Understandably, the best outcome for any public body is to have good candidates, who become good incumbents, who then produce good policy. This should be obvious to anyone: candidates, residents, bloggers, etc.
A next-best outcome would be the opportunity to draw clear contrasts between good policy and bad, so much the better to illustrate alternatives.
When that next-best outcome is so predictable – from the greatest possible distance – it’s that much better.
Other than the rising of the sun each morning, there could be nothing in town more predictable than that the Whitewater Unified School Board seats would be uncontested, and that Jim Stewart would be running for one of them. I’ve previously written about Mr. Stewart’s 2015 candidacy.
As a policy matter, just about anyone else would have been a better choice than Mr. Stewart; as a matter of drawing contrasts between good policy and bad, his tenure will offer a three years’ long opportunity to do so. (A cynical blogger – and I’m not – would have entitled this post Christmas Comes Again, in January.)
Big-spending but anti-labor is probably the worst policy position for Whitewater, but a political legacy of that sort offers the next-best thing for others to draw clear distinctions between good policy and bad.
There are difficult choices ahead for the Whitewater Schools (and other districts), although they can be managed.
What circumstances don’t offer in candidates they will in commentary.
Midweek in the Whippet City brings a mostly cloudy day with a high of thirty-two. Sunrise is 7:25 and sunset 4:36 for 9h 11m 17s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 13.3% of its visible disk illuminated.
It may be cloudy, but that doesn’t mean a good day doesn’t await. I’m an optimist about our future, but even as an optimist some days seem notably promising.
Whitewater’s Board of Zoning Appeals meets this morning at 8:30 AM.
This is the week for the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. It’s a gadget-geek cornucopia, and The Verge has coverage of the events. Here’s a look at a some of the goings on:
On this day in 1921, some women in Janesville commit themselves to a policy of abhorrence (and an abhorrent policy):
1921 – Janesville Women Abhor Salacious Entertainment
On this date the Janesville Federation of Women decided to “censor” movies and vaudeville in the city. Members of this organization praised and promoted what they considered “better offerings.” They were zealously critical towards those of a “salacious” nature. No follow-up ever determined whether the women were successful in their quest or if the increased publicity for “salacious” shows backfired. [Source:Janesville Gazette]
Happy 2016! For each day this week, we’ll give an eight-letter word or phrase and a trivia question. The 16-letter answer to that question (a title, name, or place) uses only the eight letters given.
Example:
HISTOGEN: What Rod Stewart song was his first U.S. #1 after “Maggie May,” five years later?
Answer:
“Tonight’s the Night”
What to Submit:
Submit the 16-letter title, name, or place (as “Tonight’s the Night” in the example) for your answer.
Wednesday, January 6
BALUSTER: What W.C. Handy song is named for a historic thoroughfare in Memphis, Tennessee?
The Hon. Alex Kozinski is a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The Ninth Circuit has jurisdiction over most federal appellate matters in the western continental United States. Judge Kozinski is nationally know among members of the bench, and served as chief judge of the Ninth Circuit for many years (2007-2014).
One of his finest accomplishments (and at sixty-five he’s still busy as judge and legal scholar) is his thoughtful defense of exacting standards for expert studies at trial.
To be a defender of exacting standards requires that one be an opponent of junk science, crackpot theories, and shoddy studies. That’s the Whitewater aspect of this: Americans can and should do better than the low standards local publications set for policymaking and policy studies.
In the audio clip above, Judge Kozinski speaks (last fall) to the Cato Institute about the need for sound reasoning in criminal matters. Early in the clip, he mentions a motion – a Daubert motion, following Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc., 509 U.S. 579 (1993) – used to exclude expert testimony that falls below an acceptable standard as Federal Rule of Evidence 702 requires. Daubert was a civil case, and it’s Judge Kozinski’s point that in criminal matters a Daubert standard in favor of reason – and against junk science – hasn’t been applied as often it should be.
We could use a Daubert standard for local government projects around here; even Daubert-lite would be a big improvement.
Life in Western Mongolia is an adventure. Training eagles to hunt, herding yaks, and racing camels are just a few of the daily activities of the nomadic Kazakh people. I spent a few weeks living with them and experiencing one of the most unique cultures in the world. Saddle up and enjoy the ride.
Select clips from this video are available for licensing. For inquiries: licensing@unscripted.com
licensing.unscripted.com
Original score by Max LL
www.maxll.ca
Follow me on Instagram: @brandon_l_li
Bali: vimeo.com/136405903
Tokyo: vimeo.com/129171397
North India: vimeo.com/116044343
Barcelona: vimeo.com/99401340
Dubai: vimeo.com/88224399
Turkey: vimeo.com/106755674
South India: vimeo.com/113689725
Arabia: vimeo.com/86774980
Las Vegas: vimeo.com/147458521
Australia: vimeo.com/98652051
Guam: vimeo.com/138830005
Tuesday in town will be mostly sunny with a high of thirty. Sunrise is 7:25 and sunset 4:35, for 9h 10m 10s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 20.6% of its visible disk illuminated.
An ad hoc group from the Urban Forestry Commission (Heritage Tree Committee) meets today at 4:30 PM.
The Frommers travel guide considers the Golden Gate Bridge “possibly the most beautiful, certainly the most photographed, bridge in the world”.[8] It opened in 1937 and was, until 1964, the longest suspension bridge main span in the world, at 4,200 feet (1,300 m)….
Construction began on January 5, 1933.[9] The project cost more than $35 million,[29] completing ahead of schedule and under budget.[30] The Golden Gate Bridge construction project was carried out by the McClintic-Marshall Construction Co., a subsidiary of Bethlehem Steel Corporation founded by Howard H. McClintic and Charles D. Marshall, both of Lehigh University.
Today is the birthday of a socialist whose supposedly successful community proved – predictably – anything but successful:
1813 – Utopian Community Leader Warren Chase Born
On this date the founder of a Fourierite Utopian community in what is now Ripon was born. Their inspiration came from the writings of Charles Fourier, a French Socialist who urged the rebuilding of society from its foundation as the only cure for economic ills such as the depression of 1837. The idea was supported by Horace Greely in New York and caught the eye of Warren Chase. Chase and others built a successful, non-religious communal society in which everyone received wages according to their skill, need, and work ethic.
The community reached their greatest population (180) in 1845 but soon dissipated when members began moving toward agriculture as an economic tool. Families gradually left the community to live in their own houses and work their own land in the same area. In 1850, the community disbanded and $40,000 in assets was divided among the remaining members. Warren Chase moved around the country and finally settled in California, where he held many public offices. [Source: Wisconsin Saints and Sinners by Fred L. Holmes, p. 94-104]
Here’s the Tuesday game in this week’s Sweet Sixteen series from Puzzability:
This Week’s Game — January 4-8
Sweet Sixteen
Happy 2016! For each day this week, we’ll give an eight-letter word or phrase and a trivia question. The 16-letter answer to that question (a title, name, or place) uses only the eight letters given.
Example:
HISTOGEN: What Rod Stewart song was his first U.S. #1 after “Maggie May,” five years later?
Answer:
“Tonight’s the Night”
What to Submit:
Submit the 16-letter title, name, or place (as “Tonight’s the Night” in the example) for your answer.
Tuesday, January 5
TAIL ENDS: What was the title of the 1960s-1980s American editions of the Agatha Christie book also known as And Then There Were None?
Post 54 in a series. When Green Turns Brown is an examination of a small town’s digester-energy project, in which Whitewater, Wisconsin would import other cities’ waste, claiming that the result would be both profitable and green.
There are two points to this post about Whitewater’s waste-importation proposal. First, one can state a simple fact about methane; second, one can easily deduce what this says about the seriousness of the full-time city officials in Whitewater, Wisconsin who have advanced a supposedly clean and green process of turning others’ unwanted filth into methane.
Human activities since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution (taken as the year 1750) have produced a 40% increase in the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide, from 280 ppm in 1750 to 400 ppm in 2015.[5][6] This increase has occurred despite the uptake of a large portion of the emissions by various natural “sinks” involved in the carbon cycle.[7][8]Anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions (i.e. emissions produced by human activities) come fromcombustion of carbon-based fuels, principally coal, oil, and natural gas, along with deforestation.[9]
Second, although I’ll produce a far longer, peer-review-sourced assessment of methane’s dangers later in this series, even a cursory review of methane’s impact would have suggested to Whitewater’s City Manager Cameron Clapper and Wastewater Superintendent Tim Reel that methane production is destructive to the environment.
It’s hard to overstate how troubling this is, as a policy matter: either Messrs. Clapper and Reel are incapable of anything more than lightweight, erroneous, vendor-inspired work, or they could do better but feel that lightweight, erroneous, vendor-inspired work is all that Whitewater’s residents deserve.
Those who sat in rooms and listened to presentations from Clapper and Reel in which they touted methane as a good byproduct of waste importation heard junk science in the place of reasoning, a selling job over a sound job.
There’s much on which to focus, on the science side, later in this series. I certainly don’t think a link to Wikipedia settles this matter – I think a link to Wikipedia shows that Clapper in particular hasn’t – after two years’ time – even begun to consider this matter properly.
Repeating vendors’ talking points, especially repeating the same discredited points over and over, is unworthy of a salary, particularly one derived from the taxes of so many struggling working people in a small rural town.
Our first work week of the year begins today, and I hope you’re looking forward to it as I am. Challenges await our city, but nothing that cannot be overcome, and much to which we can look forward. We have a day of partly cloudy skies and twenty-six degrees for a high. Sunrise is 7:25 and sunset 4:34, for 9h 09m 06s daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 28.9% of its visible disk illuminated.
A quick note – I had promised posts on how UW-Whitewater (and now the UW System) have addressed sexual assault. I’ve delayed the posts only to consider to additional information. It’s a serious subject, and an ongoing one for this city (and state). I’ll publish posts when they’re ready, with the understanding that there will be more policy developments to address throughout the year. It seems there will, sadly, always be the risk and occurrence of some violence in society; there needn’t, by contrast, be any administrative self-protection and mendacity in a well-ordered society.
Spirit, also known as MER-A (Mars Exploration Rover – A) or MER-2, is a robotic rover on Mars, active from 2004 to 2010.[1] It was one of two rovers of NASA‘s ongoing Mars Exploration Rover Mission. It landed successfully on Mars at 04:35 Ground UTC on January 4, 2004, three weeks before its twin, Opportunity (MER-B), landed on the other side of the planet. Its name was chosen through a NASA-sponsored student essay competition. The rover became stuck in late 2009, and its last communication with Earth was sent on March 22, 2010.
The rover completed its planned 90-sol mission. Aided by cleaning events that resulted in higher power from its solar panels, Spirit went on to function effectively over twenty times longer than NASA planners expected. Spirit also logged 7.73 km (4.8 mi) of driving instead of the planned 600 m (0.4 mi),[5] allowing more extensive geological analysis of Martian rocks and planetary surface features. Initial scientific results from the first phase of the mission (the 90-sol prime mission) were published in a special issue of the journal Science.[6]
Puzzability begins the year with a series entitled, Sweet Sixteen:
This Week’s Game — January 4-8
Sweet Sixteen
Happy 2016! For each day this week, we’ll give an eight-letter word or phrase and a trivia question. The 16-letter answer to that question (a title, name, or place) uses only the eight letters given.
Example:
HISTOGEN: What Rod Stewart song was his first U.S. #1 after “Maggie May,” five years later?
Answer:
“Tonight’s the Night”
What to Submit:
Submit the 16-letter title, name, or place (as “Tonight’s the Night” in the example) for your answer.
Monday, January 4
SHIPMENT: In what city (with state) is FedEx’s headquarters?
Sunday look much like yesterday: cloudy in the morning, sunny in the afternoon, with a high of thirty. Sunrise is 7:25 and sunset 4:33 for 9h 08m 06s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 36.8% of its visible disk illuminated.
Friday’s FW poll asked readers if, on New Year’s Day, they’d watch a college football game. Most respondents (76.47%) said yes, that they would watch one.
Two-thousand fifteen saw (at least) 83 rocket launches. Here are those 83:
On January 3rd, 1777, following his earlier victories at Trenton and Assunpink Creek, Washington is again victorious at Princeton:
On the night of January 2, 1777 George Washington, Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army, repulsed a British attack at the Battle of the Assunpink Creek inTrenton. That night, he evacuated his position, circled around General Lord Cornwallis‘ army, and went to attack the British garrison at Princeton. Brigadier GeneralHugh Mercer of the Continental Army clashed with two regiments under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Charles Mawhood of the British Army. Mercer and his troops were overrun and Washington sent some militia under Brigadier General John Cadwalader to help him. The militia, on seeing the flight of Mercer’s men, also began to flee. Washington rode up with reinforcements and rallied the fleeing militia. He then led the attack on Mawhood’s troops, driving them back. Mawhood gave the order to retreat and most of the troops tried to flee to Cornwallis in Trenton….
The British viewed Trenton and Princeton as minor American victories, but with these victories, the Americans believed that they could win the war.[43]American historians often consider the Battle of Princeton a great victory, on par with the battle of Trenton, due to the subsequent loss of control of most of New Jersey by the Crown forces. Some other historians, such as Edward Lengel consider it to be even more impressive than Trenton.[4] A century later, British historian Sir George Otto Trevelyan would write in a study of the American Revolution, when talking about the impact of the victories at Trenton and Princeton, that “It may be doubted whether so small a number of men ever employed so short a space of time with greater and more lasting effects upon the history of the world.”[51]
Here’s my amateur version of the late William Safire’s long-standing tradition of offering annual predictions. The list for 2016, the FW ninth-annual edition:
1. Whitewater’s economy will
A. Expand along with the American economy
B. Expand more slowly than the American economy
C. Be stagnant
D. Fall into recession
2. For the Whitewater Schools, the biggest issue will be
A. Budgetary
B. Academic
C. Athletic
D. Of the arts and music
3. Local government’s efforts to reach out, generally, to residents to encourage participation in government affairs will be a
A. Smashing success
B. Slight success
C. Slight disappointment
D. Significant disappointment
4. Local government’s efforts to reach out, specifically, to Hispanic residents to encourage participation in government affairs will be a
A. Smashing success
B. Slight success
C. Slight disappointment
D. Significant disappointment
5. In the April 5 primary election, Whitewater’s electorate will be
A. Predominantly Democratic
B. Predominantly Republican
C. Roughly split between the major parties
D. Impossible to determine
6. In the November 8 general election, Whitewater’s electorate will be
A. Predominantly Democratic
B. Predominantly Republican
C. Roughly split between the major parties
D. Impossible to determine
7. On November 8, Whitewater will vote between major-party candidates
A. Clinton and Rubio
B. Clinton and Cruz
C. Sanders and Bush
D. Sanders and Trump
8. For UW-Whitewater, the biggest issue will be
A. Budgetary
B. Academic
C. Athletic
D. Campus relations and sexual assault prevention
9. The biggest community event of 2016 will be the
A. July 4th events @ Cravath
B. City Market
C. Christmas Parade
D. Run Whitewater
10. The surprising development of 2016 will be the
A. Discovery of gold beneath the Starin Park water tower
B. Discovery of a witches’ coven beneath the Starin Park water tower
C. End of one local print newspaper
D. Departure of one local leader
Adams’s guesses for 2016:
1. Whitewater’s economy will
C. Be stagnant. Huge public spending, with even millions more due in the next few years, will leave Whitewater mired in an uncompetitive position.
2. For the Whitewater Schools, the biggest issue will be
A. Budgetary. Budgetary, sadly, as this district can’t get traction on any other issue. Efforts to tout academic accomplishments even when sincere are far less read than insiders think (or hope). It’s mostly the same small circle of people reading and writing for each other.
3. Local government’s efforts to reach out, generally, to residents to encourage participation in government affairs will be a
D. Significant disappointment. Local government can’t sell itself on a message of perimeter fence-building and come on gang, let’s put on a show. Whitewater’s local government has reached peak cheerleader: what insiders describe as all Whitewater is now a declining minority within the city.
4. Local government’s efforts to reach out, specifically, to Hispanic residents to encourage participation in government affairs will be a
D. Significant disappointment. Local government can’t sell itself on a Spanish-language message of perimeter fence-building and come on gang, let’s put on a show. Whitewater’s local government has reached peak cheerleader: the Hispanic community in Whitewater is a growing minority within the city, one that doesn’t need locals to guide them in a feeble, pro-government direction.
5. In the April 5 primary election, Whitewater’s electorate will be
C. Roughly split between the major parties. Republicans may still have a presidential primary race on their hands; Democrats will have settled on Sec. Clinton by April 5. What might otherwise be a predominantly Democratic electorate in a presidential year will be less so in April, where Democrats will have less immediately at stake.
6. In the November 8 general election, Whitewater’s electorate will be
A. Predominantly Democratic. Not hard to pick this one – the Democratic candidate will carry the city, and the state.
7. On November 8, Whitewater will vote between major-party candidates
B. Clinton and Cruz. Sec. Clinton will, effectively, wrap up the primary race by April; Sen. Cruz will win in a more protracted GOP primary contest.
8. For UW-Whitewater, the biggest issue will be
D. Campus relations and sexual assault prevention. This issue’s not going away; attempts to ignore the issue will make matters far worse. The UW System, itself, will find this a 2016 issue, beyond UW-Whitewater (although our local campus is an administrative bastion of act utilitarians.)
9. The biggest community event of 2016 will be the
A. July 4th @ Cravath. July 4th wins, but the Discover Whitewater series is probably secure as an ongoing Whitewater tradition (the fourth annual’s on 9.18.16).
10. The surprising development of 2016 will be the
B. Discovery of a witches’ coven beneath the Starin Park water tower. Whitewater – a beautiful but sometimes troubled place – certainly has at least one witch left, waiting to make her reappearance. We needn’t worry – here in our version of the Emerald City, I’ve no doubt that she will meet her Oz.
The second day of the year will be, for Whitewater, sunny with a high of twenty-nine. Sunrise is 7:25 and sunset 4:32, for 9h 07m 11s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 46.7% of its visible disk illuminated.
One can be sure that a Star Wars tide has swept all before it when Sarah Reichtap dances to a medley from that film series –
1863 – (Civil War) Final day of Battle of Stones River, Tennessee
This was the final day of the Battle of Stones River, near Murfreesboro, Tennessee. The 1st, 10th, 15th, 21st and 24th Wisconsin Infantry regiments and 3rd, 5th, 8th, and 10th Wisconsin Light Artillery batteries participated. The 21st was in the forefront all three days. The 24th lost nearly 40 percent of its men and almost all its officers. The two sides had traded control for three days until they both withdrew and the Union took possession of the field. The rich farmland meant to feed the Confederates now supplied the Union.
