Hot Weather Makes Writing More Difficult . . .
. . . and other truisms.
No, I’m not just being facetious. (Though you can take it that way if you really want to, as I obviously can’t stop you.) The hot weather aggravates my asthma; worse yet, the hot, humid weather we’ve been facing in Southeastern Wisconsin over the past several days tends to make my asthma act up worse than just about anything else.
And if you can’t breathe overly well, you can’t concentrate well enough to write anything. (Not blog posts. Not poetry. Certainly not fictional stories, which take more effort and thought.)
That said, the weather should cool off soon. (I’m praying for this.) Which will allow me to do more than take my inhaler, lay down where the fans are (as no air conditioner can possibly keep up, having to be used every hour of every day for several days in a row), and try to pretend that I feel up to doing anything at all.
So if you’re looking for witty observations about life, the universe, and everything, forget that — at least for a few days. But I’ll try to post about things that interest me (such as Ken Kratz’s hearing, today’s “other” blog post) while doing my best to draw a bit more air into my overtired lungs.
Former Calumet County DA Ken Kratz Pleads No Contest, Says He’s a Sex Addict
For the past three years, I’d believed that the former District Attorney of Calumet County, Ken Kratz, wasn’t going to be charged with anything, even though he’d sent racy text messages to a victim of domestic violence. After all, the Wisconsin Department of Justice failed to file charges, one of the most disgraceful non-actions I’ve seen out of the DoJ. After that, Kratz opened up a small law practice in Kimberly, Wisconsin.
Yet late in 2011, the Office of Lawyer Regulation filed an eleven-count complaint against Kratz, seeking a six-month suspension. That prompted a hearing today that was held in Appleton; Kratz was asked to answer to six counts of professional misconduct due to the scandal over his “sexting” incident (which I wrote about here and here). Kratz officially pleaded no contest to all six counts.
Please see the following story for details:
And here’s a few words from today’s Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel article:
Kratz, 51, began the morning by pleading no contest to six counts of professional misconduct related to texts and comments he made to women in 2009. The incident came to light in the fall of 2010 when The Associated Press re ported Kratz had tried to start a sexual relationship with a 25-year-old woman, the victim in a domestic violence case he was prosecuting.
The case quickly earned national attention, in part because Kratz, the elected district attorney of Calumet County, was also the chairman of the state’s crime victims’ rights board and had played a key role in passage of the state’s victims’ rights law. He also had earned statewide attention for prosecuting Steven Avery in 2007 for the sexual assault and murder of a photographer.
An aside — the Steven Avery case was very big news here, one of the biggest and nastiest cases Wisconsin has seen in the past twenty-five years or more. The fact that Kratz was the prosecuting attorney speaks to the fact that Kratz was professionally able; that Kratz also was the head of the Wisconsin victims’ rights board also speaks to his ability.
Yet Kratz was a sex addict, something he now knows and isn’t afraid to tell anyone; this, apparently, is the reason he sent those nasty texts to Stephanie Van Groll (then only twenty-five, or about half of Kratz’s age).
Honestly, I don’t know what to say about Kratz’s sex addiction, except that it’s good he’s getting treatment (Kratz said elsewhere in the Journal-Sentinel article that he goes four times weekly to a twelve-step program for people dealing with “compulsive sexuality issues”). But it still bothers me that a respected DA with so much ability would do any of this, and at least a small part of me cheered the following remarks by a well-known women’s advocate:
Patti Seger, executive director the Wisconsin Coalition Against Domestic Violence, said Tuesday’s hearing was “a long time coming,” and that it appeared for months as if he would not be held professionally accountable.
“Kratz was sworn to protect the vulnerable,” Seger said in a prepared statement. “Instead, he caused victims in Calumet County and beyond to question their faith in the justice system.”
Absolutely right.
Anyway, I don’t wish to kick anyone, not even Ken Kratz (someone I’ve previously called one of the “world’s worst people”), when he’s down. So at this point, I’ll just wish the former DA good luck with his treatment for sex addiction — and I’ll also hope that with time, luck, patience, and good health treatment that Kratz will once again be able to use his formidable ability with the law for good. (Rather than for his own, personal gratification, which is what got him into this mess in the first place.)
Just Reviewed Krafton’s “Bleeding Hearts” at SBR
Here’s the latest over at Shiny Book Review, where tonight I took on Ash Krafton’s urban fantasy BLEEDING HEARTS. This features the Demi-Vampire (they have souls, can eat regular food, and live a long time, but need blood to perform at optimum levels) as well as nasty Vampire (no -s in Krafton’s vision; the regular Vampire do not have souls and are nasty with a capital “N”) and the odd werewolf.
The heroine, Sophie Galen, is an empathic human being who writes an advice column. (Before that, she was a nurse, which is probably why she’s named “Galen” after the eminent ancient Roman physician.) She knows nothing about the Demi-Vampire (or D-V for short), much less the Vampire, at the start of BLEEDING HEARTS, yet she’s drawn to an unusual man, Marek Thurzo, when she visits a local museum. (They bond over ancient Egyptian relics.) And, of course, Marek is a D-V, which complicates her life — and the book’s plotline — nicely.
BLEEDING HEARTS is a well-paced urban fantasy/romance with some humor despite its often grim underpinnings. I enjoyed it immensely.
So what are you waiting for? Go read my review right now!
Former Brewer Pitcher Ben Sheets to Make Comeback at age 33
In August of 2010, I wrote a blog about former Milwaukee Brewers starting pitcher Ben Sheets, who had just had a major surgical procedure on his right arm (called at that time the “most massive surgery in the history of pitching” by the Hardball Talk blog.) At that time, I said that I hoped Sheets would be like former Brewers pitcher Chris Capuano, who has come all the way back after two “Tommy John” procedures and is now pitching extremely effectively for the Los Angeles Dodgers.
About one year ago, I wrote a blog after finding out that Sheets was doing rehabilitation in Arlington, TX. I said at that time that it would make no sense for Sheets to be doing rehabilitation if he wasn’t planning on making a comeback.
Well, my blog posts have been trumped by Tim Dierkes of MLB Trade Rumors, who wrote that on June 13, 2012, Sheets threw in front of scouts in Monroe, Louisiana. The four teams represented were the Philadelphia Phillies, the New York Yankees, the Los Angeles Angels, and the Atlanta Braves.**
The team that signs Sheets will have a proven ace who in the past made four All-Star teams (Sheets started the All-Star game for the National League in 2008). Because Sheets is a hard-nosed, tough-minded competitor, he should be able to help just about any team win some ballgames down the stretch if he’s able to pitch effectively.
Sheets’ road to recovery most likely will start in the minor leagues, as that’s the path every pitcher who’s been able to make a comeback (such as Capuano) has taken. But providing Sheets is patient and works his way back into top form, it’s possible for Sheets to become the same, effective pitcher as before (perhaps with a little less heat on the fastball, but he should be able to compensate for that with guile).
Chris Capuano has proven that it is indeed possible for a pitcher in his early 30s to come back from an extensive surgical procedure and pitch just as well if not better than ever. So if Sheets takes “Cappy” as a model, and gives himself time, he could still have several more years in the big leagues left.
Here’s hoping.
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** Note that the team that originally signed Sheets, the Brewers, was not on this list. I’m not pleased about that, but my best guess is that the Brewers need so much other help that they don’t see how Sheets could possibly fit into their plans. I view that as shortsighted, shoddy thinking, especially because the Brewers did sign Capuano to a minor league deal in 2010 (which worked out extremely well), which is why the Brewers know that it is indeed possible for a pitcher who’s sustained horrific arm injuries more than once to come back stronger than ever.
But I’m not the ones making the calls in the Brewers front office.
It’s Official: Wanggaard Requests Recount in District 21 Senate Race
As I expected, Van Wanggaard, the recalled Senator from Racine’s District 21, has requested a recount. Wanggaard was declared the official loser of the District 21 race by 834 votes this past Tuesday, and at that time he said he was “weighing his options.” Because of the recount request, former Senator John Lehman (D-Racine) must now wait for the recount to officially, and finally, send him back to Madison as District 21’s next Senator.
The recount will begin at 9 a.m. Wednesday, June 20, 2012, at the Racine County Courthouse.
Here’s a link to some video the Racine Journal-Times took of Lehman’s commentary after Wanggaard requested the recount:
Basically, Lehman says he has “a lot of confidence that the vote total will hold up.” He also said he has great faith in the Wisconsin election system, and that he looks forward to going back to Madison to “begin the healing process.”
Here’s a link to the actual story:
On the flip side, Wanggaard says that once upon a time, Judge Dennis Barry (now deceased) was down by about 700 votes in an election. Barry requested a recount, and it was found that Barry actually won by 900 votes.
Note that I was unable to find any reference to this election online, and that I’ve lived in Racine for many years and do not remember any such occurrence. (I’m not saying it hasn’t happened. But I am saying that I cannot find it and don’t recall it personally.)
Whereas I do recall that in 2002, Democratic incumbent Senator Kim Plache (D-Racine) lost by 773 votes to Republican Cathy Stepp. Plache did not request a recount; instead, she conceded.
Recounts are expensive, which is one reason many Republicans last year lambasted the Kloppenburg-Prosser state Supreme Court recount, even though percentage-wise, it was closer than the 1.12% margin between Lehman and Wanggaard. (Granted, recounting one Senate district is much less onerous and far less expensive than recounting a whole state, but the principle is the same.)
In this case, Wanggaard had to pay a $685 filing fee to request the recount. He did that today.
What’s more troubling than this recount request is that Wanggaard’s camp has trumpeted in the media that there were problems at various wards in Democratic areas (particularly at the Cesar Chavez Community Center, which is news to me as that’s my polling place) that rose to the level of “election fraud.” The Racine Sheriff’s office is investigating to see if any election fraud has occurred; I’d not worry so much about this except for the fact that Wanggaard is a former police officer and sits on the Police and Fire Commission in the City of Racine. This doesn’t mean the Sheriff’s Department will do anything wrong; in fact, I’d be astonished if they did. But it does mean that it appears the reason Wanggaard’s concerns about election fraud were taken more seriously than other, reported concerns, is because the Sheriff’s Department knows Wanggaard well and is more likely to believe him.
Yet I’ve heard that at other polling places, especially in Republican wards, Democrats were harassed. Nothing’s being done to investigate this by any police or Sheriff in the entirety of District 21, even though at one ward there was one person who was allowed to stay who apparently harassed every single person she saw if she felt they were going to vote for a Democrat. Why is it that this person, who apparently stayed at the polling place for five hours and strongly appears to have done something against the law in Wisconsin (it’s called “electioneering” and it’s not allowed within 100 feet of a polling place), hasn’t been investigated even though it truly appears by her actions, she interfered with the vote on June 5, 2012?
Is it because this person is alleged to be a Republican bigwig from Lake County, Illinois? (If so, that’s plain, flat wrong.)
Getting back to this particular election, Wanggaard lost fair and square. Here’s why:
- Wanggaard is well-known in this area as a former policeman and police union representative.
- Wanggaard alienated and angered people by voting against collective bargaining, especially due to being a past union representative who’s benefitted from collective bargaining.
- Wanggaard was unresponsive to the voters in this area when asked to explain what he’d done, much less why he’d done it.
These three things were more than enough to get him recalled.
As for the story about former Judge Barry, Judge Barry was a good man, a well-respected man. If it’s true that there was a problem, once upon a time, with votes being inaccurately counted and an election swinging the other way (as the Racine Journal-Times hasn’t yet referenced the election Wanggaard is discussing, and because I haven’t been able to find out anything regarding such an election online — meaning it may have pre-dated the rise of the Internet), I’d want a recount in Wanggaard’s place, too.
But I’ve said all along that I am in favor of a recount (mostly because I was in favor of Kloppenburg’s recount last year and unlike some Rs, I’m not a hypocrite). So bring on the recount . . . but don’t expect it to change things overmuch.
In other words, John Lehman is still Senator-elect for District 21, and once the recount is completed, Lehman will officially be sent to Madison to take up his duties as state Senator. Period.
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Edited to add:
The blog Badger Democracy has an interesting article you should read. In short, every public official who has a hand in this recount is either a Walker appointee or is a dyed-in-the-wool Republican (or both). This is both concerning and distressing, but the conclusions being drawn are even more so:
The bottom line here is simple – each of the players in this case – DA Chiapete, Sheriff Schmaling, former DA and now Judge Nieskes all have a vested political and financial interest in the outcome of this case. This is an obvious attempt to use unfounded claims of “vote irregularities” to block the electoral process – a highly hypocritical move for the GOP machine, smearing Milwaukee DA John Chisolm and the John Doe Investigation (Chisolm has prosecuted Democrats and Republicans alike during his truly non-partisan terms). All three of these GOP shills should recuse themselves and appoint an independent investigator if they truly believe a crime was committed.
But they won’t – look for a case in a GOP-friendly court (such as Waukesha County), based on these so-called “irregularities” to enjoin the GAB from certifying the election, as the case makes its way through the courts – and the Senate remains at 16-16 until November. Both Racine County DA and Sheriff’s Department refused comment to Badger Democracy on an “ongoing investigation.”
All I can do is hope that this will not happen, though I have seen such delaying tactics used before by the Republican Party — in Minnesota, where Republican United States Senator Norm Coleman lost narrowly in 2008 to Democrat Al Franken — in fact, Coleman lost by only 312 votes — but delayed Franken being able to take his new seat as US Senator by eight months due to various legal challenges.
Granted, that election had some things in it that this one doesn’t — namely, it was a three-party race, and the difference, percentage-wise, between Franken and Coleman was about .01% (that is, one one-hundredth of a percent).
This election isn’t nearly that close, percentage-wise, and obviously there were only two parties involved in this race — the Democrats, represented by Lehman, and the Republicans, represented by Wanggaard.
If the Rs decide that they’re better off to employ a similar “delay as long as possible” strategy, they will certainly erode public faith in the election system of Wisconsin. And considering that many, including myself, are wondering if all the vote totals in every county were exactly as stated in the Walker/Kleefisch recalls due to possible problems with electronic voting machines, that might not be a really good wasp’s nest to kick up right now.
Weird NBA Story: Commissioner Stern Insults Sportscaster Jim Rome During Interview
Folks, I really don’t understand what the commissioner of the National Basketball Association, David Stern, thought he was doing on Wednesday afternoon, June 13, 2012, but here goes: Stern intentionally insulted sportscaster Jim Rome during Rome’s live call-in, nationally syndicated radio show after Rome asked a perfectly legitimate question regarding the upcoming NBA Draft. This happened about twelve hours ago, and is all over the news.
Here’s what happened. According to the Yahoo Sports blog “Ball Don’t Lie,” Rome asked the question everyone’s been asking since the New Orleans Hornets won this year’s NBA “draft lottery,” meaning the Hornets will get to pick first, consequently getting the best player available in the 2012 NBA Draft. As the Hornets are currently owned by the NBA (and have been since December of 2010), this didn’t look very good. Rome, being a well-known sportscaster, asked the question in what surely appears to be a rather non-confrontational way.
To wit (as transcribed by Yahoo Sports from the article referenced above):
“You know, New Orleans won the draft lottery, which, of course, produced the usual round of speculation that maybe the lottery was fixed,” Rome said. “I know that you appreciate a good conspiracy theory as much as the next guy — was the fix in for the lottery?”
“Uh, you know, I have two answers for that,” Stern said. “I’ll give you the easy one — no — and a statement: Shame on you for asking.”
“You know, I understand why you would say that to me, and I wanted to preface it by saying it respectfully,” Rome replied. “I think it’s my job to ask, because I think people wonder.”
“No, it’s ridiculous,” Stern answered. “But that’s OK.”
“I know that you think it’s ridiculous, but I don’t think the question is ridiculous, because I know people think that,” Rome said. “I’m not saying that I do, but I think it’s my job to ask you that.”
“Have you stopped beating your wife yet?” Stern asked.
Now, this was a truly ridiculous answer, especially as Stern had already said above that the draft lottery wasn’t fixed. It’s especially dumb because Stern is sixty-nine years of age, an accomplished and learned man, and really shouldn’t have said any such thing, especially because his asinine statement has for the moment eclipsed the NBA’s premiere event — the NBA Finals.
Rome handled this pretty well, as you’re about to see from the transcript:
“Yeah, I don’t know if that’s fair,” Rome responded. “I don’t know that that’s fair.”
“Well, why’s that?” Stern asked.
My aside — oh, come off it, Commish! You’re playing dumb here. (Or were you having a “senior moment?”) Whatever you’re doing, it’s wrong. Cut it out.
Back to the transcript:
“Because I think that there are — and I know you read your emails and I’m sure you follow things virally on Twitter — people really do think it, whether it’s fair or not,” Rome said. “You don’t think the question’s fair to ask if your fans think it?”
Good question. So, how does Stern answer it? (Warning: this next exchange is rather lengthy.)
“People think it because people like you ask silly questions,” Stern said. “I expect it to be written about — and actually, I commented last night in my presser that there was one guy who I won’t dignify by naming who says, ‘I have no reason to know anything, and I don’t know anything, but I tell you, I believe it’s fixed.’ OK, that’s good. Why is that? ‘Well, because this team won.’ And if that team won, it would’ve been fixed also, and if that team won, it would’ve been fixed also. And if every team was invited to have a representative there, and there were four members of the media there, and if Ernst and Young certified it, would you still think it? ‘Yes.’ So, I guess …”
“I think two things, which responds to this,” Rome interjected. “Number one, I don’t think so. I don’t think so — and I’m not covering myself — I don’t think so, and I think by asking the question, it would not suggest I think so. But the one thing I would say: The league does own the team, does it not?”
“… Yes,” Stern said, a question mark at the end of his sentence.
“Does that not make the question fair?” Rome asked.
“I don’t think so,” Stern said. “Number one, we sold it. We’re gonna close this week. We already have established our price. I think that if it had gone to Michael Jordan, which was the next team up with, in terms of a high percentage, they would’ve said, ‘Oh, David’s taking care of his friend Michael.’ And if it had gone to Brooklyn, which is going into Barclay Center, it would have been fair to speculate, I suppose, that we want to take Brooklyn off of the mat. So there was no winning. And people write about it, and it’s OK to write about it, and we sort of expect it, but that’s not a question that I’ve been asked before by a respectable journalist.”
This actually is a logic chain that makes sense. But why did it take Stern so long to come up with it? And why did he have to needlessly insult Rome before he got there?
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Edited to add:
Upon further reflection, it seems that Stern wished to “frame the narrative” by giving a reason that explained why Stern had said something so insulting to Rome. Notice the slur about “respectable journalists” who supposedly wouldn’t ask such a question about “rigging the draft” — what was the point of that, especially as Rome had asked a perfectly legitimate question? (And am I really supposed to think that other sportscasters and journalists hadn’t asked Stern this question before Rome got around to it? Because I have a hard time buying that, too.)
That’s why, upon further reflection, I don’t think that Stern’s attempt at framing the narrative passes the “smell test,” even with the proviso that Stern’s logic chain regarding the other teams does make sense.
Back to the original blog.
———
From the transcript:
“I think I understand why you’re frustrated by that; I think that I understand why that would upset you,” Rome said. “I would hope that you would not hold that against me.”
“I wouldn’t hold it against you — you know, you and I have been into more contentious discussions than that,” Stern said.
“I don’t know, I’d put that one right up there,” Rome replied.
That’s the understatement of the year. But Stern was not yet done; check out this next line:
“Well, you know, it’s good copy, and you do things sometimes for cheap thrills,” Stern said.
I don’t know what Stern thought he was doing here, but that just escalated an already tense situation. And by this time, Rome was obviously getting exasperated:
“I did not do that for a cheap thrill,” Rome answered.
“Well, that’s what it sounds like,” Stern said.
“No, not at all,” Rome answered. “See, that’s where you and I — that’s our point of disconnect. That was not a cheap thrill and I was not throwing anything against the wall, and I was trying to be as respectful as possible. I’m just saying that people wonder about that. And here’s what I don’t want to do — I don’t want to say, ‘Hey commissioner, people would say …’ Because I’m going to ask a direct question. But people do wonder. But that was not a cheap thrill. I got no thrill out of that.”
“Well, it’s a cheap trick,” Stern said.
“No, flopping is a cheap trick,” Rome said.
Good one! (I get tired of watching NBA players, especially the stars, doing this all the time. It weakens the game and slows down the action.) This was an excellent way for Rome to re-direct the conversation back to basketball rather than whatever it was Stern thought he was doing. But once again, Stern didn’t take the high road:
“Well, no. But listen, you’ve been successful at making a career out of it, and I keep coming on, so …” Stern said.
“Making a career out of what, though, commissioner?” Rome interrupted. “See, I take great offense to that. Making a career of what? Cheap thrills?”
“What offense are you taking? You’re taking offense?” Stern asked.
I really do not buy Stern’s “I didn’t do anything” response here. Neither did Rome.
“I am. Now I am,” Rome answered. “If you’re saying I’ve made a career out of cheap thrills …”
“… taking on the world, and now Jim Rome is pouting? I love it,” Stern said.
Um, excuse me? Why do you wish to keep escalating an already bad situation, Mr. Commissioner? (Especially when this was entirely your own fault.)
Here’s the rest of the transcript:
“I’m not pouting; I take offense,” Rome said. “There’s a difference between pouting and taking offense. I take offense like you took offense to the question. What if I said — were you pouting when I asked the question?”
“What offenses? Do you want to hang up on me?” Stern asked.
“No, I can’t hang up on you, because I’m running out of time — I would never hang up on you,” Rome said.
“OK,” Stern said. “Listen, I’ve got to go call somebody important, like Stephen A. Smith, right now. He’s up next.”
“All right, you go make that call, and I’ll go talk to somebody else, too, I guess,” Rome said.
“All right,” Stern said.
“All right, commissioner. Have a nice day,” Rome said. “I did not hang up on him — we are officially out of time. We will come back and reset that momentarily. Stay tuned.”
As writer Dan Devine of “Ball Don’t Lie” said, Stern should not have done this because Stern is a “grown-ass man.” Devine also said, earlier in his critique:
Setting aside the moral/ethical/sensitivity argument you might make — “Hey, we probably don’t need to evoke domestic violence during a sports talk radio interview, especially when it’s not one about, y’know, domestic violence” — this wasn’t a loaded question. There most certainly was a way for Stern to answer Rome’s question — which, again, was “Was the fix in for the lottery?” — without in any way implicating the league in any impropriety.
Exactly right.
This is undoubtedly the strangest sports story in the past ten years or more, because here, we have a commissioner in David Stern who’d rather cause trouble for a sportscaster than talk about his own product — the teams who are playing in the NBA Finals (the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Miami Heat, to be exact).
Let me say it again, louder this time: David Stern would rather score cheap shots off Jim Rome than do his job, which is to promote NBA basketball. Stern shouldn’t behave this way no matter what questions Rome or any other sportscaster asks (even though Rome’s questions were fair), because it’s part of Stern’s job to handle the tough questions. (Otherwise, why accept the paycheck?)
And if I were an owner of any of the twenty-nine NBA franchises that aren’t owned by the NBA at this time, I’d be furious at Stern and be looking for a way to oust him over this. Because it’s just not right when a commissioner of a professional sport makes the story all about him, rather than about the players, coaches, or even the owners.
Just reviewed Maxton’s “The End of Progress” at SBR
Folks, if you haven’t read Graeme Maxton’s new book THE END OF PROGRESS: How Modern Economics Has Failed Us, you should. While it’s one of the most depressing books I’ve ever read — and while I pointed out, a few days ago at this blog, that Maxton has a few beliefs of the odder sort regarding the Internet, blogs, and opinions — this is an important book that needs to be read and debated.
Put simply, one of Maxton’s most important premises is that the world’s finite resources (such as water, oil, and agricultural land) aren’t being husbanded well. They also aren’t being valued properly on an economic level. Worse yet, because of this undervaluing, there’s a real problem due to how quickly these resources are being used up.
Another of his important premises — that capitalism, per se, only works when ethics and restraint are involved, as Adam Smith pointed out back in 1776 in THE WEALTH OF NATIONS — needs to be pondered by many. Because somewhere along the line, way too many of our business leaders and power brokers have completely lost our way.
Anyway, go read my review, then go read Maxton’s book.
Here’s the link:
Enjoy!
Lehman Widens Lead, is Senator-Elect
For those of you waiting for official Wisconsin recall news, here’s a news flash for you: John Lehman is still the Senator-elect from Racine’s state Senate District 21.
On Tuesday, June 12, 2012, the official canvass re-ran the numbers from the June 5, 2012 election. The only thing that changed is that former Sen. John Lehman (D-Racine) widened his narrow lead over incumbent Sen. Van Wanggaard (R-Racine) to 834 votes instead of the previous 779.
Please see this link from the Racine Journal-Times for further details:
Here’s a brief quote from that article:
The results totaled Tuesday increased Lehman’s lead by 55 votes, but Wanggaard as of Tuesday afternoon had not conceded and had not ruled out a recount, with his campaign manager citing reports of voting irregularities.
The final total was Lehman with 36,351 votes and Wanggaard with 35,517 votes, Racine County Clerk Wendy Christensen read Tuesday after finishing the canvass for the 21st Senate District at the Racine County Courthouse, 730 Wisconsin Ave.
Of course, the Democratic Party is calling on Wanggaard to concede, especially due to the analysis done by this Journal-Times article from June 6, 2012, that proves Lehman, a Democrat, won the Senate district while Scott Walker and Rebecca Kleefisch, Republican incumbents, won the races for Governor and Lieutenant Governor. Here’s the first three paragraphs from that article, which describes what happened:
While it appears Democratic challenger John Lehman led state Sen. Van Wanggaard, R-Racine, in the 21st Senate District, in those same wards Republican Gov. Scott Walker won over his Democratic challenger Tom Barrett.
Walker had 36,505 votes to Barrett’s 35,744, and, in total, 916 more people in the senate district voted in the governor’s race than in the senate race, according to unofficial results.
Lehman said he couldn’t really explain the difference in the votes. But he said possibly he is better known in the 21st Senate District than Barrett. For instance, some voters may have had him as a teacher, Lehman said. Also he said, “I really think a lot of people have questioned Sen. Wanggaard’s representing them and the way he has gone about it.”
My analysis of this occurrence is simple: Wanggaard, as I’ve said before, is a past City of Racine policeman and a police union representative. Everyone who votes in the City of Racine knew that, which is why Wanggaard lost there by a 2-to-1 margin; in the county, Wanggaard needed to win by a substantial margin to make up that difference. Wanggaard couldn’t do it.
Now, what has to be extremely difficult for Wanggaard to swallow is this: going back to his vote on SB 10 last year, had Wanggaard voted with Dale Schultz of Richland Center to oppose that bill, the likelihood is that Wanggaard would not have been recalled despite the many other things the district did not agree with Wanggaard about (such as Wanggaard’s signing of the non-disclosure agreements regarding redistricting, or Wanggaard’s agreement with the rest of the sitting Republicans in the Senate that state education funding should be slashed, which substantially hurt the Racine Unified School District). Wanggaard did support, along with Schultz, a proposed amendment that would have allowed for collective bargaining to be reinstated after two years — a “sunset” provision under the law — but procedural moves by the Republican leadership in the Senate kept that amendment from ever going to the floor. Schultz’s opposition to SB 10 was largely due to the refusal of the R leadership to hear his amendment, which is why if Wanggaard had followed Schultz’s lead and voted against SB 10 — which would’ve meant the R Senators would’ve won the day with a 17-2 margin instead of 18-1 — Wanggaard likely would never have been forced to this recall election.
Ultimately, Wanggaard was done in by his own inexperience. My guess is that he didn’t really know what was going on when he took that vote — at least, he didn’t realize the district would recall him over it (even though I, and others, wrote to him and told him bluntly that this would be the result). And his own leadership, which perhaps forgot about the fact that former Sen. George Petak (R-Racine) was recalled in District 21 in 1996 for far less than this, may have believed that everything would “blow over” — if so, they were plain, flat wrong — or may have believed that due to redistricting, had Wanggaard just been able to get to November of this year, he’d be in a “safe” Republican seat that would not recall him.
But I have news — people in Racine County were upset with Wanggaard, too. Not as many of them as in the City of Racine, demonstrably — but enough that Wanggaard could not make up Lehman’s lead. And with this split-ticket voting (where some people voted for Walker/Kleefisch on the one hand and Lehman on the other), along with some people either writing their own names in or refusing to vote for Senate at all due to their disgust with Wanggaard’s hypocrisy, it’s obvious there were more than enough people in the entirety of District 21 to recall Van Wanggaard.
So, what does Wanggaard do now? His options are two: request a recount by Friday, June 15, 2012, something he’ll have to pay for himself as the margin of Lehman’s apparent victory is large enough that the state of Wisconsin will not pay for the recount. Or concede.
My belief is that Wanggaard will request a recount, which is sensible from his context. He probably wants to know, for a certainty, the hard data that backs up this “split ticket” phenomenon from a hand recount. And he also probably wants to know, for a certainty, that the voters of Racine really did reject him, personally — especially as they retained Walker and Kleefisch.
But the hand recount won’t change the facts: Wanggaard has lost this race to Lehman.
And ultimately, even though I do feel sorry for him as he’s the first one-year Senator in Wisconsin’s history to ever get recalled, Wanggaard has no one but himself to blame. Because no matter what the Republican leadership in Madison told him last year, he should’ve remembered what happened to Petak in 1996 as he lived in Racine at the time and was active in Republican politics, and avoided this result by casting his vote with Schultz against SB 10. Period.
Obvious Takes, Pt. 1: Most Blogs are Opinions
Folks, I never thought I’d have to write these words, but here they are: most blogs, believe it or not, are opinions.
This is such an obvious thing to talk about, but apparently there are people out there who don’t realize this simple fact. For example, if you blog specifically about sports, most of what you’re talking about are your opinions about what’s going on in the world of sports. Ditto for politics (except double that, and then some), current events, and just about everything else.
Yet some people are concerned that the quality of writing on the Internet is so low that it’s leading people to forget this. Take economist Graeme Maxton, for example. In his recent book THE END OF PROGRESS: How Modern Economics Has Failed Us, Maxton said on p. 76:
It is not just that much of the information on the Internet is of dubious provenance, it is that much of what is posted as “fact” is actually opinion.
Maxton also goes on to say on p. 77 that:
The Internet is a particular problem. As well as offering a cozy home for factual mistakes or a platform for those with ill-thought-out opinions, there is the diversion it provides. Studies’ show that people who read text that is scattered with hyperlinks understand less than those who read the old-fashioned printed word.
Note that Maxton does not directly reference these studies, as there is no endnote available. He also does not discuss anything specific regarding any actual studies that have been done in this paragraph, though in the next paragraph down he references a book by Nicholas Carr called THE SHALLOWS: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains that discusses the problem of hyperlinks and Web pages.
And, if you read the above-referenced paragraph very carefully, you’ll note that Maxton doesn’t point out the excellent, fact-based and fact-checked blogs that do exist on the Internet; he instead seems to paint all blogs and everything on the ‘net with a broad brush. While it’s possible Maxton was making the case that fact-based research should not begin and end on the Web due to these limitations (a completely inoffensive statement), he cheapened his argument when he didn’t admit that at least some good, hard-hitting, factually-based articles have been posted on the Web — and that some of these hard-hitting, factually-based articles have certainly been posted on blogs.
So these words by Maxton, while to a certain extent truthful, are also a way for Maxton to frame the narrative. In this case, Maxton’s narrative is simple: “The Internet is creating a bunch of morons who can’t think for themselves. Because of that, people who read blogs on the Internet may not realize they’re actually reading opinions, rather than facts. We must fix this!”
Yet that narrative, while it does contain truth, is also an opinion, is it not? (And in a hard-bound book, no less. For shame!)
That said, Maxton’s words remain prescient because there unfortunately are people out there who will read just about anything, then parrot it back without much further thought. And at least some of those will send material “viral” that may not deserve to be read by many people — or at least may not deserve to be thought of as factual rather than the opinions most blogs truly are (this blog included).
Mind you, most people who read blogs do seem to understand the difference between fact-based commentary (which can and usually does offer an opinion) and opinions.
But just in case you’re one of the people who haven’t figured that out as of yet, consider this lesson #1 in the importance of being overly obvious. Because when it comes right down to it, most blogs are opinions, folks. And it shouldn’t take an economist like Graeme Maxton to tell you so, either.
Just reviewed Koch’s “Alien in the Family” at SBR
Folks, if you’re looking for a funny, light book about love between a human and an alien from Alpha Centauri, you might want to read Gini Koch’s ALIEN IN THE FAMILY. This book amused me to the point I read it three times; I thought the romance between Katherine “Kitty” Katt and Jeff Martini (AKA “the alien” who looks and acts like any human, except he has two hearts and can move at hyperspeed) was quite good. I liked Kitty’s friends, especially her BFF, international male model (retired) James Reader. And I thought the stuff about the A-Cs (what Koch calls her aliens) made sense, was well thought out, and added greatly to the book.
Before I forget, here’s the link to the review:
Now, back to the commentary.
So with all that, you might be wondering, “Why did Barb give this book only a B-plus?” (Not that this isn’t a good grade; it is.) Simple — every person in there is just too good-looking for words. And that’s not plausible. Not even in SF/romance.
Here’s the deal, folks; Koch says her A-Cs are mind-bogglingly, stunningly gorgeous. I buy that; they’re aliens. (Who knows how much genetic engineering they’ve been through in the recent or not-so-recent past?) But then, all of the people Kitty’s around are great-looking, too, including CIA agents, her sorority sisters from college, etc. — and I just do not buy this at all.
Further, it weakens a romance when there’s even the hint of the thought that normal-looking people (or those like me, attractive but “big, beautiful women”) maybe don’t have the right to fall in love. Or at least in this capacity, Kitty would rather not see them fall in love, or have anything to do with them — which is really quite distasteful, if you think about it overmuch.
That being said, this is a humorous SF romance so of course it’s not to be taken overly seriously. (That is, if Kitty really were in the CIA or affiliated with them, she’d have to expect that a few of them wouldn’t be stunningly gorgeous; actually, most of them would probably be nondescript sorts, all the better to blend into the background.) But as it was something that just kept hitting me across the face as there aren’t any normal-looking (or under) people that Kitty references in ALIEN IN THE FAMILY at all — certainly not among the primary, secondary, or even tertiary leads — I had to mention it.
If not for this really odd quirk (something I wish more romance writers would get beyond, especially if they’re writing SF/romance like Koch; she needs to study Lois McMaster Bujold for a while, who’s succeeded brilliantly at writing quirky characters who aren’t drop-dead gorgeous, but have extremely strong and believable romances anyway — I’d say “in spite of this” except that it’s because of who they are, warts and all that the romances work), this novel would’ve been an A-plus. But because of it, the best I could do is a B-plus, as it strains credulity way past the breaking point when there aren’t any characters who are worth a damn in a book that aren’t at least average looking (or below).
Mind you, Koch understands that her characters are must be extraordinary on the inside and have inner beauty, otherwise we won’t care about them no matter how glitteringly gorgeous they’re supposed to be on the outside. But her over-reliance on external beauty is extremely puzzling, not to mention off-putting; that I could get beyond this problem and enjoy her book so much anyway speaks to the fact that she really does write extremely well.
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One final thought: for those of you writing romance of any sort, please remember that ordinary-looking people can be great characters, too. Ordinary-looking people deserve great love stories, especially as it happens all the time that people meet, fall in love, and get married — with most people looking completely ordinary on the outside, but being completely extraordinary on the inside.
In other words, please try to let art imitate life, at least in this one, small degree. OK?
Barb Caffrey's Blog 