Paul Soglin: Waxing America

United Airlines Flies Away Customers

I took a flight to the west coast last month on United Airlines (UA). The trip went smoothly; very well in fact.  Earlier this week I checked in to see if my frequent flyer miles were credited.  They were.

I decided to check the kids' accounts to see how they were doing towards a free ticket. It turned out that on April 30th one of them with alomost 35,000 miles lost all of them for inactivity. I called United to see what could be done.

First I was told that UA sent out numerous emails warning customers that inactivity would lead to loss of miles. After a back and forth discussion that sounded like something out of "Who's On First' it was established that 'numerous' did not refer to the emails I might have received, but to the millions that United customers received.

I received an email in November and forgot about the miles expiring in April.

Then came the question of restoring the miles. It could be done. By paying $199 and flying in the next twelve months. The $199 is not applicable to cost of the ticket. It is a service fee.

I emailed United to see if something could be done. These were the miles my daughter had accumulated since her childhood.  So far no reply from United.

I could have used as few as 500 miles on restaurant vouchers and saved the day.  Oh well.

In the meantime I pointed out to a supervisor that it was not worth it for United to lose our family's business over 35,000 miles.

I pointed out to the supervisor that I had over 500,000 miles on the airline; that Sara and the kids probably had another 100,000 miles. I went through the hell of flying through Chicago, the cancelled and delayed flights. The buses and car rentals back form O'Hare. The broken promises about improved services.

We all know the drill.

She did not say anything, but I knew what she was thinking.

It is worth it in the grand scheme of things to lose you and your family as a customer.

When United deducts the tens of millions of miles, a few upset customers like me are calculated into the planning. They do not want to lose our business but it is a small price to pay compared to the millions of dollars of liability for those frequent miles that they wipe off the books.

Anyone have Northwest's phone number?

Crumbling Dollar Lifts Wisconsin Blue Cheese

Another victim of the disastrous Bush economic polices and the war in Iraq is the absence of the finest European cheeses from swank east coast restaurants.  As the Village Voice reports, How Chefs Are Dealing With the Tanking Dollar: Getting creative with imported goods

Recently, I (reporter Sarah DiGregorio) realized that I could no longer afford my favorite stinky French cheese (not that I ever really could, technically)...

At Kellari Taverna...Greek feta, once crumbled over many dishes, is now only on the tomato salad..."It's killing us!" exclaims Gregory Zapantis, the Greek-born chef at Kellari Taverna. "A few years back, it was equal—one dollar to one euro. Now the euro is $1.60."

The concerned New York culinary reporter turned to an economist who specializes in wine economics to discover that, "... the government spends more than it has, putting us in hock to the Europeans, Japanese, and Chinese to pay for Bush's tax cuts and the war in Iraq."

But the inventive mid-town Manhattan chefs now turn to Bucky when times are tough, "Zapantis has fallen in love with the fish he gets from Long Island in the summertime. And he's happy to have discovered Wisconsin blue cheese as an unlikely alternative to feta."

Faculty Salaries Elevated In Public Debate

University of Wisconsin System faulty and administrative salaries are the lowest in the Big Ten but the problem is starting to gather more needed attention around the state.

On the day that UW-Madison Commission on Faculty Compensation and Economic Benefits issued its report Report: Faculty flight a 'crisis situation' at UW-Madison , the La Crosse Tribune published a thoughtful editorial based on a story from the previous week.

The La Crosse Tribune editors wrote, Public higher education needs more support from Legislature:

...there are some signs of legislative antipathy toward higher education, which also could be a real problem in the future...

... Faculty salaries also are below peer institutions, and the university system has faced larger than average state budget cuts since 2001, making it more difficult to make up any shortfall, and guaranteeing that tuition increases will have to make up some of the differences...

...Higher education does not just help students. Universities can contribute to economic development in states — and the number of adults with advanced degrees also affects the state economy.

Legislators need to be more supportive of it.

Yes they do. Both parties. Perhaps this can be the 'signature issue' for the November, 2008 state legislative races. And while we are at it, let's include the public schools.

As I wrote on April 18, 2008 The Value of Education the knowledgeable and thoughtful business leaders in this state are all saying the same thing, "I need a trained, intelligent, thoughtful, creative workforce," or words to that effect.

Faculty salaries may not be going up but at least the issue is rising in public forums and the newspapers.

Brittany Zimmerman Phoned - Reach Out And Touch Someone

Before Brittany Zimmerman died, her last effort was a telephone call. Brittany tried to reach out and touch someone.

The most important domestic function of government is to safeguard the innocent: those who need assistance when they cannot protect themselves. To establish justice and promote the general welfare.

Society tries to prevent crime. When it cannot, it offers assistance in many forms, including 911 services which we all pay for, in part, through taxes and special fees.

I cannot imagine a more poignant example of a 911 call than a person, life at risk, dialing for help, dialing for that life.

It is the very instant where they manage to dial the number but cannot speak out that we are expected to listen and respond. It makes for gripping stories and haunting movies.

For Brittany Zimmerman it was a cold, lonely reality.

Now comes the blame. First there is the dispatcher who became too busy and moved on to other calls and forgot about Brittany. Them comes the director of the 911 Call Center who did not help his agency's stature by implying there was no reason to apologize.

The fault is more complicated than that. There are a lot of capable 911 dispatchers who could fail under the same circumstances.  It is reminiscent of the constant reminders of problems in our nation's skies. Air traffic control: Safety concerns on the nation's radar: As controllers keep their eyes on the skies, mistakes and cover-ups are surfacing.

The system did not function:

• an overworked dispatcher.
• a policy that police only automatically respond to a silent 911 call from a land line, not a cell phone.
• a lousy system for linking cell phones to their location - with all of the telephone company/government spying, you would think that emergency dispatch centers could have the primary address of every cell phone number.
• underfunded critical government services (the 911 center is just one of many).
• a desire for simple solutions like blaming the dispatcher.
• and do not forget the morons who deliberately call 911 unnecessarily.

Government failed Brittany Zimmerman. Government failed all of us. In turn, the time consuming, boring task of making systems work, focusing on public management and administration does not appeal to either politicians or the public. 

In 2004 Dane County conducted a study of the dispatch center and the 911 system.  That study predicted significant failures if reforms were not instituted. That study is one of thousands floating around city and county halls, state capitols, and Washington D.C.

They still float.

We all failed Brittany Zimmerman.

Showering: Which Side Are You On?

I shower with my back to the shower head for two reasons. I shave in the shower and if I faced the shower head, all of the lather would wash off my face. Secondly, I find, as someone else mentioned, that when facing the shower the water hits your chest but does not easily roll over your shoulder down your back. With your back to the shower head, the water covers your back and very nicely comes over the shoulders and down the chest.

One morning I noticed that my back would start hurting as soon as I got in the shower. I finally figured it out. Standing in the shower with my back to the drain and the shower head, my heels were lower than my toes. A very unnatural position, which was causing the pain.

I mentioned this to Sara, who, of course, told me I was an idiot and that all normal people shower facing the water.

This got us into a debate which I left for you, the readers, to decide.

It was virtually a dead heat. 46.3% of Waxing America readers shower, back to the water, 46.1% shower  facing the water. Twice as many women shower back to the water as face it. Among the men it is almost even.

Shaving in the shower has little to do with direction or gender.

Probably the most significant finding is that almost three times as many men as women wasted their time answering the survey.

Mifflin Street Block Party - Revisited

The Mifflin Street Block Party approached and like clockwork the journalists called asking me for opinions, comparisons, and advice.  Boring.

It was sometime in the mid 1980's that I lost interest in the block party, as it lost its political content and purpose. There were some efforts in subsequent years to add some content, but face it, the block party is nothing more now than an excuse to get drunk and stupid.

As the 1990's appraoched, and I served as mayor agian, I lowered my expectations, accepted the party for what it was and just asked that behavior not be dangerous. That meant minimizing the fights, the trips to detox or the hospitals, and recognizing that the porches of one hundred year old buildings could not hold 67 pairs of stomping feet.

My age has nothing to do with this rather cynical assessment. Rather it is memories of my youth and quickly learned lessons that overconsumption of alcohol and other mind altering substances posed two undesirable outcomes: it ruined sex, and left a horrible headache.

This year, amidst the chaos of the 400 and 500 hundred blocks of Mifflin Street was the heartfelt effort of her family and friends to raise funds to honor the memory of Brittany Zimmerman.

While some students complained about the law enforcement, all I could think of was the incredible waste of money spent on the police presence. The several hundred thousand dollars spent on Mifflin Street and Halloween could pay for additional neighborhood patrols, or nursing services, or better snow removal, or a food pantry.

In the 1960's we ran up some significant overtime bills for police and sheriffs, not to mention the national guard, but it was not to party - it was political and that included the first Mifflin Street Block Party.

There is nothing wrong with a party.

The measurement of a great party is a grand time and the police not showing up.

Big Brown - A True Champion

Since the great match up between Affirmed and Alydar in 1978 I have steadfastly thrown out the possibility of any Kentucky Derby winner going on to win the Triple Crown. It is just too grueling a challenge to run three races at a 1 1/4, 1 3/16, and 1 1/2 miles in five weeks.

Horses, especially those going two turns, and two turns against such stiff competition need at least three weeks or more to recover from a race as demanding as the Kentucky Derby.

I was wrong about Big Brown needing more conditioning and experience as a prerequisite to his winning the Kentucky Derby. Those two races were monstrous, and I like other handicappers, refused to believe that they were a substitute for additional experience on the race track.

That said, I am a believer. Marring any injury, Big Brown should be the first Triple Crown Winner in thirty years.

Clearly this horse has the physical maturity and the stamina to defeat this crop of three year olds. There may be another talented three year old out there who can fill out by June but it is unlikely. Remember, three year olds are like teenagers - every few months is like another year. But while a lot of colts, including several who skipped the Kentucky Derby,  will grow from February to June, it unlikely that they can reach the level of Big Brown. With the Kentucky Derby, he has now run three consecutive races with outstanding speed figures, and those races had demanding paces to match.

Kentucky Derby Take Two - Cowboy Cal

Update Monday May 5, 2008: For my post race comments Big Brown - A True Champion

The goddess of wagering is not going to take kindly to this. I changed my mind about the Kentucky Derby.

Friday night I reexamined the prep races, particularly the Blue Grass. My conclusion is that that race, synthetic track and all, is the secret to picking the winner. Cowboy Cal who led most of the way, is my new selection. The conventional wisdom that the published time for the half mile of :49 seconds was slow, very slow.

Cowboy Cal, leading most of the way , worked harder than the winner, Monba.  Pletcher trains both horses and he would not enter Cowboy Cal if he did not beleive the horse could win. But then again Pletcher knows very little about winning the Kentucky Derby.

If I am wrong, I am wrong, but given the racing surface and given the track variant that day, the half mile, adjusted is more like a :47.

In any case, the worst that happens is I now have the opportunity to look foolish on two successive days. Until the start of the race I will be muttering "Cowboy Cal and Smooth Air."

Colonel John, Z Fortune, Bob Black Jack and Gayego will round out my gimmicks. I will drop Recaputuretheglory and add Tale of Ekati.

When the race is over, I will do what most handicappers do. Figure out how close I came to picking the winner, and move on to the next race.

Kentucky Derby Winner 2008

Update Monday May 5, 2008: For my post race comments: Big Brown - A True Champion

Update Saturday morning May 3, 2008 8:54 am: I changed my mind about the winner.  For those who care: Kentucky Derby Take Two - Cowboy Cal

For the past two weeks friends have asked who I like in Saturday's Kentucky Derby.

Face it, for a hardened horse player, the Kentucky Derby is not the way to make money - you have to start out figuring out who will win the race. Except for an occasional, very occasional,  good year, all it is good for is bragging rights.

Here is the problem:

• Every horse in the race is asked to do something they never did before.
• Few of them have raced against one another more than once.
• They come from all over the country and despite Beyer 'figs,' comparing the varying racing surfaces distances, and weather conditions is a daunting task.
• This year the matter is complicated by three additional factors:
  • Many of the horses raced on artificial surfaces and handicappers are still having difficulty adjusting to the changes in time and pace.  The horses and jockeys are having an even greater problem.
  • The Wood Memorial had an extremely fast pace.
  • The Blue Grass had an extremely slow pace. Those last two races make it difficult to assess the fitness of about six of the entries.
• Rarely does the best horse win the race.

Anyway, I have not had a solid Derby since 2001 when I spent that Saturday morning walking around muttering "Monarchos and Invisible Ink, Invisible Ink and Monarchos." They went on to run 1-2, Monarchos winning,  with Congaree third. The $2 exacta paid over $2,458 and the $1 trifecta paid $6117.

Again, I have not has a winner since.

Undaunted, I offer up Smooth Air despite the fact that he was not 100% at the beginning of the  week.  As Andy Beyer noted, as strong as he looks, Big Brown just does not have the seasoning to go the distance with the furious pace.

I plan to mess around with Colonel John, Z Fortune, Bob Black Jack, Gayego, and Recapturetheglory in the gimmicks.

University of Wisconsin System - Two Headed Huebsch

The University of Wisconsin System has six campuses  searching for new chancellors. Two of the chancellors are retiring and four are moving on to higher paying positions. UW System chancellor exodus could grow/

Wisconsin ranks last in faculty salaries when compared to other Big Ten schools and the entire system does badly when compared to to its cohort of institutions. Republican Party Winning Battle To Destroy University of Wisconsin System. Led by Republican Mike Huebsch, the Wisconsin Assembly underfunds the schools.

Its very simple. You cannot retain good people when you do not pay them.  You do not have to pay them extraordinary salaries, just something competitive that ranges towards the mean. The private sector knows that.

In Wisconsin we have one of the fiercest opponents of public education chairing the state committee that overlooks our schools. He uses every opportunity to attack the UW System.

Steve Nass is not the issue. The responsible party is the man who put him in power.

Last December the La Crosse Tribune published an editorial commending their local legislative delegation for supporting the UW- La Crosse campus. Local leaders, students leading way on UW-L’s plan for growth

On Thursday, our entire legislative delegation was represented at a Board of Regents committee meeting to show support...But perhaps most striking was the presence and vocal support of Speaker Mike Huebsch, R-West Salem.

To say that UW-L’s plans haven’t exactly been the darling of Huebsch’s caucus would be an understatement.

It is five months later, the UW system is hurting and hurting badly. It is unfortunate, but the more powerful, more effective Huebsch is the one backing Nass, not the one who showed up at the UW Regents' meeting.

Blacks in Madison and Wisconsin

It is no surprise to Madisonians that a black youth has a thirteen times greater chance of being arrested than his white peer. We know that there are some in our state who look at that number and simply respond, "So? Blacks commit more crimes."

A number of leaders from Madison's black community called for action, as The Capital Times reported:

Coalition wants Madison to face race issues

A coalition of leaders in the African-American community called today for a renewed assault on the disparate conditions that separate Madisonians by race...

..."The State of Black Madison 2008: Before the Tipping Point," a report unveiled at a news conference Tuesday, summarizes data on criminal justice, education, economic development, health, housing and political influence. The report was commissioned by the State of Black Madison Coalition, whose members include Gray; Robert Wynn, Asset Builders of America; John Odom, Charles Hilton Houston Institute; Richard Harris, Genesis Community Development Corporation; Ray Allen, publisher of The Madison Times; and Kenneth Black, 100 Black Men.

When I took up this issue last fall, Wisconsin Policy Research Institute: Milwaukee Can Tolerate More Black Murders Part II, one of the antagonists finally muttered, "Some of those proposed ideas for reducing black crime sound good to us (strengthen families and reintegrate fathers into communities, bringing people to God), and some sound like more of the same things that have failed (more spending on education, jobs programs).

Wrong. Read their report, read the well documented study I referenced:

Effects of a School-Based, Early Childhood Intervention on Adult Health and Well-being

A total of 1539 low-income participants who enrolled in the Child-Parent Center program in 20 sites or in an alternative kindergarten intervention...

...For preschool participation, by age 24 years, the preschool group relative to the comparison group had significantly lower rates of felony arrest (16.5% vs 21.1%, respectively; P = .02; a 22% reduction) and incarceration (20.6% vs 25.6%, respectively; P = .03; a 20% reduction). They also were less likely than the comparison group to be found guilty of a crime both overall and for a felony (15.8% vs 19.9%, respectively; P = .03; a 21% reduction)...

... That the impacts of intervention extend beyond educational performance is not surprising given the well-documented links between education outcomes and adult health, mental health, and social behavior.^{25-26,36-38 ..}

^{...This study provides evidence that established early educational interventions can positively influence the adult life course in several domains of functioning. The scope and magnitude of intervention effects reveal not only the benefits to participants in fundamental indicators of health and well-being but also the potential returns to society for investments in early educational programs.} 

Prayer is nice but just like abstinence, it does not work. what works is education, education, education, job training and family enhancement. Not necessarily in that order. Spending on education and jobs programs that are properly managed work. Spending money on education and jobs programs that are not properly managed  do not work. That is not the fault of the recipients.

Kutler on Republican Executive Powers

Waxing America's favorite Emeritus Professor in the entire galaxy, the esteemed University of Wisconsin Constitutional scholar Stanley Kutler, reminds us that the Republican Party, with an almost century long record of limiting the power of the president, now embraces what could be called an imperial presidency:

  Hunkering Down in Baghdad

Voltaire had it right: history is nothing but a pack of tricks that we play on the dead...

...Executive power expanded enormously during World War II. After the war, old guard Republicans, still rooted in isolationism, proposed a constitutional amendment to give Congress authority to regulate all executive agreements with foreign powers....Republican concerns that first President Franklin D. Roosevelt at Yalta and then President Harry S. Truman at Potsdam had bargained away too much....The GOP also objected to Truman’s sending troops to Korea in 1950 without congressional approval.

Kulter notes that with the Bush Administration is "... betting that the rest of the world, from Europe to Asia, will quietly accept U.S. troops to defend their economic interests..."

Kutler writes that Bush "may have made a prophet of former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, who said last September that “the Iraq war is largely about oil” and essential for the global economy."

Flying Over Wisconsin

Spring is the best time of year to fly over Wisconsin. The other seasons provide an inviting landscape but spring is the best.

On the hills and in the valleys you see the contour lines of rich brown, freshly turned soil. Then come the neat rectangular green fields of winter wheat and alfalfa accompanied by creeks, a few ponds, and adjacent fields of cows. Some fields are still flooded from the winter snow and spring rains.

To Madison's west in Montfort are two rows of wind turbines, one longer than the other.  The neatly laid out farms with their accompanying towns and villages make all the sense in the world.

As we approached Madison the sprawl began. The farms were continually interspersed with residential development. The problem is not the amount of housing or even the size of the homes. It is the lack of compactness.

U.S. Supreme Court Engages in Activism: Ask Scalia

One of the phoniest, opportunistic ploys in recent years is the conservative assault on an independent judiciary calling for "judicial restraint" and attacking liberal or progressive justices as "judicial activists."

Rick Esenberg of the Federalist Society, takes this up in a paper used by Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce in the last judicial race, A Court Unbound? The Recent Jurisprudence of the Wisconsin Supreme Court:

Judges who seek to exercise restraint will tend to adopt techniques of construction that confine, rather than expand, their discretion...Judges practicing restraint will exhibit a sensitivity for the role of other branches of government....

Someone better get Esenberg's paper into the hands of the justices serving on the United States Supreme Court, starting with Anthony Scalia who Esenberg fondly quotes: "[a] text should not be construed strictly, and it should not be construed leniently; it should be construed reasonably, to contain all that it fairly means."

Scalia, Justice Anthony Kennedy, and Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. are having a difficult time following their own admonitions when it comes time to the "Millionaire's Amendment" to the McCain-Feingold campaign finance act.

The issue is simple enough. Under the law individuals can contribute a maximum of $2,300 to a campaign. The candidate can spend as much as they like. If a wealthy candidate contributes over $350,000 of her own money, then the individual contributors of the opponent can go as high as $6,900.

Simple enough.

Now enter the reactionary justices on the Supreme Court. Hearing a case challenging the act, these conservative justices are wallowing in judicial activism.

Justices Assail 'Millionaires' Amendment'

"The campaign finance regimes we've approved up to now, the significant limitations, have had an anti-corruption rationale," Scalia said. "The only purpose of this is to level the playing field. And I am deeply suspicious of allowing elections to be conducted under a regime whereby Congress levels the playing field. That seems to be very dangerous."

and

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said he found it "a particular vice" of the amendment that it allows the opponent of a self-financing candidate to have greater ties and to receive more money from his political party. "It puts this statute in the position of preferring one kind of speech over another. And we simply do not do that," Kennedy said.

Obviously these justices are substituting their own judgment for that of the legislative body, the United States Congress.

I am waiting for the critics of Louis Butler and Shirley Abrahamson to assail Scalia and Roberts for this exercise in judicial activism.

You can hear the crickets chirping.

More on Colorado As Budget Role Model For UW

For several years, Republican leadership in the Wisconsin legislature led by Assembly Speaker Michael Huebsch (R-West Salem) and architect of the attack on the University of Wisconsin, Stephen Nass (R-Whitewater), used Colorado as a role model. When they wanted to drive Wisconsin into economic ruin by adopting TABOR, they used Colorado's adoption of deadly spending restraints as their example of horrible fiscal management.

Now we get word from Denver that, Regents hike CU-Boulder tuition 9.3%

The decision for undergrad residents comes atop a 14.6 percent hike last year. A lack of state funds is cited:

University of Colorado Regents approved the tuition hike Tuesday, saying they had no choice but to raise the price instead of cutting programs. "None of us likes to increase tuition," Regent Paul Schauer said. "But in light of the situation we are in now, we are not left with too many options."  Last year, tuition increased 14.6 percent....

...University of Colorado Regents approved the tuition hike Tuesday, saying they had no choice but to raise the price instead of cutting programs...

... Evan Dreyer, spokesman for Gov. Bill Ritter, said the state and the university need to do more to increase higher-education funding.

None of this is new to UW students. As we noted last week, Republican Party Winning Battle To Destroy University of Wisconsin System.

Wisconsinites have two options.  The first is send a clear unequivocal message to the leadership in the state legislature that we understand the value of education and want the UW System properly funded. The other option is to hope that other states outperform us in the race to the bottom.