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 June 29th, 2009

The last NASCAR race at the Mile already run?

by @ 12:36. Filed under Business, Sports.

Don Walker reports that Wisconsin Motorsports, which promotes the races held at the Milwaukee Mile, owes NASCAR $1,878,228 for the races that ran earlier this month. Late last week, Claude Napier, head of Wisconsin Motorsports, acknowledged that he still owed NASCAR money, but it was not known at that time just how much money was owed.

As part of a deal Wisconsin Motorsports and NASCAR inked the day before before the scheduled running of the Camping World Truck Series Race on June 19, Wisconsin Motorsports acknowledged that it would not be able to pay the sanctioning fees in full, and that all the revenue generated by the races that would normally go first to Wisconsin Motorsports would instead go to NASCAR. Thanks in part to a rain delay in the Truck Series race, there were approximately 7,500 people that attended that race the early afternoon of June 20, while approximately 35,000 attended the Nationwide Series race held in the evening of June 20.

Meanwhile, questions are still swirling about whether the Indy Racing League was paid for its May race, and whether the IRL will return to Milwaukee next year. The IRL continues to avoid answering whether it got paid, while Terry Angstadt, the president of IRLs commercial division, told the Indianapolis Star that Milwaukee’s presence on their 18-race schedule was in doubt because of promoter issues.

Both Napier and the Legislative Audit Bureau both state that the Mile will lose money this year. What is telling is the State Fair’s reaction to the troubles of the company they brought in after firing the previous promoter earlier this year – they’re just going to sit back and watch the whole thing implode.

Sotomayor overturned in Ricci v. DeStefano

by @ 12:00. Filed under Law and order.

(H/T – Gabriel Malor)

The Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 opinion that New Haven, CT’s decision to discard the results of a 2003 fire captain/lieutenant examination because “too few” non-Hispanic minorities passed, and specifically none with a high enough score to qualify for promotion, violated the Civil Rights Act. Judge (and SCOTUS nominee) Sonia Sotomayor previously ruled that New Haven could discard those results.

The majority, Justice Kennedy (who wrote the majority opinion), Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Alito, Scalia and Thomas, avoided the Constitutional question of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. Instead, they decided that, since New Haven could not prove that following the results of the examination would have made it liable under the disparate-impact (the unintentional discrimination against minorities) portion of the Civil Rights Act, it violated the disparate-treatment (the intentional discrimination) portion of said Act. In fact, it stated that since the lower courts, including the appellate panel Judge Sotomayor was a part of, failed to establish any disparate impact, they inproperly applied the Equal Protection Clause.

Indeed, Justice Scalia states in his concurrence, “I join the Court’s opinion in full, but write separately to observe that its resolution of this dispute merely postpones the evil day on which the Court will have to confront the question: Whether, or to what extent, are the disparate-impact provisions of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 consistent with the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection?”

Gabriel has a lot more insight over at the linked Ace of Spades HQ post. Meanwhile, Ed Morrissey wrote that Justice Alito’s concurrence, which addresses “calculated omissions” from the dissent written by Justice Ginsburg, that “…(Judge Sotomayor’s supporters’) big sell — that she was one of the appellate court’s most brilliant minds — just took a body blow on this decision.”

What hath the DemoBudget wrought?

by @ 11:10. Filed under Politics - Wisconsin.

Brett Healy, president of the MacIver Institute, takes a look at some items slipped into the DemoBudget, including items I have missed:

  • Eliminate the requirement that, in any single fiscal year, revenues exceed expenditures, specifically for FY2011 (the second year of the budget).
  • The rest of us, most of whom have already paid for our recycling bins, get to buy the fine folks of the Town of Wrightstown their recycling bins.
  • Likely because of the criticism of the DemoBudget heaped by the various members of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, a provision added by Sheridan and Decker that will allow the micro-targeted Shepard Express be the state “newspaper of record” in Milwaukee County. The last I checked, the Tuesday paid circulation of the Journal Sentinel, the lowest day for the daily, far outstripped the weekly free circulation of the Express. There’s no word on how those in Waukesha, Racine, Kenosha, Ozaukee or Washington Counties, or those not on the East Side of Milwaukee, will get the few state notices that are still required to appear in a newspaper, but because most of those areas are Republican, Sheridan and Decker probably don’t give a <expletive deleted>.
  • A requirement, first added by the Senate, that the Department of Commerce fill the area develpment manager position in western Wisconsin by October. While speculation is that it was to secure Rep. Jeff Wood’s (Alcohol-Chippewa Falls) vote for the budget, I doubt it as Wood abandoned his supposed “fiscal conservative” values to vote for the first Assembly version, which did not contain this.
  • A $600,000 giveaway from the Public Service Commission to the Citizens’ Utility Board. As Brett put it, “Let’s give a group state taxpayer dollars so they can turnaround and sue state government. That makes a whole lot of sense.”

Gov. Doyle will conduct the final act later today with the signing and issuance of his line-item vetoes. If memory serves, while the Legislature can reverse a veto with 2/3rds votes, it has not done so in over two decades.

Honduras – short version

by @ 9:51. Filed under International relations, Politics.

I have to give major props to Fausta for staying all over the top of this, and to most of her readers for a very lively discussion in the post. For the benefit of those who have been following the likes of The News Organization That Cannot Be Quoted™ instead of the likes of The Wall Street Journal’s Mary Anastasia O’Grady, allow me to give the Cliff’s Notes version:

  • Honduras President Mel Zelaya, dismayed to learn that his country’s Constitution precludes him from serving a second term (Article 239), and indeed prohibits any changes to that Article (Article 384), tried to hold a referendum for the purpose of calling a second referendum to be held in November, at the same time as the general election and the Presidential election, to rewrite the Constitution and remove that limitation (despite the National Congress having sole power to create and approve any legal amendments). That referendum was to be held yesterday.
  • Prior to that, specifically this past Tuesday, the National Congress passed a law prohibiting referendums within 180 days of a general election.
  • Honduras’ Supreme Court declared the referendum illegal, and Honduras’ armed forces, which typically help deliver ballots, refused to deliver ballots.
  • Zelaya fired the chief of the armed forces, Gen. Romeo Vásquez, in response, and refused to reinstate him after the Supreme Court unanimously ordered his reinstatement.
  • The Supreme Election Tribunal similiarly refused to participate, so the Venezuelan Air Force was brought in to distribute ballots.
  • At 6 am Sunday, Honduras’ armed forces, operating with a court order issued by the Supreme Court, under another part of Article 239 of the constitution that specifies that any public officeholder who calls for a change to the one-term limit for President immediately give up the powers of that office and be barred from any future public office for 10 years, removed Zelaya from the country. After an initial stop in Costa Rica, the Venezuelan Air Force delivered him to Nicaragua.
  • Among those calling for Honduras to ignore its Constitution and allow Zelaya to complete his Chavista Venezuelan takeover are Venezuelan President dictator Hugo Chavez, the Organization of American States, the European Union, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

For those that wonder why such a strong one-term limit is in Honduras’ constitution, they’ve had a long history of strongmen who overstayed their welcome. After the last bout of strongmen ended in 1982, they decided, never again.

In a few minutes, Fausta will take up this topic in her Monday-Friday 15 Minutes on Latin America podcast. I highly recommend you listen.

Revisions/extensions (11:22 pm 6/29/2009) – Corrected the number of the article that prohibits any change to Honduras’ constitution that would affect the one-term-only President provision; somehow mistyped.

But Isn’t That My Ox Being Gored?

The Republican Party claims to stand for principles.  Amongst the principles they claim to stand for are limited government, personal liberty and free markets.  However, too many in the Republican Party believe that principles are not absolute.  They believe that principles can, shall we say, be flexible.  The rationale of these Republicans is that limited government is good, if I’m not in power, personal liberty is good unless my party says otherwise and free markets are good unless our party says there’s a problem.  Governor Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota is a perfect example of one of these flexibly principled Republicans.

As a result of Governor Sanford’s confusing personal life, there have been several articles this weekend promoting Pawlenty as a rising spokesperson, perhaps even now, a strong contender for the 2012 Presidential bid…yeah, whatever.  I don’t know if it’s some of that thinking or just because he’s a lame duck Governor and is working on his next meal ticket but, Pawlenty is quickly becoming to Governor’s what Michele Bachmann is for the House of Representatives; in the media all the time talking about things that they shouldn’t be talking about. 

A perfect example showing Pawlenty in the media saying things he shouldn’t and showing his flexible principles, was his appearance on Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”  On the show, Pawlenty argued that the recently passed cap and trade bill was bad policy.  OK, I’m with him so far.  It’s when he tells us why it’s bad policy that I give him my patented “Ron Paul talking about the gold standard” look.  According to American Pravda’s version of the interview, here’s why Pawlenty believes Cap and Trade is bad policy:

In an appearance on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday morning, the Republican governor said he shares the goal of reducing pollution and emissions. But he says the best way to do that is through conservation, more fuel-efficient vehicles and improving base-load power with nuclear energy.

They add:

Pawlenty says the cap and trade emissions regime in the bill would send U.S. jobs to other countries.

Funny, in 2007 the Minnesota Legislature passed a renewable energy bill.  That bill requires that energy producers in the state generate specific and increasing percentages of their energy through things like wind, solar or hydrogen.  The mandates are high enough that it will make Minnesota the state with the most renewable generated energy in the nation.  An amendment to remove Minnesota’s restriction on nuclear plants, the only State one of a few, with Wisconsin being another, to have such a restriction, failed.  Likewise, an amendment to waive the renewable requirements if they cost more than 10% more than existing methods also failed.  Finally, the bill contained a provision that allows utilities that exceed their required amounts of renewable energy to sell credits to other utilities.  Sounds a bit like the sale of carbon credits doesn’t it? 

Governor Pawlenty signed this bill and in many corners, was seen as a cheer leader for the bill.  Today, he decries a national version of what he gladly burdened Minnesotans with just two years ago. 

To too many Republicans like Pawlenty, principles only matter when it’s not their ox being gored.

Revisions/extensions (8:37 am 6/29/2009, steveegg) – Made a correction, as Wisconsin also has a complete moratorium on new nuclear power plants.

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