Today's Emmett Till*...

See here.

His father fainted when he saw his mutilated corpse. ... The Assad regime is worse, it seems to me, than even Qaddafi's. I do not know what the West can do militarily or economically, and suspect it's not much. But there is something you can do. His Facebook page is here, with 62,000 followers. Let his family and friends know you have noticed. Let history record this act of barbarism.

------------------

* Till was returned to Chicago and his mother, who had raised him mostly by herself, insisted on a public funeral service with an open casket to show the world the brutality of the killing. Tens of thousands attended his funeral or viewed his casket and images of his mutilated body were published in black magazines and newspapers, rallying popular black support and white sympathy across the U.S. Intense scrutiny was brought to bear on the condition of black civil rights in Mississippi, with newspapers around the country critical of the state.

U2, Peace on Earth:

Tell the ones who hear no sound
Whose sons are living in the ground
Peace on Earth.
No whos or whys
No one cries, like a mother (parent) cries
For peace on Earth...
She never got to say goodbye
To see the colour in his eyes
Now he's in the dirt
Peace on Earth.

YouTube version.



Walk On...

And love is not an easy thing
The only baggage that you can bring...
And love is not the easy thing...
The only baggage you can bring
Is all that you can't leave behind

And if the darkness is to keep us apart
And if the daylight feels like it's a long way off
And if your glass heart should crack
And for a second you turn back
Oh no, be strong

Walk on, walk on
What you got they can't steal it
No they can't even feel it
Walk on, walk on...
Stay safe tonight

You're packing a suitcase for a place none of us has been
A place that has to be believed to be seen
You could have flown away
A singing bird in an open cage
Who will only fly, only fly for freedom

Walk on, walk on
What you've got they can't deny it
Can't sell it, or buy it
Walk on, walk on
Stay safe tonight

And I know it aches
And your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on, walk on

Home... hard to know what it is if you've never had one
Home... I can't say where it is but I know I'm going home
That's where the heart is

and I know it aches
How your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on, walk on

Leave it behind
You got to leave it behind
All that you fashion
All that you make
All that you build
All that you break
All that you measure
All that you feel
All this you can leave behind
All that you reason
All that you sense
All that you speak
All you dress-up
All that you scheme...

YouTube version.

What Surprises Me?

If the Brett Favre "scandal" wasn't filling enough (and hey, that involved actual questions anyway of sexual harassment on the job), and well-know law professors have to roll around in the dirt because of the latest penis play to hit the news, why the heck not mention that Weiner's wife is the beautiful Pakistani-Indian American who was long rumored to be Hillary Clinton's lesbian lover and perhaps Weiner's in a sham marraige?

That's the same Huma Abedin, right?

And if you want to roll around in the dirt, or sling mud, or whatever the objective of these continued exercises is, why not go in all the way and really dirty yourself?

If you're gonna do it, do it right...

ADDED: People, people... it's an underpants picture. Sheesh, the Puritans in the crowd get this excited about the covered outline of a man's penis clad in grey skivvies? It's like junior high school all over again -- omg! A penis! And not even a naked one, at that. Who knew politicians had actual body parts -- I thought they were all built like Ken. (As I understood it too, there was a lot more going on behind the earlier shirtless man pic. It wasn't the ... nekkid chest (!) that caused him to resign.)

Move along, people... Maybe find yourselves a date with a man this weekend, or ... rediscover your own husbands out there. Yes Virginia, men have penises. And yes too, cybersexxin' is happening in our 21st Century world.

This is pretty tame stuff, the mystery guy in the grey undies. Best keep those smelling salts handy if this tame stuff is thus-far your pinnacle of porn...






Somewhere between the uber-privacy of the French, that allowed them to get away with so much sexually for so long, and the American junior-high-school-gigglefest (or worse, shamefest) that treats as 24-hour, front-page news the allegations that even a married politician might be an online flirt, is a comfortable medium. Discrete, consensual, nobody's-business-if-nobody's-complaining, happy space.

Did you know it's true that married people sometimes have "arrangements" within their partnership? Respectful, acknowledged agreements that don't harm anyone and are agreed to by both parties? Not in the family marraiges* I know, but it's true: they're out there, people. Lighten up and move on. aka, Vive la différence! (Or not, your choice, people.)

I'm inclined to think if poor Anthony's last name were Smith, Beck, Dunn or Schwartz, the news cycle would have moved on already, covering ... actual news that people need to know.

---------------
*Personally, I prefer to sing the Mac Davis version myself, but that's just me. These lyrics linked to say Mac, but clearly the gender mix makes them Anne Murray's lyrics.

May Be Factual, It May Be Cruel...

I ain't lying...

Lest you think I've forgotten Memorial Day,
remember: I work for local weekly now. I covered the ceremonies in one town -- an Our Town -- the rain held off, the storm passed, and they fed me a spaghetti dinner to boot.

In other news,
despite what good it might do to have a woman ceremonially in the position, Paul Krugman endorses another for IMF head.

Because outstanding times call for outstanding measures, and because perhaps the PC goodness might be just as effective another day, I'm inclined too to plug the unorthodox man for the position.

Just like Mitt Romney, with all his business experience, might be the best man to lead us out of our economic doldrums, should our current president not wise up soon to which way the economic winds are blowing...

In the end,
getting the job done -- or not -- matters much more than superficial characteristics that not all share. And if, in the end, that's not what America's all about -- electing the best man person to the job, despite superficial characteristics that might disqualify him elsewhere, then you might say, I missed the boat.

Hope your Memorial Day was happy:
"Home of the Free, thanks to the Brave."

G-d Bless Y'all.

Road Kill.

I was passing through Clayton on my way to meet Mal at Clear Lake last Wednesday, when I passed my first bear roadkill. This is -- was -- a young bear, over a year old, about 200 pounds. Hit around 5 a.m., according to the woman working the register that morning at the gas station down the street. The second one hit in that stretch in the past few weeks, she said.

Personal Connection.

A woman who says she graduated with honors from Thomas Jefferson School of Law in 2008 and passed the California bar exam but cannot find a decent legal job has sued the institution, contending that she was tricked into attending by employment statistics TJSL provided for the annual U.S. News & World Report law school survey.

Anna Alaburda, who racked up $150,000 in student loans and is now doing document-review work when she can find it, says she decided to attend the law school after reading the magazine's 2003 law school survey, reports the National Law Journal. It stated that 80 percent of the school's graduates were employed.

She "reasonably interpreted these figures to mean that the vast majority of TJLS graduates would find employment as full-time attorneys," the lawsuit states, alleging that "the foregoing statistics were false, misleading, and intentionally designed to deceive all who read them.
...
Beth Kransberger, who serves as the law school's associate dean for student affairs, tells the legal publication there was no misrepresentation and says TJSL followed guidelines set by the American Bar Association when reporting its employment statistics..

"We've always been accurate in what we report, and we've always followed the system given to us by the ABA," she says. "This lawsuit is very much about a larger debate. This is part of the debate about whether it's practical to pursue a graduate degree in these difficult economic times."

Dean Beth Kransberger, responding to a lawsuit here filed against the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, was the dean for admissions when I applied to UW-Law in 2002. Later I learned from classmates that she had helped recruit them for our class -- one young man working as a Milwaukee schoolteacher got the call in his classroom -- because our school wanted to up minority enrollment before the Grutter v. Bollinger* decision came down. (The fear was, if the ruling had gone the other way, the school would not be able to take race into account for preference points, in evaluating a candidate's potential.)

They overadmitted (more students accepted their offers to attend UW Law than predicted) and consequently, we graduated a very large class of 2005 after 3 years of swollen classes. Never said openly, I got the impression from snide remarks that some faculty didn't appreciate the larger than usual numbers taxing the program's capacity (the class schedule and building, as well as the usual law school opportunities for extracurricular opportunities). The Monona terrace, the day we all graduated with unlimited family present, was absolutely packed. Dean Kransberger had already moved on in her career, but turned up again as our graduation speaker, recalling memories of recruiting some of us, and delivering her speech on our class diversity.

She was an excellent marketer back then -- earned a law degree from UW herself, and then like many, figured out a way to end up back at the school, as paid administration staff. The 3-year full-tuition merit scholarship they offered me based primarily on my test scores and academic background sold me -- though sometimes I wish I had deferred a year...

I'm not sorry I know now what I know about the law -- it always helps to understand the system you live under, and what works where, don't get me wrong. It just opens your eyes to the measurements others are using as success (= high enrollment numbers), and some of the unequal tools used to satisfy those aims.
------------------

* The Court held that the law school's interest in obtaining a "critical mass" of minority students was indeed a "tailored use". O'Connor noted that sometime in the future, perhaps twenty-five years hence, racial affirmative action would no longer be necessary in order to promote diversity. It implied that affirmative action should not be allowed permanent status and that eventually a "colorblind" policy should be implemented. The opinion read, "race-conscious admissions policies must be limited in time." "The Court takes the Law School at its word that it would like nothing better than to find a race-neutral admissions formula and will terminate its use of racial preferences as soon as practicable. The Court expects that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today." The phrase "25 years from now" was echoed by Justice Thomas in his dissent. Justice Thomas, writing that the system was "illegal now", concurred with the majority only on the point that he agreed the system would still be illegal 25 years hence.

A Time to Sow...

Well that's the rest of them out the door then. Pretty much the last of the transplanted starter stock is in the ground now, out at the church garden plots on the edge of town.

(I also participate -- a founding planner, in fact -- in the 3rd annual Rice Lake community gardens, a loosely organic ground in a residential neighborhood the city is leasing us for the next five years, under signed contact. We had to prove our worth the first two years, but got unanimous support from the city council and our youthful mayor.)

But back to the plants:
These were my best that went in today. The four-packs that were getting rootbound went in first, two weeks ago before all the rain we've had around here lately. They've seized upon the sunny days, and are taking off.

Today, their bigger brothers and sisters, which had been transplanted into slightly larger containers about a month ago, went out the warehouse door. For good this time, not just to rest in sunny fields atop a trailer, only to ride out the storms and nightime goings-on under a tin roof.

So, sorry for the excessive language, but you get attached. I pulled off lower leaves and buried them deep, confident that the strong stalks and root balls will anchor them come what may...

But what once looked so big, compared to the size and condition they came out of the flats in, looks dwarfed once again when you put it out in such a large empty plot. Still, they'll do fine.

No shovels needed, the rain was just letting up a bit after sunrise this morning, when I pulled an arrow-headed hoe through the saturated hills banking the plow tire furrows in the spots they assigned me this year. (I signed up for two, to spread out a bit.) It's the most beautiful soil -- sandy in spots, strewn with straw cornstalks in some places from last year's occupants.

The cucumber vines went in (some people say they root better started outside from seed, but I'm chomping at the bit.) Broccoli, Romas, dill. Rows and rows of sugar peas and onions, dropped from above every 6 inches. (I know I know, you're supposed to start them closer and thin them out, but why waste a seedling; it's not in me. Not much of a pruner either, for the same reason: it's hard to take out healthy, just to maximize the bigger.)

To wrap it up, pictures hopefully in the morning.
You know I'll be out there early, checking on how they did their first night out.

Happy Friday then...

this time for real.

(Not easy being ahead of the times, you know. Not easy at all*. Plus, makes some people -- convinced of their own innate superiority, perhaps -- a wee bit jealous. Nevermind, we'll survive that.)
Some things you can buy maybe, but not this.
Shout if it makes you feel good -- oh yes indeed ...

-------------

* Once might say actually, it's rather tricky.

I got a dog, eats purple flowers...

C'mon now:
who out there knows the next line?*

Reminds me of this rap:

In the city, ladies look pretty.
Guys tell jokes so they can seem witty.
Tell a funny joke just to get some play,
then you try to make a move and she says: no way.
Girls are fakin', goodness sakin',
they want a man who brings home the bacon.
Got no money and got no car,
then you got no woman and there you are.
Some girls are sophistic, materialistic,
looking for a man makes them opportunistic.
They're lyin' on the beach, perpetratin' a tan
so that a brother with money can be their man.
So on the beach start strollin', real high rollin'
Everything you have is yours, and not stolen.
A girl runs up with something to prove,
So don't just stand there -- Bust a Move!

~ Young MC

----------------------

* ... ain't got much, but what we got's ours...

Thursday Post.

in the Fear Not/Paul Ryan update below.

Update:

DOH! Today's Thursday, not Friday yet...

(I guess my yesterday was so good, I'm counting it as two.)

Rejoice, Rejoice...

We Have No Choice.

The sky is clearing and the night
Has cried enough
The sun, he come, the world
to soften up
Rejoice, rejoice, we have no choice but
To carry on.

We put the paper to bed at 11. Best part of working for a weekly? You can get a weekday off.*

Love... is coming to us all.

Here's just one more then, for your Wednesday listening pleasure...

Have a wonderful evening, Mrs. Calabash.

----------------

* I'm chalking that negotiation up to skills learned in my law school education.**

** Probably not true, but not everything is directly linked, and I'm hard up in the assets of continued education column You just never know what will pay off when, eh?

Regardless, it was a fine Wednesday for garden work.

Fear Not.

Personally I'm so confident Tim Pawlenty won't get the GOP primary nod, I will eat my hat if the country chooses to jump on the "T-Paw" bandwagon.

Truth be told, he kind of flew under the radar as governor of Minnesota. Just unexciting enough to be elected, in a state that possibly was seeking an alternative to the excitment and expense of the Bush II regime.

But he was hardly all that popular, or unpopular, up here.

Would he even carry Minnesota?

BONUS: Paul Ryan who?

Seriously, I always thought the D.C. and East Coast analyst people were more enamored with Paul Ryan than Wisconsonites as a whole. Not that we're ignorant here (or smarter), just that ... he is a representative more of the professional, middle-aged family men that are common in Milwaukee and Janesville suburbs. (We saw a lot of those types, junior version, in Madison law school. Who think based on what they've experienced, they know it all and want to extrapolate their "knowledge" to advise all others. Girls might know this as the condescending Boyfriend/Daddy types, who know all the answers and are always trying to "teach" you. Hate that myself. Term I would use for such fellas? Not evil so much as ... limited. By life in the Milwaukee/Janesville corridor and especially suburbs. Nope, what you think might work on paper, very often doesn't work in practice, when you factor in all those real-world incentives/disincentives, and how things out there really work. Yep -- limited, as in: Not knowing what they don't know...)

But that doesn't get you much coverage outside the limited regional (business, in this case) interests. He's not much an ag guy, I don't think. Nor more about tourism, wildlife, or mining interests that are on the agenda in other parts of the state. I don't think his constituency is all that much small-town Wisconsin either, more mid-income manufacturing concerns, with bigger problems.

He was taken more seriously in D.C. than here at home, I think, because men from his mold (youngish 40s, conservative, fresh-faced family man with traditional Christian values) sounding a commonsense warning: "We're spending more than we have -- can we talk about this? Get the issue on the table?" -- are much less common in D.C., where initially he must have been regarded as an exotic creature. (I get the sense D.C. -- the political circles, at least -- is rather sophisticated place, where one rarely straight out says what they're thinking, without considering it from at least two steps down the line... and I don't mean that as a compliment exactly. Crafty, in a negative, fearful way, more like.)

Problem is: just because his ultimate role might have been being a Midwest representative "truthteller" at the time, doesn't mean one has confidence he has all the answers in fixing the problem he's identified. (not to downplay the "discoverer" or "pointer-outer" role, as anyone familiar with basic home maintenance can probably attest.. That is: Finding/diagnosing a problem -- particularly as you get closer and closer to the ultimate of the troubling symptoms is a big part of it: Knowing exactly what's going on/wrong.)

Had we been living in less politically polarizing times, perhaps we might have valued Rep. Ryan's contribution to the national discussion -- his representation of what families, and fiscal conservatives fear -- on that level alone. But because we are not, he was pushed into a Savior role (perhaps to counter the overblown political symbolism of President Obama?) and that's what has the actual learned thinkers in the economics and financial fields up in arms, I think.

They call that the Peter Principle, in business, I think. Moving you up in stock, because you've performed well initially in one role (his addressing a problem), and assuming thus, you have all the answers. (akin to asking the person who investigates and finds the leak* at home, thus to have all the tools and skills needed to fix it.)

Instead of working together, we work against each other. Nobody wins, and the house deteriorates...


-----------


* On second thought, it's not so much he "investigated and found the leak" so much; his role is more in the calling attention to the gushing leak that everyone pretty much knows about (the forthcoming demographic Boomer drain), but in sounding the alarm.

Really, that's important enough sometimes -- to force others to look and admit the reality some prefer not to see until too late/too costly to fix without tearing down too much.

Ryan's real trouble, imho, is not so much that he's an evil man as some might want to paint him, but that in the fixer-upper role he's been given or has assumed, he's in way over his head in terms of expertise and knowing how to fix the durned gush. Which, as all maintenance folks know, is often just as costly in the end than if you had turned the trouble over to those more in the know, and actually followed the advice more experienced help has given.

Governor Walker (Who R U?) Visits LaCrosse...

to View Damage from Sunday's Tornado.

Preliminary estimates indicate millions of dollars in damage to a tornado-ravaged South La Crosse, but federal aid likely won’t reach homeowners. A tornado packing winds up to 120 mph cut through 2.3 miles of the city’s South Side at 4:23 p.m. Sunday. In the four minutes it spent on the ground, the twister destroyed houses and buildings, snapped trees and downed power lines.

State aid will help cover costs to the city, but the destruction won’t meet the criteria necessary for a federal disaster declaration, La Crosse County Emergency Management Coordinator Keith Butler said.

“This is on the low end of what happens when a tornado moves through a community,” he said. “We’re very fortunate.”

Here's a rather funny exchange, all things considered:

On Monday afternoon, a homeowner and a politician met at Green Bay and South 13th streets. They discussed the storm’s power and its destruction in the man’s yard where attic insulation wrapped a fallen tree’s branches.

“Hang in there,” the politician said, shaking the man’s hand.

“Thank you. What’s your name?”

“Scott Walker. I’m your governor.”

Walker and state Rep. Jennifer Shilling toured hard-hit businesses and walked Green Bay Street visiting with distraught and still startled residents. The governor pledged state assistance.

“We want to make sure that everyone whose home and business has been affected is back up and running as soon as possible,” Walker said.

Come Home, President Obama.

Now I understand that, even though you're president of the United States, you get locked into schedules that you can't simply call off.

That said,
it was rather jarring to see the U.S. president overseas quaffing a pint of Guinness with a smiling face, and playing to the crowds as though campaigning again, after viewing pictures of the destruction in Joplin, Mo. as more and more bodies are retrieved from the rubble.

Yes, I know it was a pre-planned trip. And he just can't call it off every time a disaster -- natural or manmade -- strikes. Still, I liked it better when the U.S. president was content to stay home more during his term, acting as though the American people and their interests were paramount to the job.

The economy, the unemployed, the gas prices ... personally, if I were on President Obama's inner team, I'd cancel all the not-strictly-necessary overseas jaunts (vital business trips are fine, if he needs to actually be present to accomplish something) until he leaves office.

That's just common sense, right? First, he was sightseeing while we began the Libyan War. (how's that going, btw? Was I right, have more people been killed indiscriminately than had we not intervened? Do you really care about those lives lost anyway?)

Now, we've got those silly pub pics, which greeted this news reader right after hearing about the destruction here at home. Again, I get it -- the world doesn't stop because of somebody else's personal tragedy. Still, for p.r. reasons and because the American president is supposed to feign caring and leading his people, I sure wish he'd concentrate more on America, and less on Israel, Ireland, Libya, and yep, even Pakistan and Afghanistan too.

Shore up our own country's defenses, and our economy too which is quite related, and don't leave home to greet the crowds and gladhand until our own wars are ended and our own borders secured. Sure it's a big job -- someday, I pray we'll actually have a leader who understands his role. President of the United States is not President of the World. The sooner we understand and accept that, the better off the whole world will be.

IMHO, of coure.

RELATED: Jeffrey Goldberg apparently is in his element this past week ... and just can't resist playing the victim himself. Good Lord, will we never learn?

Myself, I agree with Krugman not only that America is experiencing a Lost Generation because we have learned zilch from the financial regulatory failures of the past, but that historically, the world economy and current international failures make this time now very similar to the period between the last two world wars.

I suspect, with Israel gambling big by not conceding any reparations to the displaced poor and continuing to land grab, and America's seeming promise to support her no matter what comes, the only way out is another Big War. To stoke the economy, protect the Jews in Israel from the consequences of their collective actions, and kill off thousands more innocent people worldwide.

Is this where we're heading? Hope I'm wrong, but you really can learn a lot from the past. And the past is telling.

ADDED: And so it begins...
Stanley Fish joins Jeffrey Goldberg in examining the Jewish perspective on recent news events, and drawing overblown conclusions:

It’s been an interesting week or two for Jews. Mel Gibson’s new film, “The Beaver,” opens nationwide in theaters and Jews must decide whether to pay good money to see a movie starring someone whose father is a Holocaust denier, and who has himself vilified Jews in public.
...
Then there is Dominique Strauss-Kahn, a French economist and politician who was poised to become France’s first Jewish president, imprisoned at Rikers Island after being accused of forcing sex on a chambermaid at a New York hotel. (Strauss-Kahn has now moved to a very constrained “house arrest” while awaiting arraignment, if he can find a house.) Meanwhile, on May 11 this newspaper publishes the results of a Pew Forum study that shows 67 percent of Reform Jewish households in the United States making more than $75,000 a year; only 31 percent of all households hit the same mark.

Then there are a few older stories that linger on and add to the mix. Designer John Galliano is facing trial in France and has been fired by Dior because, in the course of a drunken rant in a bar, he said to someone (who was not in fact Jewish) “I love Hitler and people like you would be dead.” Bad-boy Charlie Sheen abused various substances, cavorted with assorted women and trashed hotel-rooms for years and nothing much was done about it until he spewed anti-Semitic remarks in the direction of the Jewish producer of his hit TV show “Two and a Half Men.” In a short time he was fired and his role has been given to Ashton Kutcher, raised Catholic, but now heavily into Judaism and Kabala.

And of course there is the story that will live forever, even after its protagonist dies, the story of Bernie Madoff (a Strauss-Kahn lookalike, or is it the other way around?) who perpetrated the biggest scam in history (will he replace Meyer Lansky as the chief exhibit in the bad-guy Jewish Hall of Fame?) and ruined thousands of people, many of them fellow Jews.

The thing about these stories is that they all point in (at least) two directions.

psst. fellas? It's a very big world out there. I think perhaps some run in closed circles. Seeing teh Jew connection everywhere.

But the majority of the people -- Americans -- I know, didn't view any of these stories through a "Dude is Jewish" lens.

(Strauss-Kahn is Jewish? Betcha most Americans only knew he was French, name sounds more German actually, and were content to leave it at that. These men are being judged individually, based on the consequences of their personal choices and alleged actions, not any background trivia... As to Ashton Kucher's chosen religion? Who even knew? Really, the whole article reads like Adam Sandler's Hannukah "outing" song.)

But thanks to Fish and others for needing to point out these miniscule commonalities, and identify each by ethnically lumping. Better to assume, not so subtly one might add, the mantle of perpetual victimhood: ie, "They're* picking on a people as a whole, not flawed individuals who just happen to share this background trait or that."

Thus, the confident conclusion:

Those who offer the criticism can never quite be sure that their distaste for Israel’s actions with respect to the Palestinians is entirely innocent of the influence of centuries of vilification. And that seems to be where we are.

--------------

* "They" being the unnamed, non-Jewish others who apparently are incapable of independent thought without falling back on age-old stereotypes, according to Mr. Fish's line of thinking. Thank goodness most people think outside such circles.

Really, it's the only hope we have.

There Will Be Mud ...

The predicted rain yesterday fell late, so there was plenty of time for more planting in the misty morning.

The warehouse/storage locker is gettting less and less crowded, and my trailer lighter each time I pull it by hand out the door into the sunny field.

The church plots are assigned, and the Romas have always done well in the direct sun there. But the loamy soil in the community garden residential plots, one of which gets partial shade from a nearby stand of trees, has already absorbed the majority of cabbages, broccoli, lettuce and celery plants. Succulents, another gardener calls them.

So nice being outdoors with something to do, particularly satisfying when the rains came later to water in my work, and the lightning show began just an hour ago.

One month left of Spring, and it's the best month of the season, in spite of the mud.

Hippie Town Returns to State Capitol.

Mike Nichols of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, using Madison police reports, gives us a behind-the-scenes look at what kind of representative democracy was recently being served up at the State Capitol, while the hippie protestors had run of the place 24/7:

They say Wisconsin hasn't seen the sort of protests we had in Madison of late since at least the 1960s. Turns out some folks thought it actually was the 1960s.
...
It was - right up there on the third floor of the South Wing directly above the Senate chambers - the "overwhelming smell of burnt marijuana" emanating from an orange tent. There was so much smoke inside our esteemed Capitol that it was literally "coming out of cracks" in the tent, according to the report. One cop was concerned there was an active fire inside.

Nope. Just two dudes lying on a sleeping bag in their underwear with a "roach," rolling papers, a bag of what looked like pot, a glass "bong" and enough smoke to make Cheech and Chong jealous. Both dudes were issued citations, and one - a juvenile - was turned over to his mom.
...
You had to walk through the Capitol during the protests to really get the flavor of things. What's surprising, the reports indicate, is how much of the flavor tasted like alcohol.

On Feb. 18, for instance, somebody called the police to say there were "a couple people in the basement rotunda that have a bottle of vodka and are ready for detox." That same night, state troopers caught two kids - one only 14 - on the second floor at 11 p.m. standing next to a crate containing a 1.75-liter bottle of vodka, a 1.75-liter bottle of whiskey, bottles of Squirt and ginger ale and a quart of orange juice.

It's not clear if the orange juice was a mixer or for breakfast as, it seems, the kids' parents had given them permission to spend the night and make some sort of statement. Of course, the statement turned out to be to police and included the claim they'd gotten the booze from a man they didn't know wearing a fedora.

Yes, I know there were a lot of serious people at the Capitol as well.

In other news, wiser heads prevailed: Justice Prosser retains his seat, despite the best efforts of the liberal crowd to politicize the process and elect a Madison attorney, previously rejected for judgeships, in there.

No thanks, Madison. We might not be chanting and holding sleepovers in public buildings, but our votes count too. It's a good lesson though: being loud and demanding people pay attention (and pay for your toilet paper too) doesn't convince.

(Been saying that for years about the more flamboyant Gay pride parades, but you know how some folks like to spectate...)

"Hey, Ma. I Got a Job!"

or, Happiness Is...

Yes, I'll be joining ye ink-stained wretches in the trenches, shortly. Back in the news biz, local weekly -- conservative enough, this time armed with a law degree.

(You know, the mark of one's character is not in how you share others' bad news so much, typically with sympathy, but if you can muster yourself to share their good news too.)

In other news of the day,
I planted broccoli and more Romas, along with a half flat of celery. And the rabbits didn't find the newly planted buffet last night. Here's hoping that holds...

Keep the Fire Burning...

This is where we belong.
We are strong.
We can never give up.
(If we wanted to, we could...
But we've always understood, to keep a-lookin' for the Good!)
~REO Speedwagon, out of context, but appropriate, nonetheless.

Keep the Fire Burnin'.

My Hometown.

Think ... Perspective.

ADDED: That's the Sears Tower (Willis Tower, for the non-traditionalists) in the background center, with the Silurian Reef in the foreground.

Which is Greater, do you think?

(No correct answer, so don't be afraid of answering "wrong".)

Depth and Defense.

With the strength of the bench play, and the superior defense demonstrated last night, I wonder if there's a lesson America as a whole can take from the Bulls-Heat matchup: Depth and Defense, vs. Money and Hype.

Maybe ... Performance Matters? (Yes, Virginia... indeed.)

You're a SuperStar
Yes! That's what you are...
C'mon Vogue...
Strike a Pose, There's Nothing to It.

Performance and Merit, on the other hand, when somebody's measuring the final results that actually matter* ...
----------------
*The most worrisome lesson for the Heat stars is that they're up against a team that is dedicated above all else to outworking them. The Bulls have the coaching, size, depth and leadership to see this through. What a terrific series this could become if Miami is equal to those challenges.

Who Remembers Jesse Ventura?

Not "The Body", the wrestling career, but the politician?

Remember, he preceded Ah-nold, and boy was he a colorful one.

'If You Haven't Hunted Man, You Haven't Hunted'

Navy SEAL, before they called 'em that...

Mother's Day Sighting.

I forgot to mention:
Coming into town Sunday morning, a black bear crossed my path on double S. (Co. Rd. SS). About 150 yards 75 yards (x 2 eyes) ahead. I love the way they amble...

Small one. Didn't look to be a cub*, and it seemed to be alone.

---------
*No, I'm not basing this based on my impression from 75 yards away. As I drove past the spot it crossed, and looked into the scrub, it was standing about 10 yards off the road on the Wild Rivers Trail, where I got a better look.

Wait...

Did I hear something yesterday about a log in a flood travelling at 12 miles an hour, allegedly faster than a human being can run?

Maybe not for days on end, but Man's broke the 4-minute mile...

The breaking of the four minute mile was so significant, that is was named by Forbes as one of the greatest athletic achievements. What made this event so significant is that once the four minute barrier was broken by Roger Bannister, within three years, by the end of 1957, 16 other runners also cracked the four minute mile. Describing the psychological impact of the four minute barrier in an interview with Forbes, Sir Roger Bannister, who was knighted in 1975, related that:

The world record then was four minutes, 1.4 seconds, held by Sweden’s Gunder Haegg. It had been stuck there for nine years, since 1945. It didn’t seem logical to me, as a physiologist/doctor, that if you could run a mile in four minutes, one and a bit seconds, you couldn’t break four minutes. But it had become a psychological as well as a physical barrier. In fact the Australian, John Landy, having done four minutes, two seconds, three times, is reported to have commented, “It’s like a wall.” I couldn’t see the psychological side.

So what happened to the physical barrier that prevented humans from running the four minute mile? Was there a sudden leap in human evolution? No. It was the change in thinking that made the difference, Bannister had shown that breaking four minute mile was possible. Often the barriers we perceived are only barriers in our own minds. Previous runners had been held back by their beliefs and mindsets. When the barrier was broken other runners saw that it was possible and then 16 runners went on to do the same.

Pass It On.

Garden Update.

While I spent yesterday's beautiful weather enjoying/working on things at my rented storage locker/garage of my own (the baydoor of which opens upon a now springtime field), Mal informs me he spent the day on his knees.

Honoring Ruth?, I asked him over the phone last night.

Planting onion bulbs -- 7XX (seven hundred something, can't recall the exact figure.)

"700 bulbs you planted?" not sure I heard him right. He confirmed. A bagful, from his community garden in New Richmond, and since they finally tilled down there, and today's rain was well predicted, I think he so enjoyed gardening again, he got a bit carried away.

Of course, I'm not one to talk, as I'm currently nurturing 5 or 6 flats -- some transplanted/some still $.99 four-packs -- they're outside in the garage now, and enjoyed the sun yesterday on tables I carried out. Broccoli, Romas, cabbages, spinach and lettuce, eggplant, dill, cilantro, etc. -- I'm thinking cold weather crops, and eager to get my hands dirty myself. Sugar peapod seedings -- that's what I'll start with...

Of course, you can easily buy fresh produce up here, and it's not too expensive either as our Farmer's Markets are more about product than the see-and-be-seen social scene you might find in other locales. Not much is worth raising from seed, I've found, especially the smaller seeds that require starting in late winter, and either a tweezers or fine-motor-skills greater than I've got...

But like with the houseplants, for childless/petless people, you take your nuturing where you can get it. The better you treat your plants -- keeping them wet but not overwatering; respecting the roots and giving them greater room for growth when needed; balancing the need for sunshine yet adapting them to the colder outdoors temperatures -- the more they give you in return. And though you can buy, it's nice watching the growth and getting your time and money's worth out of a healthy pursuit.

Plus, before I started growing myself, I wasn't all that much of a vegetable eater. Did it more out of obligation than enjoyment. (Not a greens eater yourself? Start with honey as a condiment, cutting back as your tastebuds evolve... worked for me!)

The organic-soil community garden I participate in is now tilled, with our workday fencing/plotting set for Thursday evening. And the church-sponsored plots should be ready any one of these days too.

Here's to good eating, and spending a Sunday on your knees with good reason. ( "Your Health is Your Wealth" was my favorite of Ruth's sayings. )

How 'bout that This Week show on ABC

... with Christiane (pronounced: Chris-John) Amanpour ?
( Oct. '08: "It's a villa in Pakistan not a cave." )

All winter long, they had the best exclusives with the MidEast uprising interviews, and I really enjoyed the Easter Sunday discussion. I know, it's not typical "American" fare -- which is more dish than nutrition sometimes -- but that's what I like about it: you couldn't ask for a more intelligent/skeptical interviewer and a fair enough moderator too. Job well done, consistently.

If you're not watching already, you're missing out...

Here's our local columnist -- Mike Nichols, writing for the St. Paul Pioneer Press -- with a closer take (yep, even here in the middle of the country) on the end of Osama bin Laden, and what it means for/to? the country as a Whole.

The thing is, Matthew Hermanson — and I think this is what Gordy ultimately was saying when he talked about being humbled — didn't act like a stranger. And he certainly didn't treat any of the rest of us like one.

His family, in a statement issued after his death, eloquently pointed that out.

"Matthew loved serving his country and had great loyalty for his fellow servicemen," they said. "It's written, 'There is no greater love than to lay your life down for a friend.' Not only did Matthew, and his fellow servicemen, lay down their lives for a friend, they laid down their lives for countrymen and women they did not know."

Sure, Andrea Haberman — who died on the 92nd floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center nearly 10 years ago now — was one of them. So are her dad, her mom and the man she was going to marry and never got the chance to. But so, to the same extent, are all the rest of us who didn't suffer as personal a loss but benefit every bit as much from, as Gordy calls it, the fight.

I wanted to talk to him about justice and relief and how people start to move forward in the world after being targeted by terrorists. Gordy wanted to talk about the soldiers — which, it took me awhile to understand, was the same thing.

Mike Nichols can be reached at MRNichols@wi.rr.com.

Good stuff.

(click that link!~)

I Had A Mother Who Read To Me...

See here.

The Things You Learn.

Here and all along,
I thought this '82 single was by Styx.

The things you learn -- stumble upon? -- reading Krugman's blog...

Saturday:-)

GetItG(r)o(w)ing...
3:12 MID-AFTERNOON

PHOTOLESS UPDATE:

I biked down to the library*, after I brought all the little garden plants I've started out to the storage warehouse. It's warm enough at night now to keep them outside enclosed, and they sat for a few hours getting sun on a table out there before I put them inside.

Just an absolutely beautiful day here. Cool enough to keep the sun from feeling hot, and boy is it sunny!

* Computer keyboard bug prevents me from spacing, copying, or posting much in the way of text (or even numbers!) these days when using the laptop. To be fixed soon, I'm sure...

Teach Your Children Well...

America's Greatest Triumph.

Sadly for some younger Americans, I suspect the killing of terrorist Osama bin Laden is the closest they will ever come to experiencing America's Moon Shot.

Will we ever be able to raise the bar collectively -- to use our respect for science and knowledge and human growth -- to accomplish something like that again?

Or are targeted killings, and other dubious uses of deadly technology, the closest we will get to celebrating national greatness again?

(akin to taking off our shoes and submitting to full-body scans as the most we will be asked to do to defend America's liberties ...)

Artificial Closure.

I've always felt the most profound pity towards those victims who wait outside prison gates to celebrate the deaths of those murderers on Death Row, who finally were put down for their crimes.

In my years of media observations, I've seen many such victims express initial elation at hearing that the killer who took so much from their own lives is finally gone. Breathed his last.

I understand the emotion. Often times, these folks are promised some security, some sense of relief that the nightmare is finally over.

Except... it rarely is. What the victims and their families have been waiting for is elusive. Usually, the killers are out of circulation, safely locked up, for years before they are finally executed. And the promised "closure"?

If you look at the faltering marriages and relationships with surviving children, the drinking and drugging toll, it seems to me that those who begin working on "closure" long before the criminals are executed are those who keep their ongoing lives best in perspective. Prosecutors promise relief, but it's artificial. You don't just flip a switch, take one final life, and the pain is released.

I pity the 9-11 victims who think that this latest death will finally bring them some end too. Don't get me wrong -- they're entitled to their hatred, and their "eye for an eye" vengeance. I hope there are more sleepful nights, but I very much doubt if this is what they were holding out for, that their wishes will just now promise a new beginning.

A CBS newscaster today said: We put politics aside for 9-11. (Meaning Democrats and Republican politicians come together over this cause, even now, 10 years down a long road later.) I don't think it's that so much, as it is: 9-11 can accommodate all manners of political purposes and performances.

POTUS worked the room of police officers, signed a guest book (pool was unable to view what he wrote) and was given a gift by one woman who was not in a uniform but poolers couldn't tell what it was. He seemed flattered.

POTUS again gave brief remarks, echoing much of what he said at the firehouse. Check quotes against transcript.

"I am here basically to shake your hand and say how proud I am of all of you."

Sunday "sent a signal that we have never forgotten the extraordinary sacrifices that were made on 9/11."

"We did what we said we were going to do."

America will always come together over years and differences to ensure justice is done. (Not a direct quote.)

"What we did on Sunday is directly connected to what you do every day."

Thanked former Mayor Giuliani, says they have their political differences most days but that we're all Americans first.

Whole thing lasted around 15 minutes.

Said "Go Bulls!" to one officer as he took pictures with them. At 12:52 we're rolling to Ground Zero for the wreath laying.

So today, we lay wreaths and seek "closure", however loosely you might define that. And again this September, with another national election just a year away, again we'll be asked to remember, reflect, and re-live the pain of those days a decade ago. It's too big an event to pass on, too major an occasion to add up all that it's cost the country well beyond those few thousand lives initially taken in the September offense.

If that was justice, it was winning ugly. Think of all the other doors kicked in before we finally got the right address for Osama, all the innocents wrongly shot dead and dropped by drone, in pursuing the ultimate mastermind who it turns out was hiding all along in Pakistan. The Iraqi lives, the Pakistanis -- some say they number in the tens of thousands, had we bothered to keep an accurate count. We value the Americans taken from us on 9-11 much more, naturally, but think of all the foreign innocents who died at home too, as we spent 10 years seeking this justice for outselves.

Celebrate if you like -- toot your horn and pop a cork, but don't be too surprised if Man's version of justice is ultimately not as fulfilling as promised. Again, those victims who seem to recognize this early on, and don't give the Bad Guys any more power over them than they've already taken, seem to be so much more advanced in their healing work -- imho -- than those who think that this final death will be the one to bring an end to all the pain.

.

"Spirits are Using Me. Larger Voices Calling..."

Last Friday, we took the kayaks out for the first time this year. It was warm, so I drove down to New Richmond to meet Mal, and we put in on the upper Apple River.

Overhead, an eagle skimmed the shoreline here in Rice Lake on Saturday morning, as I sat reading my online papers, with links opened in the car in front of the public library. (no online service at home). But I'm getting ahead of myself...

Friday was glorious, reminded me of why I live north of Highway 8, with all the absence of civilization lore that accompanies the address. I'd been itching to get outside, on the rivers. Cabin fever from being inside all winter, and all that.

My body feels lean, the upper body and abdomen too, from putting one's whole body into the paddle. If tradeoffs are necessary in charting one's own course, I stand by the choices I've made. Friday was worth it, for the getaway, in every sense of the word.

"Are You Experienced?" is a phrase that's been running through my waking head. An acid test of sorts, do you remember what you learned, what you found worthy -- alive and renewed every Spring? It was awakened in me again last Friday -- being able to appreciate the little signs of spring, the warmth of the sun, the twisting of the trees, the awakening to new life.

Spring is the season of Discovery. It's great for rock-hunting on rainy days, with the agates shining up a storm and jumping out from the river bottoms at your eyes. And, of course you also encounter Death -- the relics of a long winter's toll.

One of the nicest things about renting is you understand it's just a temporary place -- to rest your head, cook your meals, and store your things. But getting out when the weather turns ... that's where I don't think homeowning would be much for me. Nesting, or more repulsing, taking over another's domain -- it all serves really to keep you grounded, plus you hear the self-satisfied snickers of those who just don't drive much with $4/gallon gas (I'm sensing a cockiness in those who don't travel locally and seem to secretly applaud their own lack of movement, of getting around out there...)

We passed an eagle's nest Friday, coming around a bend in the Apple. For the first time, I saw the great bird try to hide it's head and blend in with the skyline. There was one -- perhaps two or three -- nestling alongside the great white-headed creature. Little black moving silouette(s) beneath the bigger bird. For this reason, it chose not to fly off, but to try and camoflauge itself with the branches and sky. Kept trying to pull its head down, not to draw attention, much the way a white-tail will turn its rear to you, and tuck that tail trying to hide the white, all the while with the brown head straining over its shoulder to see if it's been spotted.

The tame ones -- those more used to interacting with civilization -- don't bother. Seeing deer on the periphery of towns and subdivisions is just plain different than seeing the more feral ones hiding themselves in the woods.

Still, this was the first time I'd seen an eagle taking the same tactic. Hanging its head in hopes of just blending in.



Later in the weekend, of course, the news of Osama bin Laden's capture and death. The eagle motif only goes so far... Still, May 1 is the beginning of a new month. May we all find what we're each looking for, and may we each act as though we'll do what it takes to protect and defend the good things we know.

MaySnow...