The rumor mill is churning out that Sen. Joe Biden will step aside for medical reasons* and that Sen. Hillary Clinton step in as VP. Never mind that her husband just said yesterday that Hillary never wanted to be Vice President.

Obviously, Sen. Obama wasn't thrilled with the idea either, or he would have picked her. (The thought of a Hillary VP, who only has presidential aspirations, is daunting.) Besides, wouldn't that be the ultimate flip-flop? That Obama couldn't even make up his mind on who to pick for VP?  No, I think Obama is just stuck with Biden and his bloopers. (They have added a unique bit of entertainment to this election.)

Plus, Governor Sarah Palin stole Sen. Clinton's thunder by being the first Republican** woman nominated for VP.

But in politics, you never know what will happen next. Time will tell. 

*Not so serious that they keep him out of the senate though. 

**Correction: I did not mean to forget Geraldine Ferraro. She however did not generate the same excitement and anticipation that Palin has as a possible presidential candidate in the next cycle. 

Please, comment content should relate to the subject of the post. Although I try to respond to many, do not interpret my lack of a response as agreement.

Links: 

I caught some of the Democratic convention last night. It was Hillary's big night. The video before she spoke was very well done and I think candidates will be using that medium more and more.

Finally it was Hillary's turn. Would she unify the party? She opened with,

I am honored to be here tonight. A proud mother. A proud Democrat. A proud American. And a proud supporter of Barack Obama.

(As she went down her different identities list, I wondered if she would say, A proud wife too.) 

Hillary has improved her delivery style; she seemed very enthusiastic and energetic in speaking of her (and Bill's) accomplishments and experiences. If Obama wins, more than likely, she will finally get her health care plan--maybe even a Cabinet post too?  (Transcript my emphasis)

And when Barack Obama is in the White House, he'll revitalize our economy, defend the working people of America, and meet the global challenges of our time. Democrats know how to do this. As I recall, we did it before with President Clinton and the Democrats. And we'll do it again with President Obama and the Democrats.

Just think what America will be when we transform our energy agenda by creating millions of green jobs and build a new, clean energy future. Barack Obama will make sure that middle-class families get the tax relief they deserve. And I cannot wait to watch Barack Obama sign into law a health care plan into law that covers every single American.

She promised Obama would end the war--responsibly. (No longer do they talk of immediate troop withdrawal.) This issue is rather moot at this point since President Bush and the Iraqi leadership are talking the same line.

Barack Obama will end the war in Iraq responsibly and bring our troops home a first step to repairing our alliances around the world.

Best zinger of the evening: 

Now, with an agenda like that, it makes perfect sense that George Bush and John McCain will be together next week in the Twin Cities. Because these days they're awfully hard to tell apart.

I don't agree that Bush and McCain are hard to tell apart, but then, to someone on the outside, we all look alike. Most conservatives will be holding their noses in voting for McCain. They are hardly the same. It was a good line just the same.

She talked about the women's suffrage movement and other strong women. I thought she should have mentioned Geraldine Ferraro though. After all, Geraldine was the first female V.P. candidate, making her a potential president should she be needed. 

And after so many decades 88 years ago on this very day the 19th Amendment guaranteeing women the right to vote would be forever enshrined in our Constitution.

My mother was born before women could vote. But in this election my daughter got to vote for her mother for president.

Maybe it is just because I am a mom too, but I truly did appreciate how special it must have been for her to have her mother, who was born before women had the right to vote, and her daughter both able to vote for Hillary on the presidential primary ticket. This does show how far we have come as a nation, as does having an African American as one choice on the ticket.

I can't help but wonder if Hillary's convention speech will leave attendees and Democrats wondering if they nominated the wrong candidate, just as Republicans thought after Ronald Reagan spoke at Ford's convention. The pressure is on Obama to deliver the speech of his lifetime on Thursday.

Former President Bill Clinton's speech tonight should be interesting. Will he stick to the topic assigned? Just heard on an afternoon news blurb that he has also been instructed to keep his speech to 10 minutes! 

P.S. Hillary even made light of her infamous pantsuit with a reference to The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants-suit! You can tell she is a gutsy woman by her clothing selection last night. Anyone who can carry off a tangerine-coral colored pantsuit is no shrinking violet. She has been criticized about her fashion choices, but speaking as a former fashion design major, it is not the worst choice for her. She is not a size 12 or even 14. Heavier women, looking for business attire, have a very difficult time of it. If they wear a suit jacket with a skirt, they come off rather Janet Reno-ish. The pants give a more vertical line--especially if teamed with a monochromatic blouse and jacket. She is a summer in her coloring, so yellows and oranges look good on her. OK, enough of the fluff.

Links: 

Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Betterbrookfield, Mark Levin,   Vicki Mckenna

Last night I caught a bit of the July school board meeting on cable TV*. The board was discussing Elmbrook's coming budget woes and the difficult decisions our district needs to make to keep our schools operating within budget. (Unfortunately, I missed at least the first half of the meeting, but I will watch again and take better notes.)

Glen Allgaier had created a list of cost saving possibilities--none of them an easy choice. The list included the unpleasant prospects of closing a school and increasing class sizes. The idea was we needed to dramatically cut spending in order to meet our financial obligations. There seemed to be agreement that drastic measures were necessary.

Then Dr. Gibson chimed in that we could also look at increasing revenue producers to solve our money problems as well as implementing cost savings measures. That was when he mentioned 4K as well as looking at nonresident students. Gibson acknowledged that we had decided to forgo 4K but it seemed the state aid dollar potential was still tempting him.

Another "revenue producer" would be to go to the taxpayers with a referendum to raise the spending cap!

The idea of coming at taxpayers on the heels of our $62mil high school referendum would be very distasteful to me--especially considering our budget shortfalls are nothing new.  While I had suggested a referendum to raise the spending cap to increase the maintenance/capital improvement budget as a way to deal with the high school improvements and needs, that spending cap referendum was to be instead of not in addition to the high school referendum!

4K was mentioned not as an improvement to education but solely as a cure for budget woes--as in increasing the school budget, not decreasing the taxpayer's burden. Our board decided last fall to eliminate 4K because it was not shown to improve student performance in the long run. But here we are again mentioning 4K as a possibility.

Universal 4K is also a subject of the presidential election. Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama support the idea of nationwide 4K. The Democrat party believes in pre-K as it is sometimes called.

Today, the Wall Street Journal's Protect Our Kids From Preschool summed up much of what I wrote last fall when Elmbrook was deciding their 4K question. In a nutshell, there is no longterm evidence that 4K is beneficial in the long run:

Barack Obama says he believes in universal preschool and if he's elected president he'll pump "billions of dollars into early childhood education." Universal preschool is now second only to universal health care on the liberal policy wish list...

But is strapping a backpack on all 4-year-olds and sending them to preschool good for them? Not according to available evidence.
...
Mr. Obama asserted in the Las Vegas debate on Jan. 15 that every dollar spent on preschool will produce a 10-fold return by improving academic performance, which will supposedly lower juvenile delinquency and welfare use -- and raise wages and tax contributions. Such claims are wildly exaggerated at best.

In the last half-century, U.S. preschool attendance has gone up to nearly 70% from 16%. But fourth-grade reading, science, and math scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) -- the nation's report card -- have remained virtually stagnant since the early 1970s.

The piece concludes with:

If Mr. Obama is serious about helping children, he should begin by fixing what is clearly broken: the K-12 system. The best way of doing that is by building on programs with a proven record of success. Many of these involve giving parents control over their own education dollars so that they have options other than dysfunctional public schools. The Obamas send their daughters to a private school whose annual fee in middle school runs around $20,000. Other parents deserve such choices too -- not promises of subsidized preschool that they may not want and that may be bad for their kids.

Jay Weber talked about 4K in his 8am hour today too. A man whose wife taught in Elmbrook's kindergarten program called in. He said his wife presented 25 reasons 4K was beneficial at the board meeting, but the board voted to discontinue. The caller then added, he wouldn't send his children for 4K! (He must have had his own 26 reasons it wasn't beneficial?)

Finland was again mentioned as a standard. Finland doesn't start school until age 7. Their students do better than the rest of the world.

Taxpayers are asked for more and more money each year, whether at the local or national level. Can we at least narrow down the wish list to programs that actually work?

Past post: Does 4K deserve tax dollars? 

If you wish to read other past postings on this subject, just click the tag 4K and they will come up. 

*Our venture in to cable TV was short lived. We signed on with TimeWarner for a special deal that wasn't delivered as promised. Now to get the package that was presented would cost $30 more per month. Too much for television! Monday the cable TV will be shut off. 

Links: 

Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Betterbrookfield, Mark Levin,   Vicki Mckenna

What's in a name? Plenty.

In case you missed this, the Friday edition of the Detroit News printed this headline, "Clinton, Osama meet to discuss unity"

The paper claims it was a mistake, but the error appeared on "about 45,000 newspapers distributed north and west of downtown Detroit." 

Appropriate apologizes made and accepted. I wonder if the first copy has made it to eBay yet? 

Links:

I have often said that if you wait long enough, there will be something that two opposing camps can agree on. Hillary Clinton and I do not see eye to eye on much, but when she gave her "Celestial Choir" speech the other day, we finally found our common ground!

Clinton raps Obama's 'celestial choir' campaign:

Hillary Clinton (or should I say Hillary Rodham Clinton?) today mocked Barack Obama's campaign style as one that portrays a divine-like picture of problem-solving to voters when the challenges America face are much more complex...

"None of the problems we face will be easily solved," she said before delivering a fanciful description of an Obama speech.

"Now I could stand up here and say, 'Let's just get everybody together. Let's get unified. The sky will open. The lights will come down. Celestial choirs will be singing and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect.' 

"Maybe I've just lived a little long, but I have no illusions about how hard this is going to be. You are not going to wave a magic wand and have the special interest disappear," she said.

So I find myself agreeing with Sen. Clinton, "Maybe I've just lived a little long (well, not quite as long as Hillary), but I have no illusions about how hard this is going to be" either. I don't think we can afford her programs any more than we can afford his, however.

I also found myself agreeing with Mr. Schwei's assessment of the emphasis on athletics over academics in a Jan. 16th article:

Board member Steve Schwei questioned the construction of new gymnasiums and renovation of classrooms. The new space should be allocated to academics, not athletic areas, he said.

Ready or not, the $62.2 million dollar high school referendum is coming in just 1 month on April 1st. Spread the word.

Links: Betterbrookfield,  Vicki Mckenna 

Tomorrow is the primary for President and Brookfield Aldermen in Districts 1 and 2. I have no aldermanic primary in my district. But if I did live in the 1st or 2nd district...

I would be casting my vote for Dan Sutton. I have watched Dan Sutton during his first 4 year term and I like what I see. Dan showed he had good instincts with some of his comments during those early council meetings and even though he was a new alderman, he voted against the flow. As he matured in his role as alderman, his votes reflected his good instincts more and more. In recent years, Sutton went to bat for Brookfield taxpayers: 

JSOnline Nov. 2006 Aldermen Jerry Mellone and Dan Sutton argued that the budget had some areas where reserves were high enough and expenses low enough to cut tax collections, even for one year of relief.

If you attended that council meeting or saw it on cable broadcast, you witnessed Dan's leadership skills:

From Brookfield7, Dec. 2006 Rick Owen, in his usual condescending way, in essence put down Alderman Jerry Mellone for bringing up further budget cuts. Then a remarkable thing took place: Alderman Sutton eloquently put Rick in his place by reminding the council that Jerry Mellone had every right to bring up those cuts.

Is it any wonder that earlier in 2006, many of Sutton's fellow aldermen thought he would be a good leader too?:

Brookfield7, April 2006 Last real bit of business for the council was to elect a new Council President. Scott Berg had been promoting his name and Steve Ponto was too. The surprise candidate was Dan Sutton. The first ballot was Ponto 7, Sutton 5, and Berg 2--no majority. Second ballot was Ponto 8, Sutton 5 and Berg 1. Ponto wins. Ponto was the better choice than Berg, but am disappointed that Dan Sutton did not prevail. Although Dan frequently [not always] votes with the crowd, he has good instincts and raises valid questions during the discussion. I am hoping that with the new aldermen on the council that Dan will trust his good instincts more and vote accordingly.

It did not take long for Dan Sutton to trust his good instincts more and more. He deserves your vote. 

Now, if I lived in the 2nd district...

Terrence Halmstad would be getting my vote. Mr. Halmstad, according to Brookfieldnow's article and voter's guide, reflects my values.

Halmstad said the relocation of the fire station coupled with further development near the intersection could make traffic in the area "horrendous."

Halmstad also said he's been frustrated with the city's approach to development and redevelopment in the district and across Brookfield.

"We're not really looking at these (projects) really hard before they're passed," he said.

Rick Owen's quote in the guide, "I supported the 2020 Master Plan and continue to endorse it. One of its essential doctrines is the preservation of single family residential neighborhoods.", from my perspective, seems rather in conflict with Will the real Rick Owen please stand up?  Rick dismissed the 2020 Master Plan's specificity and Alderman Jerry Mellone's efforts to protect Mellone's single family neighborhood from an over enthusiastic Calhoun Road widening project.

Rick has always been very polite to me personally. But his civility does neighborhoods little good as his hand consistently reaches for the vote YES button on development issues. 

I don't know that there is much of a difference between Jennifer Donze and Rick Owen. They both serve on the Plan Commission. If the colossal Fountain Brook Crossing project is any indicator, they both voted "to recommend rezoning to allow construction of a four-story office building." The Journal article stated, "Commissioners said Monday that the concept is growing on them for its potential as a striking gateway as motorists enter the city from New Berlin. 'In a way, the height is an important part of that,' said Commissioner Jennifer Donze." 

Jennifer and Rick seem to think our taxes are low enough too. Terry Halmstad sees that there is "no longer a distinction between wants and needs; this has to change."

The choice is yours, District 1 and 2 residents. Please research this for yourself and make an informed decision.

As for my Hillary Clinton vote, no, I have not become a Democrat. But since McCain will get the Republican nomination with or without me (he is now my 1st choice for president), I am at least going to vote tomorrow for my 2nd choice for president. 

Why Hillary Clinton? Because she is more conservative than Barack Obama*. She is considered to be the 16th most liberal senator, while Barack is considered to be THE most liberal (1st). They both are making promises to fund all sorts of government programs with taxpayer money, but Barack even out-gives Hillary. I see him as much more charming and thus will be able to get his measures through Congress easier.

So that is it. Tomorrow I vote for my first ever Democrat for President, Hillary. 

*One of the reasons I view Barack as the most liberal...

 "Who would oppose a bill that said you couldn't kill a baby who was born? Not Kennedy, Boxer or Hillary Rodham Clinton. Not even the hard-core National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL). Obama, however, is another story. The year after the Born Alive Infants Protection Act became federal law in 2002, identical language was considered in a committee of the Illinois Senate. It was defeated with the committee's chairman, Obama, leading the opposition."

Links: Betterbrookfield,  Vicki Mckenna