Does anyone find it a bit creepy that the number one song in Great Britain today in 1957 is about Paul Anka’s brother’s babysitter?
Three years later, the number one single across the sea required no words:
Two years later, the number one U.S. single was a dance that was easier than learning your ABCs:
Today in 1963, Little Stevie Wonder became the first artist to have the number one pop single and album and to lead the R&B charts with his “Twelve-Year-Old Genius”:
Today in 1974 the rock charts were topped by one of the more dubious number-one singles:
Today in 1990, at the beginning of Operation Desert Shield, Sinead O’Connor refused to sing if the National Anthem was performed before her concert at the Garden State Arts Plaza in Homdel, N.J. Radio stations respond by pulling O’Connor’s music from their airwaves.
That was the same day that Iron Maiden won a lawsuit from the families of two people who committed suicide, claiming that subliminal messages in the group’s “Stained Class” album drove them to kill themselves.
As you know, school starts the day after Labor Day. (If you like or hate that, click here and scroll down a bit to vote in the poll.)
On Monday, I went to a school meeting at which Michael picked up his school-issued iPad. Platteville seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade students are getting them in the first year of a program that probably will eventually see all students getting them.
One of the things iPads apparently can do is take photos. So can most laptops and cellphones. (But you knew that already.) But apparently iPads can take different kinds of photos. So for those who care (and you care because you’re reading this, right? Right? Hello?), this is what I look like with his iPad’s thermal imaging camera:
(In the background, by the way, is his bike. Actually, it’s my bike. I won it in a raffle. However, to no parent’s surprise, I never get to ride it.)
And this is supposed to be an example of the iPad’s X-ray camera capabilities …
… which brings to mind the days when David Letterman was funny, and he’d stare at the camera and say, “Hep me! I been HIP-mo-tized.”
I wonder if anyone would notice one of these in print.
Though school in Wisconsin doesn’t start for 10 more days, the high school football season starts tonight.
I will be on the air in Platteville tonight announcing that rarest of things, a big early-season game between Darlington, apparently the prohibitive favorite in its conference, and Platteville, one of two favorites in its conference, at 7 p.m. on WPVL (1590 AM) in Platteville and online worldwide at http://www.theespndoubleteam.com.
Similar to where I used to announce, Ripon, Platteville is embroiled in its own conference problems, about which you can read my thoughts here. Those thoughts may seem similar to my thoughts one year earlier (and before that elsewhere) because as far as Platteville goes, not much has changed.
The more I watch the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, which sanctions Wisconsin high school sports, the less I’m impressed. The I in its initials could stand for (dis)Ingenuous, as in essentially all its arguments in its lawsuit against Gannett Newspapers, which dared to broadcast postseason basketball without going through the right WIAA hoops (so to speak).
The WIAA claims to be a voluntary association, which in truth is as voluntary as holding a driver’s license. Do you need a driver’s license? Only if you want to drive. Driving is theoretically optional, but factually mandatory. One of those A’s in WIAA should stand for “arrogance,” too, given that the WIAA refuses to acknowledge that none of its activities would be possible without taxpayer dollars — the taxpayer dollars that build and maintain the schools (including UW campuses and UW–Madison’s Camp Randall Stadium and Kohl Center) that hold high school events, the taxpayer dollars that pay coaches (most of whom are teachers, whose salaries are paid for by us taxpayers), the taxpayer dollars that buy many athletic supplies, and so on.
On that happy note, enjoy the season.
Brian Fraley of Right Wisconsin asks:
In the next few days, we’re expected to hear the official announcement that Special Elections will be held in the 21st, 69th and 70th Assembly Districts. Are the communities of South Milwaukee, Abbotsford and Wisconsin Rapids ready for localized versions of the Capitol Chaos?
The following are expected to announce their resignations from the State Assembly: Republican Assembly Majority Leader Scott Suder (expected to land at the Public Service Commission), Republican legislator Mark Honadel (rumored to be heading to the private sector) and Democratic State Representative Amy Sue Vruwink (who could land at the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection).
This could set up three simultaneous special elections in the fall. There is a strong likelihood that at least one partisan nomination would be contested in each seat, meaning the primary and general election dates for each race could be set for the same dates.
So with a dozen or more candidates vying for (at least) three vacancies, can the residents of central and southeast Wisconsin expect sit ins, sing-a-longs, and screaming guys in pink dresses at candidate forums this fall?
Given the excessively fractious state of state politics (and I remain amazed this hasn’t happened in this state … yet), Fraley’s prediction seems a certainty.
The better questions are (1) what difference will the protests make, and (2) what difference will the elections make? Between the 2010 state elections and the 2012 state elections, Democrats spent tens of millions of dollars and utterly failed to change the 2010-to-2012 results. Sen. Dan Kapanke (R–La Crosse) lost, but Republicans gained a seat right back when Rep. Tom Tiffany (R–Hazelhurst) replaced retiring Sen. Jim Holperin (D–Conover). I suspect the protesters changed as many minds for them as changed minds to vote against them.
Republicans are comfortably in control in the Assembly. Of those seats, Suder’s may be as close to a swing seat as exists, meaning the Democrats might see their minority grow by one, and I wouldn’t necessarily lay money on that, given 2010 redistricting. Elections before they’re regularly scheduled do give the winner the incumbent’s advantage, but the incumbent party’s advantage is already built in.
James Taranto starts by criticizing a straw man invented by Mike Konczal of the Washington Amazon.com Post …
One can spend an entire lifetime debating the distinction between “public” and “private,” but for this post let’s use an approach from John Dewey. In The Public and Its Problems (1927), Dewey argued that the public is involved wherever an action between two people has consequences “that extend beyond the two directly concerned.” Given “that they affect the welfare of many others, the act acquires a public capacity.” And as such needs a public response. And conservatives reject this.
… and then follows up with an inconvenient point:
Konczal mocks Charles Murray for arguing, in Coming Apart: The State of White America, that “a private solution of elites shaming the poor is better than any government response to the trials faced by working-class whites.” (To clarify, while most of Murray’s data are specific to whites, that argument is not.) …
But when you consider the social problems Murray identifies–problems that are worse among nonwhites than among whites–a lot of them implicate what most liberals would consider private decisions: decisions, that is, about sex, marriage and reproduction.
Aren’t these decisions “public” by the Dewey-Konczal definition–particularly under a welfare state? Most obviously, a decision to have sex can produce a child; a poor woman’s decision to have sex outside wedlock greatly increases the likelihood that the child will be a burden on the public fisc.
But it’s not just poor people whose sexual, reproductive and marital decisions have effects beyond themselves. Sexual-marketplace theory teaches that prevailing mores and expectations are not simply handed down by “elites”: They are an effect of individual actions (in the aggregate) as well as a cause.
Nor is the public effect of reproductive choices limited to those poor enough to be on what we usually think of as “welfare.” Declining fertility threatens the long-term solvency of the middle-class entitlements, Social Security and Medicare. Thus every person’s sexual behavior, every decision to marry or not, every woman’s decision about whether to have children has a public effect.
You may object that the public effect of any such individual decision is too negligible to justify government intrusion. But in the realm of commerce, the left rejects that claim. In Wickard v. Filburn (1942), the landmark New Deal case, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the government could regulate a farmer’s use of home-grown wheat on the basis of just such an aggregate effect: “That appellee’s own contribution to the demand for wheat may be trivial by itself is not enough to remove him from the scope of federal regulation where, as here, his contribution, taken together with that of many others similarly situated, is far from trivial.”
How, then, can sexual and reproductive liberty–the very soul of contemporary liberalism–be justified in Dewey-Konczal terms if economic liberty cannot?
Today in 1964, the Supremes reached number one by wondering …
Today in 1968, the Beatles briefly broke up when Ringo Starr quit during recording of their “White Album.” Starr rejoined the group Sept. 3, but in the meantime the remaining trio recorded “Back in the USSR” with Paul McCartney on drums and John Lennon on bass:
Maury Brown of the new Gammons baseball website, blames for Ryan Braun’s PED problems … you:
From comments by fans for articles on the internet, to social media, to your local bar, right now someone is railing on about performance-enhancing drugs in baseball. They seethe on one side of the argument or the other, pouring out venom (and often expletives) in extra-large doses. Many times, in 140 characters or less, adjectives are sprinkled about and dripping with snark. To them, the matter is offered in black and white terms.
As if blame is ever that easy. The PED issue in baseball has plenty of blame to go around.
Start by blaming the jar of “greenies” that used to sit on the clubhouse table. We don’t talk about this much because we like to think that those players “back in the good-old days” didn’t need to performance enhance. Maybe they simply used them like one downs espresso and energy drinks but even Henry Aaron admitted to using “greenies”.
Blame the players or those that were “above 5% using steroid” as part of the survey test in 2003. When those players tested positive, it put in place the mandatory drug testing policy. While it was the first step in addressing the steroid issue, since then we’ve all become jaded. A player starts to perform above their norm—for whatever reason—and our immediate reaction is they “juiced.” Somewhere, Jeff Bagwell is nodding his head.
Blame the shifting sands on what was and wasn’t banned and how that changed the view (see androstenedione). Hate how the system was not yet fully formed at the time with testing, certification, and a case of where the MLBPA had fought tooth and nail because the rank and file hadn’t gotten any balls yet, and those that juiced had the upper hand. Who doesn’t remember Gene Orza, the former COO of the MLB Players Association, saying of steroids, “I have no doubt that they are not worse than cigarettes.”? Who can’t remember Donald Fehr fighting the battle for his constituency, the players?
Blame Commissioner Selig for either being blind to seeing it all go down, or as some think, letting it slide when McGwire and Sosa were in the midst of their historic (and PED fueled) race for the single-season home run record (I have always thought Bud simply couldn’t put 2 and 2 together on it). If, as Selig said, he really had no idea it was going on, where were those that must have seen it occurring and didn’t advise him? …
Blame the fans for their inability to really care about PEDs in the game. Only when it’s the high-profile player or when the sacred records or being molested do you jump up and down. You can cite records dating back to the game’s beginnings but all but a handful recount that Alex Sanchez of the then Devil Rays was the very first player suspended for PEDs in Major League Baseball. Fewer still are concerned about the near daily reports of Minor Leaguers being suspended for this drug or that. Ultimately what fans care about with PEDs is building star athletes up, and then (sadly) tearing them down. …
Blame the league and Commissioner Selig for over-stepping the boundaries of the Joint Drug Agreement in the Alex Rodriguez/Biogenesis case. A-Rod’s no saint, and seems to have juiced (he hasn’t denied it, nor has his team of lawyers), but you’re all in a tizzy over the fact that he wouldn’t go quietly on a 211 game suspension when there’s nothing outlined in the drug agreement, that you agreed to with the union for the players that allows for such stiff penalties. Not only does it put you in a position of looking weak should arbitrator Fredric Horowitz overturn the suspension, or more likely, lower the number of games he’s suspended for, it more importantly puts labor peace in jeopardy. Congrats. Not since the owners colluded has there been an action on your part that could potentially kill the game’s golden goose. …
Blame poverty for the Latin kids who juice to want a better life. Blame the minor leaguer who’s juicing to make the show. Blame the high-profile players for greed. At every level of the game, a single source is the issue, which is …
Blame the money. Blame the salaries. Blame it on the revenues. This is what fuels it all.
Finally, blame yourself. Don’t act shocked. Don’t be aghast at the comment. Be honest. The incredible salaries which fuels this hyper-competitiveness that leads some to PEDs is what drives it all. You’re appalled, and yet like some drug addict you go to games, watch on television, and buy the merchandising. In that sense, those that are griping the loudest are those that are the biggest hypocrites. You’re the enabler. If the money stopped—if we all became Howard Beale in Network and said, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!”—it would slowly subside. In the end, the issue of performance-enhancing drugs in sports is tied to you. Ultimately, that’s where the power resides. I know it. I’m one of them. The only difference is, it’s all not as simple as it’s often portrayed. All I ask is that the next time you want to lay a finger at those “lying cheaters” or call Selig “the sport’s biggest overreacher” you remember that. Be mad. Want the game to be clean (if it ever has been). But, I can’t take the easy path on it. I can’t accept the arguments. I see it as Pandora’s Box, and we’re not going back. Am I apathetic? Maybe. Am I tired of it all? I think you can read this and say, no. You can’t see it but my shirt reads, “Reality Sucks”. Welcome to reality.
There is, however, an opposing view:
Nothing personal against you, Maury, because I like you, but really: Blame the fans for “not caring enough” about steroids until a superstar is involved? Or even worse, for continuing to listen to and watch and attend games at all? What a load of BS. We the fans are not the caretakers of the product. Baseball and the franchisees are. We love baseball and we simply watch the product put in front of us. Baseball are the ones using the interest fans have to justify their turning a blind eye to the dangerous drug element in the game in the service of what they believe is more profitable. I don’t even blame the players so much–rather than engaging in evil for the purpose of subverting the Game, they are only doing what they feel they have to to go all in on a career in baseball, where the difference between making it versus almost making it is the difference between achieving wealth versus living check to check, if even that. It’s a skewed incentive that few of us could resist if we were confronted with it ourselves. That’s a different discussion, though. But honestly–blaming the fans? That’s basically blaming the victim for the sin of following human nature. What a load of crap. We would be happy watching the best available product, whatever it is.
The corollary to that is that there is little fan interest in a baseball team that loses 100 games every year. And if you’re looking for sports figures to be heroes instead of just players you enjoy watching … well, you know how I feel about that.
The Washington Post surveys the prospects of Gov. Scott Walker for becoming … all together now … President Walker:
If Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) runs for president in 2016, his theme will likely be some version of this: “No” is not enough for the GOP.
“You don’t just sit back and nick the other side — you’ve got to lay out a plan,” Walker said Monday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
Walker added: “As governors, as state leaders, we’re more optimistic than our friends in Washington. We’re not just against something. We’re laying out a plan. We’re laying out a vision.”
Walker is rejecting two things. One is Washington, which is not surprising at all, considering how unpopular Congress is right now and how unpopular the Democratic-controlled White House is to the Republican primary voters whom Walker wants to win over.
Secondly — and more notably — Walker is pleading for a Republican Party that stands for something.
Consider that House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) recently told CBS News, “We should not be judged by how many new laws we create,” but rather: “We ought to be judged on how many laws we repeal. We’ve got more laws than the administration could ever enforce.”
Walker seems to be saying the Republican resume needs to read more than that. For his part, Walker, who had the benefit of having a GOP legislature when he entered office, signed a law that curbed collective bargaining for public employees. That act would probably be a big asset in a Republican primary. If he runs, look for it to be a centerpiece of his pitch.
Walker illuminates the difference between governors running for president and those from Washington running for president. Governors — Walker, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan — are executives. They have to get things done. That makes governors more pragmatic than those who run from the congressional branch. Congressmen and senators — Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Al Gore — can vote for or against or present. Nothing about Congress, other than being in leadership, has anything to do with being president.
Steve Prestegard.com: The Presteblog 