"Protests" and the Silent Majority

Patrick McIlheran of the Journal Sentinel got national attention yesterday with his column, "Unions want to overturn election result."   A minor point in the article deserves a little more notice, because it provides needed perspective on the so-called "massive" protests in Madison by public employee unions.   McIlheran writes,

Union activists in Madison Tuesday spoke apocalyptically of "class war," hinting wildly at general strikes and takeovers of the Capitol. They correctly see their control of the state slipping and must figure that if they bring 13,000 shouting people to Madison, they can overrule the election.

Any worried legislators should keep in mind that Walker drew about five times that many votes in Dane County alone in November

Exactly so.   Newspapers and media often report what they see and use adjectives like "massive" to describe what they see, but they rarely report what they don't see.   For example, if you want to get your faces in the paper, get together 10 or 12 students at Marquette University here in Milwaukee and do a pro-choice "protest" outside of Jesu Church on campus.   Bring your signs saying things like "Keep Your Rosaries Off My Ovaries," and you'll be certain to get on the local News at Six.  But meanwhile there are thousands of students at Marquette (a Jesuit university) who go to Mass at Jesu every week and who, if asked, would give reliably Pro-Life opinions, but who generallly just go about their lives working and studying without feeling the need to publically announce those opinions through something called "protesting."   They don't get press, because they aren't doing something that registers within our culture's conceptual biases as "news."  

With regard to the Madison protests, it is well to remember that there are thousands of teachers in Wisconsin who haven't walked off their jobs, and there are millions of Wisconsin residents who aren't protesting, and who, in fact, voted for Governor Walker and the new State Senate precisely because they wanted them to rein in spending without raising Wisconsin's already too-high tax burden.   The news media doesn't report on that "silent majority," but they are out there.  

To put it in somewhat more concrete terms, if the news reports are accurate, something like 13,000 people came to Madison to protest yesterday.   The news media calls these protests "massive" routinely, as shown by this Google screen shot. 

Search Results

1. News for massive protest madison

   Washington Post (blog)

   Wisconsin gov.: GOP emboldened by protests 2 hours ago ... emboldened by massive protests against his controversial budget plan. ... the demonstrators who filled the state capitol building in Madison and the ... The Hill (blog) - 3996 related articles - Shared by 10+

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2. Hearing day in Madison: Hundreds come to testify on budget bill

   Feb 15, 2011 ... Related Galleries. PHOTOS: Local groups organize bus trips to Madison: (5) Photos. PHOTO GALLERY: Massive protests in Madison: (17) Photos ...
   www.journaltimes.com/.../article_7fbefd44-391e-11e0-b9eb-001cc4c002e0. html - Cached
3. Collection : PHOTO GALLERY: Massive protests in Madison

   Feb 15, 2011 ... The majority of the group was protesting Gov. Walker's ...
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4. Live Reporting from the Massive Protests in Wisconsin -- Over ...

   Feb 17, 2011 ... 4:20pm Eight year old Cleo Johnson joins her teacher Mr. Marks from Lapham Elementary School at the massive protest in Madison today. ...
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5. 40% of Madison Teachers call in Sick, Schools Shut; Video of ...

   Feb 17, 2011 ... 40% of Madison Teachers call in Sick, Schools Shut; Video of Massive Protest in Wisconsin Capitol Building; If Jackasses Could Think ...
   foreclosureblues.wordpress.com/.../40-of-madison-teachers-call-in-sick- schools-shut-video-of-massive-protest-in-wisconsin-capitol-building-if- ...

But guess how many people came to Green Bay to celebrate the Packers' Super Bowl parade less than two weeks ago?   50,000.   These people are the silent majority in this state:

On Union Thugs and "Sick Outs"

Wisconsin is making the national news today because of extraordinary events that I believe will soon be replicated across the country, because they stem from a simple problem that many other states and municipalities suffer from -- Wisconsin cannot afford the pension and health benefits it has promised to its public employees.  

Facing this problem, new Governor Scott Walker has proposed an obvious solution -- government workers going forward will have to pay 50% of the calculated contribution to their pension system and 13% of their health insurance costs out of their own paychecks.  Walker, a Republican, proposed this cost-cutting measure instead of raising taxes based on the sound moral proposition (to me anyway) that well-paid government employees with great benefits shouldn't get to pass the costs of those benefits onto less well-paid private citizens.  For those of us who pay for our own retirements and health insurance out of pocket, being taxed so that public employees with little accountability and no requirement to turn a profit can retire at age 55 with a lavish pension and free health care for life is an outrage.  

In other words, Walker is counting on tapping into the growing frustration in America that public employees (the government) are parasites living well off the work of everybody else.   (Note: the proposal would also strip most government employees of their collective bargaining rights, under the theory it is inherently corrupt when politicians whose campaigns are supported by public sector unions are asked to sign off on higher wages and benefits for those same unions under the guise of collective bargaining.)

Not surprisingly, the public employee unions and their Democrat party stooges don't like this one bit.  So, yesterday, teachers in Madison staged a "sick out" and shut down the Madison public schools, and are essentially trying to shut down the Capitol with protests, as you can see above in the Capitol rotunda.   Then, today, Democrat senators in the state senate have fled the jurisdiction to avoid a quorum call to vote on the Governor's budget plan.

My thought is this:  if Scott Walker wants to become an immediate national figure on the level of a Chris Christie, the great governor of New Jersey, he has one obvious course of action.   Fire them.   Any teacher who lied to her employer by claiming to be sick and then going to the Capitol to protest has undoubtedly breached their contract.   Fire them.   I think his approval rating would skyrocket.

***

One sidebar too:  Walker is a relatively young guy, only 43, and he has two boys in high school.  Union thugs showed up at his home in Wauwatosa -- my hometown -- to protest yesterday, knowing of course that he was in Madison.   Is there any reason they would do that other than to say, implicitly, that they know where he lives?   Can you imagine what would happen if this was a Democrat politician and his family home was threatened by Republican protestors?

UPDATE:

Oh, and remember this sort of thing the next time a liberal lectures you about "civility" in political discourse.

Birthdays Today

A titan of American business was born today, Thomas Watson, the founder of IBM.

Watson was born in 1874.   His father owned a modest lumber business in rural New York and he worked on the family farm.   Watson quit his first job teaching after one day, then quit his second job as a bookkeeper almos tas quickly.   Then he became a traveling salesman, first peddling organs and pianos, then sewing machines, a job from which he was fired, and then shares in a building and loan, from which he was also fired.   Then he opened a butcher shop, which went bust.   Finally, having had an NCR cash register in his shop, he went to NCR to arrange a new repayment schedule, and ended up joining the company as a salesman.   It was at NCR that he first became a big success, and from there he moved to become general manager of Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation in 1914 at age 40.   In 1924 he renamed the company International Business Machines.  And the rest, as they say, is history.... just this week a computer named "Watson" defeated humans on the TV game show Jeopardy, signaling for some the "singularity" when artificial intelligence surpasses human intelligence. 

What does Watson teach us (the original, not the machine)?   That business success is inextricably linked to salesmanship, and that salesmanship is inextricably linked to perseverance, and that perseverance is part and parcel with a willingness to risk failure and keep trying.  One wonders whether the current generation, which expects financial security and success almost as a birthright, has the same mettle.

***

It's also Michael Jordan's birthday.   He's now 48.   Jordan's success is also instructive, but perhaps in a negative way.   Certainly his greatness had much to do with his athletic ability, but the separation between Jordan and the other great players of his day had less to do with athleticism and much more to do with his will.   Jordan simply wanted to win more than other players, and that will to win was palpable when he stepped on the court.   More than even natural physical ability, I would tend to think that level of will power is innate.... you either have it, or you don't, and no amount of coaching (in business, the equivalent would be no amount of success seminars attended or how-to books read) can give it to you.

On the other hand, maybe physical ability had a little to do with it too:

Girl Thursday - Joni Mitchell

My son is turning into a really good rock-and-roll guitarist, and he's starting to get into playing (and sort of singing) acoustic songs so that he can, at some point, perform a live set for people.   So I thought I'd show him a really great acoustic performer as today's Girl of the Day, Joni Mitchell:

Pujols and Musial

On Tuesday Stan Musial was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award America can bestow.   Musial, the greatest Cardinal, was and remains an "iconic" figure in the team's history. 

The word "iconic" has been used to describe Albert Pujols' status with the Cardinals in recent days.   It has apparently astonished many that the Cardinals' ownership and management would let an "iconic" player such as Pujols go to free agency.  He is the Cardinals' "brand," it is said.   He should be a "Cardinal for life," just as Musial has been.   (You'll note that Musial is wearing a Cardinals red blazer for the ceremony.)

The problem with this attitude is that times have changed.   Musial was paid $80,000 a year from age 30 through age 36 (1951-57),   He got a raise to $100,000 per year for his age 37 and 38 years, but then was cut back to $80,000 for his age 39 year, and $65,000 for playing at age 40 to 42.   A lot of money for the time, certainly, but it also has to be put in perspective.  In 1958, at the top of his earning power, Musial commanded a salary that was roughly 20 times the median family income in America for that year ($5100).   A comparable athlete's salary today would be roughly $1,000,000 per year.   But Pujols is asking to be paid something on the order of 600 times what the median family makes (roughly $50,000) -- $30 million per year.   Where it might have made sense to pay an "icon" like Musial more than he was worth in his declining years, it's a different order of magnitude when you're deciding whether to pay Pujols more than you think he's worth.

And make no mistake... upon reflection, the Cardinals are making the right decision.  Consider the comparison of Musial and Pujols.  Two all-time great players, no doubt.   Musial was an 8.4 WAR (wins-against-replacement) player on average for years 22-31 (this is almost exactly what Pujols has averaged over his first ten years).  But beginning at age 32 -- the age Pujols' new contract would start -- even Musial began to slip.   He was a 6.7 WAR player from age 32 through 36, but he was only a 2.2 WAR player on average for years 37-41 (years 6 through 10 in the ten-year deal Pujols is apparently looking for).  You could pay Musial $100,000, or $80,000 or $65,000 to be an "emeritus" presence on the team.   But you can't pay Pujols $30 million if he turns out, like Musial, to be a 2.2 WAR player at the same age.   Not in St. Louis anyway.   There's just not enough money to waste that much on a player who, once great, has become mediocre. 

Some more stats.   Between ages 32-36, Musial had five straight 100 RBI seasons; after 36, he never had another one.   Between ages 32-36, Musial hit between 27 and 35 HRs a year; after 36, he never hit more than 19.   Between ages 32-36, Musial received MVP votes every year, finishing 2nd in the voting in one year and never finishing below ninth; after age 36 Musial still received MVP votes in three years, but never finished higher than 10th.  

Finally, it's perhaps worth remembering that, in 1964, the year after Musial retired, the Cardinals won the World Series.   In 1963, Musial had gotten nearly 400 plate appearances playing primarily in left field.   In 1964, those plate appearances went to a young, unknown left fielder the Cardinals picked up mid-season by the name of Lou Brock, who just so happened to end up being a Hall of Famer himself.

Pujols, being human, is going to begin the decline phase of his career soon.   He'll still be great for a few more years, but he won't be as great, and then he won't be great at all, and then he'll be mediocre, and then he'll be gone.   I wish all that would happen as a Cardinal, but we can't pay him $30 million a year to be a mediocre 38-41 year old. 

Girl Wednesday - Esther Williams

Trolling SI.com for Albert Pujols information this morning, I was bombarded by marketing for SI's annual swimsuit issue.   It's a little rough for the father of two daughters approaching their teenage years to deal with girls who aren't all that much older -- some of the SI models are as young as 18!   But I guess some things don't change, as shown by today's Girl of the Day, the star of Hollywood's somewhat bizarre aquatic musicals, Esther Williams.  

On the other hand, maybe things do change a little:



Is Pujols Worth It?

If Pujols' demand is for $30 million a year for 10 years, in a word, no.  Pujols will be 32 in the first year of his new contract.   If you pay him, you'll have a right to expect him to put up all-time great years for that amount of money.  But, of the 150 highest OPS years in baseball history for hitters (on base average plus slugging average), only 34 (roughly 22%) occurred when the player was 32 or older.  Of the Top 50 OPS years, only two happened when the player was 37 or older, and both were by Barry Bonds when he was, shall we say, doing some suspicious things.  And, the three players who Pujols' career most resembles through age 30 (again, through the miracle of online baseball statistics) -- Jimmie Foxx, Frank Robinson and Ken Griffey, Jr. -- had a grand total of 17 seasons between them with an OPS of 1.000 or more and none of them occurred when they were 32 years old or older.  

The Cardinals were extraordinarily smart and lucky when they signed Pujols to his current eight-year deal in 2004, locking him up for $111 million through his prime.   Pujols, in turn, traded the potential of hitting it even bigger for the security of that deal, when he was only three years into his career.   He's been paid extraordinarily well in real terms, but less certainly than he was worth during an historic first ten years (years in which he posted 8 years with an OPS of 1.000 or more)   The Cardinals won that deal.  It happens when parties enter into contracts.   But the Cardinals would be foolish from a business perspective to assume that Pujols will continue to produce at that level from age 32 through age 41.  It hasn't happened without steroids in the history of baseball.  

I'm really sad to say this, because I've enjoyed watching Pujols so much, but I think the Cardinals are going to have to let him walk.  

Birthdays Today

It's Galileo's birthday today.   Born in 1564, Galileo, of course, is the man who first theorized that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and who was tried by the Roman Inquisition for his heresy.   Galileo has had the last laugh in history -- Einstein called him the father of modern science -- but he lived out his life under house arrest.

Girl Tuesday - Barrie Chase

Barrie Chase was Fred Astaire's dance partner in a series of TV specials from the late 1950s through the 1960s.  A beautiful gal and a great, very balletic dancer:

Here are Chase and Astaire from a 1966 special:

The President's Budget - Not Serious

President Obama released his FY 2012 budget today, and it is an astonishing document.   In my 51 years I don't think I've ever seen a President abdicate leadership with such gusto, as if he simply doesn't care what happens to his country.  It's a deeply unserious proposal that borders on impeachable -- a President, after all, is bound by his oath to of office to "faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States," and to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."  This budget does neither, and does so with a degree of cynicism that is palpable.  Obama clearly wants to force Republicans to propose cuts, and then plans to demagogue those cuts as heartless or cruel, even while the country goes off a fiscal cliff from which there will be no return.  

Here are the key facts, drawn from The Corner on National Review Online: 

$3.73 trillion — total spending this year (25 percent of GDP, highest levels since World War Two).

$46 trillion — total spending over the next decade.

$8.7 trillion — total new spending over the same period.

$26.3 trillion — Total new debt, including entitlement obligations, predicted by 2021.

$7.2 trillion — Total deficit predicted by the end of the decade.

$1.1 trillion — How much the White House estimates the proposal will reduce the deficit over the next ten years.

$4 trillion — How much the president’s deficit commission recommended reducing the deficit over the next ten years to avoid financial catastrophe.

$1.6 trillion — The projected annual deficit for 2011 (11 percent of GDP), up from $1.3 trillion in 2010.

$2 trillion — Amount the budget will raise taxes on business and upper-income families over the next ten years, which includes letting the Bush-era tax rates expire in 2012 (for incomes $250,000 and up).

$50 billion — Amount the administration plans to spend this year on infrastructure and transportation “investments.”

$30 billion — Amount dedicated to a “National Infrastructure Bank to invest in projects of regional or national significance to the economy,” including the much-touted high-speed rail initiative.

$77.4 billion — Funding allocated for the Department of Education, a 22 percent increase from 2010 levels, and a 35 percent increase from 2008 levels.

$29.5 billion — Total spending on the Department of Energy, a 22 percent increase from 2008 levels.

$9.9 billion — Funding allocated for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), a 30 percent increase from 2008 levels.

$150 billion — Total amount the White House plans to spend next year on research and development programs.

If your brother-in-law was deeply in debt, to the point where you feared from the security of your sister and your nieces and nephews, and yet he was proposing borrowing hundreds of thousands of dollars over the next few years in order to finance some get-rich-quick scheme and to maintain a lavish lifestyle that his income has never been able to support, wouldn't you at some point think it was time for a family intervention?   Obama and the Democrats are the profligate children in the American family.   It's time for the adults to intervene.  

Memorial Bix

Just because I felt like it today... my old man's favorite jazz:

Birthdays Today

The randomness of fame - which in turn suggests the futility of seeking fame -- is perhaps best demonstrated in almost mathematical form by how some days have multiple "famous" births, and others have relatively few or none at all.   In any event, the only birthday that interests me today is Jack Benny, who was born in 1894.  Jack Benny was ubiquitous as a comedian in the 1950s and into the 1960s when I was a kid.   He was always known as a clean comedian who didn't do "blue" material, but I recall that my dad had a bootlegged Friar's Club tape (is Youtube anything more than a way of compiling and searching all of the world's bootlegs?) in which Benny went pretty blue, up to using the "f" word.

Benny was a funny, funny man, and I can't help thinking he was funnier than most of what passes for comedy today:

Girl Monday - Grammy Version

It's my general view that the Grammy Awards -- and popular music in general -- are at a nadir.   Perhaps that's just the view of an old fogey.  But I can't help thinking that the "best song" of the year, "Need You Now" by Lady Antebellum, is absolutely generic, and won't be listened to in another five years, much less another fifty years.   Meanwhile, if you look back to 1960, the best album of the year was "Come Dance With Me!" by Frank Sinatra.   No contest.




On the other hand, you have to admit that Katy Perry is semi-cute and has assets that would have been valued back in the day. 

Girl Saturday - On Wisconsin!

The Badgers beat No. 1 Ohio State today at the Kohl Center in Madison, 71-67.   A great win for coach Bo Ryan, who always seems to get relatively unathletic, relatively unrecruited players to play hard, play defense, play smart, and play winning basketball.

Birthdays Today - The Greatest American?

I am willing to entertain arguments that George Washington is the greatest American -- military leader of the American Revolution, President of the Constitutional Convention, first President of the U.S.   Washington's act of stepping down from the Presidency after two terms may be the single greatest and most seminal act in the history of the country, because it proved that we were a country of laws, not of men, and that we were never to devolve into dictatorship or monarchy.  Dwight David Eisenhower might be the favorite of some -- certainly the leadership of Allied armies in the European Theater during World War II is the largest undertaking in human history; and he was an underrated President during a period of prosperity at home and Cold War abroad. 

But I think if there were a poll taken, the overwhelming choice for greatest American would be Abraham Lincoln, born today in 1809.   Through his wisdom, perseverance, and moral courage -- Lincoln bore the weight of sacrificing hundreds of thousands of young men on the altar of liberty, and he gave his own life to an assassin (something he must have known could and likely would happen) -- he saved his country at its moment of greatest peril.   No one else can make that claim.  

Every school child should be made to memorize the peroration of Lincoln's First Inaugural Address, if they learn nothing else, because it captures best who we are as a country, even better than his Gettysburg Address:

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

***
Amazingly, on the same day Lincoln was born in 1809, another world historical man was born, Charles Darwin, the discoverer of the theory of evolution.   Just as there are few, like Lincoln, who can lay claim to saving their country, there are few, like Darwin, who can lay claim to fundamentally changing the way we think about our world.   Galileo, Newton, Darwin, Einstein.   It's a small pantheon.  

Finally, it's also another great American's birthday, General Omar Bradley, born in 1893.  Bradley was the last surviving five-star general before his death.   Commander of II Corps in Tunisia (after Patton) and Sicily, commander of 1st Army on D-Day and the 12th Army Group for the breakout from Normandy and thereafter, Bradley was known as the "G.I.'s General" for his unfailing courtesy and concern for his men; it is legendary that he never issued an order without saying "Please."

Palinus Maximus

Sarah Palin, whose birthday is today (she's all of 47), spoke last weekend at the Young America's Foundation at a dinner honoring Ronald Reagan's 100th birthday.   Here is a key passage:

... we are at a crossroads. This is a time for choosing and the choices before us are as clear now as they were in 1964.

Do we still believe in the values that this country was founded on? God-given individual liberties and limited government and free-market capitalism?

Or do we surrender to big government and a corporatism agenda?

Do we believe that we can compete and succeed by individual initiative or do we need government to take care of us and plan for us?

Do we still have the courage and the will to not only endure, but to soar and to succeed?

How we answer will be America’s glory or our shame.

And these are not easy questions because today for many, there is fear in the air. The little guy, the individual American is made to feels ill-equipped and helpless and afraid in the face of our challenges.

First let’s remember, if we do just ask, remember God doesn’t give us that spirit of fear. He gives us a spirit of power and love and a sound mind. Seek that spirit and we can we can have courage and confidence to make sound decisions.

Friends, we are not helpless. Our future is in our own hands. Our success and our greatness lies in the courage and the hard work of individual Americans. We are an exceptional nation because we were built on and we are to affirm those values of freedom and hard work.

Palin was criticized this week for turning down an opportunity to speak at CPAC, the big conservative convention.   But she clearly wants to position herself as the heir to Reagan -- a positive, sunny Westerner who can lead us forward by leading us backward to our better, pioneer selves.   It's a ballsy strategy.