Hurry up and read this blog! Make that Evelyn Wood course pay off! Like John Madden's fast-actin' Tinactin, the word of the hour is Act Fast. Not wisely, not thoughtfully, but FAST!
That explains passage of the $789 billion stimulus package. Friday's roll call on the 1,073-page stimulus bill came less than 24 hours after the House-Senate conference committee completed its work.
The legislation is "among the costliestever considered in Congress," according to the Associated Press. No time to dawdle; no fair peeking at the text. Just pass the thing!
Apparently, the thing hit congressmen's desks full of cross-outs and hand-written over-writes. Here is U.S. Rep. Tom Price, R-Georgia. (By the way, opposition to this bill was bi-partisan: 7 Democrats in the House joined all Republicans to vote no.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A68eWFAbClA
Keep movin', movin', movin'
Though they're disapprovin'
Keep them doggies movin'
Rawhide
A kind of panicky, hell-bent for leather stampede is the order of the day. Here is Dave Zweifel on The Capital Times website:
If we don't want to miss a golden opportunity to bring commuterrail and other public transportation alternatives to Dane County, we need to act now.
We need to act fast if we're going to be able to take advantage of what could be a one-time opportunity to get significant financial help. The county has already scheduled four forums for later this month and in March to give citizens a chance to learn more about regional transportation authorities and how they work.
The gatherings will explain how a Regional Transit Authority can bring local governments together to cooperate on everything from expanded bus service to building park and ride spaces to public rail transit ... [Fast Action Needed On RTA]
(The hearings are 6 p.m. Feb. 23 at Middleton City Hall, 6 p.m. Feb. 26 at Stoughton City Hall, 6 p.m. March 2 at the DeForest Community Center, and 7 p.m. March 4 at the Sun Prairie library.)
March 4? That's not soon enough. Quick, hurry. Move up the dates! Hold them yesterday. Time, she is a wastin'.
Interrogatories to The Kathleen: How many years have you been in office? Twelve? And where is the North Mendota Parkway? Are they going to pour concrete this summer? Kathleen? Kathleen! Tempus fugit! Instead, she's wrapped her mandibles about a commuter train.
Good ol' Dave talks about a "funding mechanism." That's Lib-speak for MORE TAXES!
The train's first delivery: A new taxing authority. Unelected, not accountable to the voters. Just in time for the April 7 county executive election.
Don't try to understand 'em
Just rope 'em, pull and brand 'em
Soon we'll be living high and wide
Hyaa!
How liberals think
Research into the globulous mass that fills the craniums of the Left continues here at Blaska's Blog Experimental Research Center and Work Farm. First on the dissecting table is Ed Garvey. Ed, any pain? Mind if we proceed? Ed? Anyway this is Ed on Saturday:
Huzzah!The stimulus package passed. Not in time to save the Madison Rep, but maybe intime to save the nation.
What? No porculus for the Madison Repertory theater? Some "stimulus" package! Baffling.
On the next slab lies (in both senses of the word) domestic terrorist William Ayers. Here he is in the Sunday N.Y. Times Magazine:
"The election of Obama is an important strike against white supremacy. On the other hand, if you claim we're in a post-racial society, how do you explain the fact that 40 percent of black kids under 5 live in poverty?"
Are you talking to me, Bill? (Cue Travis Bickle.) Are you asking me? How do I explain it, Bill? Isn't it obvious? It's because pointy white hoods and flammable crosses are flying out of the WalMart and the Target stores. They can't keep up with demand! It's because the 13th and 14th Amendments have been repealed.
It is because people are not causative agents who make decisions that can affect their lives for better or worse. It's because holding father responsible for running out on the mother after impregnating her would be so anti-counter-cultural! It's because all the Pigs have not yet been Off'd! Not that you didn't try, Bill.
The party of ideas
Fred Barnes' interview this weekend in the Wall Street Journal with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush is a must read. Jeb credits Tommy Thompson and John Engler of Michigan as mentoring his own highly successful eight years as governor of our fourth-largest state.
And he proves worthy of those governors as a man of ideas.
What comes through when Mr. Bush is asked about education is how radical his views are. He would toss out the traditional K-to-12 scheme in favor of a credit system, like colleges have.
"It's not based on seat time," he says. "It's whether you accomplished the task. Now we're like GM in its heyday of mass production. We don't have a flourishing education system that's customized. There's a whole world out there that didn't exist 10 years ago, which is online learning. We have the ability today to customize learning so we don't cast young people aside."
"The idea that somehow Sweden would be the land of innovation, where private involvement in what was considered a government activity, is quite shocking to us Americans," Mr. Bush says. "But they're way ahead of us. They have a totally voucherized system. The kids come from Baghdad, Somalia -- this is in the tougher part of Stockholm -- and they're learning three languages by the time they finish. . . . there's no reason we can't have that except we're stuck in the old way."
"I think it would be great politically for President Obama" to break with one of his party's interest groups, Mr. Bush says. "I hope it's the teachers' union. [Wall Street Journal: Republicans Must Be a National Party]
Be certain to vote this Tuesday, February 17, for Superintendent of Public Instruction. If you want the teachers union to continue to control education in Wisconsin, vote Tony Evers. He's WEAC's marionette. If you would like to take back control of education, you have two excellent choices:
RoseHernandez, who took on WEAC and won in defense of virtual schooling or
Van Mobley, a Concordia University professor who is a strong proponent of Milwaukee choice schools and of Tommy Thompson's fiscally responsible "qualified economic offer."
Hurry! Act now!
One Wisconsin, Two-Faced
I am indebted to Jim Wigderson, proprietor of the Wigderson Library and Pub, for calling out Scot Ross and his liberal cover group, One Wisconsin Now. With its own murky financing, One Wisconsin Now displays a delicious double standard by asking that Justices Gableman and Ziegler recuse themselves for third-party expenditures over which they had no control but then having nothing to say on incumbent State Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson for raking in the cash from interests with business before the court. [The One Wisconsin Now contortionist act]
Now sing along as
welcome their new trail boss, Barack:
Rollin', rollin', rollin' Rollin', rollin', rollin' Rollin', rollin', rollin' Rollin', rollin', rollin' Rawhide!
Rollin', rollin', rollin' Though the streams are swollen Keep them doggies rollin' Rawhide
Rain and wind and weather Hell bent for leather Wishin' my gal was by my side All the things I'm missin' Good vittals, love and kissin' Are waiting at the end of my ride
Move 'em on, head 'em up Head 'em up, move 'em on Move 'em on, head 'em up Rawhide
Count 'em out, ride 'em in Ride 'em in, count 'em out Count 'em out, ride 'em in Rawhide
Keep movin', movin', movin' Though they're disapprovin' Keep them doggies movin' Rawhide
Don't try to understand 'em Just rope 'em, pull and brand 'em Soon we'll be living high and wide My hearts calculatin' My true love will be waitin' Be waitin' at the end of my ride
Hyaa!
Rollin', rollin',rollin'
Hyaa!
Rollin', rollin',rollin'
Hyaa!
Rawhide!
Rawhide!
