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City, Police, School District

Update on School Resource Officer Discussions Between the Whitewater School District and the City of Whitewater

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There’s a positive development today in a joint press release from the Whitewater Unified School District and the City of Whitewater over a possible new agreement for a school resource officer. The release from the Whitewater Unified School District’s board president, on behalf of the district and the city, appears below: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, DIRECTLY…

City, Daily Bread, Local Government, Open Government, Police, School District

Daily Bread for 4.30.25: Discussion of Whitewater’s School Resource Officer Merits a 120-Day Contract Extension

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Good morning. Wednesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 65. Sunrise is 5:50 and sunset is 7:54, for 14 hours, 5 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 11 percent of its visible disk illuminated. On this day in 1803, American representatives sign a treaty to purchase the Louisiana Territory from…

America, Babbittry, Boosterism, City, Daily Bread, Economics, Economy, Special Interests, That Which Paved the Way, Trumpism, Willful Ignorance, Wisconsin

Daily Bread for 4.26.25: Consumer Sentiment Falls, and Web Searches for Economic Calamity Rise

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Good morning.

Saturday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 59. Sunrise is 5:55 and sunset is 7:50, for 13 hours, 54 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 2.2 percent of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1954, the first clinical trials of Jonas Salk‘s polio vaccine begin in Fairfax County, Virginia.

Two charts tell the tale of Americans’ economic concerns:

See Alex Harring, Americans are getting flashbacks to 2008 as tariffs stoke recession fears, CNBC, April 26, 2025.

When sentiment declines, it’s understandable that Americans would look for examples of other difficult times.

For modern Whitewater, the Great Recession’s influence is the key to understanding both economics and politics in the city. It is Whitewater’s signal modern event. Those difficult years from 2007-2009 led to an aftermath that still afflicts the city.

The failure of local officials and community leaders during that time was astonishing: the boosters1 wanted to deflect past others’ suffering, the special-interest men diverted valuable resources to their own schemes while Whitewater stayed poor2, the center-left grew but still struggles to land a decisive blow3, and the rightwing populists4 now in the city owe their present role as a faction to forces they can’t or won’t grasp.

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  1. Narrow of mind and small of heart. See the FREE WHITEWATER category on Boosterism. ↩︎
  2. Avaricious schemers failing time and again to match the accomplishments of the generation before them. See the FREE WHITEWATER category on Special Interests. ↩︎
  3. It does no good to talk to a hyena in a soft voice hoping that the vile creature will give up meat for vegetables. See Wisconsin Senate Democrats Hope Hyenas Will Stop Eating Meat. ↩︎
  4. An authoritarian populist movement of recrimination and revenge. See Defining Populism. ↩︎

Hubble views of Mars and more for space telecope’s 35th anniversary:

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope is celebratiing 35 years in space. See images of Mars, planetary nebula NGC 2899, Rosette Nebula and galaxy NGC 5335 to celebrate.

America, City, Daily Bread, Wisconsin

Daily Bread for 4.19.25: A Message from New England

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Good morning.

Saturday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of 57. Sunrise is 6:06 and sunset is 7:42, for 13 hours, 36 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 65 percent of its visible disk illuminated.

Across America, in places near and far, Americans will exercise today the right of the people peaceably to assemble. There will be many days like this, and many assemblies across this continent, each one part of a growing effort.


In Boston, Americans celebrated the 250th anniversary of the nighttime ride of Paul Revere. They added their own contemporary touches in projections on the side of the Old North Church:



— NorthEnd.page (@northendpage.bsky.social) April 17, 2025 at 9:16 PM

northend.page/old-north-pr… Silence Dogood has some more messages to deliver. Tonight their canvas was the Old North Church.

— NorthEnd.page (@northendpage.bsky.social) April 17, 2025 at 11:22 PM

Rare North African lion cubs play in the sun:

A quartet of 12-week-old North African lion cubs were spotted playing in the spring sunshine at Whipsnade Zoo in England in a video released on April 15. Classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, North African lions, Whipsnade say, are declining. Since becoming home to lionesses Waka and Winta and lion Malik in 2023 and with the new arrivals, the zoo now has a pride of ten North African lions.

Business, City, Daily Bread, Economy, Employment, Excuses and Rationalizations, Planning, Tariffs, Taxes/Taxation, Trump, Wisconsin

Daily Bread for 4.14.25: Federal Planning for Manufacturing Isn’t Planning at All

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Good morning.

Monday in Whitewater will be windy with a high of 59. Sunrise is 6:14 and sunset is 7:36, for 13 hours, 22 minutes of daytime. The moon a waning gibbous with 98 percent of its visible disk illuminated.

Whitewater’s Plan and Architectural Review Commission meets at 6 PM.


On this day in 1958, the Soviet satellite Sputnik 2 falls from orbit after a mission duration of 162 days. This was the first spacecraft to carry a living animal, a female dog named Laika, who likely lived only a few hours.

One of the justifications for tariffs is to bring back manufacturing to states like Wisconsin. It’s ill-considered:

But one of the biggest barriers to bringing manufacturing back, both in Wisconsin and nationally, is a labor shortage. 

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce reportsthe latest data show there were around 1.2 million more jobs open nationally than there were unemployed workers. Wisconsin, meanwhile, has had more openings than job seekers since 2021.

Over the last decade, [founder of the Florida-based Reshoring Initiative Harry] Moser said employers have told him the U.S. labor market is “weak, both in terms of quantity of people and quality of people.” He said there have been efforts in recent years that have helped some, pointing to high school apprenticeship programs. He says Trump’s goal of bringing manufacturing back hinges on workforce.

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In Wisconsin, a 2023 research report from WMC found the state’s median age was older than the rate nationally, and warned if the population doesn’t grow at a faster rate, workforce shortages would worsen.

“We don’t have enough workers for the jobs that we have, let alone if we want to grow a job (field),” [president of the business lobbying group Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce Kurt] Bauer with WMC said. “This is a significant challenge.” 

See Joe Schulz, Trump says tariffs will bring back manufacturing, but Wisconsin’s labor shortage may stand in the way, Wisconsin Public Radio, April 14, 2025.

One hears talk in Whitewater on recruiting for manufacturing before any other priority. It’s more a diversionary tactic than anything else; these gentlemen are simply looking for something, however implausible, to shift the conversion.

Tariffs for Semiconductors Forthcoming:

City, Daily Bread, Tariffs, Taxes/Taxation, Trump, Trumpism, Wisconsin

Daily Bread for 4.13.25: The Anti-Tax Crowd Backed a Taxman

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Good morning.

Sunday in Whitewater will be windy with a high of 66. Sunrise is 6:16 and sunset is 7:35, for 13 hours, 19 minutes of daytime. The moon a waning gibbous with 99.6 percent of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1960, the United States launches Transit 1-B, the world’s first satellite navigation system.

In Whitewater, and towns across America, the Trump men put up signs reading “TRUMP LOW TAXES, KAMALA HIGH TAXES.” These signs were as ridiculous as they were false: Trump campaigned on tariffs and tariffs are taxes. (Yet the nature of an authoritarian populist movement like theirs is fallacies, fabrications, and as with their claims about COVID or election conspiracies, a refusal to accept contrary evidence.1)

Outside the required orthodoxy of Trumpism, conservative businessmen are among the first to admit the economic damage from these tariffs:

In interviews with Urban Milwaukee, all said the new tariffs will fuel inflation, raising costs for local companies, manufacturers, entrepreneurs and consumers; and that the shock waves created by the policy have the potential to send the U.S. economy into a recession.

“It’s almost unanimous concern, and I have not spoken to any business leader that’s celebrating the tariffs,” said Dale Kooyenga, President and CEO of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, describing the responses he’s heard since the tariffs were announced.

The impact is registering immediately for some businesses, Kooyenga said. Like one local company he spoke with that placed a large product order. The tariff doesn’t apply to the date of purchase, but happens when the goods hit the dock in the U.S. “And so now that their order was so large and the tariff so large,” Kooyenga noted, “it creates significant cash flow issues in a time when interest rates are high.”

The new tariffs will produce a price shock for the local building and trades industry and construction budgets, said Dan Bukiewicz, President of the Milwaukee Building & Trades Council and mayor of the City of Oak Creek. “The reaction is not good,” said Bukiewicz. “From the contractors that perform construction work to small business owners that supply everything from safety vests to gloves, hard hats, safety glasses: [the price of] everything’s going up.” 

See Graham Kilmer, Tariffs Will Hurt Business, Workers in Wisconsin (‘Local business, labor and university experts warn that tariffs will lead to a recession’), Urban Milwaukee, April 7, 2025.

All these loud and proud local anti-tax men supported a candidate who has now inflicted worse than anything they’ve ever complained about.

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  1. See FREE WHITEWATER, Quick Observations on a Weekend, April 6, 2025. Many of these Trumpists, despite a few having pretensions otherwise, are and will always be Facebook types. See FREE WHITEWATER, Facebook Discussions as Displays of Ignorance, Fallacies, and Marginal Literacy, July 31, 2020. Their preferred medium is more disordered today than it was in 2020. ↩︎

Barred Owl Female Rises To Show Off Duo Of Fluffy Owlets – April 10, 2025:

Watch the female lift up during mealtime to show off her two adorable owlets. The nestlings are 3 and 4 days old as of April 10. Brooding is done solely by the female, and she remains a near constant presence at the nest for at least two weeks until the owlets are large enough to spend some time in the box alone.