood, even the gated ones.

For those sitting on the side lines patting themselves on the back about their wonderful initiative and their self-assurance that they are better than these people; be grateful the government, your government, is on the job trying to solve this mess that your beloved former president left you.

Or else you too could become a statistic.