City officials urged to link youth summer jobs program to academic performance - Pittsburgh Business Times:

What do you get in life with a lottery choice?

City officials urged to link youth summer jobs program to academic performance - Pittsburgh Business Times:: "Richard Flanagan, youth development director at Bloomfield Garfield Corp., urged Mayor Luke Ravenstahl and other elected officials to tie academic performance to youth job placement to maximize use of economic stimulus funding. Summer job candidates are currently chosen by lottery.

In Pittsburgh, you get to pick a school by lottery. That's bad.

In Pittsburgh you get to pick who to hire by lottery. That's bad too.

I agree with Mr. Flannigan. Hire based on merit. Imagine that.

Dowd blasts Ravenstahl for contributions from contractors

Getting closer.

Dowd blasts Ravenstahl for contributions from contractors 'On the first day of taking office, I would issue an executive order that would ban no-bid contracts for political contributors to elected officials,' said Mr. Dowd, whose 2007 council run was backed in part by a handful of lawyers and financiers that do business with the city. 'I'm sure at some point we will also say that we will have no no-bid contracts.'

One does not need to ban political contributions for people who have no-bid contracts if you eliminate all no-bid contracts. So, I'd say, as I have said in the past, the city should eliminate all no-bid contracts. There is no place for no-bid contracts in government.

Simple.

Otherwise, I don't like the removal of free speech for some on day one.

Furthermore, all donors to political campaigns can have their names and details visible as soon as the money gets deposited. And, as soon as the campaign spends any money, that gets reported as well. All incomes and all expenses of political action commitees -- starting with me -- can be made visible on the internet in real time.

Dowd blasts Ravenstahl for contributions from contractors: "Pittsburgh Controller Michael Lamb has said he is putting together searchable, online lists of contributions and contracts."

Too little and too late, Mr. Lamb. Get moving already.

St. Louis - Daily RFT - Libertarians Claim State Violated Homeland Security Policies

St. Louis - Daily RFT - Libertarians Claim State Violated Homeland Security Policies Libertarians are still rankled about a memo uncovered last week in which Gov. Jay Nixon and other state officials classify followers of Ron Paul and third-party candidates as possible militia members.

Yesterday, the Missouri Libertarian Party issued a statement saying that the memo in question (circulated by the Missouri Information Analysis Center, or MIAC) failed to follow U.S. Department of Homeland Security policies that prohibit political profiling and other civil rights violations.

Carmen Latrice Robinson's says "fighter"

UPDAED. See comments.

Humm...

Facebook | Carmen Latrice Robinson's NotesA Good Fight!

Safe neighborhoods, good schools and a strong local economy are the building blocks of a livable city; those goals will not become a reality without a fighter at the helm.

I AM NOT AFRAID of A GOOD Fight!

If you’re looking for an advocate and not a politician, vote for a fighter Carmen Robinson, as you’re Mayor May 19th.

G.W. Bush and Dick Chaney were always looking to start a fight.

Tom Murphy was always in 'fight mode' too.

I'm thinking, 'fire in the belly' is great -- if not necessary. However, I'm not excited in the least bit about one who picks to make fights.

The Kingdom of Heaven goes to the peacemakers. Making peace is rough.

Give us un-unflappable leadership. Give us a fixture for certain principles. Give us tenacity. Give us an underdog that isn't intimidated. Give us drive and determination. Give us the uncomfortable.

More than telling you are hungry for a fight -- deliver the actions. Engage in that mental toughness of a fight with bone-headed authority figures day-in-and-day-out. Who are your in a rumble with? How is it going? What ground are you going to protect. What areas do we need to recapture? Draw lines and see who falls on which side?

If you want to be a fearless fighter like the TV cartoon, Tazmanian Devil, jumping around in a huff without purpose, you'll get less than 400 votes and not do much but blow smoke and dust into the air.

Finally, some are less into the fight and more into the outcomes. Getting jazzed about the fight is almost a primal urge -- if not middle-school aged hubris. Rather, let's jump on the bandwagon of a victor. Let's celebrate the win together. That is with real mass appeal.

Goffyness of Governance

Bill would exempt some from yearly tax relief form: "under Councilman Patrick Dowd's legislation, residents 50 and older would only have to fill out the city's Act 77 tax relief form once. Then they would have their assessments frozen until they moved or reported an increase in income."

Making a tax freeze is a guarantee way to advance corruption, unfairness, and plant all sorts of other bad karma nasty ramifications.

This is politics 101 for dummies and Dowd seems to be the one who wants to go there now.

Pandering. Unsustainable. Unethical in the end.

The entire Allegheny County re-assessment boondoggle came about because of a 'freeze mentality.' Their bogus fix is a turn-back the clock solution. Live in the past. Stay there.

Meanwhile, the city and region shrink some more.

Dowd, or someone else, should take the high road on these important matters of self governance.

Schools dig into stimulus arithmetic

Don't let that cat out of the bag.

Schools dig into stimulus arithmetic For those who are hoping the closed Schenley High School building will be renovated, Mr. Roosevelt said, 'There's not monies sufficient to bring a project of that magnitude to the table, nor is it consistent with the very clear Obama administration edict that the money be used primarily on student gains.'

Do students gain when they have extra time on a bus?

Do students gain when those in 6th grade are put with those in 9th, 10, 11th and 12th?

Do students gain when $5-Million of additional money is to be spent in the summer of 2009 to fix up a school that will be given to a bulldozer in less than four years?

Do students gain when massive buildings sit empty?

I say that students gain when prudent investments of the past are continually realized into the future.

I say students gain when they can study and learn in a learning community, such is Oakland. Today, some will be walking to a play for a Spanish class field trip to the Oakland-based Cathedral. The topic of the play is an idealistic gent who took on some major opponents -- quixotic even.

I say high school reform is needed and must be in the back seat as we speed into a future with community participation with our schools.

The magnitude of fixing some plaster at Schenley High School has never been put onto the table in a fair, open and honest way. We don't need to fix the pipe organ. We don't need a lavish food court in the school. And the alternative costs are not put into the formula either. The magnitude is the uncertainty and doubt -- not a building with interior walls and ceilings that match what is found in some other schools.

Mr. Roosevelt expects the school system's innovations will prove effective. Prove that the past innovations have proven as much.

What about the Gifted Center innovations that have not come to pass?

What about K-8 schools?

What model of 6-12 grade schools has proven to work -- ever -- anywhere?

What about the ALAs? Why the flop? Why the uncertainty?

What about starting of school in mid August -- when we don't even know how many showed up for school on those days nor how hot the buildings were?

How are the kids doing in Duquesne's district? PPS has had a hand in that leadership innovation. Summary reports are where?

How are the Vo Tech kids doing in schools now -- since the closing of South Vo Tech? Where is the proven effect document with peer review, naturally.

The closing of some 20 school buildings in the past has made an impact. The Rightsizing innovation has saved money yet put dark holes into many communities. Where and how and when do we get to look at the effect of those empty buildings to places such as Knoxville and Hazelwood (with the still closed Gladstone Middle School)?

Here is a final question in our search for proof: What maget programs are effective? Why? How?

Save a radio show, The Edge of Sports

Updated: See comments.

Edge of Sports Nation: The People at Sirius/XM have decided that they will be no longer broadcasting Edge of Sports Radio. Their reason has nothing to do with the quality of the show.We have interviewed political/sports legends from Kareem Abdul Jabbar to Jim Brown; sportswriters from Sally Jenkins to Selena Roberts; sports sociologists from Dr. Graham Farred to Dr. Mary Jo Kane; and the most cutting edge bloggers from Michael Tillery to DK Wilson. We have also used the show to spur debates throughout the sports world from our interview with the late Pat Tillman's mother Mary to our conversations about the Firestone boycott before the Super Bowl.

This is the only show where sports and politics come together and that's exactly why it is getting the shaft. The high ups at Sirius XM LIKE the show but think it is too sporty for the political channel and too political for the sports channel. We need you to tell them otherwise. If you have never listened to the show, go to this link address.

http://www.edgeofsports.com/audio.html

If you do dig the show, or just support the concept of a radio show that brings these issues together, please send RESPECTFUL complaints WITHOUT profanity to the following email addresses.

MKarmazin@SiriusXM.com; SGreenstein@SiriusXM.com; JColeman@SiriusXM.com; GParsons@SiriusXM.com

If you are a Sirius/XM subscriber, go to http://xmradio.com/help/emailus.xmc?ch=167

---

Update:

E of S Nation. Well I'll be g-damned. We won. This is the quickest victory since Tyson took out Spinks. Or King Kong Bundy avalanched George Welles. It seems that hundreds of people emailed the top brass at Sirius/Xm this morning and told them to keep Edge of Sports Radio and in record time, it worked. We are going to be on Sirius/XM Sports Nation on weekends and we will still post the show to iTunes and on edgeofsports.com. Give us two weeks to get the paperwork signed and then we should be back.

Thanks so much to everyone who sent emails, faxes, or just vibrations to the Sirius/XM honchos. In fact, part of the deal is for me to ask folks to please please stop emailing them.

I haven't been this happy since game 6 in 1986. This almost makes up for picking West Virginia in the final four.

In struggle and sports,
Dave Zirin

Blog of the Allies, New Pittsburgh Blog

The Pitt News has a guy that is blogging on his own. He did the bit about the couches and I sent him a note that came back with this pointer. Nice, again.

Blog of the Allies: "Have you ever taken a wrong turn off Bates and ended up in East Berlin, 1984?"

"So preposterous!" Lehe: Couch law cramps 'Burgh living

From china - foods

In China, two women sit on a porch couch like this.

The Pitt News - Lehe: Couch law cramps 'Burgh living Behold City Council’s recent commandment: It is now illegal to put a couch on your front porch in Pittsburgh.

The law sounds ominously like the climax of an unlikely slippery slope argument. Imagine: You’re talking to some right-wing militia nutjob about building codes. “Some basic safety ordinances are called for,” you say. And nutjob says, in a fit of paranoia, “Building codes are fine. But before long, they’ll make it illegal to put a damn couch on your own front porch!” You throw up your hands in disgust because the idea is so preposterous.

Understand that Mr. Kraus, on city council, could be called "Mr. Preposterous."

That's a college word, preposterous.

Latin praeposterus, literally, in the wrong order, from prae- + posterus hinder, following — more at posterior

The posterior part is best left for another day or another blog.

And, source 2:

Contrary to nature, reason, or common sense; absurd. See Synonyms at foolish.

More from The Pitt News:

The newspaper coverage and the City Council members themselves make it clear that the ban is to prevent couch burning... I came to a surprising conclusion: You can burn a couch that isn’t on your porch. Clearly, a porch couch can be stolen and burned by someone besides the owner, but I would submit that the City Council instead take the radical step of making theft illegal.

For every infringement on people’s liberty, the extent of imposition has to be weighed against the severity and commonness of the problem the infringement tries to pre-empt... The couch-burning problem is not serious. It rarely happens. Only a dozen or so of the many thousands of couches that sit on Pittsburgh’s porches year round are set afire. Obviously couch burning should be illegal, but the act is not especially damaging either. The porch couch ban is equivalent to putting stop signs at every single intersection in Pittsburgh, because statistically over one year the stop signs might save a life.

OMG. Only a knucklehead would take the city councilman's logic to its next step by suggesting the city put stop signs at every intersection in the city to prevent car crashes. Bruce Kraus has his marching orders now. The volumes of research will be waved in council chambers in the weeks to come -- and we'll have someone to blame beyond the over-reaching legislative folly wizard.

The Kraus viewpoint is disconnected from reality.

Oakland is not burning. All of the damage happened in one night, not all week long. The damage done by couch burning is also negligible compared with the overturned cars, bus stop collapses and bonfires that people set with trash cans and wooden debris, not couches. It is downright amazing what people can burn when they put their minds to it. That’s Yankee ingenuity in action.

Kraus also makes a non sequitur: “One idiot decides to place an accelerant on the wood of that porch, and that whole row of houses could go up.” This is to say that, if someone covers a porch in gasoline and lights up a couch that’s on the porch, then the porch will catch on fire.

Supporters talk about other reasons, such as rodents and insects that infest couches. This is a classic case of a solution in search of a problem. It’s like people who argue for lower speed limits because driving your car fast hurts its gas mileage, which causes global warming and terrorism and supports governments hostile to women’s rights.

No one believes Pittsburgh suffers from serious rodent problems, or that any such problems are due to porch couches. No one was biting their nails over rat problems before the Super Bowl. Besides, the consequences of vermin infestation fall mainly on those who possess the couches.

Show me the upstanding Pittsburghers who shake their fists at fate and cry: “I did everything right! I keep a clean household! But my neighbor has a couch on his porch that rats use as a springboard for swarm attacks on my home.”

Those who say porch couches are a fire hazard forget that this is only true to the extent that couches in general are fire hazards. The danger doesn’t go away inside the house. A couch actually seems more dangerous inside, where it is dry, can burn a long time with no one noticing, and sits among carpets and other fire-prone upholstered furniture. Is a ban on all couches next? This is a silly, slippery slope. Yet, if you had told the average person five months ago about a porch-couch ban to stop rioting, she would have thought you silly then as well.

The important thing about these complaints — couch theft, couch burning, rodent infestations, fires — is that they are already illegal. More people calling the police, and better police response, would solve these problems surgically.

Well written Lewis.

From texture - misc.

Some things just bug me more than others.

South Side's revelry challenges police

Here is the perfect example of when it is great to scream, "Think Again!"

South Side's revelry challenges police: "'I'm sorry, officer,' the man said. 'I apologize. I didn't even think about it.'"

Didn't even think about it. Well, a $100 ticket -- or whatever the amount -- is good cause to think again. The ticket, the enforcement, would be a 'wake up call' that would linger longer in that guy's memory. And, in the collective conscious of the community.

So, did this guy get a ticket? Was a fine ordered and collected by the police? The order came from the neighbors. What was delivered by the officers of the peace?

Yep, think again to Mr. Kraus too. He is the one who wants more state help on the South Side, saying they don't help enough but it was a State Police Officer that used his gun while on patrols the week prior.

Kraus wants to get a 'handle on this.' The city doesn't need city council members putting handles on what they can't handle.

I'd say that the neighborhood's personality changed on St. Patrick's Day much before 6 pm. It changed on the day of the St. Pat's Day Parade, the Saturday before St. Pat's Day -- by about 10 am. So, the re-change on Tuesday, the real St. Pat's Day, came at 6 pm -- as reported.




A tall girl in black tights and a short skirt was walking away from a long, wide puddle that was streaking over the pavement toward the cruiser.

She saw the officers, flipped jet black hair over her shoulder and stalked away.

"That's class there, sweetheart, real class," Officer Stover called after her.

She was lucky they hadn't actually seen her urinating, he said. They would have issued a citation.

That's enforcement. That's evidence. That's when it is time, again, to "Think Again." Issue the citation.

School Districts Paying Double At Pump - News Story - WPXI Pittsburgh

Target 11: School Districts Paying Double At Pump - News Story - WPXI Pittsburgh Target 11: School Districts Paying Double At Pump
PITTSBURGH -- Are local school districts being taken for a ride when it comes to filling up their school buses?
Target 11 investigator Karen Welles crunched some numbers to find out.
It cost $4.31 a gallon to fill up almost every school bus in Allegheny County when the price at the pump is about $2.00 a gallon.
Why so much more?

Meet Dok and Kevin, together

This image was taken at the Kingsley Center, home to the Kingsley Stingrays swim team, under coach Hosea Holder.



Time for a pep talk, and a blast from the past.



Choose your friends wisely. Give it a go. It is time to turn good into greatness.

FLUKE gear

Shop to you drop.

FLUKE FLUKE

Mayor Luke? Total fluke.

Urgent call for help for the sake of democracy

Please Help Audit Phantom Ballots

Tomorrow at the Division of Elections!

Meeting at the Division of Elections at 10 am!

What: Phantom ballots occur when more eBallots are cast than
voter's signed in to vote on the touchscreen voting machines.

Where: The Allegheny County Division of Elections
6th floor of the County Office Building,
542 Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15219

When: 10 am to 2:30 pm
If we hope to get 10 volunteer auditors.

How: Simple and fun! Follow the link to see how its done!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRtsKF4Ox2c

The Theory Underlying Concept Maps and How to Construct and Use Them

The Theory Underlying Concept Maps and How to Construct and Use Them he Theory Underlying Concept Maps and How to Construct and Use Them

I hope to use Concept Maps with Mark Conner, a Pgh Public School employee in charge of family engagement.

They tried to kills us. But we won. So, let's eat.

Words from the refrain from a Purim song by Dave Nachmanoff.

St. Pat's Day in Ireland

Too bad they didn't have couches to burn.

Home | WOPULAR: "Cars torched, firefighters attacked, police bombarded and neighbors terrified: It was another fine St. Patrick's Day in Ireland, where inebriated mobs annually turn districts of Dublin and Belfast into a nightmare.

Where is Dan Rooney when you need him? He could stand there in the helmet and spikes and fix it all.

Olympic Swimmer Visits Capitol Hill

Olympic Swimmer Visits Capitol Hill - washingtonpost.com: "Olympic swimmer Cullen Jones yesterday implored lawmakers to put federal and state monies toward what has been a privately financed program to teach swimming skills to inner-city children."



During his morning visit to Capitol Hill, Jones in particular urged lawmakers in his home state of New Jersey to commit funding for the USA Swimming Foundation's "Make a Splash" initiative, which Jones said helped 2,500 inner-city kids in Atlanta learn how to swim last summer.

The four-year-old program, Jones said, has spread to 21 states but its success has been jeopardized by the economic crisis.

Jones, who won a gold medal in the 4x100 freestyle relay in Beijing, learned to swim after nearly drowning at a water park in Irvington, N.J., when he was 5.

"This is something we really want to catch fire and spread throughout the country," Jones said.

Motznik vs Diven and a real solution

Marty Griffin of KDKA Radio is going to rant about Diven and Motznik on his show. I just sent this via instant message:

Judges, or district magistrates, don't really represent the people. Rather, they are to uphold the Constitution and laws. Greater scrutiny and higher standards are necessary.

Solution: Insert "NOTA" - "None Of The Above" voting on all ballots. If NOTA wins, a re-do with different candidates is necesary. Works wonders in other areas. PA could do it too.

Diven, Motznik challenge each other's election petitions

My oh my.

Diven, Motznik challenge each other's election petitions City Councilman Jim Motznik -- who is battling his former boss Michael Diven for an open district justice seat in the city's South Hills -- filed court papers today challenging Mr. Diven's nomination petitions, and Mr. Diven turned around and did the same to his former chief-of-staff.

Democracy at work.

Michael Diven is the guy who had dead folks rise up to sign past nomination petitions.