Here's What's Bad About School Choice

In his wrong-headed and wrongly defended piece promoting school choice, economic consultant Larry Kaufman asks what’s wrong with school choice.  Well, Larry, here’s your answer. School choice shows a fundamental lack of understanding to the purpose of public education by ignoring the effects of the privatized-style system of school choice.  And, being a former educator, I believe I have a slight touch more insight into the perils of school choice than, say, a professional economist who never taught fifth grade as far as I can tell.

First, we have to acknowledge school choice is by definition a private school model, which Larry doesn't do.  He says that school choice isn't privatization.  Now, parents are given a check by the state and then schools, all schools - private, public, religious, online, doens't matter - presumably compete for those dollars.  Competing for dollars is a private, business style model.  It's pretty simple.

Now,  how exactly they will they compete is never outlined by school choice advocates.  The simple belief is that they compete by being better than their competitors by touting achievement, test scores, and success rates.  If that were the case and we actually responded to our sensible angels like that, we'd all drive Volvos for their safety and everyone would eat vegetables instead of soda and wads of fried meat.

So how schools compete will be with famous graduates or maybe tailoring education tracts to specific audiences to lure them in, such a strong football school or focusing on teaching a particular political bent to history and science.   Promising more "family time," things like that.  The goal of the education shifts then from simply educating the students the best you can to manipulating a slice of the public into believing your school is the best school for their children in order to financially survive and crush the competition, while providing an education suited to the brand sold.  To suggest this is anything other than a privatized model is ridiculous.  To suggest that the concept of education does not suffer when we stop trying to create the education we need and focus instead on creating the education we want to buy is foolish.  We'll wind up with the fried meat wad version of education that makes us feel good and that we agree with and that's all.  (Assuming math doesn't get real sexy in the future.)  It'll provide the critical thinking opportunities available in your average comments section of a news story because schools will be afraid to challenge anyone from their customer pools.  Yes, some schools will be brave, and they may be rewarded, but how many parents would really be willing to send their kids to schools that will challenge their beliefs...and how many administrators would be willing to take a chance on that bravery, or will they give up and chase the dollars?

Here is where school choice unravels as a statewide model for public schools further, while ignoring the drastic shift in focus away from actual education to a commodized education detailed above for the time being.  Let’s start small and seemingly inconsequential with a worry of a statewide school-choice model.  Schools would be forced to advertise in a variety of media to get the customers/students in the doors. 

Honestly, how else will a public know which are the “good” schools and which are the” bad” schools?  And what choice will a school have but to advertise especially if another school can afford to advertise?  And would attack ads be allowed, like some kind of daisy-and-the-mushroom-cloud-style ad explaining that one elementary school is so much better than another?  Do you want to see that ad promoting third grade programs like a Cardinal Stritch ad?  Will the check from the government to the parents be enough to cover a school’s advertising budget?  I tend to think not.

The checks will undoubtedly cover “tuition” for the student and end there.  The amount of this tuition check will surely be a political tool, going up and down at the whims and vagaries of whichever party is in charge, but it won’t cover the actual cost of the education that can be guaranteed due to our irrational phobia of taxes, but apparent acquiescence to fees.  While I'm thinking of this, you also know that eventually the voucher would be a government entitlement sought to be cut entirely by Republicans.  There is no explicit guarantee of an education in the Bill of Rights, so clearly The Founders wouldn't have wanted us to educate anyone.  You can hear that just as clearly as me, right?  Sean Hannity.  He'll say it.  He may have already said it for all I know.


 Public schools already charge ancillary fees to cover expenses for things like books, but if they are competing for state dollars, the cost of that competition will surely be passed on to the parents through a variety of fees to pay for that advertising or any number of cleverly worded levies to pay for programs meant to lure students into the schools.  I bet they’ll be called “enrichment fees.”  Regardless of how the amount is packaged, the cost of a marketed “good” education will surely be higher than what is paid now by parents just so the schools can try to compete.  And I bet right now at the best private schools the price for tuition per pupil is higher than public school students.  I may be wrong on this, I have no numbers to back me up, but even if you gave the vouchers to everyone, to cover the costs of one of these dream schools we picture in our minds when we think "private school" (like something with ivy on brick walls and smart future-y furniture inside) would far exceed the voucher amount, so what struggling economic family could afford the overage for tuition beyond the voucher.  Those who can't afford that extra bit of money go where, exactly?  Cheap schools?  You really want to make the creation of "cheap schools" a goal because undoubtedly "cheap schools" would need to be created since not everyone could afford the extra tuition for the good schools.

Cost of education does not get at the heart of the issue yet either, but we’re circling down to it, and we can see how a school choice movement ripples out to effect more than just being allowed to be a good school for your child.  Let’s think of the students.  Presumably, school choice would let parents send their kids to whichever school they want and equally presumably they would choose the best school.  It does stand to reason that a good majority would choose the best school to send their kids.  However, that “best school” simply will not take all of those who applied.  It can’t.  It’s bad business.


Their reputation and revenue stream is at stake with every child admitted.  Enrollments at the best schools would be capped artificially.  The best schools will have admittance tests surely to control their brand and image.   So, ultimately, “school choice” will shift the power to these select schools to choose which students get the premium education sought by everyone.   I get that this is a bit of doomsday prediction and I don’t think that it would happen overnight, but down the road, as competition stiffens and schools struggle to stay afloat, why would they take a risk on the kid with poor reading skills, or a diagnosed learning disability, or parents who may not have the money to pay the enrichment fees or maybe the one kid who could change their student/pupil ratio.

Also this cost to bring school to market greatly benefits private schools with endowments and private education firms already in the business.  Your local school will fail simply because they won't have the financial stability to stay afloat, or the pot of money to design, advertise and implement the programs needed to attract people. It will be bought by Kaplan or a private university type venture, they'll slap the logo over the front of the school - erasing a small bit of local history that comes with public school names , unless they go with the "brought to you by" route of naming rights, like "Samuel Gompers Elementary: A Division of EduDyne" or some crud like that.  Assuming that the school won't be dissolved in favor of online education, which would be substantially cheaper to run, though far, far less useful. (Hard to teach things like sharing online & teamwork online to grade schoolers since they won't have that concrete experience of it.)

The end game of school choice limits the access to the quality public education even more than the current system by its cost via additional fees and enrollment caps used to help keep the schools economically viable.

In that lies the true devil of school choice.  Public education is about providing every child that walks into that door.  It doesn't matter about race, religion, parental political affiliation, or anything.  Every child deserves the best education.  And the best education isn't necessarily the education that they - or their parents - want.  For example, very, very few people want geometry.  The critical thinking, problem solving and math skills that result from geometry, they want, but how many people realize that?  How many more people will go, "Pthh! I don't use geometry and I'm just fine!  I want my son to be an engineer or a doctor, not a geometer!"  How many literature, history, social studies programs would be excised in favor hunting classes since that's what will bring students and therefore dollars?  How many passions will remain unstirred because some school was picked by a parent to not challenge or expose the student to a variety of views?

By the way, school choice does not ensure the things that plague schools will go away.  School choice does not address how to fix low test scores.  School choice does not address how to fix achievement inequality.  School choice does not address violence/drugs/gangs in schools.  It does nothing but swirls the money around into different hands.  How does that help?  It will, if anything, perpetuate all the bad parts of the current education system where some schools seem destined to succeed due to community & monetary support not available in other areas and those in bad areas economically and socially will continue to fail.  The poors will get the Wal-Mart schools, the riches get the William Sonoma schools.  Same as it ever was.

Schools are a product of the community around them.  No more, no less.  Fixing schools means fixing communities.  You cannot fix schools in a vacuum, or dealing only with them.  It's treating a symptom not the cause.  And school choice isn't even an appropriate medicine to take to even sort of fix education if you're going to treat it without going after trying to establish larger societal issues like community stability.

If you want to fix schools, the solution is to is to mimic what some charter schools have done that actually addresses education.  Lengthen the school year. Lengthen the school day.  Keep the kids in there longer, that's the goal.  Higher standards, more pressure and all that doesn't make sense.  If you want better education, you have to teach them more.  It's impossibly simple and it actually addresses education itself.  There's the benefits of the students not losing stuff to long pointless summer breaks.  Also the school days aren't blown up by the leakages and sucks on time that happens every single day so there's more time for subjects.  It gives teachers a chance to be a bit more innovative and cover more ground.  It would also probably allow for less homework for the kids because they could maybe get more out of the classroom time (if used wisely).

Lookit, I know all the pitfalls of the longer day & year arguments in terms of cost.  If you want good schools, you have to pay for it one way or the other.  We can't hop up and down demanding the best for the price we want to spend.  If that was the case, I would have a somehow American-made BMW that cost me a nickel, but that doesn't make sense.  The best costs.  It always does, it always will.  Lengthen the school year & day and pay for it with higher taxes.  Either we want the best or we don't.  If we don't, we got to be honest about the reason.

There's also the issue the bad teacher issue.  We treat this problem entirely wrong.  Pay teachers more and there would be fewer bad teachers.  We get pissy because a small section of the teachers are bad and we react by cutting all of their salaries or just making it hard on all teachers because we don't like that one cruddy biology teacher we had in 7th grade, so by god, all teachers everywhere must suffer.  Because of that behavior, the talented don't go in to teacher.  And you wind up with the talent pool we have, which is still full with a great many effective, kind, patient and compassionate teachers, but more would be drawn to it for higher pay.   Again, yes, it will cost you in taxes, but good.  You want the best?  Right?  Gotta pay for it.  A nickel won't buy you a Beamer, no matter how much you whine.

We got to talk about school accountability as well, and with that the answer is value-added testing.  If there must be a test, then that's the only test that makes sense for teachers.  Teachers help raise and shape students and provided much more lasting impacts on a student's life than just whether or not they did well on a single test.  This is like testing a parent for effective parenting and basing that parenting skill off one test toward the end of some select years of their life.  But you're going to test them about math to decide if they're a good parent.

Now, I understand the need for accountability because we have a hard time trusting the better angels of our nature when it comes to success in our jobs.  However we seem to be perfectly cool with trusting people with loaded weapons wherever the hell they want to go...but we won't trust a teacher to the their job....isn't that interesting.  But, it just makes too much sense to gauge a teacher's value on the growth made over a year rather that one moment in time.  This kind of test would probably need to be yearly, and to properly asses things like the growth and impact of teachers so each district is able to fully understand the data, it will cost more.  But again, nickels and Beamers.

I took all this time to say that school choice is a bogus and a false choice.  It does nothing.  It fixes nothing.  It addresses no problems of education.  What's the flipping use?

Retaking

This was taken the night of March 9 after the union busting was sliced from the Budget Repair Bill in a cover-of-night procedural maneuver.

Of all the nights I wish I had stayed in the capitol, this was the one where I felt most compelled and still feel guilty for leaving that night.

Reasons, Excuses, Rationalizing, Disappointment in Mankind and the Continuing Spirit

(photo by me of The Ed Show stage prior to the recall election results on August 9)

I'm sure you're aware that Democrats failed to pick up the required seats to flip control of the Wisconsin State Senate. They won only two of the six races yesterday, meaning Republicans hold the Senate with a 17 to 16 margin. Oh, sigh.

It's a slender majority, but when political parties don't listen to one another, where issues are legislated with a brand-loyalty hivemind instead of attempting to find a consensus, any majority will suffice.

I keep waffling between utter despondence and a kind of spunky silver-lining I-will-continue-to-fight mood now. It's something I'm going to struggle with all day today, and for a good long while probably.

The silver-lining to me is that these six districts were Republican held and on Republican turf (except for LaCrosse). All of these senators withstood the Democrat wave in 2008, so their districts were, for the most part, solidly Republican. In fact, Walker won these six districts in 2010 by an average of 13 points. So the waters we were fishing in for progressive change were shallow already. Many of these Repubs didn't even face challengers in their last election, so the chance of pulling this off was always slight. It never felt like they were slight here; no one ever uttered those words that maybe, just maybe, going after these six seats would be excruciatingly difficult and a little bit like tilting at windmills. No one ever admitted that and saying so now sure looks like rationalizing away a bad outcome, but what else can you do? The facts are the facts and Republican districts vote Republican which is why they are Republican districts after all. (Thank you, gerrymandering.) And why would you ever say, right from the start on this recall fervor, that, hey, this more than likely will just be a lost cause in these districts? Hard to motivate people if you're looking concrete hard odds right in the face, hard to make people feel the nearly impossible is possible talking like that.

And strides were made in these districts. And the fact that the Pasch/Darling race was close is good news. The Clark/Olsen race sure turned out disappointing, but Olsen's been running unopposed, and this underlines why that was happening. And two seats were taken for God's sake. No small feat. In one night, the the number of people successfully recalled in Wisconsin history doubled. And, if anything, this stands as a call for moderation in our state politics instead of the far right wing agenda that has less to do with benefiting Wisconsin than a vision of a complete profit-based, light caste system, corporatized society.

Also, this was not a statewide election, which everyone should note who is calling this a kind of failure or thinking that the recall Walker campaign will fail. The recall will happen, bank on it. The actual election will be tough though, which leads me to my greater disappointments here.

First, is the money in this election. Around $35 million or so was spent in this election. Alberta Darling, Repub from the billionaires club of northern Milwaukee & parts of Waukesha, had something like $9 million all to herself (counting outside spending & her own campaign dollars combined).

I know this had national attention and so on. I get that, but nine fucking million dollars? There's all kinds of things that money could be better spent on, like, say, a start up business that would employ some people.

The ads throughout the state were constant. The phone calls were constant. The door knocking was constant. On that note, there was record turn out, but it probably also tested the saturation/irritation level of the entire state of Wisconsin all because this unchecked money just flowed in from all over.

When I talked to people on the phone during my phone banking shifts, if they were pissy about the dozen phone calls, visitors & ads, I was quick to remind them that thanks to Citizens United, this is the world in which we live. Money, gobs of it, will be spent constantly and each time an important election happens, it will be like this. This total saturation will be the new normal so long as Citizen's United stands.

And if you think it is bad now, just wait until 2012 here in Wisconsin. Presidential election, Paul Ryan campaign, an open US Senate seat, state Assembly seats, state Senate seats (including people who just survived & won recall tonight) and a Walker recall. Are you kidding me? Political spending in Wisconsin next year will, undoubtedly, top $100 million easy. Very easy. It seems silly to suggest it will be under $100 million. We won't see a regular television ad all year. The blitz will drive people insane, dull people & the turnout, or some grand unplugging rebellion against all media sources.

My second disappointment is the idea that these are Republican districts in the first place. Yes, I don't understand Republicans in general with their fealty to wealth over country & state, and their manipulation of people with strong Christian beliefs into buying their trust-and-obey totalitarian aspirations for government, but the idea that there are districts that traditionally vote one way is downright absurd to me.

For example, Robert Cowles is a Republican in a Republican district that has been Democratic for 12 out of the last 100 plus years. There might be a reasonable explanation for this kind of brand loyalty, but over time party philosophies shift. Nixon era Republicans are probably closer to your modern era Democrat than the Republicans running around cheering the decline of the United States. The Republicans who cheered along with Reagan for workers rights are the same ones cheering their demise now. How is that possible?

So have the people of Cowles district changed so the party changed, or has the party changed and they changed with it? Which is the tail and which is the dog here? My inclination is to believe that the party announces a position, or takes up a particular view on an issue and the people follow because they identify themselves as a Republican. And in order to keep that self-identification, they vote with their party, or their being. And it's a loyalty that's disturbing. How can so many people, consistently, decide they'd rather vote party than their best interest?

For example, who can honestly be against clean water? How can anyone in their right mind be okay with wanting to loosen clean water regulations to make certain companies don't (further) poison our drinking water? How can a person stand up and say, "Sure, I trust you, Monsanto. There's no way gross negligence on your part would result in poisoning my water. Why would you ever allow gross negligence to happen? Safeguards. bah. Who needs them!" Actually, that's exactly what they would say, which defies all logic to me. They could say that while complaining loudly that they need concealed guns to protect themselves from danger. Well, dipshit, you can't shoot the cancer out of your water, so fat lotta good that gun's gonna do from actual danger. And you can't avoid cancer water, especially if you do things like shower or shave, but if you have even a little bit of sense, you can avoid situations where a gun is necessary. Regulations is the equivalent of concealed carry legislation. It's about protection, but it's protection that actually fucking works and no one needs to get murdered.

Whew, sorry about that digression, anyway, stand a Republican up and have him rail against clean water regulations and Republicans will vote for him like Pavlov's dog because he is a Republican and they're a Republican, so there you go, he's right. Logic & self-preservation be damned, they're Republican through and through. I know I'm underselling the point of political messaging and how you could spin revoking something like clean water protections a thousand ways to make it seem not that bad or even perhaps better for you & the ECONOMY* but when it comes down to it, agreeing with this political party is agreeing with poisoning water.

Why is that we get so attached to political parties & political figures like this that we're willing to make that kind of sacrifice? Makes you feel sad for humanity in that sense that we're essentially willing to poison ourselves for the sake of a shred of consistent personal identity.

But, with all that said, after all that bitching, I'm still hopeful that there is a dawn after all this night. There must be. Better angels of our natures must exist, somewhere, dormant under all this mess, confusion, and divisiveness. Even if there isn't a dawn or our better selves, even if all this is a fool's errand and we're caste system bound due to this slow motion totalitarian coup we're suffering through, what better fight is there than the good fight.

I have two phone bank shifts scheduled this weekend, and I might trade one for a road trip to a district to knock on doors. And I know my contribution is small. Minuscule even, so I shouldn't flatter myself or try to make what I'm doing to amount to anything special. But, this fight will go on. This fight goes on. As Fighting Bob LaFollette said, "We are slow to realize that democracy is a life, and involves continual struggle." Damn right, Bob. And I'm not stopping now.

viva wisco!

*yes, all caps, like how God gets a capital letter, but the ECONOMY is that much more more important, so that bitch is all caps.

It Begins for Me. (February 16)

(click picture to enlarge)

It's high time I share all the photos I took over the course of the protests while they were out screaming in earnest. Some of them turned out wonderfully (like the one above). Many blurry. Others were amateurish, but I meant well. I was involved in a lot of the marching and carrying on, so it was difficult to get a lot of well staged photos, plus my camera works terribly in low to moderate light.

I do plan on doing a bit of commentary, a bit of remembrance about each picture. But this one, I'm just going to let sit.

This is from the from the February 16, two days after the protests really began. I was down there the previous two days, but I forgot my camera, so there's no evidence of it. I really wish I could have taken a picture of the students on February 14 with their signs and everything waiting for the walk light to cross the street. I can't imagine they would do that now. This is the mark of when the numbers really started to get big. Click on the picture and enjoy.

viva wisco

New Fatness

I can tell my life has started to take shape because I'm concerned about my weight again. In the full throat of the protests and recall signature seeking and volunteering, my weight was not an omnipresent concern like it had been before. There was other serious shit going on, so my frivolous personal worries meant nothing. Now, I'm seeing bulges under my shirt where none had been before, some button up shirts once loose are now tight and I'm fretting over food choices (yet not making better choices just the same) and working out & self-loathing everyday. Good to see that I can get back to old habits.

Right now, I'm sitting somewhere between 227 and 222 pounds. When my scale is activated, it has this ambient 5 pound reading on there. I'm not sure how or why that's going on, though I bet it has something to do with the angle of the floor in the bathroom. So, I can just subtract that amount from my total. Right? That's the way it should work. No reason to assume that the scale somehow corrects itself at higher weights, right? No, of course not. I should subtract 5 pounds from whatever the total is showing. Anyway, the last time I weighed myself, it showed 227, so I think I weight 222 pounds (maybe).

While this is still much, much better than where I was years ago at 350+, 222 to 227 represents a 9 to 14 pound gain from my all-time low of 213 last year. And I'm not that 350 pound dude anymore and I haven't been. No one I know in Madison has ever seen me at that weight, and only one person I talk to currently knows me from a heavier time. Madison Bryan is light nearly hairless creature who likes to bicycle to work and has awesome music tastes & righteous politics. Old Bryan (heretofore known as Old Tub) with this nu-metal, donut, fast food, and soda pop love is long gone, just like his hair. I was downright svelte last year, now I'm back to pudgy. Rather I feel pudgy. Empirically, I'm not that bad. Medically, I'm probably obese. Bryanly, I gotta take better care of myself.

But...but...but...

See there are new challenges. I'm a touch older. I have chronic tailbone pain that just kills me when I do activities like biking. No, I haven't asked a doctor about it. Come on, now. What do you take me for? Someone who does things like that? Please. Also I need new running shoes because while I love running, each time I tried I hurt myself to the point where I couldn't run or bike for two days after thanks to knee and calf pain. The shoes I have are pretty old and are cheapo Nikes from Kohls, so I imagine there are better shoes out there that will help me not hurt myself. Plus, with new challenges, politics have become the mother of all time sucks. I want to know more constantly. Facebook has become an evil motherfucker in taking up all my time, reading up about how the governor of this state is ruining one thing or another thing or doing something else dastardly. His latest, okaying half a million dollars in outside legal fees to defend his union-busting bill. See, we're a broke state, so we need to make sure to spend a half million dollars on outside-government legal fees in order to remove rights. You know...for the savings. Motherfucker.

See the problem with saying that "we're broke" you begin to expect government to behave as it if it were actually broke and not doing shit like that.

Argh! Look at that. Again, distracted, irritated and wanting to pursue and explicate to everyone why he's wrong. Not that I know the actually numbers of why he's wrong, but this is not what good government looks like. It should never have to look like this, behave like this, or pursue such ideas so blindly.

Whew. That is why I'm having a hard time staying on task with writing, reading, losing weight and just taking care of me. How can I be worried about such things when there's a fight for the soul of a state and a region I've grown to really care about? Shouldn't I be doing that, all the time? Every moment where I'm not calling people, or doing something to make a difference, aren't I wasting it? And that's not to say I believe I'm some kind of difference maker, but dammit...every moment I'm not doing something politically charges to help reclaim the state, I feel upset at myself. And now, looking in the mirror, I've seen I've neglected myself. Not writing, not reading, not doing any of that. But I have to and goddamnit I'm going to try.

So, here's to doing everything and doing it well because that seems to be my only choice. I know it'll be unhealthy, but it's what's I must do.

I had set a private goal of losing 20 to 30 pounds by my birthday, but that probably won't happen. I just need to lose 5 pounds by the end of August, recall at least 3 Republican legislators, push the serving Democrats to a more meaningful left (not just Republican light, but honest to god fair/progressive tax reform for starters), read more (like finish that goddamn American Rust book) and write every day. Every damn day. That doesn't seem so hard, does it?

viva wisco y me

Debt Ceiling

Is it possible that Republicans want to default on the debt ceiling? I think so. Unfortunately.

Maybe my line of thought is ridiculous, but if you think of all the countries that wind up needing help from the International Monetary Fund due to bankruptcy, to get it, they must submit their country to serious Milton Friedman-style privatization of everything.

So, maybe, if Republicans can kill our worldwide credit score by defaulting on the debt that would start us rolling toward needing to sell off all government holdings and strip away regulations in order to appease those with the money who could help us out. Is this crazy to think this? I doesn't feel crazy. It should. It really should. But then again, they are slaves to privatization, not country. These Republicans aren't patriots of country, but patriots of wealth. Plutocrats I think they're called.

I'm not 100% what the US government would have to sell off though. NASA, probably. Roads for sure. Social security & Medicare would be sold off first, most def. Schools would be cashed in on. Any other government "funding" things out there that seem like a cash cow that I'm missing? Utilities, sure.

Maybe I'm nuts to be worried about it in these terms. But doesn't it sort of look like it?

viva wisco

I think the best bar name ever would be The Ease It Inn.

Please don't steal that idea.

viva wisco

Desperate for Blood in the Water

On Friday, I went to the Solidarity Singalong on the capitol steps. I've listened to the singalong quite a few times, but I'm not a regular singer at all. By that I mean I sing terribly, an atonal bumblebee best describes my singing voice. But today I went just for the fun of it and I had heard it was "March on Your Capitol Day" so I thought maybe there would be a large crowd. The Singalong was bigger than usual and they even had a band backing them this time, which was pretty cool.

I had gone with a friend from work and she was carrying her usual protest sign that says "Blame Wall Street." We're walking back, chatting, minding our own business (except for the sign, of course). When this lady in a blue Lexus SUV, probably early 2000s model, license plate 801SFK rolls up next to us.

This lady taunts from her rolled down car window, "I'm a Scott Walker fan, la, la la!" I turn around to look at the lady and she's got this wild-eyed look of anticipation on her face. She was wanting something for me and my work friend. You can always tell someone who wants a little piece of your ass and she was spoiling for a fight. One of the classic motorist versus pedestrian fights that are always high on rhetoric. Clearly she wanted to engage in a valuable debate on the merits of her ignorance and my righteousness.

Anyway, I freeze up. The only quick retort I supplied myself with was, "There's no accounting for taste," which doesn't make sense. So, being that I couldn't be clever enough, nor did I want to scream "Cunt!" at her (that wouldn't have been decent; however, a true statement, verily), I turned, rubbed my chin and shook my head. I'm kind of embarrassed to by the since of nerves I felt when she said that from the window and that I couldn't cook up of something better to say.

So, I keep going on my way. Then I hear from the blue Lexus SUV, "Hey, don't flip me off, asshole!"

Now, I'm a little surprised, being that I did not flip her off. Neither did my co-worker. Upon further review, my rubbing of my face must have been construed as flipping her off. Apparently, rubbing the side of one's face while thinking, "Man, I really should have shaved today" is the equivalent in some cultures or exurbs of Madison as flipping someone off. I don't flip people off sincerely. It's a pretty ridiculous gesture, don't you think? Look, it's my finger! Come on? That's offensive? It's a finger. I see fingers all the time. I've never been shocked at the sight a finger, particularly when still attached to a hand and in the appropriate slot for the finger length.

So I turn around, and there she is, the Lexus driver who just called me an asshole, flipping me off from her now rolled up window. Again she had that kind of froggy look in her eye where you know she just wanted me to do something. Give her a little shout, something. All I could do was just shake my head, laugh at her. And also write her license plate down. I won't do anything with it, though. But I did write it in my notebook in case she blew through a red light or sped or something illegal. Being a cunt in public isn't much of an offense in my book, so I needn't call the cops on her.

Anyway, she was so spoiling for someone to confront her for being a bitch she had to invent a reason to yell asshole at someone, anyone, that was a protester. I bet she rode a couple laps around the capitol to yell insults at the Solidarity Singalong people because...because...I don't know. To vent? To feel superior? Probably that last one. Bitches, man. Damn.

I've stewed on this for a day. It's pretty funny still, I think, but today I see that Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Prosser (yes, the one that was just barely re-elected despite his asshole credentials) choked a fellow Supreme Court Justice during a heated argument. There is a conflicting story that says the choked Justice may have lunged at Prosser, which to me sounds a bit like the "she was asking for it" or the "she fell down the stairs" or "she ran right into the knife, 14 times, I swear" kind of defense...and the "lunging" story is attributable to one, unnamed source, who also said that no pressure was exerted during the choke hold. Now, I wonder which unnamed source would have the knowledge on the amount of pressure exerted in the choke hold AND have a reason to blame his actions on someone else...which I'm sure this "source" did before when he tried to blame the Chief Justice for when this source had to call her a "total bitch" and promised "to destroy" her.

And then there's the bit about how one of the Singalong people got battered by a Tea Party zealot.

I know what's going on here. People want to fight out their frustrations. Neither side wants to listen, so let's just fucking have it out. What a perfect time to allow concealed and carry legislation, right? Punching singers. Choking judges. My insignificant event. It's not enough that we're a divided state, and country, and will be for some time, I'm afraid, unless the revolution comes. This whole mess seems strangely orchestrated. The state gets catastrophically divided where you can't even buy beer or bratwurst without it being a political statement. So everyone is pissed and rather than maybe do something to stem the tide, be a little less of a prick, they ratchet things up more, to piss and divide everyone further. Then they pass a law making it cool to carry concealed guns pretty much wherever the hell we want. So we're an angry, armed populace, wanting so bad to get into a fight that we'll just make up reasons to do it, so long as we can feel justified in our contempt of this person. Doesn't it kind of feel that somebody, somewhere, for some reason sees this kind of division, hatred and potential violence as awesome, a great opportunity for something, so the pressure and divisiveness stays pedal down, just waiting for the first batch of firebombs to be tossed. I know, I know, put down the tinfoil hat. I'm in no way suggesting some grand conspiracy truly exists (that's insane), but it does feel strange to me, like there's some other game being played here that we're all not fully aware of or understand...which is a feeling I hate because it doesn't make sense and it's not a rational response. But how can anyone see all this, live through all this, and not have a response to want to change it, or compromise or something...unless all this vitriol is the desired response.

I don't know, man. After all, I don't have a Lexus SUV and I am, apparently, an asshole. Just please don't punch, choke or shoot me.

viva wisco

Why I Apologized to Russ Feingold

I met Russ Feingold recently. It was after his second visit to Walkerville, at which he gave a rousing speech about how it was the free trade agreements that started us to the path we have now economically, how corporate interests sully every level of our political system and how we should never, ever quit fighting. It was good speech. Check YouTube; it'll be on there someplace.

While others did crowd Russ to shake his hand or grab pictures after he left the podium, I hung back. Oh, I wanted to mix it up and I was there on the outskirts of the melee of people having him sign things, or sticking out their hand for a quick political grasp. It turned into a scrum, so I backed off. Hard to see the value of this kind of thing. That's not really meeting him, it's harassing. Plus, it is absurd that people do that to those we admire. What's the value of crushing in around people like that? It means nothing to them, little to you, and really nothing is accomplished. Evolutionarily, I wonder why we do it. Does getting closer and touching those we admire mean something to our lizard brain? What? To prove that maybe this thing we admire or like is a tangible thing so we must touch it to prove in our hearts that, yes, it truly exists? I don't know, and I'm off topic. Anyway, I didn't crowd the man.

Emily and I biked home from the event and we just lucked into Russ Feingold outside of a restaurant at downtown Madison. We stopped, talked for a second, shook his hand, and I apologized to him. It was a glorious moment, one that I'll remember for quite a while. Shame that I didn't get a picture with him, but that'll be for another time, if I'm lucky enough to meet him again.

I was stupid giddy about meeting him, too. I called my buddy Seth right afterwards and said, "Dude, I met fucking Russ Feingold! I shook his fucking hand!" I smiled for hours afterwards. The next morning, I couldn't wait to tell the people I worked with that I met Russ Feingold. I'm still surprised this happened.

Anyway, I told him that I was sorry that I did not campaign for him, that I only voted for him. I promised myself that I would apologize to him if I ever got the chance and, by god, I did it.

Now, why? Russ was going to lose in the election because of any number of forces lined up against him. There was probably nothing I could have done to reverse the outcome of this election, but the results bugged me just the same. It irritated me that so many people would vote against Feingold for...Christ, I still don't know why people voted against Feingold. They just did.

That sense of irritation is what bugged me though and stuck with me. If I was so irritated, so upset that Feingold lost, why didn't I do anything to stop it, or at least try to stop it? Even if I failed, which I probably would have, how much right to my feelings do I have if I made zero effort to produce a different outcome? None. I felt I had no right to complain, no right to feel this irritation, this loss, this anger of him losing because I didn't do shit about it. I could hold no claim to my indignation.

It seems silly, maybe. I am but one nervous and shy man, who still lacks the conviction for bold choices after all. I may not make much of a difference, but I can at least try in my own small, quiet way and own some responsibility to affect the changes I believe in.

That's why I apologized. He embodies what I want in a politician and what happens if not enough people care. I did not stand up or even try to stand up for what I believed in. It's embarrassing. Oh, I put a bumper sticker on my car, big deal. Have you ever had your mind changed with a bumper sticker with someone's last name and a number on it? I should hope not.

But that's why I am where I am now. All this stuff I'm doing. The phone banking. Chanting. Protesting. Boycotting. Donating. All of it all ties back to Russ Feingold losing that election because never again would I not at least try.

So, again, I'm sorry I let you (and myself) down in 2010, Russ Feingold. It won't happen again.

viva wisco

Because What's a Blog Without a Preamble Post and Acknowledging It

I've tried blogging a few times on a few platforms. Mustaches and weight loss preoccupied me mostly then, as they do now. I quit each time, disenchanted with the process of doing this, worrying about finding time to do it, and because I don't really find what I have to say required reading for anybody. I'm not a budding memoirist, nor do I feel compelled to share things about my uninteresting days because, frankly, they are uninteresting to me as well.

But I'm caught in this modern era of constant sharing combined with our own inflated sense of self, and also a desperate need to get some shit off my chest. So here I am.

As the title says, I'm here in Madison, Wisconsin, living through all the hoopla, upheaval, disappointment, disgust and joy of the protests here. By my reckoning, I've attended around 100 days worth of protesting. Carrying signs, taking pictures, taking videos. Screamed "Fox News lies!" as loud as I could during a live remote done by that propaganda machine. God help me, I own and operate a vuvuzela. I've collected recall signatures. I've phone banked. I've done it all save for sleeping in the capitol & the Walkervilles (yes, there were two).

However, I'm not all sunshine and lollipops about the protests, the movement or what have you. That's why I'm writing here, mostly. I'm trying to figure out why and what's keeping me from being some pinko socialist because, frankly, at times I feel like that's what I identify most anymore, and that in and of itself I find interesting because socialists I've seen and felt shamed into buying newspapers from make me uncomfortable (except John Nichols, he's all right). I've been radicalized by all the goings on in Madison, yet I'm only partly committed to my radical ways. The typical Christmas-and-Easter type of socialist you could say.

There's all that, plus, recently I went to a wedding. Yes, this will make sense. Not logical sense to you, but me, maybe, anyway, hang with this, a wedding was attended. During that time, I got to bro down with a couple friends I don't see often enough and we just bullshit pretty much non-stop about all kinds of useless stuff, but it was a blast. Like we talked for 15 minutes about why would Doc Ock, from the Spiderman comics, even create metal tentacles with the ability to go bananas, possess you and turn you into a super-villain man-robo octopus. Wouldn't you not program that into the thing? Seems like something you would, could and most definitely should avoid. So there will probably be a dose of that here (and some loving odes to bad music on Sundays), probably even some diversions into literature as well in between working shit out about the aforementioned political concerns (though hopefully that's not all I'll be doing)

To sum up, let me steal a line from Todd Snider to really encapsulate this current blogging venture: I didn't come down here to change any of your minds about anything, I come down here to ease my own mind about everything. Cheers, all.

viva wisco

Special note on my hypocrisy: Notice how in the first couple paragraphs I take a swipe at this current need to overshare and entitlement & enshrinement of our opinions...do you see how often I used the pronoun "I" in this whole post? Just noticed that myself...

Reload

Okay. Let's try this again.