Finally!
Something interesting in this campaign:

Democratic presidential frontrunner John Kerry is planning a response to a DRUDGE REPORT exclusive which first revealed the frantic behind-the-scenes drama surrounding a woman who recently fled the country, reportedly at the prodding of Kerry!

The nature and details of a claimed two-year relationship, beginning in the Spring of 2001, between a young woman and Kerry is at the center of serious investigations at several media outlets.

Here's the weird part:

Kerry is scheduled to appear on IMUS IN THE MORNING on Friday. Later he is scheduled to join General Wesley Clark, who, in an off-the-record conversation with a dozen reporters earlier this week, plainly stated: "Kerry will implode over an intern issue."

Reporters who witnessed Clark making the stunning comments marvel at the General's reluctance to later confirm they were spoken -- only to later endorse Kerry for the nomination!

As Drudge would say, "Developing..."

Marc

Williams to return to Tampa
Super Bowl XXII MVP Doug Williams has agreed to terms that will bring him to the front office of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Williams, who won the Super Bowl with the Redskins during the 1987 season, joined the Skins in 1986 after a five year stint with Tampa Bay during which he led the Bucs to three playoff berths, including a loss to the Rams in the 1979 NFC championship. Following the 1982 season Williams left Tampa as a result of a contract dispute. The Bucs didn't return to the playoffs until 1997. After leaving Tampa, Williams played with the Oklahoma Outlaws of the USFL for a couple of years, before joining the Skins in 1986.

Williams will resign as the head football coach at Grambling, where he was only the second football coach in school history. He will leave his alma mater with a 52-18 record in six seasons. Williams will work as a personnel executive in the Bucs scouting department. The team will hold a press conference to introduce the former quarterback tommorrow.

Tony

Lazy Brothers-In-Law Need Jobs, Too
The Sun is reporting that many city high school athletic events have been cancelled due to a lack of buses. Some bus companies have refused to take jobs from the city because payment is late or never comes at all. So what is the city's excuse for this mess?

School system spokeswoman Vanessa C. Pyatt said the delay in payments to bus companies, officials and some coaches results from a "staffing shortage."

Marc

Addendum: International Brotherhood of Lazy Brothers-In-Law
The unions are voting today on whether to accept the temporary pay cuts proposed by Mayor O'Malley. But don't expect them to vote on their own time:

The Baltimore Teachers Union vote will be held from noon to 4 p.m. today at the Baltimore Convention Center.Teachers and teachers' aides may enter through the entrance at Pratt and Howard streets. Free parking will be available in a lot at 200 W. Lombard St., and in a garage at Pratt and Howard. City schools will close at 12:30 today to allow for the voting.

In Honor Of Draper...
From James Lileks' Gallery Of Regrettable Food:

Check out the coffee Jello.

Marc

Addendum: It's a Draper bonanza! - The Story Of Bread

Harm City
Here's a map of crime within a quarter-mile of my house in the last two weeks of January:

Two robberies, three stolen cars - it could certainly be worse in this town. Check out your neighborhood!

Marc

Funeral attendance not Edwards cup of tea
With Wesley Clark dropping out of the race and Howard Dean holding on as long as possible in the hopes that Kerry does something stupid enough to derail his virtual lock on the nomination, the media has moved on to the second phase of the Democratic nominating process: The Veepstakes.

This turn of events spells the most trouble for North Carolina Senator John Edwards, whose campaign has, almost from the beginning, been dogged by questions about his feelings toward acceptng the VP slot. The youthful Edwards, who has repeatedly rebuffed this questions, is now being treated by most reporters as if he is, in effect, running for vice-president. But asking him this question over and over again, as today's Media Notes points out, is an exercise in futility.

If Edwards would say yes to this question it would mean the end of his campaign. If he says no he would make it all the more difficult to accept the nomination if it were offered to him.

Of course Edwards is considering a VP nomination. Why in the hell wouldn't he? He's young, he's not running again for the Senate and he could use the slot as a launching pad for 2008.

Here's the answer I think he should give:
Ted, Sam, George, Cokie, Tim, Bob, Wolf, Tom, Peter, Dan, Brit, I am focused and committed to the goal of becoming the next president because I truly believe that I can help bring about the real change that America needs and wants. If that does not happen, I would of course consider any opportunity to further serve my country.

Would people think this was bullshit? Maybe. But my gut tells me its closer than anything else he's said to the way he really feels

Tony

Under Gibbs, with patience comes success
News out of Washington today is that Redskins QB Patrick Ramsey is reportedly upset over talks head coach Joe Gibbs has been having with veteran quaterback Mark Brunell. The talks, which occurred over the weekend and which Ramsey was alerted to ahead of time, have included Gibbs offering Brunell the chance to compete for the starter's job if he were to sign with the Skins. Ramsey, who is set to begin his third NFL season, had assumed that the job would be his to lose after he earned the position last year. Ramsey was the starting quarterback until late in the year when he was replaced by Elisabeth Hasselbeck's husband as a result of injuries.

Check out Wilbon's take here.

I understand Ramsey's position here, but he needs to realize that acquiring Brunell (or any veteran QB) could very well be a blessing in disguise. With the amount of punishment Ramsey took last year it may be wise for him to sit a year or two, learn the Gibbs system and allow Gibbs time to revamp an offensive line that gave up sack after devastating sack last year. In the meantime, acquiring Brunell would dramatically increase Gibbs' chance at returing the Skins to respectability, and contention, maybe as early as next year.

Tony

Poor Teachers
From an editorial in the Sun:

The deal is a good one. Teachers' salaries have gone up considerably in the past six years - 40 percent and more - and the General Assembly, which foots most of the bill for the city, is aware of that. It makes sense, politically, to share the burden - in a way that won't hurt the city's schoolchildren. And the money will be paid back to the teachers within 17 months.

Please, won't someone think of the children!

Marc

You learn quickly, grasshopper
I'm trying something new. I call it "Zen blogging." I'm just gonna let these quotes, which appeared in the same article in today's Sun about the big Thornton rally in Annapolis, speak for themselves:

The rally included many eager to participate in a show of civic action, and some not so willing. Eight-year-old Chinua Abubakar was fidgeting in the evening chill, so his mother wrapped his ears in a knit cap but rebuffed his calls to leave. "I've been telling him he must listen," said Darlene Abubakar, a Prince George's County resident who wants smaller class sizes.

"We think that term 'slots for tots' reeks of questionable ethics," said Beth Novick, a sixth-grade teacher at Greenbelt Elementary School in Prince George's County who brought two of her pupils.

"If no one comes down here, I'll wake up one morning and have no P.E. class," said Tim Mullaney, 11, one of Novick's pupils.

Tony "The Blogmaster" Jackson

The comeback...ah, fuck this shit
According to today's Washington Post, Howard Dean, egged on by supporters, will not drop out of the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination if he fails to win next week's Wisconsin primary, as he had previously stated. Dean, who raised about $1 million after primary losses in New Hampshire and Iowa (and all states that have held primaries or caucuses to this point), says he will continue his quest for the presidency until he either wins or is mathematically eliminated from the contest. According to the article, this decision was the result of meeting supporters throughout the state of Wisconsin who urged Dean not to give up the fight. In the article Dean said he likes to make decisions by allowing ideas to "incubate unconsciously for a long time." Wow, that's exactly how I used to pretend I was working on papers in college.

Personally, I think Dean's campaign realized that a)they are not going to win Wisconsin, b)they've got the money to keep running and c) they're not giving that money back, so what the hell. It seems to me that the Dean strategy is to hang in this thing as long as possible in the hopes that Kerry does something devestatingly stupid. Well, here's to hope.

In other political news, Washington Post reporter Dana Milbank muses today as to the chances that Dick Cheney will get booted off the Republican ticket this fall. It seems the chances are slim right now, but I'd love to see him replaced if only because it could inject some flavor into what's shaping up to be a rather bland general election.

And finally, I'll leave you with satirist P.J. O'Rourke's take on the Democrats and Iraq (as appeared in the Jan/Feb issue of Atlantic Monthly):

For the major Democratic candidates, Iraq is the Sharper Image airport-store issue -- a big, attractive thingamajig with lots of intriguing features. But there may be baggage problems. And what do you really do with it when you get it home.

Tony

The Real Kerry
Some good Kerry stuff from the New York Post:

ONE of the surest ways to get the phones ringing on any Massachusetts talk-radio show is to ask people to call in and tell their John Kerry stories. The phone lines are soon filled, and most of the stories have a common theme: our junior senator pulling rank on one of his constituents, breaking in line, demanding to pay less (or nothing) or ducking out before the bill arrives.

The tales often have one other common thread. Most end with Sen. Kerry inquiring of the lesser mortal: "Do you know who I am?"

Marc

Brunell To Skins?
From ESPN's Len Pasquarelli:

The Redskins are closing in on a trade to acquire Jaguars quarterback Mark Brunell, several team and NFL sources told ESPN.com.

A deal for Brunell could be completed in the coming week if all the components fall into line.

But what about Ramsey?

Ramsey, 24, is under contract through the 2006 season and his salaries and cap charges are not exorbitant, meaning Washington could retain him and allow Brunell, in part, to serve as his mentor.

It is difficult to imagine Brunell agreeing to any deal to a team where he did not have assurances of at least competing for the starting job. Steinberg reiterated last week at the Super Bowl that Brunell still believes he can be a starter for several more seasons.

Marc

Calling all swine.
So, jerks. Sunday, sometime after noon, for a meeting, non NFL, but nonetheless. A sunday is a sunday. My place, bring booze, bring saturated fats. Bring, yourself. I'm tired, of staring at Iron and Blood. So this is now the top post.

Draper

Iron And Blood
I was reading an Andrew Sullivan piece in TNR on the prospect of a conservative revolt against George Bush, when I saw this:

I'm not sure that president Bush has ever been a believer in real personal freedom. On most social and cultural issues--from drug legalization to marriage rights--Bush has always been an authoritarian-style conservative. He has never consistently or boldly spoken of the need to restrain government as a good in itself. He has governed exactly as one would have expected, if you consider him a Texas adherent of the religious right who happened to grow up in a family committed to public service. Whatever the context, Bush has had choices. And almost every choice he has made has been in the direction of an authoritarian, big-spending conservatism, not a frugal, libertarian one.

And then it hit me: George Bush is a lot like Otto von Bismarck.

Bismarck inherited a Prussian estate; Bush inherited an oil fortune. Both were mediocre students who spent their youth aimlessly. Politically, both Bush and Bismarck are traditionalist social conservatives without clear principles about economic matters, where they are guided by pragmatism rather than principle.

Like Bismarck, Bush sees domestic politics as a means to an end - the end being political survival and the continuation of his foreign policy. Bismarck enacted the world's first social security system in order to buy the political support of the rapidly expanding class of industrial workers. Bush recently passed a prescription drug entitlement in the hope of buying the support of the nation's fastest-growing demographic cohort: the elderly. Bush throws bones (judicial appointments, partial-birth abortion ban) to his conservative base, just as Bismarck attacked Socialists and Catholics to keep his base of reactionary Prussian Junkers satisfied.

Even the foreign policies of the two men are similar. Bismarck was haunted by the memories of the crushing defeat of Prussia at the hands of Napoleon. He used aggressive tactics - such as a "preemptive" war with France - to achieve the conservative goal of security. Bismarck disdained global ambitions; he once declared, "Colonies for Germany are like fur coats for Polish nobles". Similarly, Bush derided nation-building during his presidential run, but has ended up invading and then reconstructing Afghanistan and Iraq in the name of "homeland security".

But there is one glaring difference between Otto von Bismarck and George Bush: Bush's failure to subordinate domestic political gains to the greater goals of his foreign policy. Bush wants to practice realpolitik abroad while submitting fantasyland budgets at home. Sullivan:

He could have made an argument for general sacrifice, keeping the deficit manageable, while fighting an important war. He chose not to. I emphasize the word "chose." Rather than make the case for war responsibly and coherently, he argued that we could afford everything: guns, butter, margarine, whipped cream, whatever.

In 1862, when the Reichstag balked at providing funding for the army, Bismarck berated them with these famous words:

The great questions of the day will not be decided by speeches and the resolutions of majorities... but by iron and blood.

If George Bush would demonstrate an iron will in demanding the funding for a larger and stronger military, a lot less blood would have to be shed by American soldiers.

Marc

Those that can, do...
After playing around on the Internet for a while it occurred to me that I don't have a post on the front page of the blog. Well, I simply can't have that.

Unlike most of the stuff I write on this blog, today's post comes from Maryland, and more specifically, deals with education.

Maryland's education officials are offering class time and in some cases academic and community service credit to students who attend a downtown Annapolis rally that will encourage legislators to accept the Thornton Commission's reccommendations on school funding. The article raises a number of issues, including whether its proper to allow students participating in advocacy (and in this case political) activities to receive community service credit toward graduation. Further, is it appropriate for schools to use government money in order to lobby the government? And I was prepared to talk about both of those issues (and a couple of others) except that I then read another article dealing with teachers.

Today's Sun also reports that Baltimore City School chief Bonnie Copeland has announced the preparation of plans to layoff about 1200 city teachers if the teachers do not agree to either a temporary pay cut or furlough. The Baltimore Teacher's Union is expected to vote on the issue tommorrow morning. It's likely that any cost-cutting efforts that include pay cuts or furloughs will be rejected, and layoffs will begin.

These two articles kinda got me thinking: What in the hell is wrong with teachers?

I'm prepared to look beyond the rather smarmy tactic of literally busining in hordes of uninterested students to a rally so that the teacher's union can demand more money from the government. What's more troubling to me is the fact that none of these "concerned" teachers used this opportunity as a chance to (gasp) teach. Couldn't some enterprising young civics teacher assign his or her class to research the issues involved in the education funding debate? They could hold mock committee meetings and travel to Annapolis to observe the actual proceedings or have an audience with their representative. Heck, they could even write letters to their representatives that urge support (or comdenation, in a perfect world) for the Thornton measures. But at least they'd be learning, instead of being treated like interchangeable cogs in the teacher's union's unwavering efforts to pry loose every last dime that the government has and call it "helping kids." (Not only are they not learning, but they're being used for poltical purposes and are receiving kickbacks as a result. Anyone wondering why kids grow increasingly cynical about politics and government?)

The second article is even more clear than the first. Teachers are willing to take themselves out of the classroom rather than accept a pay cut. While the pay cut (which would be temporary, by the way) would be across the board, meaning that everyone (including administrators, facilitators and janitors) would be affected, the job losses will affect teachers more so than other people connected to the schools. The teachers, either because of stubborness, or stupidity or corruption (or more likely a combination of all three) are willing to let their students take the fall, rather than themselves. What's their answer? Increase the amount of time given to paying off the $58 million cumulative budget deficit from the current projection of 18 months to several years. Forgive me for sounding cynical, but I'm guessing I'm not the only person who thinks the Union's timetable for debt reduction would be so long that it would coincide with a number of vital teacher pay raises.

Look, I know that a great many people who are teachers are good at their job. They are dedicated and want what's best for their students. But as a group, teachers behave just like any other special interest group in this country. Just like the farmers and the elderly, they line up at the great government trough elbowing each other in order to get the best chance at the most money.

(Coincidentally, the Democrats being in bed with all three of these groups is a large part of their problem)

Is more money going to help our schools? Probably not. But what could help is teachers putting aside their own personal poltical agendas and re-dedicating themselves to the ideals that got them into teaching in the first place: because they wanted to help children. (Or couldn't find anything else they were good at in college. Either way.)

Tony