ArchPundit

Is It the End of the Reporting Quarter or Something?

ArchPundit September 30, 2003 No Comments

Give to your favorite Democratic Senate Candidate–Dan Hynes information is below. (no this isn’t favoritism, he sent it out, Barack didn’t and Hull doesn’t need to).

TO: Friends and Supporters
FR: Hynes for US Senate
RE: Twelve hours to help make America work again.

As our next United States Senator from Illinois, Dan Hynes is determined to change Washington’s misguided priorities and make America work once again.

And you can help. RIGHT NOW.

As one of Dan’s closest friends and supporters, today is the last day you can make a contribution before our campaign must file its official third-quarter campaign finance report.

Until midnight tonight, you can make a huge difference in Dan’s campaign — and a bold statement about the new course America must take to realize her incredible promise and potential.

President Bush and the Republicans just keep on doing it wrong. Huge tax breaks for the super-rich. Bad trade deals that export American jobs and hopes overseas. Turning the other cheek as America’s biggest corporate special interests violate their workers’ pensions and cook their own books.

As our next US Senator, Dan Hynes is ready to stand up to the Bush agenda. Dan’s ready to fight for tax policies that respect hard-working Americans and protect the middle class. Trade deals that put American assembly lines ahead of the corporate bottom line. And real corporate responsibility to end Washington’s practice of corporate capitulation.

Help Dan get it done.

Please consider making a contribution to Dan?s campaign today by going to our website at www.danhynes.com, calling our Chicago office at 312-337-2004 or by mailing a contribution, made out to ?Hynes for Senate,? to our headquarters at: 1525 N. Wells, Chicago, IL 60610.

With your help, Dan can win the Democratic primary and help win back the U.S. Senate. Together, we can get America – and Americans – working again.

Thank you for your past and future support!

Hynes for Senate

Pursuant to the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 and the regulations of the Federal Elections Commission, based on filings made by an opposing candidate for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Illinois, the Hynes Exploratory Committee may accept up to $12,000 from an individual. To contribute an individual must be a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident of 18 years or older. Contributions from the treasuries of corporations, incorporated corporations, and labor organizations are prohibited. Contributions from Illinois Comptroller employees are not accepted by the Hynes for Senate Campaign. Contributions to Hynes for Senate are not tax deductible for federal income tax purposes.

I’ve Been Cursed, I Think

ArchPundit September 30, 2003 No Comments

While most of you who read the Illinois and General side of the blog don’t get exposed to my writing on the Saint Louis Public Schools at Blog Saint Louis, it is a significant portion of my blogging.

One post in particular has drawn the attention of Rochell Moore, a Saint Louis Public School Board Member. A post on Political State Report reported on efforts to reform the Saint Louis public Schools. That post included very critical remarks about Ms. Moore. It appears that she has reponded in comments

This article is most slanderous and malicious in it’s intent. You are not a medical doctor nor are you licensed to give an opinion on someone’s health. It was Charlene Jones who placed cocaine in my coffee on October 21, 2003. She came to the hospital and told them I was paranoid and delusional. I have the records to prove it.

If you are going to tell the story, tell it correctly. Please refrain from referring to me as mentally ill. Because of your writings and tone, you too can be added to the letter sent to Francis Slay

An electronic version of the letter is available at the Arch City Chronicle.

"The Lord shall make the pestilence cleave unto Francis Slay and anyone who helps him, until he have consumed thee from off the land, whither thou goest to possess it," she writes, modifying a passage found in Deuteronomy 28:21. "The Lord shall smite Francis Slay and anyone who helps him with a consumption, and with a fever, and with an inflammation, and with an extreme burning, and with the sword and with blasting and with mildew; and the angel of the Lord shall pursue Francis Slay until he perishes."

So I’m on mildew watch.

24-3 at the Half

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

Did I mention, Cubs Win! The Bears certainly aren’t going to. I don’t mind losing 10-7. I do mind losing 37-10.

How to Attract Quality Teachers to Urban Environments

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

Via Haas, Via Bill Purdy, comes Matt Miller’s Atlantic Monthly piece, A New Deal For Teachers . Miller proposes a plan to improve teacher pay in poor districts,

If the quality of urban schools is to be improved, teaching poor children must become the career of choice for talented young Americans who want to make a difference with their lives and earn a good living too. To achieve that the federal government should raise the salary of every teacher in a poor school by at least 50 percent. But this increase would be contingent on two fundamental reforms: teachers’ unions would have to abandon the lockstep pay schedules, so that the top-performing half of the teacher corps could be paid significantly more; and the dismissal process for poor-performing teachers would have to be condensed to four to six months.

I can’t argue with the proposal, but there is another problem no one wants to address which is how urban districts hire teachers. (free registration required)

Urban school districts are losing out on the best teachers because they are mired in layers of policy and practice that postpone hiring until after most of the best applicants have accepted jobs in suburban systems, a report released here last week contends.

The study by the New Teacher Project challenges the perception that city school systems are strapped for teachers because too few people want to teach in high-poverty schools. On the contrary, the authors found that with good recruiting strategies, urban districts can draw five or more applicants for every opening.

You have to have a functioning human resources department that puts a premium on hiring high quality teachers.

Heras Win!

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

Heras Win!Heras Win!Heras Win!Heras Win!Heras Win!

Okay, enough, but he pulls out the victory in the second to last day of the Vuelta a Espana in what had to be one of the most hellacious time trial stages I’ve ever seen.

The good news, he’ll be back with Postal for Lance’s attempt at 6. He is targeting 2005 as his year.

Kos is in heaven too

Who Will Take the Fall?

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

Get your Max Speak Dead Pool Bets Placed

Who are the Dead Men Walking?

Did I mention…

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

CUBS WIN!

Don’t Blame the Reporters, Blame the Administration

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

Normally, I agree with Joe Conason on many issues, but today I think he is shifting the blame to the wrong group concerning the leadk of Valerie Plame’s status as a CIA operative.

Now that we know the CIA has asked the Justice Department to investigate the "outing" of Valerie Plame — aka Mrs. Wilson — as an agency operative, this scandal has broken onto the front pages. Sooner or later, John Ashcroft may be forced to appoint a special counsel, as both Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and John Kerry, D-Mass., have demanded. (One reason to name a special counsel, or independent counsel, is that a key suspect named Karl Rove used to work as a political consultant for Ashcroft — and played a part in his appointment as attorney general.)

While the president’s press secretary insists that Rove was not involved in this outrage, I can’t help wondering how reporters, editors and bureau chiefs in the capital justify their silence. Tim Russert of NBC and Robin Sproul of ABC both said they wouldn’t discuss any matter involving sources. That’s an ironclad rule of journalism, up to a point. But what should a journalist do when a source commits a serious crime in his or her presence? What if that crime not only threatens to jeopardize human lives, but also harms U.S. national security in the most profound way?

The real question is why isn’t the President at a podium pounding on a lectern calling for someone’s head?

I question Novak’s judgement, but his sources are his sources.

This is a despicable act by a despicable person. We don’t know who did it yet, but when it comes out, and it will, one can only hope the President accepts some responsibility for this. If the person acted without his knowledge, and I’m guessing the leakers did, he damn well better have a major mea culpa. If the leaker acted with the President’s knowledge—well, let’s hope that something that ugly didn’t happen.

For continuing excellent coverage on the issue see,
Calpundit
Dan Drezner
Mark Kleinman
and of course, Josh Marshall

Sauget Corruption

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

Noticeably absent from the news were tales of St. Clair County corruption, but today, Sauget comes through for those of us titilated by the Metro East mess.

SAUGET — Lingerie. Home appliances. Weight loss products. Dinner parties at St. Louis steakhouses.

Those are just some of the scores of purchases Mayor Paul Sauget has charged to village taxpayers on village credit cards, according to a Belleville News-Democrat review of credit card statements.

Between December 2001 and August 2003, Sauget racked up $38,407 in expenses, according to billing statement copies obtained under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act.

The statements for the village-issued American Express and Citi Platinum cards show that Sauget’s expenses have spanned a wide gamut.

They include: $57 for a People magazine subscription in December 2001; $5,010 for medical services at the Midwest Head and Neck Center in St. Louis in May 2002; $25 for mail order vitamins in October 2002; and $35 for coins from the Franklin Mint in New York, the receipts show.

Also included were scores of items bought from vendors catering to a female clientele.

They include: $117 for cosmetics from a Bloomingdales catalog in December 2001; $165 for women’s clothing from Victoria’s Secret in February 2002; $228 for women’s underwear from Dillard’s department store in Fairview Heights in October 2002; $275 for the L.A. Weight Loss Center in O’Fallon; and $45 for a trip to USA Nails in Cahokia in August 2002, the receipts show.

Sauget, 78, has served as mayor of the village — population 249 — that bears his family name for more than three decades.

If the village is known for anything, it’s for the hulking chemical plants and popular bars and strip clubs planted along Illinois 3. The internal workings of village government usually keep a low profile.

Sauget was incorporated to avoid East St. Louis incorporating the area and imposing controls on Monsanto’s chemical plants. East St. Louis is now rewarded with heavy metals in their soil killing off the old trees.

It along with Brooklyn and Washington Park are essentially dens of corruption that the rest of Illinois has treated like law free zones.

Polls, Polls, Polls

ArchPundit September 29, 2003 No Comments

Bernard Schoenburg covers a couple Senate stories yesterday reporting a month old Hynes poll with the recent Fox poll.

Hynes’ camp made public a poll last week that shows their candidate in the lead. Hynes had support from 26 percent of likely Democratic primary voters. Other totals were 15 percent for MARIA PAPPAS, the Cook County treasurer, who has not yet announced a bid; 12 percent for Obama; 4 percent for GERY CHICO, 3 percent for BLAIR HULL, 1 percent for JOYCE WASHINGTON and 1 percent for NANCY SKINNER. Global Strategy Group Inc. of New York took that poll of 1,000 likely Democratic primary voters Aug. 14-20 – more than a month ago. Hynes spokeswoman CHRIS MATHER said the campaign decided to let Hynes formally launch his campaign before releasing the poll numbers. The numbers include those leaning to a candidate – amounting to 4 percentage points for Hynes, 1 for Obama and 2 for Pappas.

Another poll commissioned by Fox News and reported Thursday in Chicago is more recent. The poll of 400 Democrats and 400 Republicans done by KRC Communications Research of Newton, Mass., from Monday through Wednesday, found 50 percent of Democrats undecided, with 10 percent for Hynes, 9 percent for Hull, 8 percent for Obama, 7 percent for Chico and 5 percent for Washington.

2 key points. First, don’t trust polls by the candidate too much. Second, the larger the sample size the better. I have to wonder if the Fox News poll doesn’t suffer from only having 400 respondents. All of the major candidates are within the margin of error anyway, but given Hynes has some name recognition before starting, he should be higher than 9 percent. IOW, don’t always trust media polls either.

The big problem is that this early in a race, most voters aren’t paying attention and they want to give an answer to pollsters. The important thing is that when they do that, if things don’t intervene to create interest, that might be how they vote too.

The article also contains some interesting Rauschenberger details concerning his views on Democrats in the Lege and his background.