Just got back into town, checked my e-mail, and found that the Journal Sentinel had denied my application to be a community columnist. Oh well, it was a long shot anyway. Good luck to whoever did get the gig (I think there are like 30 of them).
Christian Schneider
Author, Columnist
Page 49 of 82
Caution: Only read this post if you like money. And lots of it.
I think we can all agree that the best part of a root beer float occurs when the ice cream melts and mixes with the root beer. When they\’re separate, they are just ice cream and root beer. But when they mix, you get a magical tasting concoction that doesn\’t occur elsewhere in nature.
I\’m telling you – if someone were able to figure out a way to bottle the ice cream/root beer mix and sell it, I\’d buy it by the case. It would be a lot easier than having to find an ice cream stand on the run, then waiting for the chemical transformation to take place. It would be a license to print money.
I know this blog has degenerated into me bitching about the Brewers, but it has been for good reason. This quote in today\’s paper from recently-acquired reliever Scott Linebrink set me off:
As so often happens for the Brewers, no matter what the score is in the early going, the final innings were adventuresome. Houston scored two unearned runs in the seventh off reliever Scott Linebrink, who heard his share of boos when Yost opted not to pull him with the bases and one down.
\”There\’s not a lot of teams I\’ve been on in a division race, where you\’re in control of the game and don\’t give up the lead and you still get booed,\” Linebrink said.
So for Linebrink (who my friend Jay has dubbed \”LineDrive\”), loading the bases with one out and giving up two runs is known as \”being in control.\” Hey – he didn\’t give up the three-run lead, right?
Here\’s a memo to this jackass: fully one-quarter of the Brewers\’ losses this year have been because of the bullpen – which his acquisition was supposed to help. Instead, he\’s exacerbated their bullpen problems. In fact, I think there\’s some question as to whether Linebrink knows if he\’s playing for the right team – I heard he was found in the Astros\’ locker room tapping his foot. After blowing 15 games where they were ahead by more than three runs, you\’d think he\’d understand fan frustration.
Linebrink\’s 2006 salary is listed as $1,365,000. So I\’ll strike a deal with Mr. Sensitive: He can pay $100 so he and his kids can come to my work to boo me, and I\’ll take the $1.3 million. In fact, I\’d be willing to go in to a game and walk the bases full for only $500,000. Think of the savings to the Brewers.
The fact that the Padres were so willing to part with this moron in the midst of their own playoff run says a lot. When teams in first place are unloading middle relief (which other teams are always trying to acquire around the trade deadline), an alarm should go off.
And if he\’s sensitive to booing, he should try being Derrick Turnbow for a day. I would boo Turnbow before he comes in the game, while he\’s in the game, when he leaves the game, when he leaves the stadium to walk out to his car, and while he\’s mowing his lawn at home. If I saw him ordering dinner on a date at a restaurant, I\’d walk up and boo him. \”You ordered the salmon? Boo! Boooooooo!\”
This is historically bad news for my household:
First, it hit the workers. From Milwaukee to Missouri and California, the fake butter flavor they mixed for use in microwave popcorn poisoned their lungs. Now, in the first case of its kind, a doctor has found a possible link between serious lung disease and consumers of microwave popcorn.
\”I was as surprised as I could be,\” said Cecile Rose, the chief occupational and environmental medicine physician at National Jewish Medical and Research Center, one of the nation\’s most prestigious lung disease hospitals. Rose has seen many cases of factory workers\’ lungs destroyed by a chemical called diacetyl, responsible for giving microwave popcorn its buttery flavor, but never in a consumer of the popcorn. Until she started seeing a 53-year-old Colorado man whose favorite snack was microwave popcorn.
I probably down two or three bags of this stuff per week while watching sports. All this time I thought it was going to be the Brewers that finally killed me – instead, it\’s going to be what I\’ve been eating while watching them. Now I\’m going to have to eat more of my wife\’s all-natural hippie popcorn.
Concerned that their doctors-in-training were working too many marathon shifts, many states have limited the number of hours their residents can work. The thinking was that long shifts often affected patient care, leading residents to make mistakes in their treatments.
A new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association actually shows no correlation between hours worked and the quality of care given to Medicaid patients. They conclude that \”implementation of duty hours limitations was not associated with any significant change in risk-adjusted mortality among Medicare patients.\”
The State Policy Network Blog points out the unintended effect of New Jersey\’s newly increased cigarette tax – it actually reduces revenue to the state. SPN points to an Asbury Park Press column by Gregg Edwards, which says:
To support the Fiscal Year 2007 state budget, Gov. Corzine successfully proposed increasing the cigarette tax by 17.5 cents, from $2.40 to 2.575 per pack. It was the fourth tax increase in a six-year period and it made New Jersey\’s tax the highest state tax in the nation.
Here was the result: In FY 2006, the cigarette tax raised more than $787 million. In FY 2007 – after it was hiked by almost 7 percent – the tax raised only $764 million, or $23 million less than the previous year.
[…]
Some of the sales decline was due to smokers giving up an expensive habit, but that can\’t explain its magnitude. Many smokers don\’t buy cigarettes from New Jersey retailers. Instead, some purchase cigarettes in the states that border New Jersey, all of which have lower cigarette prices. While New Jersey\’s sales are plummeting, Delaware\’s are increasing. And it\’s certainly not the case that more Delaware residents are becoming smokers. Also, some smokers make purchases via the Internet. Others even buy in the black market, which owes its very existence to New Jersey\’s steep tax.
So higher taxes means less revenue to the state – and while some of the reduction can be attributed to people quitting smoking, much of it likely means people are getting their cigarettes from other sources. In fact, recent research suggests that higher cigarette taxes don\’t, in fact, dissuade low-income smokers from quitting.
Of course, Governor Doyle\’s proposed per-pack cigarette tax increase of $1.25 far exceeds the new 17.5 cent tax in New Jersey. So it will take a lot more people quitting or purchasing their cigarettes from out of state or online to offset the tax increase. However, this effect supports Deb Jordahl\’s WPRI Commentary from last week, which demonstrates the paradox of state government relying on a new tax that is intended to keep people from a behavior that is needed to keep collecting the tax.
Tonight\’s \”Here and Now\” commentary goes out to all the U.S. Americans:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pj3nyJ-MOh8]
There\’s even a little acting. I smell Emmy….
I also need to clarify a point made on the original broadcast. The introduction to my commentary mentioned that I wanted to see the program \”cut.\” That\’s not really the case – I\’m merely lobbying for more parental involvement in the program. Either way, I can imagine the Wisconsin Public Television e-mail server is kindly accepting hate mail as we speak.
As Flannery O\’Connor said, \”you have to push as hard as the age that pushes against you.\”
Tonight\’s the night. Pour a glass of wine, light some candles, get the love oils out, and settle down with the one you love to watch \”Here and Now\” on public television together. I will be providing some moderately considered commentary at roughly the 24 minute mark.
For those in markets where it\’s not on until Sunday, you can catch it online here. I\’ll try to post my part on the site here after it\’s on.
This may be the week that I finally get thrown off the air forever. So you may want to watch carefully.
Rumor has it that there is some sort of \”baseball contest\” being performed at Wrigley Field tonight. I, for one, would rather watch \”Chocolate Rain\” on a three hour loop than watch any more Brewer games this year:
By now, you may have heard about the Meng brothers, Chinese miners who had to go to extraordinary lengths to stay alive while trapped in a mine:
Trapped miners ate coal, drank urine
BEIJING – The Meng brothers felt pretty good about their chances of making it out of the collapsed coal mine, until the sound of digging from outside stopped. With no food or water, they were forced to eat coal and drink their own urine from discarded bottles. When they were too exhausted to try to dig themselves out, they slept huddled together in the cold and dark. Meng Xianchen and Meng Xianyou finally clawed their way to the surface after nearly six days underground — a rare tale of survival in China\’s coal mines, the world\’s deadliest, where an average of 13 workers are killed every day.
Now a question for Brewer fans – would you rather watch the Brewers play the Cubs for the upcoming three game series, or would you rather be trapped in a mine, forced to eat coal and drink your own urine? Take plenty of time to think about it.
POST GAME 1 UPDATE: It\’s urine in a landslide.
Have you been looking to join the high-pressure world of counting things? Are you interested in the fast-moving job of reading pieces of paper and entering numbers on those papers into a computer?
According to this promotional video, you may be just enough of a thrill-seeker to work at… the Wisconsin Department of Revenue! Get ready for the nonstop action of poring over tax forms and entering that data into a computer. Sense of adventure (and willingness to take short lunch breaks) required.
In the video, intended to get people fired up about the bean-counting over at DOR, it mentions that the agency is reponsible for \”providing property tax relief for the taxpayers of Wisconsin.\” Actually, the Legislature does that via changes in the law – DOR just cuts the checks. In fact, there\’d be a little more \”property tax relief\” available had DOR not spent money on this ridiculous video. DOR taking credit for property tax relief shows they\’re trying to fool prospective employees into thinking that all the calls they get from taxpayers are going to be friendly calls thanking them for all the wonderful tax relief they provide.
Oh, and did I mention that the DOR workforce is diverse? They only point it out three times in the video. As if some guy sitting at home in his underwear watching \”The View\” is going to turn down a job offer because DOR doesn\’t employ enough Eskimos.
Of course, DOR is a vital department to the well-being of the state. The more truant taxpayers they can track down, the less you will have to pay. But it\’s not exactly like they\’re picking from a pool of recruits whose only options are to either join the Navy SEALS or enter data from tax forms into a computer.
So-called good government groups in Wisconsin are eternally hyperventilating about the unfair advantage fundraising gives incumbent candidates. They complain that sitting elected officials can use their office to build excessive warchests, which makes them invulnerable come election time. Generally, their answer is to fund campaigns with taxpayer money and limit total campaign expenditures.
When these groups obsess about campaign fundraising, they miss some very real advantages incumbent legislators have over challengers. Yes, it is difficult for a challenger to raise funds like a sitting legislator – but with the party fundraising system currently in place, viable challengers will get the cash they need to run a campaign.
The real benefit of incumbency comes not in the ability to raise money, but the enormous advantage legislators have in how we structure their work schedule. Essentially, taxpayers pay their legislators to campaign for eight months every two years. On March 13th of 2008, legislators will walk out of the Capitol having completed the 2007-09 biennium. Between March and November, they will be free to do all of the campaigning they want – going door to door, making fundraising calls, and attending church fairs. The entire time, they will be collecting a state paycheck and benefits.
On the other hand, think of someone looking to challenge one of these incumbents. If I own, say, a print shop and want to challenge Senator Schmoe for her Senate seat, I essentially have to quit my job for five months to do all the campaigning I would need to do to be competitive. There’s no way I could do all the retail politics I needed to in my off hours to compete with the incumbent – who is free to do whatever they want during regular work hours. Even if I tried to maintain my job while running for office, it would virtually guarantee that I wouldn’t see my family until election day. These are huge disincentives for successful businesspeople to run for office in Wisconsin.
The answer? Fire our legislators from March through November of campaign years. Let’s see if they can manage running a campaign and holding down a job at the same time, rather than having the taxpayers pick up their salaries during campaign season. This is what their prospective challengers have to endure. Think about how crazy this situation is for Assembly representatives – we pay them salaries for 14 months to do actual legislative work, then pay them for 10 months for them to convince us that they should be back for another two year term to do the same thing.
Another major advantage enjoyed by legislators is the way they get to utilize their office as an incumbent. Elected officials get to flood their district with political newsletters and other mailings, as well as sending out hundreds of the state “Blue Books” (the state almanac).
Certainly, communicating with constituents is an important part of a legislator’s job. If someone in their district needs assistance, it is their job to help. The Legislature is budgeted to spend $141 million over the next two years, with a portion of that dedicated to mailing newsletters that are essentially campaign materials – they list all the representative’s legislative accomplishments, complete with photos and phony questionnaires. Again, taxpayers are picking up the tab to be told how great their incumbent elected official is.
There’s very little taxpayers can do to limit the office expenses of their representatives. Furthermore, name recognition from being in office is one of the unavoidable spoils of getting elected in the first place. But what we can do is make these expenses more transparent. Take the State of New York, for instance – their state law requires all their legislators’ expenditures be compiled in a single book, which is then distributed to the public. The media and public get a chance to see who is spending what in their office budgets – including mailings, phone calls, and travel expenses. Such a process in Wisconsin would begin to shine some light on which legislators are using taxpayer money to gain political advantage.
In recent years, the media have been running around like their collective hair is on fire at the prospect that there might be politics going on at the Capitol on state time. Yet right under their noses is a framework that dissuades good people from running competitive campaigns and gives incumbents significant advantages. While many legislative seats are simply non-competitive, some simple changes can level the playing field for those that are in play. And it won’t require taxpayers picking up the tab for campaign ads.
I watched Wisconsin\’s own Steve Stricker win the Barclays golf tournament yesterday, which catapulted him into first place in the FedEx standings (whatever the hell those are). With the Brewers blowing more than Jenna Jameson, it is cool to see a good Wisconsin sports story.
But after Stricker made his final putt and got choked up during his post-win interview, I realized how much more important his win was. As he walked off the green, he got a big hug from fellow Wisconsin golfer Jerry Kelly, who was waiting for him. And in a small way, I though Kelly\’s hug was so Wisconsin. I mean, here\’s two guys who are friends from the same state, but constantly competing against each other. But when one succeeds, the other is there to show his appreciation and offer his congratulations.
There are plenty of golfers that hail from the same areas – mostly California and Florida – but you never see these guys wait for each other to congratulate their pals on winning a tournament. I hadn\’t seen that before. And it just seems fitting that they\’re Wisconsin guys. In a hokey way, it seems like that\’s what we\’re all about. Furthermore, I have never received a hug in Minnesota, so screw those guys.
Anyway, it was a nice touch on a day that I concluded that the Brewers have now shaved five years off of my life. When they deliver my eulogy, they should say \”he lived a good life, but it could have been a lot longer if not for the 2007 Milwaukee Brewers.\”
A few weeks ago, the HD Discovery Channel started running episodes of a show called \”It\’s All Geek to Me.\” It\’s a show hosted by New York Times technology columnist David Pogue, and offers reviews and tips on new technologies. (Although two months after filming, the episodes are usually out of date.)
The Discovery Channel posts what they call \”show notes\” that run through the suggestions found in the episodes. I found the notes relating to the show on cell phones pretty helpful. For instance:
Secret “get to the beep” keystrokes:
As noted in the show, you don’t have to listen to the endless outgoing greeting when you just want to leave someone a voicemail message. You can cut directly to the beep by pressing a certain key:
Verizon: press *
Sprint: press 1
T-Mobile or Cingular/AT&T: press #At the end, I noted sadly that: “Of course, you have to know which carrier the person you’re calling uses, so you know which keystroke to use!”
This remains the fatal flaw of my genius idea (publicizing the “cut to the beep” keystrokes).
But here’s the genius solution: publicize it yourself! When you record your voicemail greeting, say, “Push star at any time to skip Verizon’s gibberish,” or whatever. That way, your callers hear your voice but not the recorded lady’s, and they don’t have to remember what the keystroke is.I hereby charge the Pogue Army with the task of changing their outgoing cell phone messages, this very day. Let’s teach those cell carriers that they’re not going to run up our bill so easily!
And if you\’re stuck and need free directory assistance:
Call 800-FREE-411. You have to listen to a 20-second ad, but it’s better than paying $2 to your carrier for directory assistance!
Or send a text message to GOOGL (46645) that says “Robert Gonzales 10024” (or whatever person or business you’re looking for). Google will send back the full name, address, and phone number, within just a few seconds.
BONUS TIP: After the show aired, a reader wrote to inform me that you can now have the best of both worlds. You can get FREE directory assistance, WITHOUT having to send a text message! Unfortunately, it’s only a Yellow Pages at the moment (business numbers only — not residential).
The hero again is Google. Just call 800-GOOG-411.
There\’s even a free service for the times where you know you\’re going to be in a boring meeting and want to have someone call you:
You can program http://www.popularitydialer.com to call your cell phone at a specified time, to get you out of a boring meeting or a bad date. It’s free — and it’s awesome!
You can go to the Discovery Channel website to see the tips David Pogue offers on laptop computers, digital cameras, video cameras, and other electronics products.
I was perusing some of my older CDs today, and ran across Motley Crue\’s \”Shout at the Devil.\” In looking at the cover, I was noticing that all the guys in the band really had the glam look down. The whole \’80s hair band effeminate look. That is, all of them except Mick Mars. He\’s just a terrible, terrible looking woman. Honestly, if I were to run into the Crue at a bar, he\’d be the only one I\’d have a chance to hook up with. See below:
![\"\"](\"http://www.christianschneiderblog.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/_wvG0NnggKqk/RtIbIjWQWLI/AAAAAAAAAYU/iwFdiDXKm0U/s1600-h/motley_crue_shout_at_the_devil.jpg\")
The question is: At the time, do you think he was upset at being an ugly female, or did he carry it around as a badge of honor? Is being able to pass as a reasonably good looking chick a bonus? I could go either way on this. I need convincing.