This, that and the other thing

Now we know why Virginia is solid Democrat: Citing ‘gun violence,’ University of Virginia cancels 21-gun salute portion of Veterans Day ceremony.” (Source here.)

What are the odds that both the Packers and the UW Badgers would win by stuffing late-game scoring drives at home games in the same weekend? (Lesson for both coaches in Sunday’s game at Lambeau: Take the points.)

The unlettered field hands at Blaska Experimental Work Farm (and Penal Colony) raided the neighbors’ curbsides for suitably macerated leaves Sunday, with which they mulched the asparagus fields and fall-tilled gardens. Singing the Cole Porter songbook as they labored. They worked one step ahead of the busy City street crews, who were working a Sunday, perhaps in anticipation of today’s (11-11-19) snow.

Blaska Stately Manor has hardened its target with a motion detector flood light. Saturday night it captured the first interloper: a big-ass raccoon standing on its hind legs surveying the newly illuminated scene.

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We’re getting to them! We see how Ald. Keith Furman is tap dancing furiously in defense of the City of Madison budget that adds zero police officers and fire fighters but devotes $200,000 to a full-time police critic. Kudos to the WI State Journal for its report today that police overtime is up two-thirds in the last 10 years and fire overtime is up 92% and that their budgets increased by a smaller percent than the overall city budget during that time.

Official Madison’s animus toward police is a national, progressive phenomenon. Recall New York police being sprayed with water hoses, pelted with food, assaulted, shot at and killed. 

Police unions say frequent criticism of police from city politicians and reform advocates is stoking anti-police sentiment. “The message is that there are no consequences for your actions,” says criminal justice prof and former cop Joseph Giacalone. “You’re a victim of racism and the police are the enemy. That’s basically the message.”

More here and here.

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⇒ The Madison City budget will be debated next Tuesday, November 12, in the City-Council chambers. The meeting starts at 5:30 — one hour earlier than normal. Please sign up before hand, in person, to testify or (at least) register your support for more police officers and deleting the $200,000 police critic. You get five minutes to speak but must sign up first. (Indicate you are speaking against Item #3 on the agenda.) In the meantime, e-mail your alders now.

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When in Dowd, read Maureen Dowd. Yeah, she’s a big-time NY Times lib, but who writes lede sentences like this: “We’ve had the baby, so why not the nanny? … So maybe it’s fitting for Mrs. Doubtfire to pop in to lay down the law in this federal funded nursery.” You guessed it: she’s referring to Trump and Bloomberg. What does the latter’s entry say about the sad state of the field of Democrats?

A follow-up on Kentucky governor’s race: Matt Bevin had the lowest approval rating among the 50 governors — 34% — and still damn near won.

Hooray for C-Span. Watched much of its coverage of the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, an occasion the Old Settlers at Blaska Manor remember well. We thought the Iron Curtain was permanent. Gawd, those Communists were bastards. They shot their own people trying to get out of the world’s biggest prison farm. Most touching, the very elderly James Baker, secretary of state of George Bush the Elder, remembered calling his  German counterpart. The German’s secretary tells Baker, “Before I put him on the line, I just want to say ‘God Bless America.’” Old Secretary Baker teared up at that story.

Blaska’s Bottom Line: That, my friends, is what Veterans Day is all about.

What do YOU think?