State Democrats Announce Jobs Program

I have to admit, Democrats came up with some very good ideas for job creation. Aside from increasing tax credits and caps to $8 million for those dirt poor angel investors, the rest of program is loaded with creative ways to bootstrap the free market without heavy government interference. Particularly with the green retrofitting, education and micro loans sections.

CORE Jobs Act Excerpt:
Our number one priority is to rebuild Wisconsin’s economy, and put our men and women back to work. The Wisconsin C.O.R.E. Jobs Act is a comprehensive economic development package that builds on successful job creation programs and capitalizes on the strengths of our state. C.O.R.E. stands for Connecting Opportunity, Research, and Entrepreneurship; and that’s what the CORE Jobs Act will do.

It certainly beats the state GOP's wealth redistribution program of more tax cuts to the wealthy, deregulation and the basic surrender of government agency and treasury to old money venture capitalists.

Email this article to a friend

Large Wastewater Rate Increase Expected In Janesville

I was holding back this post for a few days to see how the Janesville Gazette would report on the wastewater rate hike proposal as presented in the council agenda by the city administration. As it turns out the newspaper did not publish any report on the expected rate hike or agenda for Monday's city council meeting.

Agenda Excerpt:
As such, adjustments in the rates have occurred. This rate adjustment will generate an additional $2,125,200 in revenue in fiscal year 2010, or an overall increase in rates of 30.3%, effective January 1, residential 2010. The proposed rate adjustment will result in the average wastewater bill increasing by 29.3%, or $18.05 per quarter.

Let's back up a moment. For the past year, the Janesville water utility (with the help from the watchdog Gazette) repeatedly used the term "quarterly water bill" here and here rather loosely to help present a previous water rate increase. They pegged the average quarterly water bill at $40. For all practical purposes, Janesville residents do not receive a "wastewater bill" per se. Wastewater charges are included on the invoice most Janesville residents would call the "quarterly water bill."

Now that we're past that, it appears the city administration is making a slightly better effort to draw a distinction between the wastewater portion and the supply side on the "average quarterly water bill."From this we can assume the old average residential quarterly water bill was about $106 ($40 water supply + $61 wastewater and $5 fire department). After this latest increase including the one from earlier in the year, the new average "quarterly water bill" should be around $130.55

Well, we are still making assumptions. These figures may or may not include the fixed wastewater fee which the administration describes as rising disproportionately for different users. Got that? I would suppose that feature arose from the recently approved Clean Wisconsin agreement.

Still, the city administration appears to have made an effort this time and might begin to figure out what most people define as their water bill. Perhaps someday the term "quarterly water bill" in Janesville will mean just that - the total of all the charges from utilities that appear on our "quarterly water bill" and not just what administration officials want it to mean at any given time to fit their specific presentation or goal.

It's just as well the Gazette didn't run Monday's council agenda through their filter, at least now we see the information as it was intended - straight from the horse's mouth.

Revision: Only hours before the Janesville City council meeting, the Janesville Gazette posted a short blog entry? placing the projected "new" average quarterly water bill after the wastewater rate proposal at $120.40. This should be fairly accurate since the earlier water supply rate increase (mentioned in the above post) was replaced instead by Clean Wisconsin's progressive water rate policy.

Email this article to a friend

Are Auto Insurance Companies Piling On Increases?

Bear with me on this story as most of it is strictly from the cobwebs crossing the hallows of my mind.

Due to a heightened sense of financial vulnerability in my personal situation during the 1990’s, I went to my auto insurance agent and requested to have higher liability coverages for more protection. I don’t recall exactly what the coverages were at the time but I thought they were ridiculously low considering the expensive cars on the road, the higher costs necessary to repair them, and the continuous ratcheting up of medical expenses. I do remember what some of the coverage numbers were changed to.

The agent recommended 100,000/300,000 liability which translated to $100,000 for uninsured motorists/per injury and $300,000 per accident. Property damage was set at $25,000. I also recall the agent explaining how these amounts were becoming more common as the high standard for automobile insurance and would raise my premium only a few dollars per period because they don’t anticipate any sudden surge in costs or claims. I clearly remember that part because he said it while scrutinizing me with one eye. I reassured him I didn’t expect to post any sudden claims – with that, we had a good laugh.

However, when we got to the medical coverage part, he seemed to show some resistance and suggested anything higher than $10,000 would have a substantial impact on my premiums. So it was capped at $10,000. All in all, my yearly premium increased by a little more than 10%. Again, I remember the amount because I wrote a separate check in advance at the agent’s office. I don't recall receiving any shocking increases thereafter.

Over the years since, I’ve changed insurance companies, but kept the exact same coverages while making zero claims. It also now turns out that the coverage I’ve had for the past 15 years is nearly identical to the new increased coverages mandated by the Wisconsin legislature. And so, with the new mandatory requirement that all drivers must carry insurance and pay into the kitty, I felt I should see either little to no increase in my premium. Well, I figured wrong. I just received my usual 6-month premium notice which is due during the last week of November and according to my calculator, it has a 11.8% increase.

According to GOP partisans and their media enablers, I'm supposed to hold insurance companies blameless for this increase.

Email this article to a friend

Moore's Love Story Is A Haunt

I finally got the chance to see Michael Moore’s “Capitalism: A Love Story” over the Halloween weekend at the Rock Theatre (Wildwood) here in Janesville.

To my surprise, the documentary fittingly opens up with the tune “Louie, Louie” in the days of the class war cruelty that prevailed between the ruling elite and the peasants of the Roman Empire. From there, Moore takes off into the current American foreclosure crisis and weaves bits of historical facts, modern politics and human nature into a heart felt and personal cinematic experience.

Of course during the following two hours he tackles a multitude of the common misconceptions about capitalism. For instance, he accurately portrays how the practitioners of capitalism have successfully commercialized and glorified its worst attributes synonymously with personal success, God and country. He also paints establishment figures including police as nothing more than pawns and sycophants taking marching orders from the controlling big business elitists.

No doubt, Moore's enemies will label him as a irritable rabble-rouser and hypocrite simply because his documentary will likely turn a handsome profit. To the contrary, Moore gave me the impression that he loves capitalism, hence the title. He just has a problem with capitalism's single-minded and cold-blooded adherents and hi-jackers. And who could blame him?

However, he does tend to give socialism a little more credit than I think it deserves, yet at the same time he doesn’t completely take down the capital system. In a broad sense, his documentary makes a compelling argument against the perversions and greed obviously driving the money operators and other “get rich” wannabes to turn a profit.

I was disappointed in how short Congressman Paul Ryan’s role was in the film. But one thing was clear. Moore did a great job describing the importance the owners of America place on those who know how to steer the masses wrong. Ryan was one of the Wall Street pawn’s in Congress who did just that, yet was able to convince his supporters at home that he courageously voted against his principles to protect their risk. For this, his political party crowned him as a future rising star in the political arena. Ryan has slowly polished this personal gift into a quality that is highly regarded among the masters of the universe.

There is perhaps an interesting side note to the Wisconsin connection with Moore's film than just the fast talking and corporate-groomed Paul Ryan. Though Moore makes no mention of this at all, few people would connect the late billionaire Ken Hendricks of Beloit-based ABC Supply with Moore's love story. However, Hendricks was not only a heavy donor to Paul Ryan’s re-election campaigns but also was the primary sponsor of a movie parodizing Michael Moore as a modern day left-wing Ebenezer Scrooge in the forgettable dud "An American carol." This all may be just my own peculiar observation, but "Capitalism" was released one day short of exactly a year after the national debut of American Carol.

Nevertheless, Moore’s documentary is a must see for those who want to witness another confirming point of view of your worst suspicions about capitalism. It’s a respectful mixture of real life events backed up with historical evidence through the common sense eyes of the folksy idealist film maker. There certainly is a lot to chew on. I give it four stars.

Email this article to a friend

Wealthy Community Organizers Have Inside Track

Way back in June of this year, after the Gazette published an article about our city and county government's efforts to market the area for potential new businesses and entrepreneurs, I had a few questions to ask. Actually, it's not so important that I had a few questions to ask back then as much as they offered up some rather unethical interactions and questionable information that deserved some answers.

JG Excerpt(s): (June 14, 2009)
The alliance taps a bigger war chest of talent and money....“If I’ve got a company considering Janesville, and I can just get them there, these guys will close the deal,” Schwartz said...Each week, the group is in either Milwaukee or Chicago making detailed presentations to potential brokers, developers and investors.

Afterwards, I raised a few questions here.

RNR Excerpt: (June 17, 2009)
How do individuals separate their governmental duties from their Alliance duties? The Alliance address is the Rock County Court House Building - under whose power and authority do they operate under? Do we assume the Rock County Board? If the Alliance is a multi-governmental body – who pays for what? Are local business owners involved? Who are its members? And what connection do they have in city, county and state government? What connection does the Alliance have to the local business elite? Where is the transparency?

Finally last week, the Gazette published a front page article titled,"We need to pull together" which did answer a couple questions regarding the once hidden chest of wealth and the local elite pulling the strings behind the curtain.

JG Excerpt: (Oct. 29, 2009)
The money will be budgeted over five years and will be used to develop software specific to Rock County's economic development efforts.

It also will offset travel and marketing materials for the alliance partners who have spent a significant number of days on the road selling Rock County, said James Otterstein, the county's economic development manager.

To be honest (not to imply I'm ever dishonest), I didn't expect any answers from these folks or the Gazette, so I have to give them some credit even though the transparency and publicity seems more of a matter of expediency than it does to provide a sense of selfless public service.

Still I don't feel any more comfortable knowing that any special interest group, regardless of their wealth or lack thereof, not only have an inside track into government but are also bankrolling extracurricular activities of high ranking government employees to apparently do their bidding.

Perhaps I'm the only person who thought the Gazette's article in June was just a little too sneaky from the start. After this newly released information, I don't feel much better than before.

Email this article to a friend

Fox Not News

Daily Show Full Episodes

Political Humor

Health Care Crisis

None of the opin-you-tainment shows on the "other" cable channels have a "news" logo on the screen during airtime. Lou Dobbs, Campbell Brown and Larry King's show have a CNN logo only - not news. Rachel Maddow, Keith Olbermann and the Ed Show have a MSNBC logo only - not news. But turn to Fox and Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck and the rest of them all have the Fox "News" logo revolving in the corner 24/7.

Yet, Jon Stewart is the most trusted name in news. So why not drop the comedy logo?

Email this article to a friend

Four Wisconsin Justices Embarrass State Judicial System

The State Supreme Court adopted a rule Wednesday that says campaign contributions and independently run ads in themselves cannot force a judge off of a case. Voting for the WMC-sponsored rule were Justices Patience Roggensack, Annette Ziegler, David Prosser and Michael Gableman. In effect, they have laid out the welcome mat for big money contributions and third party advocates to spend as much money as they can on their re-election campaigns.

Wisconsin Law Journal Excerpt:
“People give money to someone they think will be fair and impartial,” said Gableman. “I don’t think there is any weird motive or agenda for judges if they get $1,000 or $10,000.”

Luckily I'm not a big gambling man because I would have lost big numbers betting that justice would prevail.

JS Online Excerpt:
"It rejects this almost implicit assumption that I hear . . . that somehow candidates would somehow be tempted to make improper decisions based on something as low as $1,000," he said.

Hear that? It'll cost more than a grand to tempt Gableman.

Email this article to a friend

Media Effort Underway To Destabilize Majority On Ice Arena Boondoggle

After reading the Gazette's Tuesday article about the Janesville ice arena boondoggle, I found the newspaper's ramped up story-line reminiscent of past publishing activities the newspaper undertook to pass the school referendum or to sell the wealthy investor's county land-swap deal to an unsuspecting public.
In addition, the Gazette published two major editorials on their arena position in four days.

In Tuesday's city council article, the paper makes no reference to Council member Yuri Rashkin’s well contrived blizzard of common sense he displayed for explaining his opposition vote of the administration’s arena plan. Not one word. I don't want to make too much of it, but his position was not only unique from the others, it was built on startlingly profound judgement. Now, if you're a regular visitor here, you'd know that doesn't come easy for me to say, particularly about someone who I have had very little to agree with on. So please don't think I'm in the tank here. Rashkin did mention the word “grassroots” somewhere in his logic and that alone could be enough to get excommunicated from the country club set here in Janesville. For obvious reasons, the Gazette so far has shut down all opposition talk in their so-called objectively written articles on the ice arena.

But it really hit home when I watched the short 6PM news report on Channel 15-WMTV out of Madison (Channel 5 Charter) about the Janesville Ice Arena on Wednesday. They described the ice arena debate as a controversy but proceeded to televise a very one-sided account absent of any real controversy! Rashkin was not given any face time to respond for the 6PM newscast and had a short uneventful moment at 10PM. Instead they put a pro-hockey spokesperson on camera and proceeded to oversimplify the deal as a positive development and about sending a message that Janesville is looking out for it's kids.

In a related article in today's (Thursday) Gazette titled, "We need to pull together" is another timely piece by the newspaper to sway public opinion towards the socialized losses incurred from public-private partnerships. The article contains an interesting list of local people from what can be viewed as the area's Bilderburg group."

For small town politics, this is big-time stagecraft.

Read WMTV's report and view video here. The video broadcast on television was 1 min. 28 sec. long.

Some additional Boondoggle notes

* The two sheet ice arena is now being marketed as a regional facility primarily to attract non-Janesville users from Beloit and Walworth County. In exchange, Janesville will lose its public-use community centered ice rink.

* The land site of the new arena has an approximate value at least equivalent to the price thrown around for land acquisition for the fire station - around $1 million dollars. The land value puts the city's share at $3.5 million instead of the reported $2.5 million and it will not generate property taxes over the lifespan of the arena.

* The old ice arena has a replacement cost value of at least $2 million in its current condition. The structure is expected to be bull-dozed.

* The date (March 1st) is arbitrarily set by the city administration. It holds little power or importance to the actual deal and will be changed or extended anytime to fit the requirements of the private investment group. My guess is they will be given all the way to 2011 or 2012 to raise the money.

* The plan to move the ice arena to the southern edge of the city will remove another community facility from the city's central core and will help steer more traffic away from the downtown district. In other words, it is consistent with the city's comprehensive growth plan.

* During the WHP contract discussions, the handful of previous ice arena user groups were promised little disruption of their use schedules - according to the media. Now they've suddenly become a group that's clamoring for ice time and in need of a home - according to the media.

* The current ice arena subsidies and attendance figures have been unfairly compared to other public use facilities in Janesville such as the Senior Center and the Hedberg Library. The ice arena is the only one that has been privatized for profits while socializing the capital investment, operating losses and maintenance onto the taxpayers.

* The next inner-city facility expected to fall at the hands of the country club set are the batting cages on Jackson Street.

* The astro-turf group behind the regional two sheet ice arena are the same folks who succeeded to foist (with help from the Gazette) a $70.5 million tax hike upon Janesville school district taxpayers.

This list will be expanded and reposted as more information becomes available.

Email this article to a friend

WMC Aiming To Get Their Money's Worth

In what probably is one of the most obscene proposals ever to be submitted to the state's high court, the morally bankrupt group known as the WMC is requesting that...

Daily Press Excerpt:
...judges would not be required to step aside from cases involving groups or individuals no matter how much they spent to help their campaigns.

Daily Press Excerpt:
"Individuals and organizations spend money to help elect a judicial candidate precisely because they want that candidate to be a judge — that is, to preside over cases, including their own," WMC attorney Mike Wittenwyler said in the petition. "There is nothing corrupt about that. That is democracy."

That's not democracy - that's bold-faced corruption. In that case, why bother with campaign contributions? Why not just pay the judges directly for each court case?

Obviously, the high court should strike their proposal down. But does that mean if the WMC or other special interests can't buy judges, they will no longer contribute to their election campaigns? Yeeeeaaah!

Email this article to a friend