Category Archives: Uncategorized

Milwaukee Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan is on trial this week for helping an illegal immigrant escape — briefly — arrest by ICE. I don’t know if she’ll be convicted or not and even if she is she’s likely to get a light sentence. That’s appropriate because Dugan should never have been criminally prosecuted inContinue reading “Dugan’s No Hero”

An Associated Press story from the other day caught my eye. It was about a controversy stemming from a new policy limiting how much a student can borrow under federally supported student loan programs. The policy itself is sound. It limits how much a student can borrow based on their likely income once they graduate.Continue reading “What’s College For?”

Rob Reiner’s going to get the last laugh. The other day Donald Trump did what Donald Trump does. He was mean-spirited, cruel, vulgar, self-obsessed and wrong. That’s par for Trump’s course. On Monday Trump said that Reiner’s death was “reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction withContinue reading “Trump’s Derangement”

A few weeks ago, former journalist, local pol and current blogger-provacateur David Blaska invited me for a cup of coffee. He wanted to run an idea by me. His idea was to create a new local party in Dane County. I thought it was a good idea, until I didn’t. Blaska, a Never Trump RepublicanContinue reading “‘Sensible Dane’ Still Makes Sense”

The evidence of Donald Trump’s slipping hold on his party is growing. Yesterday, the Indiana State Senate overwhelmingly rejected Trump’s demand that they rig their congressional maps to provide Republicans with another seat. More Republican senators voted against Trump than with him. On the same day, four Republicans U.S. Senators voted with the Democrats toContinue reading “Trump Fades Some More”

Since the announced sale of Exact Sciences, which makes the colon cancer test kit, a few months ago, there’s been speculation that the company’s founder and CEO Kevin Conroy would get in the race for Wisconsin governor. It now comes down to this: how do you get along with your brother-in-law? Because yesterday Joel Brennan,Continue reading “Brennan In, Conroy Out”

There’s a certain kind of liberal who doesn’t care much for democracy. When I became Mayor of Madison in 2003, my experience in government had been as an aide in the legislature and as a Dane County Supervisor. Those bodies operated pretty much as a political science major would have expected. Bills were introduced, powerfulContinue reading “The Elites Had This Coming”

One of the more intriguing — and one of the few positive — things to happen in the last few weeks is the announcement that Michael and Susan Dell will contribute $6.25 billion toward “Trump accounts” set up under the Big Beautiful Bill. Shameless self-promotion aside, this is one good thing that’s come out ofContinue reading “Give a Kid a House”

With Mandela Barnes’ unsurprising announcement that he’s joining the race for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, that field appears to be pretty well set. The only potential, but not yet announced candidate, out there is former state Department of Administration Secretary Joel Brennan. I would expect him to get in before Christmas and I’d be surprisedContinue reading “Checking in on Dem Candidates”

Trump pardons a notorious drug dealer while he deports a bright college student. The college student didn’t flatter him and hire Roger Stone. Her bad. Any Lucia Lopez Belloza is a 19-year old student at Babson College near Boston who has been in this country since she was seven. She has no criminal record. InContinue reading “Two Tales of Honduras”