No Runny Eggs

The repository of one hard-boiled egg from the south suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin (and the occassional guest-blogger). The ramblings within may or may not offend, shock and awe you, but they are what I (or my guest-bloggers) think.

Archive for July 28th, 2010

My superintendent in Franklin is grossly underpaid (and so is yours)

by @ 21:59. Filed under Miscellaneous.

DISCLAIMER: I am not picking on Franklin Superintendent Steve Patz or any other super…..just stay with me, ok.

You cannot make this stuff up.

I was driving to a meeting today listening to Charlie Sykes. He was devoting a segment of his program to a breaking story, and kudos to them, on Milwaukeenewsbuzz.com. It is mind blowing and mind boggling:

“Some Milwaukee Public Schools teachers could be getting their hotel accommodations or other Spring Break vacation expenses paid by the district under an agreement reached with the teachers union.”

The details follow.

Now this comes after yours truly blogged information received earlier this month from the MacIver Institute:

“Information provided by MPS and the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction and compiled by the MacIver Institute shows that in 2002, the average MPS teacher made $63,413 in salary and benefits. Next year, the average teacher will make $98,423*.

Now they’re getting vacation expenses paid for them??!!

Holy phone lines, Batman! That’s a talk show topic.

So Charlie opened up the airwaves to the audience.

Some teacher union sympathizer got in and tried to go head to head with Charlie.

Mistake.

The talk show host always has the upper hand. He’s a better communicator, debater, and he has studied up on the facts.

He defended this sweetheart vacation deal the teachers were getting.

He claimed that the poor, whiny, moaning teachers deserve far more than what they get.

And Sykes, as you might expect, had him for lunch. Whiny, moaning crybaby teachers don’t need whiny, moaning, crybaby sympathizers to rush to their defense…..because they have no defense.

Alright, alright, Kevin. Why drag Steve Patz into this?? Huh??

OK, I’ll tell you, and again, I have nothing against Patz per se.

It’s just that this ignoramus that foolishly called into the Sykes program said, and you can hear it on the podcast, that school superintendents deserve a lot more than what they are currently being compensated.

Oh really?

Yes, really.

How much?

Try, in the millions.

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Say what?

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School superintendents need to be paid in the millions.

That’s WAY WAY WAY more than
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THE GREAT OBAMESSIAH!

Sorry.

Superintendents,  and that would include Franklin’s Steve Patz, don’t deserve more than the governor. Those of you who were in on negotiating Patz’s contract, you got screwed and so did the Franklin taxpayers.

Millions for school superintendents who are running districts cranking out failing student after failing student?

Wow. Are we in trouble.

Public Policy Polling returning to its Democrat roots?

by @ 12:39. Filed under Politics.

Jim Geraghty and a couple of his regular readers found some rather odd crosstabs in recent Public Policy Polling releases in New Hampshire and California races that purport to show surges for Democrat candidates. At the same time other pollsters (no, Bill, not just Rasmussen) are finding fewer self-identified Democrats and liberals nationwide, PPP somehow found more of them in both New Hampshire and California for their latest polls.

Something tells me that a close examination of the PPP crosstabs in their next series of Wisconsin releases is in order.

Only in government, MPS edition

by @ 12:26. Filed under Education, Politics - Wisconsin.

(H/T – Charlie Sykes)

Milwaukee Magazine‘s NewsBuzz reports on an employment situation that can only happen in government. First, the setup: Milwaukee Public Schools has, for the past several years, scheduled an in-school school-day district-wide taking of the ACT college admission examination in order to facilitate the participation of every high school junior. For this coming school year, they scheduled it for Wednesday, April 27, 2011.

Somebody in the district offices forgot to tell those who negotiated the 2010-2011 school calendar with the Milwaukee Teachers’ Education Association that 4/27/2011 is the Wednesday after Easter. The tentative agreement, reached in early June, had spring break at its traditional Good Friday-through-Friday after Easter slot.

The MPS board caught this potential problem at the June 24 meeting, during which the final ratification of the school calendar was supposed to take place. Rather than attempting to reschedule the date of the ACT test, asking high-school juniors who want to take the test come in during spring break, or asking those juniors to take the test on one of the several Saturdays and at one of the several locations (some of which are MPS facilities) suburban and private-school students take the test, they told the negotiators to move spring break to accomodate the 4/27 ACT test date, and decided to hold off on agreeing to the school calendar until that was done.

On July 9, MPS and MTEA reached a pair of agreements regarding spring break. First, they agreed to move spring break to the week before Easter plus the Monday following Easter. That in itself is not at all controversial – it is the same number of weekdays, and it encompasses Easter.

However, the second part is something only a union would demand and only a government entity would grant – a chance, at the board’s discretion, of reimbursement for any and all expenses on an altered or cancelled vacation during the week after Easter that are non-refundable, non-reimbursable, or penalties generated by an alteration or cancellation.

Yes, you read that right – MPS will in all likelyhood pay for the assumptions made by employees based on an unofficial and never-ratified schedule. In the private sector, especially in a non-union shop, the employer would have told the employees, in so many words, “Tough luck.” In fact, that same sentiment would have been given had the vacation been forced to be altered or cancelled at the last minute.

A Tale of Two Responses to Last Week’s Storms

by @ 7:44. Filed under Miscellaneous.

This past weekend, countless Milwaukee households grappled with what to do next to put their very existence together following life-threatening rain storms last Thursday. Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, still battling the severe injuries he suffered when he singlehandedly took on a weapon-wielding fanatic gone berserk last August managed to somehow on his rare day off from Milwaukee City Hall reject spending time with his family so he could survey the damage to the city he loves more than freedom itself.

Barrett emerged from his home early Saturday morning while the overwhelming majority of his constituents slept safely in their warm beds thanks to the mayor’s ongoing efforts that have stifled violent criminals in Milwaukee, The mayor saw a young woman walking a parched poodle down the street. Without hesitation, Barrett ran to his outdoor hose, and grabbing it with his still injured hand, turned the water on and hustled back to quench the animal’s thirst, the dog now lying on its side from the early morning July heat.

Aides to Barrett repeatedly asked the mayor if he wanted to drive him to the damaged areas. Barrett stoically replied, “No. I’ll walk.”

Along his path, Barrett encountered numerous constituents. One young boy, wearing knee braces and with a tear in his eye asked the mayor, “Could you help me, someday?” Barrett, choking back tears of his own replied, “Son, when I’m governor, the sick, the ill, the fragile couldn’t ask for a better friend in the state Capitol than me.”

“Thank you, Mayor,” the young boy responded.

Barrett smiled and winked to the young lad who looked happier than he’s been in months.

Before arriving at his first stop of what would be many to see the havoc Mother Nature caused, the mayor thought it best to enter a nearby church and pray for the victims and their recovery. While inside, some nuns who gathered to recite the Rosary, normally unflappable, found themselves overcome, unable to hide their emotions and show how impressed they were with Barrett.

“God bless you, sir,” said one of the nuns.

“All in a day’s work, Sister,” said Barrett.

On his route, Barrett passed four children’s lemonade stands and bought drinks at all four, offering to come to each child’s classroom in September to discuss how each and every one of them deserves a great school.

In the absence of crossing guards, Barrett also escorted nine elderly men and women, six with canes, three in wheelchairs across busy intersections.

During one stretch of his walk, Barrett encountered at least a half dozen gang members congregating on a busy street corner. Completely forgetting  and ignoring the peril that struck him last year when he courageously stood up to a mad man armed with a tire iron, Barrett stopped, and after first asking the gang members if their mothers knew what they were doing, implored the young men to give up their life of crime before he enthusiastically handed them schedules to Milwaukee’s summer ethnic and church festivals.

Despite being urged by aides to pick up his pace and get to the scene of storm-ravaged homes, Barrett insisted that these were necessary stops for the good of the community and all mankind.

Barrett would, indeed, conduct his own personal assessment of the damage, visiting over 175 homes personally before the sun completely set.

Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker, the right-wing conservative candidate who stands in the way of a fine gentleman like Tom Barrett becoming governor and whose party has often been characterized as mean-spirited had a slightly different weekend.

Having watched the 10:00 news on all local TV stations the night before and having been advised by staff that a tour of the mass destruction in Milwaukee County Saturday might be a good idea, Walker slept in until at least 10:00 the next morning.

Upon finally waking up as thousands of Milwaukee County residents feverishly worked to clean up their basements, Walker ate two rather unhealthy bowls of Captain Crunch that have caused many Wisconsinites of voting age to become obese while watching an hour of the Cartoon Network. Too much Tv viewing has also been said to contribute to obesity.

Walker then called his bookie, believed to be located in Las Vegas, and placed at least three bets against the Milwaukee Brewers, the most beloved team in our city, the team that drew three million fans the past two seasons at Miler Park, many of whom vote.

After taking a two-minute shower, Walker briefly toweled himself off, got dressed and went to Potawatomi to play some slots.

“I just love the second-hand smoke,” Walker was overheard saying to a fellow gambler. “Annoys those damn liberals.”

Upon leaving Potawatomi, a casino that has, by its very existenece destroyed numerous lives, Walker was met by a young Indian child soliciting donations for blankets. Walker refused to contribute after the girl couldn’t come up with a large campaign donation in return.

Most of the afternoon, Walker spent reading the National Review in his hammock on his outdoor patio while snacking on liver pate, crab legs, and caviar.

“Hell, it’s the weekend. Screw the brown bag crap,” said Walker.

When asked by an aide if he might want to take a personal look at the storm damage for great shots with struggling families, Walker became indignant. “This is Milwaukee. We’re a hearty bunch. Don’t they have shop vacs?”

The rest of the afternoon, Walker spent time envisioning his very first state budget as governor that would end all state aid to hospitals, nursing homes and assisted living facilities.

Saturday night, Walker sat on his front porch, throwing rocks at senior citizens walking by.
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Folks, this has been a satirical look at how the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported how Tom Barrett and Scott Walker acted this past weekend following last week’s storms.

Here is the actual article the paper published.

Milwaukee’s dailythat so desperately wants Barrett to defeat Walker, may as well have gone with what I just blogged.

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