This is not the Haas you’re looking for.

While I do support Barack Obama for President, and I was even a closet Deaniac, (“but I’m not a Democrat!”), there’s another Obama supporter named Jason Haas who’s not me. Howdy from Milwaukee, Other Jason Haas!

I-94 is completely open again

Thank goodness. I’m glad that this major thoroughfare is open and that it’s been deemed safe. Here’s the latest WisDOT closed road map:

Compare this to the June 14 map:

Much better, eh? The other effect that I-94 westbound in Jefferson County being closed was that it made me take I-43, which offers a more relaxed pace of travel. That in turn allowed me to take this picture of my car’s dashboard:

I’d driven 401.1 miles on about half a tank of fuel. Danke, mein TDI! Unfortunately, the car always seems to go through fuel faster on the second half-tank, and in the end my total miles were just under 650 miles from about 13.5 gallons of fuel, which makes for right around 48 MPG. Not bad. With diesel up to ~$4.60/gallon, and commercial biodiesel even higher, I need every efficient mile I can get.

Why should you has cheezburger when you can has WAR!

With all necessary apologies to those who value things like grammar and spelling (I’m looking at you, Mallard Fillmore), I report with little regret that the wisdom of Ceiling Cat has come to my house, and that although I never do so, I know that indeed, icanhascheezburger.

On that note, it gives me great pleasure to introduce the logical next step in the evolutionary progress of Internets culture, I CAN HAS WAR. It seems that the McCain campaign rather artfully borrowed from Obama’s web site design, even to the point of lifting the slogan. While McCain is not shown emerging from a great luminous aura, McCain’s camp seems to be airdropping everything about Obama’s campaign but the candidate himself into McCain’s turf. This could be the first time I remember seeing a Republican candidate trying to ape the Dem — which should be interesting now that President Bush has engaged in negotiations with North Korea, the apparently former third member of the Axis of Evil, and in doing so performed the single largest flip-flop in political history. Which is odd, as that’s what Senator Obama has been saying should be done all along. Gee, George, you’re sure not making it easy for McCain to fill the emperor’s clothes.

Now if somebody could explain to me how this thing works, I’d be grateful.

County Board Passes Sales Tax Referrendum

The future of our treasured resource, the Milwaukee County Parks, looks like it may have a bright future — at least for the moment. According to Jim Goulee of The Park People,

“The Milwaukee County Board today passed a resolution to place an advisory referendum for a half percent sales tax increase for support of our parks. The referendum will be placed on the November ballot, assuming it withstands Walker’s veto. The board passed the resolution with a vote of 13 to 5 (Supv. Lipscomb was absent). This margin represents a super majority which is necessary to override the expected veto.”

If you ask me, this is very good news. For years, many have been complaining about a high property tax levy in Milwaukee County. (Let me assure you it’s high in Dane County, too.) This finally gives us a chance to do something about it. Scott Walker has made a big deal about not raising property taxes — which he hasn’t been able to do. It seems that no one, be it Walker or our friends at CRG have been able to actually manifest any real reduction of property taxes. Finally, we have a way to do it.

By voting for the sales tax, you can help lower the property tax which all landowners must pay in the County. That is something that no amount of recalls or electing ultraconservatives to the county board would ever do.

We need to watch this closly. Except a veto attempt by Walker, which will be overturned, and a months-long “vote no” chorus on the wingnut radio. This will need to be marketed both in the suburbs and in urban Milwaukee. But we can do it. So let’s do it!

Also: Jim Goulee wrote again to say that he was incorrect on two points. The motion still passed, but it was by 12-6. Thirteen members of the board would be needed for a veto override, meaning Supervisor Lipscomb, who was absent today and did not vote, will be the swing vote to override Walker’s veto.

Second, the sales tax would also aid transit, which Goulee did not mention, which is understandable, as he is a proponent of the parks.

Update: Walker vetoed the resolution, as expected, but the Board will likely vote to override his veto in September. How many veto overrides has he seen now?

A better “Clean Sweep” for Wisconsin

Rather than former state senator and hard-right-wing religious zealot Tom Reynolds’ Clean Sweep Wisconsin PAC, may I offer Operation Clean Sweep, a joint effort American Red Cross and Salvation Army. Rather than backing candidates who don’t believe in habeus corpus or ensuring that we do in fact become a theocracy, according to WFRV-TV in Green Bay, Operation Clean Sweep seeks to “help those affected by the recent flooding in the Midwest.” The Green Bay Press-Gazette (a Gannett newspaper) ran a story on the operation, .

While I couldn’t find much further information on it, there is an American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund page. All financial donations to the Red Cross are tax-deductible, but they apparently also need everything from buckets and pails to garbage bags to bottled water, rubber gloves and respirator masks. The effects of the floods are by no means not over. Driving down I-94 last weekend I saw that while much of the flood water has receeded, there are still hundreds if not thousands of acres of devastated farm land. That says nothing about the people that were affected by the floods, be they in Green Bay, Wisconsin or Burlington, Iowa.

Humboldt Park wading pool open again; new hours 10-2PM

Walking home from the Chill on the Hill [on Tuesday] night, we saw that the wading pool in Humboldt Park is indeed open once again, and that the hours have been changed to 10-2PM. Unfortuantely, it’s closed during the peak heat/sun hours of the late afternoon. I hope that the hours are changed again when we approach the hottest months of the summer, assuming the temperature ever gets above 80 deg. F.

(And let’s hope I haven’t condemned us to two months of above-90 weather by saying that!)

McCain’s energy policy oscillations, Part 1

Today Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain proposed “offering a $300 million prize for the development of a battery package that has the size, capacity, cost and power to leapfrog the commercially available plug-in hybrids or electric cars.” So the government will give some lucky winner three hundred million dollars for developing a great new battery. Sound goods. Add to that $5,000 in tax credits for consumers who buy new (so-called) zero-emission vehicles, which may eventually use this hypothetical battery. Cash in the pocket always sounds good, until you look at the details.

First off, where would this three hundred million dollars come from? It certainly won’t be from ending the war in Iraq. Despite his avowed hatred of war, McCain doesn’t want to end the war in Iraq. He seems eager to bomb Iran, and continues the Bush administration’s bomb-the-terrorists-into-submission stance. So the cash certainly wouldn’t come from reduced war spending.

Rather, McCain said, “I could pay for it by canceling three pork-barrel projects that are unnecessary and unwanted.” Three pork-barrel projects, each worth $100 million dollars. Perhaps, say, transit funding? Goodness knows in this day of $136+ per barrel oil and $5.25/gallon diesel fuel, investing in transit infrastructure would be foolish. Spending on public transit surely would be a good target for his “pork” slashing.

Of course, this is purely an assumption on my part on the wishes of a potential McCain administration. But this statement implies that he knows of three that can be cut right now, but he did nothing to stop them. The image his people would like to sell of “John McCain the maverick budget hawk/fiscal conservative” quickly is undermined again with this new image of “John McCain the senator who knows of three $100M barrels of pork but didn’t do anything to stop them,” just as it had been by the “John McCain the senator who admittedly doesn’t understand economics,” and yet played a direct role in the Keating Five savings and loan scandal of 1993. The one that cost American taxpayers two billion dollars ($2,000,000,000!!) to bail out — which is over six and a half times as large as the size of his three hundred million dollar battery prize.

Why is McCain suddenly presenting a golden carrot to exurban voters in the form of possible $5,000 in tax credits for consumers who buy new so-called zero-emission vehicles? Note that up to a $3,000 tax credit is currently available on hybrids.

Why is McCain trying to sell a a $300 million prize that would be paid for by cutting pork that he could fight right now but isn’t doing anything to stop?

And what would McCain’s economic advisor and old friend-of-Enron Phil Gramm have to say about all of this? I’ll be looking into the Enron-Gramm-McCain connection in the coming days.

Trial date set for UWM embezzlement case

According to the UWM Post, a trial date has been set for former UWM Student Association President Russell Rueden. The Post previously reported that Mr. Rueden was accused of embezzling $10,000 from UWM. Apparently former Sandburg Halls [the UWM dormitories] Administrative Council President Matt Franson wrote the check to Rueden’s advertising firm, AcerPrudens. (Is that clever anagram for “Ruedens Ace P.R.,” or “Super Dancer”?) Mr. Rueden served at the time as Speaker of the Senate for the Student Association (SA). He was suspended from his duties and later removed from the SA.

Reudens has since been charged with three counts of felony theft and two counts of misdemeanor theft. An article published in late May 2008 in the Gannet-owned Oshkosh Northwestern said that “there’s a proposal in place to plea the case down to a single misdemeanor theft charge,” and that “a plea hearing and sentencing are set for next month,” which would be this month of June. The AP similarly reported that there was a plea deal was in the works. But according to a Post story that ran on June 20, the plea deal has not been worked out, leading to the scheduling of the final pre-trial hearing for 8:30AM on July 25.

Adios, George Carlin

You likely know by now that legendary comedian and trouble-maker George Carlin has died. Our friend the illusory tenant has a smart tribute to Carlin up, which reminds me of what I heard on the radio the other night. Thinker, political analyst, and author Michael Parenti (his latest is Contrary Notions) was reading at Cody’s Books some time before they closed this month, and said that under our constitutional protection of free speech, things such as “I love my mom” will never be fought against, it will never be repressed. It’s things the what George Carlin said that do get repressed, that do get censored, be it officially or unofficially, by government watchdogs or by an editor’s scruples and sense of what’s right or wrong. If you need to see what I mean, look at mr. tenant’s entry on Carlin. He’s got pictures posted from when George Carlin was arrested here in Milwaukee in 1972 after his performance at Summerfest. (The charges were later dismissed.) In short, saying “God is good” will not be shut down. But what Carlin said about religion was fought against, making him into an invaluable fighter for free speech. I will mourn him for that more than anything.

My kid’s first day at summer camp

There must be some saying about what a milestone that the first day of your child’s summer camp represent that I’m either totally unaware of or totally forgetting. Either way, today is the first day of summer camp for my daughter down at a local MPS school. Her fears of being there were pretty strong today, though they steadily wavered throughout the morning. Having her outfit for the day picked out the night before seemed to help us make a smooth start, and we caught the #11 MCTS bus for the short ride to camp with ease. It wasn’t until we got about a block from the school that her anxiety kicked in once again.

Honestly, I feeling just like that when I was about her age. The fear of the unknown, the fear of not knowing who will be there. The kids seemed pretty happy to be there for the most part, though one boy was wailing for his mother. Despite Hari’s visible anxiety, a Milwaukee Recreation staff person helped her get started with some coloring books, giving me the opportunity to make a quiet exit.

The program looks very good, full of activities for groups and individual kids. Another parent told me that on hotter days, the kids are taken to a pool, and that overall, he’s very happy with the program. It should be good!