Released in early June 1994.
Daily Bread
Daily Bread for 6.14.14
by JOHN ADAMS •
Good morning, Whitewater.
Saturday will be mostly sunny with a high of seventy-seven.
On this day in 1982, Argentine forces surrender to Britain in the Falklands War. The New York Times reported the surrender the next day:
General Moore radioed from his command post on Mount Kent: ”Falkland Islands once more under Government desired by their inhabitants. God Save the Queen.” It had taken the British three weeks and four days of fighting on the ground to retake the islands following their landings at San Carlos Bay….
The dramatic moves Monday and today toward an end of the war came after British troops under General Moore stormed into the outskirts – and, unofficial reports said, into the streets – of the Falkland capital. Argentine defenses were reported to have crumbled under the onslaught of artillery, naval gunfire, air attacks and the charge of as many as 7,500 foot soldiers – paratroopers, marines, Gurkhas and Guards.
Sweeping forward from their positions on the high ground just west of Stanley, which they had taken on Friday and Saturday, the British forces overran the main Argentine defensive perimeter in three places – Tumbledown Mountain, Mount William and Wireless Ridge. The Argentines broke and ran, falling back into a promontory of only about seven square miles around the capital and its strategic airstrip, it was reported.
General Moore’s offensive plan had originally envisaged a pause there before the final assault, but as organized opposition collapsed he urged his men forward and they pushed to the edge of town.
It appeared that the defenders were short of food and water, and British correspondents in Chile, who have been monitoring the radio links between General Menendez and the mainland, reported that the circuit went dead after an officer said the power was failing.
On this day in 1885, it’s the first Flag Day in Wisconsin:
1885 – Birth of Flag Day
On this date the first recognized observance of Flag Day in Wisconsin occurred at the Stony Hill School near Waubeka. The event was led by Bernard J. Cigrand, a teacher. Flag Day did not become a national observance until 31 years later when Woodrow Wilson reconized it on June 14, 1916. [Source: History Just Ahead: A guide to Wisconsin’s Historical Markers, edited by Sarah Davis McBride]
Cats
Dear Kitten…
by JOHN ADAMS •
Animals, Poll
Friday Poll: Farm Dog or Lap Dog?
by JOHN ADAMS •
Modern Farmer asks whether farm dogs are happier than lap dogs:
Although the love between man and dog is indeed powerful, you might wonder whether the active, outdoors pup is enjoying a more enriching existence than his indoors counterpart. By keeping dogs as inside companions, are we asking them to lead less satisfying lives?
Recently, science has been reckoning with this question. An associate professor of animal behavior and well-being at Purdue University, Candace Croney began conducting cognitive tests on agility and companion dogs back in 2010. The tests ranged from basic — displacing a transparent cover to find food — to difficult — pressing the top end of a weighted tube to, again, find food — but in all cases, agility dogs generally performed better than companions.
“Agility dogs are exposed to different things and required to engage their brains more,” says Croney, who is also the director of Purdue’s Center for Animal Welfare Science. “Physical activity does facilitate the development of neurons and helps support good brain activity, which may possibly be contributing [to their success] as well.”
What do you think?
Daily Bread
Daily Bread for 6.13.14
by JOHN ADAMS •
Good morning, Whitewater.
Our week ends with sunny skies, a high of seventy-one, and northwest winds at ten to fifteen miles per hour.
On this day in 1966, the U.S. Supreme Court hands down a decision in Miranda v. Arizona:
Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court which passed 5–4. The Court held that both inculpatory and exculpatory statements made in response to interrogation by a defendant in police custody will be admissible at trial only if the prosecution can show that the defendant was informed of the right to consult with an attorney before and during questioning and of the right against self-incrimination prior to questioning by police, and that the defendant not only understood these rights, but voluntarily waived them.
This had a significant impact on law enforcement in the United States, by making what became known as the Miranda rights part of routine police procedure to ensure that suspects were informed of their rights. The Supreme Court decided Miranda with three other consolidated cases: Westover v. United States, Vignera v. New York, and California v. Stewart.
The Miranda warning (often abbreviated to “Miranda,” or “Mirandizing” a suspect) is the name of the formal warning that is required to be given by police in the United States to criminal suspects in police custody (or in a custodial situation) before they are interrogated, in accordance with the Miranda ruling. Its purpose is to ensure the accused are aware of, and reminded of, these rights under the U.S. Constitution, and that they know they can invoke them at any time during the interview.
On this day in 1863, soldiers from Wisconsin continue service during the Siege of Vicksburg:
1863 – (Civil War) Siege of Vicksburg, Mississippi, continues
Wisconsin troops were still engaged in the Siege of Vicksburg. The 8th, 11th, 12th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 20th, 23rd, 25th,27th, 29th and 33rd Wisconsin Infantry regiments, the 1st, 6th, 7th and 12th Wisconsin Light Artillery batteries and the 2nd Wisconsin Cavalry were among Union forces surrounding the city.
Puzzability‘s Pop Flies series concludes today:
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This Week’s Game — June 9-13
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Pop Flies
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It all starts with Dad this week. For each day, we started with a word that begins with the two-letter chunk PA and deleted it to get a new word. The two-word answer phrase, described by each day’s clue, is the longer PA word followed by the shorter word.
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Example:
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Undercover scheme to entrap the gang of kids wielding liquid adhesive
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Answer:
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Pasting sting
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What to Submit:
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Submit the two-word phrase, with the PA word first (as “Pasting sting” in the example), for your answer.
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Friday, June 13
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Animals, History
Calvin Coolidge’s Pet Raccoon
by JOHN ADAMS •
Calvin Coolidge was a good president, but as for his taste in pets, I’m not so sure:
One of the best-known four-legged White House residents during the Coolidge years — a raccoon — had actually been meant to be eaten.
She was sent from Mississippi to be part of the White House Thanksgiving meal in 1926, but the Coolidge family found her to be friendly and docile and decided to keep her as a pet instead.The president who mistakenly called her a “he” announced the raccoon’s arrival in one of his regular press conferences. “I don’t think he is quite grown yet,” Coolidge told reporters.
“He is very playful, very interesting, and seems very well trained and well behaved.” The president also asked the press to help him come up with a name for the new pet.
Rebecca, as she came to be called on Christmas Eve of that year, soon became a favorite of the president and First Lady Grace Coolidge, and was a frequent sight at White House events, including Easter egg rolls.
Via Calvin Coolidge’s Pet Raccoon Rebecca @ The Presidential Pet Museum.
Local Government, Politics
‘Movers and Shakers’ Get It Wrong, Again
by JOHN ADAMS •
Across Wisconsin, a majority of counties are now issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. (As of Tuesday afternoon, the number was at 50 of 72 Wisconsin counties, or about seventy-percent of them. By Wednesday in my area, Rock, Jefferson, and Walworth County were issuing licenses to gay couples.)
(See, from Craig Gilbert of the Journal Sentinel, County decisions reflect shifting politics of gay marriage.)
Of those counties issuing licenses, 23 of them were counties that Mitt Romney carried in 2012, including 7 of the 12 most Republican counties in the state.
Needless to say, the most-significant impact is to those couples who have the liberty to marry. Like all libertarians, I support marriage equality.
But there’s a secondary, political consideration, too: How is it that neither Right nor Left expected so many conservative counties to begin issuing same-sex marriage licenses so quickly?
Even a year ago, both conservatives and liberals would have predicted significant conservative political resistance to same-sex marriage following a ruling like U.S. District Judge Crabb’s Friday ruling.
That hasn’t happened. In fact, as Craig Gilbert notes, Waukesha County is issuing same-sex marriage licenses, and it’s the most Republican county of its size in all America.
For a secondary topic, this is a story about how supposed insiders, influencers, and so-called opinion-makers have trouble understanding political trends even in their own, small Midwestern state.
The clerks in these conservative counties are hardly radicals; they’re Republicans and conservatives, themselves.
The swiftness of these changes shows how blind and out-of-touch self-designated elites are. Conservative cliques doubted this would happen; liberal cliques expected more controversy and resistance.
This is what happens when one talks only to those in a small, like-minded circle. The selection bias of conversation partners in these tiny circles is huge. Far from being clever and cosmopolitan as they image themselves, they’re mostly dull, narrow, and lazy.
This is true of liberals and conservatives. They’ve both been proved wrong and tone deaf.
And, for it all, when their predictions go wrong, these movers and shakers are surprised: What, huh, me?
It’s not the first time; it won’t be the last.
Posted also @ Daily Adams.
Whitewater addendum: If the city’s town squires are so sure of their big ideas, then why not put those ideas and projects to a city-wide vote? It’s a rhetorical question; they’d walk on broken glass before they’d risk an up-or-down vote.
Daily Bread
Daily Bread for 6.12.14
by JOHN ADAMS •
Good morning, Whitewater.
Thursday will be mostly sunny, with a high of seventy-five, and just a one-fifth chance of rain.
On this day in 1987, Pres. Reagan asked Soviet leader Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall.
On this day in 1899, Wisconsin saw her worst tornado strike:
1899 – New Richmond Tornado
On this date the worst tornado disaster in Wisconsin history occured. The storm virtually leveled New Richmond on the day the Gollmar Brothers Circus came to town. At the time, New Richmond was a prosperous town of 2500 people and one of the most scenic places in Wisconsin. On the day of the storm, the streets were filled with residents and tourists waiting for the afternoon circus parade. Shortly after the circus ended, the tornado passed through the very center of town, completely leveling buildings. Over 300 buildings were damaged or destroyed. Massive amounts of flying debris resulted in multiple deaths in at least 26 different families. In all, the storm claimed 117 lives and caused 150 injuries. [Source: National Weather Service]
Here’s Puzzability‘s game for today:
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This Week’s Game — June 9-13
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Pop Flies
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It all starts with Dad this week. For each day, we started with a word that begins with the two-letter chunk PA and deleted it to get a new word. The two-word answer phrase, described by each day’s clue, is the longer PA word followed by the shorter word.
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Example:
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Undercover scheme to entrap the gang of kids wielding liquid adhesive
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Answer:
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Pasting sting
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What to Submit:
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Submit the two-word phrase, with the PA word first (as “Pasting sting” in the example), for your answer.
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Thursday, June 12
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Science/Nature
Watching Mercury transit the Sun from Mars
by JOHN ADAMS •
Business, Corporate Welfare, Economy, Local Government
Rand Paul on Chamber of Commerce Republicans
by JOHN ADAMS •
Sen. Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, often moves (sometimes quixotically) between libertarian and conventionally conservative, Republican positions.
Still, there’s unquestionably some libertarian in him, and in his libertarianism he shares a dynamic philosophy (if not party label) with a huge number of other Americans (about 22%, or just under one-in-four people).
Here’s what Paul, speaking to GOP activists, had to say about the U.S. Chamber of Commerce:
“Chamber of Commerce is fine, I was a member of the Chamber of Commerce, but a Chamber of Commerce Republican is not going to win a national election….I’m not saying we give up on what we believe in, but we have to expand what we believe in….
The interesting thing about it is, as I go around the country, no matter who I talk to, whether it’s the establishment — the wealthy who support our party sometimes — or the poor, people say it’s time, time for this libertarian moment, this liberty moment,” he said. “It’s no longer something that scares people, it’s what [makes] people say, we can’t run the same-old same-old, we’re not going to win with the same-old, same-old.
Part of this is an appeal to an expanded base on issues beyond business issues.
But there’s much more to it, as small-government advocates like Nick Sorrentino well understand:
The big companies, the ones which have long partnered with the government to get a piece of the taxpayer pie would prefer that the true blue small government types just stay home and leave the “governing” to the party and industry hacks….
being pro-business and being pro-market are not the same thing. Big business likes government and regulations (often) because big business controls government and the regulatory process to a large extent. The Chamber of Commerce and the big companies which run the show there like government involvement. The Chamber might say that it is a champion of “free enterprise” but it is far from a champion. Free enterprise is actually pretty much NOT what many members of the Chamber of Commerce want.
Free enterprise, free markets, free prices are however increasingly what a very large portion of the American people want. They see an economy which is stagnant for most, while those who are entrenched in the crony class do well. The too-big-to-fail folks are sitting pretty these days.
The sloganeering of big-business and government cronyism is increasingly ineffective, and awaits a reckoning before a public sharper and fairer than a self-promoting, bloated clique comprehends.
Originally posted at Daily Adams.
Whitewater addendum: There’s more to write about this, as policy and politics in Whitewater. The most important point is that those who advocate public money for white-collar welfare lack a valid economic justification for their preferential treatment of friends and pet projects.
Odd, though, that a dull cadre has picked a rallying cry of crony capitalism, when that very policy is already losing favor and failing elsewhere.
They’re men who have come to a fad too late, like someone excited about a new toy after it’s already hit the discount shelves.
Anderson, Cartoons & Comics
Honestly Expect
by JOHN ADAMS •
Daily Bread
Daily Bread for 6.11.14
by JOHN ADAMS •
Good morning, Whitewater.
We’ll have a rainy Wednesday, with a high of sixty-six.
On this day in 1944, the Allies at Normandy link forces: “Five days after the D-Day landing, the five Allied landing groups, made up of some 330,000 troops, link up in Normandy to form a single solid front across northwestern France.”
It’s Gene Wilder’s birthday:
On this date Gene Wilder (aka Jerome Silberman) was born in Milwaukee. Wilder graduated from Washington High School in Milwaukee in 1951. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Iowa in 1955. and studied judo, fencing, gymnastics and voice at the Old Vic Theatre School in Bristol, England.
Wilder won the Clarence Derwent award for the Broadway play “The Complaisant Lover” in 1962. He continued to perform on Broadway in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1963), Dynamite Tonight (1964), and The White House (1964). Wilder made his film debut in Bonnie and Clyde (1967), then earned an Oscar nomination the following year as the accountant Leo Bloom in The Producers, the first of three films he made for writer-director Mel Brooks. Wilder is known for his work in such films as Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971), Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask) (1972), Blazing Saddles (1973), and Young Frankenstein (1974).
After his second wife Gilda Radner died of ovarian cancer, Wilder co-founded Gilda’s Club, a support group to raise awareness of the disease. [Source: Internet Movie Database].
As Wonka, expressing concern for Mike Teavee:
Here’s the Wednesday game from Puzzability in the Pop Flies series:
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This Week’s Game — June 9-13
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Pop Flies
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It all starts with Dad this week. For each day, we started with a word that begins with the two-letter chunk PA and deleted it to get a new word. The two-word answer phrase, described by each day’s clue, is the longer PA word followed by the shorter word.
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Example:
|
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Undercover scheme to entrap the gang of kids wielding liquid adhesive
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Answer:
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Pasting sting
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What to Submit:
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Submit the two-word phrase, with the PA word first (as “Pasting sting” in the example), for your answer.
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Wednesday, June 11
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Film
Film: Top 10 Practical Movie Effects of All Time
by JOHN ADAMS •
Captivating work —
Corporate Welfare, Government Spending, Misconduct, State Government
The Truth About the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation
by JOHN ADAMS •
There are those times when small-government conservatives, Democrats, and libertarians agree. Acknowledging the misconduct, failures, and cronyism of the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation would be one of those occasions. It is, among other things, the state’s biggest white-collar welfare scheme, both mismanaged and mendacious.
Here’s the effectual motto of the WEDC:
When officials of the city and university boast of these grants, that’s what they’re peddling.
Job Creation Failure
• 46% of companies receiving incentives with a job creation goal failed to report any progress.
• Less than 25% of companies awarded incentives with job creation goals reached at least half of their goal.
• Only 12% of companies reached the targeted number of jobs.
Job Retention Mediocre
• 37% of companies receiving incentives with a job retention goal have no reported progress toward that goal.
• 62% of companies awarded incentives with job retention goals have reached at least half of their goal.
• 51% reached their targeted number of jobs. But, some of these companies laid off workers either before or after receiving incentives.
Capital Investment Sluggish
• 44% of companies receiving incentives including a capital investment goal have no reported progress toward that goal.
• 42% of companies awarded incentives with capital investment goals reached at least half of their goal.
• 25% reached their targeted level of investment.