Archive for March, 2008
March 26th, 2008
John McCain, who’s already won enough delegates to become the Republican Party’s presidential nominee, has got to be loving the latest Gallup poll.
The poll says the rancor between the two Democratic campaigns, Hillary’s and Barack’s, may be permanent. 28 percent of Hillary supporters say they’ll vote for Mccain if Barack gets the Democratic nomination; 19 percent of Obama supporters say they’ll vote for McCain if Hillary wins it.
Read the poll here:
Gallup cautions that this is still March, and many of those angry Dems will probably come home to their party on Election Day in November.
However, you’ve got to wonder about the prospect of all those liberals actually voting for McCain, who of late has been claiming Ronald Reagan as his political role model. Me? I doubt they really will. My prediction is that angry Dems will just stay home, or leave the presidency spot blank.
March 26th, 2008
Despite what she’s said over and over on the campaingn trail, 1990s First Lady Hillary Clinton:
*Did not play a role in the Northern Irish peace negotiations. She did accept a teapot, however.
*Did not land in Bosnia amidst sniper fire and have to be whisked away by soldiers. News footage shows her standing around on airport tarmac visiting with children, greeting troops, shaking hands with dignataries.
*Was not the first First Lady since Eleanor Roosevelt to visit a combat zone. That distinction goes to Pat Nixon.
March 23rd, 2008
“Give them tickets? Yeah, that’ll solve it,” said a member of the Register Star’s Community Viewpoints Board in a story in Sunday’s paper. The story goes on to say that the remark, about Mayor Larry Morrissey’s recent crackdown on in-school truants, kids who are in school but not in class, prompted laughter.
I understand the folks’ frustration, but how about we shed that good ol’ Rockford cynicism that keeps us from ever moving beyond perceived hopelessness?
It’s getting kind of old.
Because, you see, who in the School District had been thinking outside the box to get those children to class? At least somebody finally took some action.
Giving kids tickets was a last resort because the Rockford School District has not dealt adequately with the problem. My source — a daughter in one of the Rockford public high schools — said the ticketing had the desired effect. The halls were clear and everyone went to class last week.
It’s not a perfect solution, but we must not let the perfect become the enemy of the good. Indeed, we certainly must make the good the enemy of the status quo.
What we’re seeing, I hope, is the stirring of a community fed up with excuses for under-performing schools. I hope the mayor keeps up the fight, and I hope he can get some charter schools established.
March 19th, 2008
I guess Bob O’Brien was right, after all. O’Brien, executive director of Chicago Rockford International Airport, has been a skeptic on the value of courting “legacy” airlines to come here. They’re a fickle lot, as Northwest proved, and now United is proving by pulling out of the RFD-Denver route. I always wondered about United’s commitment, because the airline only used 49 seat jets here, instead of larger regional jets it uses on other routes. Perhaps they only came here because they thought another carrier was about to go into the market.
O’Brien believes that there’s a growing secondary market of airports like RFD, on the fringes of major metro areas that are growing toward the airports, which is what is happening with Chicagoland, moving toward RFD at a steady rate of growth.
The airlines serving these secondary markets increasingly are new ones, not bound to the old hub and spoke system. Allegiant fits the model, and by all accounts it is very successful on the routes it flies. One problem for Allegiant is that the MD-80s it flies aren’t very good on fuel economy. That didn’t matter a couple of years ago, when jet fuel was still reasonably priced. It matters now.
On Thursday, RFD will announce “air service developments” that include a new destination and another destination. I know that airport leaders have been concerned about United pulling out, and I also know they’ve been looking for other carriers to come in and fill the Denver route. I think Thursday’s announcement will have something to say about that.
March 18th, 2008
Barack Obama has just delivered a masterful, sweeping speech about race relations, in Philadelphia, across the street from Independence Hall. He manages to strongly criticize some of his former pastor’s words, while refusing to throw him under the bus. Mostly, the speech is a frank discussion of the state of race relations in 21st century America.
Read it here, and tell me your reaction.
March 17th, 2008
The Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s fiery sermons escaped notice of the mainstream press, even though the retired pastor of Chicago’s Trinity Church of Christ, Barack Obama’s home church for 20 years, features prominently in Obama’s books.
Wright’s words are interpreted differently depending on which side of American history you’re on. Whites created the country for their benefit — blacks were denied citizenship and counted as three-fifths of a man for census purposes. Naturally, any retelling of the national tale has a different slant if the teller is descended from people who were not considered fully human by the vaunted Founders.
I don’t buy everything Wright says — I don’t think the U.S. government created the AIDS virus, and I think the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was necessary and saved upwards of a million American lives — but I understand his basic themes.
I liked this article from The Guardian about Wright and his effect on Obama’s campaign. I’d like to know what you think of it.
March 17th, 2008
Mayor Morrissey’s decision to have police issue citations to students who are in school but not in class is working. The first day of Hizzoner’s new policy saw cops write 89 citations to high school and middle school students.
The word that cops were writing citations to appear in court on truancy charges was a motivational tool that prompted kids to skedaddle to class rather than loiter in halls.
March 16th, 2008
If the city of Rockford wants to place cameras on overhead traffic lights to catch red-light runners, why is that the concern of state Sen. Dave Syverson?
Syverson railed against Rockford’s attempt to get him to pass a state law to allow the city to place the cameras on traffic lights. He said it’s just a scheme to collect money.
It’s not, but what if it were? Does Syverson have a problem with nabbing and fining drivers who run red lights?
March 11th, 2008
Good for Mayor Morrissey standing up to the imperial school bureaucrats — the School District Central Command Triumverate of Katz, Hoffman & Hernandez.
Incredibly, the school “leaders” believe that city cops shouldn’t issue truancy tickets to kids who are in school, but roaming the halls instead of going to class. No, they want the cops to wait until a fight breaks out, then stop it.
Morrissey, realizing logically that such “in-school truants” are the very ones who foment trouble, wants his cops to ticket the kids if they don’t go back to class.
There was good cooperation between Morrissey and former Superintendent Dennis Thompson. Both men made TV commercials together touting the importance of being in school. Both warned that the truancy ordinance would be enforced.
Then Thompson left abruptly. Now, truancy referals have dried up.
Where is the School Board on this one?
March 11th, 2008
Rockford aldermen have turned spendthrifts. They added two ambulances to the budget at a cost of $260,000, even though the fire department didn’t request any ambulances.
Then, they promptly created their own, $50,000 slush fund, to do exactly what, we’re not sure. It seems as if this money is to be Ald. Nancy Johnson’s cash stash, to be used on lobbying and other projects designed to engage in one-up-manship with the mayor, who orignally wanted the $50,000 for his own lobbying project.
This is going to be money wasted. Aldermen know nothing about lobbying the state of Illinois. The money would only do some good if were put into a bigger pot of money to actually hire a professional lobbyist.
But, next year’s an election year, so I understand full well what Alderman Nancy, the Democrat caucus chair, is doing. She’s having a little fun at the expense of the independent mayor.
Taxpayers have a right to demand to know what this money is going to be used for. But I don’t think they’ll ever find out.
the public
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