SwingingTheLamp

I can hear the vexillologists weep.

This is why the April 1st election for Supreme Court is so critical. We need to have fair district maps to have a hope of getting a Legislature that will share the state surplus with cities instead of sitting on it. It's a Republican strategy to deliberately withhold shared revenue from Madison in order to force their agenda down our throats, like they did in Milwaukee, that led to the recent referendum to increase property taxes. (They've also withheld payments for municipal services that Madison has already provided to state buildings.) If Congress removes this tax exemption, too, we'll be doubly-squeezed.

Everybody knows that a traffic jam is the result of too many cars on the road. Real-life experience says that the only way that ever works to ease traffic congestion is to have fewer cars on the road. New York switched on congestion tolling earlier this year, flawed as it is, and lo, fewer cars on the road means fewer traffic jams!

So of course the new administration wants to cancel transit projects. Is this stupid, malicious, or both?

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A group backed by billionaire Elon Musk is behind a set of deceptive attack ads and text messages targeting voters just weeks ahead of the election for a seat on Wisconsin’s Supreme Court, employing a battleground state strategy it used last year against Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris.

I've heard tales of deceptive mailings coming in, too. Has anybody here received one?

I find myself in this situation: I bought a used Sailrite Ultrafeed sewing machine, which came with a bunch of accessories, including a table with a Consew servo motor. The Ultrafeed is in a travel case, and I want it take it on boats. I also have a Kenmore machine from 1970, with a badly-damaged case. It would make more sense to transplant that head onto the table. The machine has the same dimensions as the Ultrafeed, so I just need a new drive belt.

The servo motor also has a needle synchronizer. Is there a practical way to attach that sensor to a domestic machine (that has a clutch)?

One man commits a horrific crime. The other man shoots a CEO. The difference in response by our politicians is illuminating.

CNN and ProPublica found that Democratic vice-presidential nominee Tim Walz is the owner of an active account on the website HotOrNotDish.net, where he posts under the anonymous username DarthTater, according to an investigative analysis of comments on the forum. The user DarthTater has for more than a decade offered compliments (sometimes accompanied by a flame emoji) under every single photo uploaded to the site for hot dish appreciators.

The account also mentioned the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in one post, in which it wished other HotOrNotDish.net users a “happy MLK weekend!” and hoped they would get to “spend it with family, eating hot dish.”

Walz appears to have been active under the same username for years on a variety of HotOrNotDish.net’s subforums for other hot dish-related issues, including once posting 24 times in a thread dedicated to the question of “Is hot dish casserole?” DarthTater ultimately concluded, “Sorry, friends. I’ve got to hit the hay. A lot of good points. Food for thought (almost as delicious as hot dish).”

Posts going back years include statements such as “That hot dish looks delicious” and “My only note? Try it with Schell’s beer. But what you have going looks good too!” and “Hope you’re enjoying that delicious dish with your beautiful family! Cherish your family! I know I cherish mine!”

DarthTater also expressed some viewpoints that matched with Walz’s public persona. In one instance, the user wrote, “National Coming Out Day is around the corner and I need to be on my A-game with snacks (I’m a GSA club sponsor). Any suggestions, hot dish friends?” adding, “Goes without saying, but, just in case, I disapprove of slavery.”

DarthTater was also the name Walz appears to have used on Quora, where that user often posted detailed replies to queries about the best snow tires to purchase.

Walz admitted that the account might be his, adding that he hoped he had not said anything that would offend anyone. “Those hot dishes all looked delicious,” he noted. “I wouldn’t want anyone to think that their hot dish didn’t pass muster.”

Another HotOrNotDish.net user, MarkRobinsonIsMyLegalNameAndThisIsMyRealEmailPleaseAskMeAboutNazismIAmForIt, complained about DarthTater’s posts being dragged into the news. “Why is it fair to bring in the things that people post anonymously on forums in their spare time?” the mystery poster asked. “Especially if, frankly, they’re not all that surprising.” (On the record, the legally named Mark Robinson denied engaging in any such behavior.)

MarkRobinsonIsMyLegalName was a less active HotOrNotDish.net poster, having left only one comment, “some folks need killing,” under a picture of a hot dish that had used cream of mushroom soup as its base.

I saw Madison in this article immediately. I hear a lot of local residents try to deny the fact that we have an acute housing shortage, opposing new construction projects on the grounds that they require tearing down ~~dilapidated dumps~~"affordable housing," which displaces lower-income residents, as if building new market-rate apartments causes wealthier people to move here. Here's the reality:

Alex Horowitz: We're short on all homes. Full stop. There just aren't enough of them. And that means that existing homes are getting bid up because we see high income households competing with low income households for the same residences since just not enough are getting built.

We're a growing city with a healthy economy. People keep moving here, and as they do, housing is like a game of musical chairs, except seats go to those with more money. The Common Council and mayor are trying to do something about it.

Horowitz: So restrictive zoning is the primary culprit. It's made it hard to build homes in the areas where there are jobs. And so that has created an immense housing shortage. And each home is getting bid up, whether it's a rental or whether it's a home to buy.

Restrictive zoning. It makes building new housing illegal in most of the city. The West Area Plan is an incremental step forward on this issue, but of course, change is scary enough to turn people into bullies, literally shouting abuse at city staffers in public meetings. Let's hope that they're tough enough, and wise enough, to keep pushing it forward, because:

Horowitz: [...] And we certainly see some local elected officials and some residents concerned about changes in their community, even though the evidence suggests that allowing more homes is mostly beneficial by improving affordability and reducing homelessness.

Kelly: Is there a downside? I'm thinking of people trying to find a parking place, for starters.

Horowitz: So we see that in places that have actually eliminated parking minimums, that we see fewer people driving at all and having cars and we see vehicle miles traveled decrease because people can get around via other mechanisms.

Well, now, would you look at that?! If we change the incentives, if we stop incentivizing driving by law, people change their behavior. In this case, they can save a ton of money by not needing a car.

Madison, WI's Honor Among Thieves, live at The Harmony Bar and Grill. Recorded by Steve Gotcher for the 105.5 radio show "Mad City Live" Halloween 1997. Some of the tunes were on the band's 1998 album, "Primordial Soup du Jour", but not this wild and crazy one.

A crane lifts pads for the hands-free mooring system at the Welland Canal locks into place. Credit: Michel Gosselin. Video and more photos here.