Paul Soglin: Waxing America

Arlen Specter Always Uncomfortable, Never a Leader

The problem for Arlen Specter (PA) and the Democrats is that this man who knows better will probably be as uncomfortable as a Democrat as he was as a Republican.

Arlen Specter's  jump to the Democratic Party surprises no one. For the past half dozen years it was clear that Specter was uncomfortable with the Neocons and right-wing zealots in his party. The addition of one more vote in the Democratic column is all he brings, along with his desk and chair.

Over two years ago we posted Arlen Specter Makes a Deal: Sells Out The Constitution for Power. At the height of one of the Constitutional crises presented by the out of control Bush White House that had no recognition of civil liberties, Specter made a lot of noise about freedom and then collapsed:

Specter went into negotiations with the White House and his own party, knowing that his chairmanship of the Senate Judiciary Committee was at stake. He caved.

...It is hard to believe that the Arlen Specter of the nineteen-eighties—the maverick who defied his party on an issue of the magnitude of the Bork nomination—would have considered yielding on a question as fundamental as habeas corpus ...

He destroyed the foundation of Anglo-American jurisprudence and took us back to the days of the Star Chamber Courts.

...Specter is hoping the courts will restore the rights of the detainees to bring habeas cases. “The bill was severable. It has a severability clause. And I think the courts will invalidate it,” he told me. “They’re not going to give up authority to decide habeas-corpus cases, not a chance.” Others are less sure.

When you look at Specter's record on all matters Constitutional in 2006, the man has no shame. He signaled all year that he was unprincipled and shallow.

Unlike most of the Republicans in power at the time, Specter knew better as to what was right and what was wrong. Like all of the Republicans, he failed to show any leadership.

Specter is as good as those who surround him. He is not a leader.

That is why he choose to be a Republican in the first place, that he why he failed to lead during the Bush Constitutional crisis, and that is why, faced with sure defeat as a Pennsylvania Republican, he switched parties.

What power he gathered was through seniority, not command.

His vote is welcome; his addition to the majority is welcome.

Never count on him to lead.

Harvey Milk and George Moscone

Tonight we saw Milk.  The first two minutes were as emotional an introduction to any film I have ever seen.

My reaction to the film is a reflection of the quality of the movie.  It is also a response from living through those times.

It was powerful and moving. Everything said about Sean Penn's outstanding performance is true.

The city of Madison adopted its equal opportunity ordinance protecting all individuals regardless of sexual orientation or sexual preference in the spring or summer of 1976.

Unlike Dade County, Florida, Minneapolis, or Eugene, Oregon, despite our best efforts to bait Anita Bryant, we could not lure her to Madison.  

June  1977 was the last time I saw San Francisco Mayor George Moscone. It was probably Friday June 17 at the conclusion of a hard week of work.

Moscone, U.S. Conference of Mayors President, Ken Gibson from Newark, and  Mayor John Rousakis of Savannah were at the hotel swimming pool.

Gibson and I were in the water, Moscone and Rousakis sunned themselves on lounge chairs when a young photographer from the Tuscon Citizen appeared. He had been trying to get pictures of mayors not working and he had his victims. I spotted him and alerted the others. Gibson and I simply turned our backs to his camera lens.

Moscone was exhausted since every crazed Tusconian with a San Francisco connection had called his hotel room the previous night. Moscone simply draped a towel over his face.

Rousakis did not care and did not move.

The kid snapped a few pictures and walked over to Rousakis. He asked for names. The mayor pointed to Moscone and then himself, "He is Michael Blandic, the new mayor of Chicago, and I am Maynard Jackson, the mayor of Atlanta." (Jackson left, Rousakis right)

Mayor Moscone and Harvey Milk were assassinated on Monday November 27, 1978. The moment hearing of the tragedy and seeing Dianne Feinstein on the news announcing their deaths was as real last night as it was that day.

On Tuesday November 28, 1978 I made reservations for San Francisco. That night our city council met. We had ended the practice of opening the meetings with a formal prayer and instead rotated among the council members who would begin each session with some thoughts of their own. Alderman Jim Yeadon began with words memorializing the two slain leaders. Two years earlier, as a citizen serving on the Equal Opportunities Commission, Jim was instrumental in the adoption of Madison's ordinance protecting gay rights. From the Wisconsin State Journal Friday December 12, 2008:

The assassinations of Milk and Moscone marked a poignant moment for Yeadon, who asked to open the first council meeting after the slayings with a remembrance.

"I get shivers when I think about it," he recalls. "I said, 'Yesterday there were three openly gay elected officials in the country. Today there are two. And I don't know how many good mayors there were in the country, but today the world is one the less.' Then I asked people to bow their heads and pray and give their thoughts to the people in San Francisco. I was almost crying. It really brought it home."

On Wednesday November 29, 1978 I flew to San Francisco where I caught up with some friends from Madison in a city numb with grief.

to be continued

Terrorists Attack U.S. Homeland; Lower Manhattan, Main Street In Shambles

Almost seven years to the day, terrorists again struck the United States.

A stunning makeover of the Wall Street landscape sent stocks falling precipitously Monday, with the Dow Jones industrials losing 500 points in their worst slide since the September 2001 terrorist attacks. Investors recoiled after a shakeup of the financial industry that took out two storied names: Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Merrill Lynch & Co.

Lead by the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse*, all domestic criminals, instilled into the highest levels of the Bush Administration, the results were devastating on Monday.

It left hundreds of thousands of Americans either losing their homes and jobs, or both, and the children and grandchildren of the American people enslaved to pay billions of dollars in debt.

The attack began when the Bush Administration was instructed by Wall Street to open the doors at U.S. Department of the Interior and release lust, gluttony, greed, wrath, and envy.

It is rumored that pride and sloth are still hangin' with Dick Cheney.

The wonders of an unregulated economy, encouraged by a right-wing insistence that markets will correct the excesses in private behavior, demonstrates the power of terrorists willing to sacrifice the security of their nation and families.

While there was no immediate loss of life, the death toll should reach into the tens of thousands as dedicated workers find that they and their loved ones no longer have access to a health care system capable of treating the most catastrophic illnesses and diseases.

One disgruntled business leader, previously supporting John McCain remarked, "I cannot trust him. He is so bent on winning, he gives us Sarah Palin. If he died, I cannot imagine her leading us out of this mess. In fact, I cannot imagine McCain doing it either."

*Conquest, War, Famine and Death

I Have More Foreign Policy Experience than Sarah Palin

With John McCain pushing Sarah Palin's experience in international matters and foreign policy,  McCain touts Palin on foreign affairs, I figured it was not too late to get in on the fun.

I served as mayor of Madison, Wisconsin, 1973-79 and 1989-1997:

• In 1978 I traveled to Japan for Hiroshima Day where I addressed one thousand delegates at a peace conference. The US and Japan have enjoyed peace continuously since then.
• The 1975 trip to Cuba was instrumental in  the first exchange of a sports team between the United States and Cuba, when the Cuban volleyball team subsequently toured the US. The well mannered host team proceeded to lose all nine games.
• That first of the three Cuban trips was given the green light by the State Department in an effort to speed along a successful US-Cuban anti-hijacking treaty. After our visit there were no more hijackings.
• My 1976 trip to Israel coincided with the historic visit of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. I graciously agreed to vacate my Jerusalem hotel room and get out of town to make way for Sadat's entourage, thus furthering the efforts for a Middle East peace.
• We went to Germany, drove on the Autobahn at outrageous speeds and offended no one.
• We went to France twice. In 1982 we caused an incident which resulted in a pheasant being struck by a Frenchman's vehicle at 160 kilometer an hour vehicle, blowing out the windshield. Peace was maintained.
• In 1998 we again toured France and Italy where I authoritatively pronounced, "There are no sharks in the Mediterranean."  The French overlooked the faus pax and we were allowed to stay. We further avoided international incidents by never speaking English in public and passing the entire family off as Spaniards. I was most convincing answering all questions with "si' not "yes" or "oui."

We know that a Governor's supervision of the National Guard is no more foreign policy than a mayor's heading the local police department:

• In 1973 Police Chief David Couper and I stifled an internal insurrection, peacefully.
• In 1989 we handled a major demonstration by anti-choice demonstrators without incident.
• Numerous times, (except the year 1996 when I let Alderman Verveer talk me into changing strategy for the Mifflin Street Block Party), utilizing my own experiences in the streets, I developed tactics with the police and fire departments that resulted in peaceful block parties and Halloweens.

The day Sarah Palin can deal with the fall or spring revelry of a population of students five times the size of her home town in a peaceful manner with minimal arrests and property damage, she can carry my laptop and gas mask.

Is it the water or the air in Milwaukee?

It could be Milwaukee's air, or the water, or both.  Last week I posted  What Do We Do About the Parents - Incarceration- Especially Blacks, leading with 

Every time we hear right wing analysis about societal problems, whether it comes from Mark Belling or his protege, Charlie Sykes, the rant is about the parents. The not so unsubtle message is that drug addled, unwed inner city residents, authority dissin' and probably black, are incapable of rearing their children.

Then, before the Internet ink was barely dry, Rick Esenberg was in my face with "Inconvenient Truths?" leading with:

Paul Soglin is upset with right wingers for blaming poor educational results in MPS on the "parents."

Before going any further, would someone, anyone, show Rick where there is a reference to the Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS). I did mention the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD), but not Milwaukee.

But Rick's errant missive does not end with the first paragraph. Writing in paragraph three, the legal scholar observes,

It doesn't seem to be a simple function of racism and poverty and the absence of social programs because the degree of dysfunction has increased as both have decreased.

Rick, go to MPS and get a graph of the number of children in households where they are eligible for the free lunch program. Kids in the free lunch program is a good measurement of poverty in a school district. Compare that over the past twnety years and then come back and we can continue the conversation.

Just for the record, kids in the free lunch program in Madison have increased from 20% in the late 1980's, to 26% in the mid 1990's, to over 48% presently.  Of course most of that is because of the migration of families to the Madison area from other Midwestern cities, including Milwaukee. What is amazing about Madison is that despite this significant increase in poverty, academic standards have not  been severely impacted.

Much of the success is the result of the kind of programming that goes beyond direct education of the kids. It impacts the family, it enhances the family, and it set neighborhood standards that even Rick admires. Unfortunately, even Madison is in danger as budget cuts jeopardize many of these programs.

But so long as Rick and his compatriots blame the parents without any recognized programs to break the cycle, Milwaukee will be fighting a desperate losing battle.

Rick gets one thing right. It is something I suggested to him last year as being part of the problem.

Is it the abandonment of poor neighborhoods by the black middle class?

Yes, middle class blacks left the city just as their white middle class counterparts had done years before. So that is part of the problem, but only part of it. There were other institutions and structures available years ago that are no longer effective against poverty and crime.

There are ways to fix the problem. Blaming the parents and leaving it at that is no solution. Frankly, I don't think everyone praying cuts it either.

Rick, racism for middle class blacks may be on the decline, but I am not so sure that poor black families felt any signicant improvement in the past decade.

Law and Order American Style: Fascist Home Wreckers

Last week's story from Prince George's County, Maryland was not unusual or rare except that the facts in this instance are so clear and unconverted. A police dog found a package at a shipping facility that contained thirty pounds of marijuana. They followed the delivery to the nice middle class home and then conducted a raid.

There was a problem. They knew nothing about the intended recipients of the package. Police raid Md. mayor's home and kill his dogs

Mayor Cheye Calvo got home from work, saw a package addressed to his wife on the front porch and brought it inside, putting it on a table. Suddenly, police with guns drawn kicked in the door and stormed in, shooting to death the couple's two dogs and seizing the unopened package...

...Police say the couple appeared to be innocent victims of a scheme by two men to smuggle millions of dollars worth of marijuana by having it delivered to about a half-dozen unsuspecting recipients.

Before this chaotic event was resolved, the two family dogs were shot,

Calvo insisted the couple's two black Labradors were gentle creatures and said police apparently killed them "for sport," gunning down one of them as it was running away.

and Calvo's mother in law was treated like the victim of a Fascist state:

But officials insisted they acted within the law, saying the operation was compromised when Calvo's mother-in-law saw officers approaching the house and screamed...

...when she was handcuffed and interrogated for several hours.

Nothing surprising here. Nor should you be stunned or shocked by the response of the police department:

Prince George's County Police Chief Melvin High.. defended the way the raid was conducted. He and other officials did not apologize for killing the dogs, saying the officers felt threatened...But officials insisted they acted within the law, saying the operation was compromised when Calvo's mother-in-law saw officers approaching the house and screamed.

Years ago I had a discussion with Madison police officers on city policy regarding searches and intrusions without a warrant. One officer defended departmental policy saying, "Recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions allow us to do it, it is within the law."

He was right, but I responded, "Just because the Supreme Court has lowered the bar, compromised rights to protect citizens from abusive process of law, does not require us to lower our Constitutional standards."

This is the result of the cynical appointments to the United States Supreme Court by Reagan, Bush, and Bush.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court rulings are no different with the court now owned by Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce (WMC) The election of Anette Ziegler and Max Gableman ensured a right-wing majority that will do all within its power to limit citizens' protections against illegal search and seizures and unwarranted brutal force.

Years ago I created a Public Safety Review Committee for the city of Madison.  This is exactly the kind of subject they should examine. It would be wise for them to call in police officials and go over the Madison standards in these kind of situations. Nowhere is it written that we have to live by the lowest common denominator whether it is set by Clarence Thomas or Max Gableman.

These folks were white and middle class, and the mayor. Imagine being black and not so middle class, and not the mayor.

Masks in China. The Olympic Committe is A Joke. Nothing Has Changed

The hoopla, pageantry, silliness, nastiness and profiteering of the Olympics has not changed in over fifty years. If there is any question in your mind, run out and get Dave Maraniss' insightful  Rome 1960. The Olympics that Changed the World. 

Soviet Communism and the Cold War ended,  but the organizers and operators of the games are still far more important than the athletes. While the achievements of the competitors is often compelling and poignant, on the world stage the manipulations of governments, businesses, and  street level ticket scalpers is far more important when measuring the impact on the world's peoples.

Start with this story, and follow what unravels over the next few weeks. US cyclists apologize for wearing masks.

BEIJING (AP)—A group of American cyclists has apologized to Beijing Olympic organizers after arriving in China’s capital wearing face masks.

Jim Scherr, the U.S. Olympic Committee’s chief executive officer, said his organization didn’t ask the cyclists to apologize.

“Those athletes regret that action and have written an apology to BOCOG on their own behalf,” Scherr said. “They now realize and understand how their actions were perceived by the host nation and by the organizing committee.”

The China Olympics are a joke. A failure before they start.

For starters, the International Olympic Committee had this silly notion that by awarding the Olympics to China, it would induce that government to halt repression and recognize basic human rights. That was Joke 1.

Not content with destroying the jobs of American industrial workers with wages unfit for any dignified person, the Chinese spent most of this past year trying to murder our dogs and cats with poisoned pet food. Joke 2.

Finally there is the effort to contain the pollution. As though the soiled land, the contaminated waters, and the fouled air disappear by banning half the cars in Beijing on alternate days and temporarily closing industrial plants. Joke 3.

You cannot possibly insult the Chinese government by wearing face masks when eleven months of the year half of China tries to keep the pollution out of their lungs.

"I am sorry my voice sounds muffled, but if I remove my mask, the air pollution will burn my lungs like dry twigs in a campfire."

Those voices are muzzled for reasons other than the pollution. Those faces are hidden for reasons other than the pollution.

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."

Senator Russ Feingold. Why He Is the Best

I found it on Wisopinion.com

It needs as much exposure as possible.

Russ Feingold on the New FISA Legislation

 

Charlie Sykes Move Over. Mark Belling: The New Expert on Child Raising

Not content to let Charlie Sykes corner the market on telling Wisconsinites how to raise their children, Mark Belling  has some sage advice and opinions for those of you disappointed that the 18th century work-houses of Oliver Twist's day are no longer thriving.

Pete Kennedy at GMtoday, wrote a thoughtful piece, Don't fill up the cup, Arrowhead drug testing a ‘really stupid’ idea , questioning the wisdom and the constitutionality of the Arrowhead High School drug testing policy.

Belling, eloquently jumps into the discussion with this profundity, Way to Go Arrowhead,

The presumption that a high school kid has rights is precisely the attitude that empowers them to make bad decisions.

The illogic, the misunderstanding of the Constitution, and the sheer stupidity of this comment makes The Three Stooges, yes, all seven of them, presidential contenders.

Anyone who raised a child in the last 50,000 years knows that the most powerful force in the universe is teenage peer group pressure. It is  that scourge that parents must continually battle in an effort to minimize not just the bad, but the scary, the stupid, and the silly decisions that kids make.

As for the notion that kids have no rights, I guess Mr. Belling missed the last two hundred years in this country. When it comes to kids:

• Kids are persons and are protected from predators be they strangers or abusive parents.
• Kids do not have to work for seven cents an hour for twelve hours a day, six days a week - I know, more "nanny state" interference with a free market economy.
• Kids can own property and have assets, through trust funds that are carefully regulated and monitored by federal and state law.
• In almost every instance the provisions of the United States Constitution applies to children. The exceptions of some rights that are omitted that children do not enjoy is a very short list.
• Most of the Constitutional protections in the first Ten Amendments apply to children.

Belling goes on to tell a mother who cannot afford a $600 ticket for the Hannah Montana concert:

... the angry mother ought to consider instilling in her children acceptance of the harsh reality that in life we don’t get everything we want and that the things that we desire are in our reach only if we work for them.

Yes, little Susie, the way George W. Bush worked for his fortune, the way the rip off artists at Halliburton worked for theirs, the way Jack Abramoff and his cronies and the crooks at Enron, all worked for theirs.

Mark, here is some better advice for a nine year old girl:

We have to make choices in life about what to do with our money. It might be nice to go to a Hannah Montana concert, but think of all the things we give up, better things.  Maybe one day you will have enough money to do things like that but for now it will have to wait. In the meantime, understand there are people in this world like Mark Belling, who are materialists who place the value of everything in terms of money. Dear, there are other things in life to value like love, clean water, fresh air, and getting the likes of Stephen Nass (R) out of the legislature.