Ad Astra

Honestly, I'm largely ambivalent to whether or not Cudahy builds a Wal-Mart.  I don't much like Wal-Mart; I think they're cheap, dirty, and sell plastic Chinese toys loaded with lead paint (which clearly makes the megastore chain complicit in a Communist plot to poison an entire generation of American children). I've watched the whole debate from the outside thinking only one thing.  You guessed it.

"Thank heaven it's Cudahy and not South Milwaukee."

Token Cudahy joke aside, I'm a big fan of spending my money locally whenever possible.  Given the recent downturn in the economy (I'm not calling it a "recession" until the Yankees and Jets stop signing free agents), this has taken on a new sense of urgency.  Let's face it: With all this talk of businesses closing and jobs in the balance, when you spend your hard-earned dollars would you rather they wind up lining the pockets of the Wal-Mart ownership group, or the guy across the aisle in church?

Being a free-market kind of guy, I'll spend my money where I want to.  And whether or not Cudahy builds their Wal-Mart, that means I'll gladly pay a few extra bucks for a better product or service.  I'm all in favor of quality over quantity, after all.  So let's take a look at some of my favorite locally owned businesses here in the South Shore area and hopefully drum up some traffic for them.  These folks all do a good job.

SportCuts (Barbershop - South Milwaukee, St. Francis, Oak Creek)

My boys and I make regular trips to the St. Francis location of this local barber's, and we always come away with decent-looking heads. The catch-- you get your own TV on which to watch, well, sports-- works great with guys like me.  You can get a haircut and not miss the big game (or the small one, or SportsCenter, or the hot-dog-eating contest or whatever).  One thing they could use is a few kid-friendly movies for the little ones-- my toddlers love playing football but they're not quite watching it yet-- but that's a small quibble.  Every Packer, Badger, Brewer and Buck fan on the South Shore should get their hair cut here. There's not really any debate.

Taken 2 the Cleaners (Valet Dry Cleaning - Milwaukee Metro Area)

Now this is good stuff. Valet dry cleaning service that picks up your gear at your home or office door and delivers it back a few days later. Best of all, it's run by locals who take customer service personally. You can't go wrong with these guys. They've picked up my stuff from my home in Bay View and my office in Brookfield, and it always comes back looking better than new. 

Sheridan's (Dining - Cudahy)

This is quite possibly my favorite restaurant not named Erv's Mug in the entire area.  Located in the old Fountain Blue building on Lake Drive, it's situated in a Cudahy landmark but feels more like Brussels or Amsterdam.  (Not that I'd know what Brussels or Amsterdam feel like, but I've seen pictures.)  Given the high quality of the food, prices are reasonable.  We've had both brunch and dinner here and come away impressed every time.  And they're pretty kid-friendly for an establishment that places such high emphasis on aesthetics.  You'd expect a restaurant like this to glare disapprovingly at toddlers, but the staff at Sheridan's were really generous to our boys.

Carleton Grange (Dining - St. Francis)

I've written these guys up in this space before, but it's worth pointing out the delicious curry french fries and my favorite new feature-- the smoke-free bar. As someone who inhaled plenty of second-hand smoke working in bars during my twenties, I've got real issues with cigarettes these days... just the smell of them makes me gag.  At Carleton Grange, you can get good food, good beer and good atmosphere without the drag of cigarette smoke (pun intended).  The Underground map on the wall makes me nostalgic for London, too-- a European capital I've actually been to, for once.

If you have your own suggestions for local establishments worth supporting, leave a comment below or drop me an email!  Just FYI - Wal-Mart comments will not be published.  Unless they're funny.

I don't usually use this space to apologize to anyone, but then again, I don't usually offend people with what I write.  That said, I don't usually write when I'm angry, either, so maybe I have a lesson to learn from that. 

I want to say this today: I'm offering a complete and unconditional apology to any Star Wars fans I may have offended in my last blog post.  (I've taken the post itself down.  I'm that thoroughly embarassed by it.)

Listen, guys... I don't hate people like you, I was just ranting. I even noted in the post title that it was a rant. Rants are by definition ill-advised, angry, emotional screeds, and at the moment I wrote this I was well and truly ticked off that I couldn't get my son a seven-dollar toy he wanted without dropping 50 bucks on it. I'm not typically a ranter and now I wish I never had been.

Frankly, I may have gone a bit overboard because I was-- in fact-- that mad.  I love my kids and try to do everything I can for them. 

As it happens, I love Star Wars.  I have a lot of other interests too, so I don't embrace it to the level that some folks do, but that doesn't mean those who do are doing anything wrong.  In my ignorance it seems I've made a lot of mistakes.  I've received enough comments and email about this to convince me that I was in error here, so let me try to clarify if I can.

The people who dress up as stormtroopers are actually pretty cool.  They do charity work and mobilize to help others in need.  They show up at birthday parties.  They're called the 501st Legion and to all appearances, they're normal folk like you and me-- they just happen to keep a really sweet Halloween costume in the closet and trot it out more than once a year.  After learning about them, I think these guys are awesome and I feel like a real jerk for lumping them in with my anger at price-gouging toy speculators.  Sorry, guys-- really and in all honesty.

Yes, there are still some nuts-- there are actually people who worship the Force, which is a ludicrous concept even to many Star Wars fans.  But I'm told my anger should have been directed at the price gouging toy speculators who, while not fans of the Star Wars movies / books / toys / etc., buy up stock of these items in order to take advantage of the real collectors I erroneously identify as the source of my pain. This seems fair. Interestingly, the collectors target THESE guys as the Comic Book Guy sort.  I would not have known that.  Now I know who I'm really mad at, and that's a good thing.

At the end of the day, I posted in anger and offended a lot of people I actually have a lot in common with.  My sons love Star Wars, in part because I do (and in part just because it's really cool).  Sure, I don't take it to the degree that some other people do, but I'm hardly one to judge folks whose enthusiasm marks them as hard-core fans.  It wasn't right or fair and I feel awful about it.

I won't write anymore when I'm angry; I apologize to all the people I may have offended.  I'm really sorry, all of you.  I hope you can accept it.

And if I'm allowed to say this: May the Force be with you.

So what does it mean when we say we're from South Milwaukee?

Many things to many people, I suppose.  I've seen and heard a lot of negative commentary over the years, been responsible for some of it myself in my younger days (most kids are), but at the end of the day-- after you take away all the irony, all the jokes about Journey and Camaros, all the Rust Belt pathos and high-school silliness-- you're inevitably left with a handful of defining images.  And these things are, just as inevitably, true.

For me, now, as an adult and a father, South Milwaukee isn't a topographical distinction; it's not lines on a map.  It's not a school that I went to or a set of colors I wore.  It's an attitude, a mentality, a feeling tied in with the concepts of home and family that you really only know when you've been without it for a while, and suddenly realize it's been missing.  It's a state of mind, it's an outlook, and running through it all it's a thread of memories.

For me, it's my dad having quintuple bypass surgery a few years back, and not taking any sick days since, refusing to make excuses. 

It's my mom giving her heart and soul to children over the years-- hers, sure, but hundreds of others-- and getting paid peanuts for it, but going back every day because those kids need love and attention from someone. 

It's going in for a checkup at the dentist and having the hygienist tell me about the day in 1975 that my grandpa-- then a dentist just down the street-- passed away.

It's the quiet, brutal glory of pulling down the line in a driving rainstorm and pancaking one of Cudahy's all-conference linebackers.

It's the never-too-distant echo of the drop forge down the street at Bucyrus-Erie, ringing in through my window and keeping me awake on humid nights before we could afford any air conditioning.

It's summers at my grandma's house on Fairview Ave., swimming in the pool and playing baseball in the backyard until half my uncles and aunts showed up seemingly every night for an impromptu party.

It's eight- and nine-year-old kids dressed to the nines, walking around St. John's grassy courtyard on a bright spring day to first Communion, and forgetting for a moment the church and school lie buried under asphalt now.

It's a weary and peaceful 4am in the godawful stench of that nearby tannery, picking up the morning delivery of Sunday Journals with my dad.

It's spending my Friday nights as a college student and a young professional to watch my brothers' every football game-- never missing a one-- whether they knew I was there or not, because family is forever.

It's all of this and more, of course, so much more that it adds up in your heart and really becomes a part of you.  Something you share with your children, something that bleeds into who you are and how you carry yourself in a crowd, how you do your job and how you treat other people.

That's everything that hits me all at once when I hear someone say "South Milwaukee".  What do those words mean to you?

A regular reader of this blog asked me for my thoughts on social networking software lately, and as I was writing my response I decided to post it in the public domain.  I realize this doesn't have a great deal of local flavor to it, but then, neither did my posts on Barack Obama.  In the future we'll have a blog on our company website to post tech-related thoughts, but until then, I'll use this space on occasion.

Anyhow, I was asked about social networking tools-- software that allows people to connect with one another and share information online-- and how they're being used in business, specifically locally and with respect to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007.  For those of you unfamiliar with MOSS/SharePoint, it's like the Swiss Army Knife of IT... if you need to do something with a computer system in support of your business / school / organization / etc., chances are good MOSS can do it.

Have any of your customers used (social networking) features?

Most of our MOSS customers are at least exploring the social networking features of My Sites, though few have yet taken the time to plan out how they’ll do it in a real sense. There's a distinct adoption curve to SharePoint, and for many businesses the personal productivity stuff comes after the team collaboration features.  I expect we'll see more growth in this (and other features like Web Content Management) in the coming year, as businesses begin to see real value in consolidating their infrastructure with Microsoft in lieu of managing apps / systems from a handful of "best of breed" vendors.  This has always made sense, but in our current economy it's really a no-brainer.

Anyhow, as far as social networking features, I usually see basic My Sites, and People Search built from it, but not a lot of work done around the profiling, org structure, and other aspects that can be key for expert location and knowledge management. I encourage my clients to use the native RSS Reader to pull information from both inside and outside the environment to their My Sites and Team Sites. Many clients are beginning to use wikis more fully, and a handful are using blogs; both features are growing in usage but the uptake has been slow to date.

I think much of this is due to the overly conservative nature of the Milwaukee IT/business community in general.  There aren’t a lot of “risk takers” in leadership roles around here, and having worked on both Coasts in the past, I think that seems to be a very local bias.  I’ve had the pleasure of working with a few notable exceptions in the greater Milwaukee area, and these visionaries are generally the only ones pushing their companies down this road.  They see this stuff as a key differentiator between themselves and their competition and based on what I’m seeing in the market, they are right.  A better-informed, better prepared and faster-reacting workforce will set these companies apart.  In some cases it is already happening.

Anything special they needed to do from an IT perspective?

MOSS social networking is centered on My Sites and their attendant profiles.  In order to really fill these profiles out in a standardized way, you need a strong Active Directory imprint and an organizational commitment to storing business data like contact info, desk location, org structure in AD.  They also need to develop a security policy and application usage policies that document the right way (and provide examples of the wrong way) of using this stuff.  Once all that is done, the key is encouraging/requiring users to self-populate data fields in their own My Site profiles.  This starts the ball rolling, and once you’ve been doing this for a year or so, you’re well on your way to the holy grail of knowledge management – the actual perpetuation and maintenance of employees’ (easily searchable!) valuable business knowledge, even after they leave the company.

I’ve heard that one large company in the area (not a Concurrency client) is steering clear of social networking specifically because they can’t control what people enter as “skills”, which I think is absurd.  Unlike content and collaboration sites—where planning and governance is essential—social networking needs organic growth and encouragement to spread and provide value.  This encouragement is typically more a function of internal communications or HR arms, but it’s really not all that different than IT change management.  (Not coincidentally, many IT change management efforts fail for the same reason—companies are happy to plunk down cash for a new server, but are rarely willing to make the comparatively inexpensive investment in resources to motivate, train and equip their employees to work smarter.)

So besides being willing to utilize Active Directory as more than an authentication tool, IT teams typically need to partner with whomever in the organization is responsible for internal training of and communication to employees in order to build that “user acceptance” they need to realize the value from social networking.

If anyone is interested in learning more about how to leverage the power of MOSS for their company, I'll be speaking on this topic and others this Friday at Microsoft's local offices in Waukesha.  I do a lot of work in this space for Concurrency (http://www.concurrency.com) and am always happy to lend a hand.

Here we go. 

Brace yourselves.

It's January 20th, and everyone's chattering about how we should all remember the specifics of where we were, what we were doing, how it unfolded, etc., etc. as if Barack Obama's inauguration is predestined to become an indelible moment in the national consciousness.  And perhaps one day it will be.  I'm not ready to jump on that bandwagon quite yet, though.

Doubtless there's immense significance in this event from a civil rights perspective, and I don't want to downplay that in any way.  The man was elected on November 7th; that was properly the significant date as far as marking any kind of civil rights victory.  And in large part that very fact-- yes, Mr. Obama was elected as our first black president-- is singularly responsible for the tremendous groundswell of goodwill aimed directly at Pennsylvania Avenue today. 

That's what I'm wondering about today.  All that goodwill.

What will Mr. Obama and his Congress do with all that goodwill?  The one thing I can see that's assuredly historic about today is the opportunity that faces this administration.

Now, I don't subscribe to the theory being pandered about by various hype merchants that this is 'our darkest hour'.  This was not "the most important presidential election in history"; that sort of hyperbole verged on yellow journalism.  Obama may be facing some unquestioned problems, but we're not dealing with Pearl Harbor, the Great Depression, or Redcoats setting fire to the White House here; it's time we stopped talking like it.  Still, we have a good many problems, and the new government has a chance to make progress in fighting them.

This begs the question, will Obama and friends use this popular goodwill to truly heal the wounds of a divided nation?  Move forward with energy and optimism to face the challenges aligned against our country today?  Capitalize on their apparent popular support to actually make a positive difference in the direction of government, industry and the geopolitical chess board?  Govern from the center and not the far left?

Or will they pull a page from Nancy Pelosi's playbook and use their new platform as a soapbox for denouncing, denigrating and an attempt at marginalizing the opposition?

George Bush had this opportunity after 9/11. From where I stand, it was through a series of ham-handed decisions that he and his advisors squandered a great deal of that popular goodwill.  Fairly or not, that fact has defined the popular perception of the Republican Party for the last few years. What Obama does with similar circumstances will play a large part in defining our perception of the Democrats-- now and in the record books.

And only then will anyone be able to say that January 20, 2008 was or wasn't a truly historic occasion.  Until then, let's hold off on the coronations.

Thought I'd take a couple quick minutes to outline the way I approach comments on this blog.  If you've tried to post a comment here in the past few months, you'll have noticed that I do take advantage of the "moderator" utility that allows the owner of a blog to decide which comments get published on his/her blog.  For the most part, comments haven't been a problem-- I enjoy the give and take that occurs between myself and some of my readers.  On occasion I've received some objectionable feedback, however.  

The amusing thing about nasty blog comments, to me, is how the people who leave them always hide behind an anonymous alias.  Here I am, with my name and face out there for all to see, and I have no problem sharing my thoughts and opinions.  On the other hand, you've got people who would love to share their petty attempts at cyber-bullying with the world (or at least this corner of it)... so long as they don't have to actually own up to who they are.  Personally, I tend to see this kind of behavior as a symptom of deeper psychological issues, but that's their problem, not mine. 

Curiously, this hasn't occured so much on posts related to topics that actually generate real controversy-- you know, religion and politics-- but on things we generally consider to be normal, happy stuff that decent, grown-up people don't fight about.  To judge by some of the feedback I get, someone went and made things like parenthood, high-school football, and neighborhood interest into hot-button issues while I wasn't looking.  Anyway, regardless of your reasons for reading this blog, here's the deal:

1. I do not allow you to publish comments that I judge to be personal attacks on myself, another individual, or another reader. Case closed.

2. I do not allow you to publish anyone's personal contact info in comments (including your own). 

3. I do not allow you to make statements I judge to be racist, sexist etc. on my blog.

4. If you actually know me and you have a comment or question about something I wrote, try sending an email, which generally works for most people.

I truly enjoy feedback and some of the dialogue with different, well-meaning readers out there. But to those of you who get your jollies at hiding behind an anonymous internet alias and trying to slam other folks, I can only say this:

If you have an axe to grind, you can't grind it here.  This blog isn't your public forum-- it's mine, and we play by my rules here.  If you don't like them, tough-- or at the very least, thank me.  By refusing to publish your crap, I'm saving you from looking like an idiot (even while hiding behind your anonymous internet name). 

Regular readers of both this blog and the weekly "South Shore NOW" newspaper will by now have noticed that, on occasion, an edited version of one of my posts will appear in that paper.  The posts in questions are typically trimmed to fit the available column space by the South Shore NOW editorial staff.  This sometimes has the effect of adding language I wouldn't personally use, or trimming key points or amusing anecdotes out of the original post.

I don't typically have a problem with this.  It's part of the deal when you write a blog on this site, and I know that it's fun for my family to see me in the paper.  Sometimes, though, an editorial review reminds me of why I never pursued a career in journalism.  Yep, that's right... editing.  Today was a textbook example.  My most recent post was run in this morning's paper, but unfortunately a very important element was completely cut.  It changed the tone of the post and in my opinion, a) made yours truly look like an arrogant homer and b) placed an unfair expectation on next year's South Milwaukee football team-- a point completely counter to what I was trying to do with the post.

If we didn't need further proof after a long and agonizing presidential campaign, this is what happens when you take someone's words out of context.  The offending sentence, used to close the column in today's paper and written as much by an editor as myself, reads thusly: "However, the Rockets can and should beat any team in the Woodland Conference this season."

What I actually wrote?  "I saw South Milwaukee this year, and they can and should play with-- and beat-- any team in that conference next season.  They'll have the numbers and they'll have the returning players at key positions to make an impact in football... if they want to.  But they have to cut down on the turnovers and inconsistent play that always seem to mark Rocket football since time out of mind.  They need to take the offseason seriously and show up as a team for things like passing league, weight training and captains' practices.  And on top of all that, as they enter this new conference, they need to view their new rivals with confidence, but not cockiness."

This represents a huge, huge difference in tone, intent and frankly, the actual language used.  I wanted to let the kids over at SMHS know that they can have some great success if they do things the right way, and I think that is clear in the blog.  Unfortunately, what was printed in the paper reads like it was uttered by an arrogant, ignorant homer.  I may in fact be a homer, but I'm neither arrogant about the Rockets' chances nor ignorant of what it really takes to win in high school football.

I want to use this blog to personally apologize to the coaches, players and parents from South Milwaukee High School who may have read the paper this morning.  While I'm not directly responsible for what was printed in the paper, it comes under my byline and with my headshot placed right next to it.  It was based on my words, even if it took them completely out of context.  You know as well as I do that you'll never win just by showing up, and that you have a lot of work to do to finish any season-- against any competition-- with great results.  I know that you will all put in a great effort and I wish all of you success.

Just don't believe everything you read.

I had the chance to catch the Greendale - Wisco playoff game with my wife this weekend, and while it was definitely one of the more exciting prep football games I've ever seen, one of the first thoughts running through my mind as we left had little to do with either the Vikings or the Panthers.  As it happens, I was actually thinking that next year's South Milwaukee Rockets had better get their act together right now.  Next year could be a lot tougher than they expect, and not just because some hoodlums from Cudahy might drop by to spray-paint our field.

You see, for next year the Rockets are leaving the rugged Southeastern Conference, where their enrollment makes them the smallest of nine schools, and (re)joining the Woodland.  This is a smallest-to-largest transition for them, because SMHS will-- again, by general enrollment figures only-- immediately become the biggest school in their new conference.  And with that status will come some unfair expectations.

In many high school sports, big schools usually-- but not always-- come out ahead of their smaller brethren.  In prep football, this often leads to a lot of assumptions about who comes out ahead in the standings before the games are ever played.  Well, now that I've seen just about all of the Woodland teams play in person these last few years-- many of them this past season alone-- I think this kind of overconfidence born of enrollment-based assumptions could very well doom the Rockets before they start.  What could easily be a 2009 of great promise and great results could wind up as just another ho-hum year for Rocket Football.

Don't believe me?  Let's look at the last time South Milwaukee joined the Woodland-- 1993. (SMHS spent 1993 - 1997 in the Woodland before moving to the reconfigured SEC.)  That season, South Milwaukee was coming off three straight 4 - 4 finishes in the powerful Suburban Park Conference.  Keep this in mind-- you wouldn't know it from listening to people in town, but back then, a 4 - 4 season was disappointing to the locals.  How times have changed, and not for the better.

Anyhow, it was in 1993 that SPC powers West Allis Central, West Allis Hale, Muskego, and Kettle Moraine (along with annual doormat Oak Creek) were first replaced with Franklin, Brookfield Central and East, and the Wauwatosa schools.  Not a one of those five new schools had any sort of football tradition, and they all represented communites that were relatively affluent.  Back in the day the stereotypical "rich kid" schools meant kids who weren't tough enough to play football, not kids who were afforded the finest summer camps, equipment, playing surfaces and coaching staffs that money can buy.  That trend (we'll call it the "Homestead Effect" in future columns) was still a few years down the road. 

It was easy to look at the schedule before the season and mark up a 'W' by every one of those schools, along with SPC holdover Greenfield.  Cudahy was coming off an 0-8 year; only defending champion Greendale should pose any kind of problem.  Right?  That's what a lot of people thought.  One of my younger brothers was a senior that year, and I remember friends and family expecting one heck of a great season. 

Things didn't quite turn out that way.  John still had a good year individually, but the team was terrible.  The blocking was inconsistent at best, the defense was atrocious, the receivers couldn't catch a pass and the backs weren't much of a threat on the ground.  Needless to say, every one of those "soft" teams (with the notable exception of Franklin) beat our Rockets, and soundly. 

A lot changes in fifteen years, but there's a lesson to be learned here for today's South Milwaukee kids.  Greendale's not the only Woodland team I caught this year; I've seen Eisenhower and Cudahy, and of course Thomas More.  In the past few seasons I've seen perennial Woodland contenders Pewaukee and St. Francis play as well.  Now while the talent and turnout for these programs really runs the gamut, several of them compare favorably with South Milwaukee. In football, it's not about enrollment in the school-- it's about the kids you put on the field. 

The top teams in the Woodland field very competitive youth programs with high participation at every level, and that continues up through high school.  As Greendale showed against Wisconsin Lutheran, and like Eisenhower proved against D.C. Everest earlier this year, Woodland teams can compete with the best in the state at any level. 

I saw South Milwaukee this year, and they can and should play with-- and beat-- any team in that conference next season.  They'll have the numbers and they'll have the returning players at key positions to make an impact in football... if they want to.  But they have to cut down on the turnovers and inconsistent play that always seem to mark Rocket football since time out of mind.  They need to take the offseason seriously and show up as a team for things like passing league, weight training and captains' practices.  And on top of all that, as they enter this new conference, they need to view their new rivals with confidence, but not cockiness.

If they don't, it'll just be 1993 all over again.  And while that might play better than a graffiti binge in Cudahy, it won't be much fun around here.

Posted just after 9PM on Election Day, 2008.  Most major news services are declaring Obama the likely winner in the Presidential election.

Dear Mr. Obama,

Congratulations.  If the exit polls can be trusted, you've won the 2008 election for the right to represent our great nation as the next President of the United States of America.  I'm writing this letter to wish you the best of luck, and to give you a little advice.

You see, I didn't cast my vote for you.  Like millions of other Americans, I found it impossible to believe you were worthy of this honor.  It's not that I didn't get suckered in by your slick media campaign; I've seen you speak and I must admit, you're a very articulate, persuasive presence on the television.  If I'd only had your paid advertisements to go by-- shucks, if I'd only had the articles written in your favor by all those fawning journalists and academics-- I might have marked my ballot in the little slot marked "Obama".

I had a little more than that to go on, though.  I had a platform of my own on which to base my vote through rationale and reason. It's a set of principles shared in large part by many Americans-- the people you'll soon be governing.  I don't believe in many of the things you believe, though contrary to what I'm hearing on TV, I'm an educated person myself. 

That's right, Mr. Obama.  Unlike you, I don't believe that "separation of church and state" means removing all reference to God from civic discourse.  Unlike you, I don't believe that "Fairness" means forcing privately owned and operated radio stations to provide equal airtime to different viewpoints.  Unlike you, I don't believe the key to economic recovery is higher taxes on business and capital gains, or that the key to improving our educational system is to place more dollars into the hands of school districts bound up in red tape and teachers' unions that follow their own agenda. 

Too-- and perhaps most importantly-- I don't believe that your apparent election to public office is a referendum on my beliefs; I don't think it's outdated or in any way archaic or a passing fad to believe in God, the Constitution, the rights of the individual states, a foreign policy based on strength, or an economy that allows business to do what it's meant to do (i.e., generate revenue).  No, to borrow your own phrase, I'm not "clinging" to these beliefs.  I'm living them, because that's what true Americans, good citizens, do; we practice what we preach. And I'll continue to live them, despite your victory over my own chosen candidate.

Please keep this in mind, because I would like to remind you, Mr. Obama: You have exactly four years to prove you're more than empty rhetoric and a media-friendly rock star.

With voters like me, you've lost either way-- follow through on your campaign promises, make us suffer, and we'll like you even less than we do now.  Fulfill those promises, and we'll see how many of the millions of swing voters who swung your direction this time around will remain in your camp-- once the impact of your dangerous, regressive policies starts to hit home.  Fail those millions of swing voters you've charmed into backing your agenda, and you'll be held up to account for your broken promises.  I wouldn't want to walk ten steps in your shoes, Mr. Obama, let alone the proverbial mile.

There's only two ways you can turn your first term into a second, from where I sit.  Either keep up the charm and the suave facade with the media for another four years-- and sadly, that's what I've come to expect from you-- or actually be the unifier you want us to think that you are.  Don't just "reach across the aisle", Mr. Obama-- step across it.  Straddle it.  Make a move toward the middle.  I'm not foolish enough to urge you to adopt any conservative principles, but please realize that Americans aren't giving you a blank check to push the reactionary, far-left, anti-Bush agenda I've heard from so many Democrats since the 2004 campaign.  They want a President who will heal the wounds of partisan division.

Do what's right for this country, Mr. Obama-- not what's right for your party, what's right for your friends, or what's right for Barack Obama, but for this country-- and I'll have no choice but to change my opinion of you.  Only you know if that's even on your agenda, and I'll admit that I'm not optimistic.

All I and those millions like me can really do at this point is "hope".  I understand that's a word you're familiar with.

Best regards,
Rich Wood

This is an important message I recently received in an email from the John McCain campaign.  I felt the need to repeat it here because-- let's face it-- Obama's broken promise to reject public financing has allowed him to outspend his opponent at a heretofore-unheard-of ratio.  You need to see the facts to make up your mind, and if the McCain/Palin campaign can't afford to combat Obama's ads with similar ads, the least I can do as a supporter is help them out.

From the McCain/Palin Campaign: "Barack Obama And Joe Biden Have Consistently Lied To Americans About John McCain's Plan. Their claims have failed every fact-check - from CBS to the Washington Post. John McCain is not going to raise taxes on middle class families. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are the only ones in this race that plan to raise taxes."

Click here for the details of the McCain/Palin Health Care Plan.

A play in five acts. 

[AUTHOR'S NOTE: The following is probably a work of complete fiction, although given current events, the author allows for the possibility that some of it may actually have happened precisely as he's written it, and if so any resemblance is not only non-coincidental, it's expressly intended.]

ACT ONE.

Election Day is fast approaching.  The United States of America is facing numerous crises economic, military and domestic.  Hard-working Joe the Plumber is wondering how he will feed his family, and asks presidential candidate Barack Obama for a tax break.

Obama: Joe, as you are a hard-working man guilty of living the American dream, not only will I refuse to qualify you for a tax break, I will actually take your money and spread it around among people who haven't earned it. 

Joe the Plumber scratches his bald head.

Joe the Plumber: Senator Obama, that really doesn't make much sense to me.  I earned this money.  I have a family to feed and a business to run.  Why shouldn't I get to hold on to my profits?

Obama: Because spreading the wealth around is good.  And, um, never mind what it did to Eastern Europe between 1945 and 1991.  Now go home, get ready to lose your business, and let me get back to pretending I stand for the common man.

Chuckling happily to himself, Obama returns to his hotel and climbs into bed. 

ACT TWO. 

Midnight.  Obama is awakened by the sound of clanking chains. He opens his eyes to find the ghost of John Edwards, former Democratic Senator (NC) and presidential candidate hovering over him.

Obama: John? Is that you? But you're not dead yet!

Edwards: No, but ever since my affair with that Hunter woman hit, my political career is.

Obama: John, my chief campaign aide was your primary speechwriter in 2004.  I'm sorry I stole him, but let's face it-- all that same old inspirational oratory sounds a lot better coming from me than just another white Southern Democrat.

Edwards: You're right.  It almost sounds original.  Not at all like its major themes were borrowed from RFK's 1968 campaign.  But that's neither here nor there.  Barack, I'm here to tell you that tonight you'll be visited by three ghosts.  They're going to tell you how to steal this election from John McCain.

Obama: John McCain is a man who's served his country with honor and distinction for nearly four decades.  How can I possibly steal an election from someone like that?

Edwards shakes his head.

Edwards: You'll be amazed what you can do once you break your vow to reject public financing. With the national media in your back pocket and a mind-numbing barrage of character assassination ads out of the gate, the American people will conveniently forget your inability to keep a promise.

Edwards winks and fades into the night, the clanking of chains fading away with him.  Obama shrugs and goes back to sleep.  Fade out.

ACT THREE.

Obama is gently shaken from sleep by the ghost of Jimmy Carter. 

Obama: President Carter?!?  But you're not dead yet either!

Carter: Yes, but after I published my most recent book, my--

Obama winces and holds up a hand for quiet.

Obama: Not that again. Look... I suppose you're the Ghost of Elections Past?

Carter: Guilty as charged.  Now let's take a trip back to 1980....

The room swirls around Obama and Carter in a high-speed montage of chronological events, backward from 2008 to 1980.  The theme music from 80's television series "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century"  echoes eerily in the background.  They emerge from the maelstrom in an Oval Office complete with the traditional presidential seal. Obama appears as he did in that decade, a fresh-faced graduate of the wealthy and exclusive Punahou prep school in Hawaii.

Obama: That's not my presidential seal.

Carter: Well yes, it was a bit classier the way the rest of us did it, but oh no, you had to be different.

Obama: Now just a minute--

Carter: You see, Barack, that's what I'm here to show you.  Look at what I was facing in 1980.  An energy crisis.  Violence in the Middle East.  A resurgent and aggressive Russia.  A massive recession.  A national sense of pessimism blunted only by the willfully ignorant stupidity of disco music.

Obama: All of that sounds... fairly familiar.  Well, except for the disco music.

Carter: You see where I'm going?  But who won that election?  Ronald Reagan.  Because Reagan presented a bold plan for change that challenged the status quo.

Obama: But you were the status quo.  I'm the challenger.

Carter: No, you're both challengers.  The trick will be to make McCain look like he's aligned in lockstep with President Bush.  Never mind the man's actual voting record or bipartisan efforts-- or your own lack of any real cooperative efforts in your own Senate experience.  Once you can fool people into believing that, they'll see you the way they saw Reagan.  As a legitimate breath of fresh air.

Obama: You know, Jimmy, maybe you're not such a crackpot after all....

Obama lies back on his pillow, a thoughtful look on his face as the colors whirl around him and he is returned to his hotel room.  Fade out.

ACT FOUR.

Now waiting patiently for the second ghost, Obama is delighted to find none other than Howard Dean appear in his chamber.

Obama: Howard!  But you're not--

Dean: Not even close. Because while that YELP killed my political career, I've been more than happy to pull the strings at DNC headquarters and steer us further and further left of center.

Obama: And believe me, I appreciate all of your hard work and dedication to turning back the American clock until we're a regressive, protectionist state that falls well behind in the global economy. 

Dean: Thanks.  But that's not why I'm here. I'm the Ghost of Elections Present.  Come with me to the Old South....

Dean leads Obama through another swirly-color-montage to a Sarah Palin campaign rally in a Southern state.  They pause at arm's reach from a group of poorly-clad, slovenly folk who clearly represent the dregs of American society.

Howard Dean hands Barack Obama a videocamera.

Obama: Howard, what's this for?

Dean, smiling an evil grin from ear to ear: Trust me.  Just wait.

They don't have to wait long.  Soon, Palin takes the microphone and the ill-mannered dregs begin to shout racist epithets and objectionable remarks about Obama, who recoils.

Dean, nastily: Film it, damn you!

Obama, to his credit, draws back further from the scene.

Obama: Howard, this is just disgusting!  Why would you want me to--

Dean: Trust me, Senator Obama.  You're part African-American.  If we get this on tape, we'll be able to post it on YouTube and cause a national furor by parlaying a handful of racist xenophobes as the heart and soul of McCain/Palin supporters. Not to mention really getting out the black vote. 

Obama reluctantly begins to roll the tape.

Dean: Hell, if we're lucky, we can talk angry liberal bloggers across the country into making it out that Palin and McCain are racists too.

Obama: That's really not fair, Howard.  Or true.

Dean: They've had the Oval Office for EIGHT YEARS, Barack!  We'll stop at nothing to get it back!  Nothing, you hear me?  No trick is too dirty, no insinuation too low! 

Dean begins to foam at the mouth and rant about the Patriot Act and impeaching President Bush.  Curiously, he fails to mention the lack of any successful terrorist attacks on American soil since 9/11.  Fade out.

ACT FIVE. 

Senator Obama is awakened once more, this time by Joe Biden.  Senator Biden looks about three decades older than usual.  Which, when you think about it, is pretty gosh-darn old.

Obama:  Joe?  Is that you?  What happened?

Biden: I'm the Ghost of Elections Future, Barack.

Obama: Future? My goodness, Joe... you're still running in 2020?  Fantastic!

Biden: No, Barack... this is me in 2012.  After four years of your presidency.

Obama stares blankly at this drained shell of the man formerly known as Fightin' Joe Biden.

Biden: Yes. You see, after you raised taxes on American businesses, many of the small ones closed their doors, unable to pay their employees.  The economy is actually worse than it was four years ago.  The big corporations... well, they sent more jobs overseas, because your buddies in the unions priced their workers out of competition.  Iran, emboldened by your recognition of their President Ahmadenijad, went ahead with their plans to secure nuclear weapons and is now a threat to not only Israel, but world peace in general... and it doesn't hurt that they gobbled up Iraq after your unilateral pullout from that country.  By doing away with school choice programs, you doomed thousands of inner-city children to negligence, inattention and poor discipline in failing districts like Milwaukee Public Schools, contributing to the cycle of poverty plaguing our urban youth-- not ending it.  And your appointment of liberal Supreme Court justices has effectively chased all mention of God not only from the classroom, but from all civic discourse including the Pledge of Allegiance.  Good job, buddy. 

Obama: ....

Fade out.

END.

Thanks to my old pal David from St. John's for the quip that inspired this post. Go Eagles!

It's early on Thursday morning, the 16th of October, and I'm still thinking about last night's debate and some of the comments I've been getting on this blog lately.  Seems to me that it's now become important enough to use this space to discuss why I'm voting for John McCain, and why I hope you will too.

Rather than spend hours I don't have writing up thoughtful summations of why Senator McCain is the right man for America, I did what any self-respecting guy my age would do-- I went to his website. 

While there, I found some interesting stuff, and some really solid points that appeal to me personally.  The site has changed since my last visit a few months back, before the Republican National Convention.  Don't take my word for it, but go and check out the "Issues" section for your own sake.  Read it and learn for yourself-- don't let me or anyone else on the web, on TV, or in the paper tell you what John McCain does or doesn't stand for. 

Interestingly, on McCain's website, the very first issue addressed is "The Economy".  This would seem to refute the Obama campaign's loud, oft-repeated and baseless claim that McCain isn't focusing on this issue.  Did the McCain campaign claim it couldn't win if the economy took center stage in the national conversation?  Sure they did-- in the context that Obama's early barrage of negative attack ads linking McCain's policies to those of President Bush found unfortunately fertile ground, and tilted the playing field in his favor. 

This is like the Chicago Obamas getting an early lead in football thanks to a turnover and a handful of penalties.  Now the Green Bay McCains are forced to abandon playing a balanced game, and have to throw the ball downfield in order to catch up.  It doesn't mean they can't run the ball-- or talk about the economy.  It just means that's not in their best interests anymore if they want to win the game... er, election.  For Obama to claim McCain won't talk about the economy now-- while (1) dodging the point that he refused McCain's many offers to discuss it in town hall meetings two months ago, and (2) refusing to acknowledge that it's his own early onslaught of negative ads that put McCain in this position is, quite frankly, disingenuous.

But let's examine the key stances on which I find Sen. McCain to be clearly superior to Sen. Obama.  On abortion, McCain says: "At its core, abortion is a human tragedy. To effect meaningful change, we must engage the debate at a human level."  To Barack Obama, there is no debate.  As far as he's concerned, Roe vs. Wade ended the debate.  The fact that millions of Americans oppose Roe vs. Wade would seem a fairly clear indicator that we need to consider a better way to address this issue-- and we could begin, as McCain favors, by leaving it up to the states at the very least.

McCain endorses stem cell research on adult stem cells, but not embryonic stem cells.  To me as a Catholic, this is the only acceptable stance on this issue.  What good is saving a life if it comes at the cost of another, innocent life?  McCain's site has a brilliant quote in this regard: "Compassion to relieve suffering and to cure deadly disease cannot erode moral and ethical principles."  It goes on to note that, "As president, John McCain will strongly support funding for promising research programs, including amniotic fluid and adult stem cell research and other types of scientific study that do not involve the use of human embryos."  I like it.  Obama?  He doesn't even admit there's a distinction.  Personally, I'll take the man who sticks to his moral and ethical principles.

On govenment reform, and this is another direct quote, "John McCain has fought the good fight against the practices that alienate the public from their elected leaders. He has fought for public disclosure of those who lobby lawmakers for a living, and to prohibit them from providing gifts to elected officials. He has fought for greater transparency regarding the official activities of lobbyists, disclosure of those who arrange for lawmakers' travel, and require members to pay full charter rates when using corporate aircraft."  That's just the beginning.  McCain opposes wasteful spending.  When confronted with his own wasteful spending practices during the debates, Barack Obama smiles that broad smile of his, shrugs his shoulders... and changes the subject.

Dodging the question, changing the subject-- that's not good enough for me.  Not in a friend or a business partner, let alone the President of the United States.

Many of you won't vote for McCain, of course, so if you're already firmly in the Obama camp, your time would have been better spent elsewhere than reading the above-- but thanks for making it this far.  I'd like to hope that if your man wins, he'd prove a decent president-- I actually thought as much a few months back.  But the tone of the campaign has changed, the dangerous anger of the Far Left has infused too much of Obama's rhetoric, and the concept that this man could possibly be the unifier, the messenger of hope, the all-around good-for-America reformer that he claims he'd be just seems too unlikely to hope for from where I stand.  His slippery showing in last night's debate didn't remind me of Jack or Bobby Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, or even the first President Bush so much as it brought the Artful Dodger to mind. 

I came away from last night convinced that Barack Obama isn't half the man so many millions of Americans (including many of my friends and even some family members) think he is.  I've now more or less gone from backing my own candidate to truly hoping the other guy loses.  He scares me that much.  But this post wasn't about him, and I'd rather not let him hijack my blog the way he's hijacked the national conversation thus far. 

This post was about John McCain.

I hope you'll join me in casting your vote his way.

For the last few months, I’ve had an account on Facebook.  For those of you who aren’t yet familiar with it, Facebook is an online “social networking” site that people join to stay in touch with friends and family over the internet.  Originally restricted to students only, in the past year the site has opened up to old folks like myself, my wife and dozens of our old friends from high school and college.  The numbers are growing daily, and it’s been great fun reconnecting with people whom I’d lost touch with over the years.

One of the more interesting things about Facebook is the way it puts you in touch with how people in your own circle see the world.  Lately, with a presidential election coming up in a month or so, that means you see more and more politically oriented commentary, and I have to admit it’s a bit odd to see old friends regurgitating the lines and stances of national pundits. 

A stance that’s struck me squarely between the eyes, however, is the number of people I know who’ve been picking on Sarah Palin for her “folksy” manner of speaking in last week’s debate.  I’d expect this from the high-minded, self-styled cultural elite—you know, the circulation base of the New York Times, the people who write Tina Fey’s lines on Saturday Night Live, the people who try to tell us which cars to drive / clothes to wear / books to read et cetera—but it’s kind of funny coming from my friends.

Don’t get me wrong.  They are my friends, and I like and respect every single one of them whether they’ve taken a stance like this or not.  But I can’t understand how anybody who comes from our shared circumstances can take issue with a candidate using idiomatic phraseology like “gonna”, “wanna”, “doggone it”, and “you betcha”.  Why?  I guess this should be kind of obvious, but in case people don’t want to admit it, let’s be clear: around these parts, we all talk this way, either now or when we were growing up.

I should be the poster child for this, really.  I was the kid who came home from first grade and told my own parents they needed to say “want to” because “wanna” wasn’t a word.

And then Reality hit me somewhere about age six.  “This is how real people talk,” it told me.  This is the way we speak in South Milwaukee, the kind of language I heard and still hear around the dinner table, in the locker room, in church and on holidays.  And honestly, I use it myself as often as not.  That’s Reality.

Maybe it hasn’t hit you, my friends.  Maybe your parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins, and friends never used any of these phrases (though I find that extremely difficult to believe).  Maybe you don’t feel comfortable voting for someone who speaks this way because you think a Presidential (or Vice-Presidential) candidate should have a more refined mastery of the English language than you do.  Unless it’s that last one, my friends—because while I don’t agree, at least I can understand it—I’m going to politely ask you to come on back to Reality with me.

Me?  Yes, me.  And yes, I’m the same guy who went on to graduate from Marquette University with a degree in English of all things.  I don’t doubt for a second that my schooling in linguistics and literature has made me far more sensitive to language than any of you that I’ve seen pointing your fingers at Sarah Palin thus far, but I’m not joining those ranks.  I know where I come from, I know how people talk around here, and while I’m not much for “doggone it” myself, I don’t have any problems with the phrase.  Truth be told, I’d rather have a president who sounds like George Bush than one who sounds like me (for those scoring at home, I'm the geek who’s used the words “argot”, "idiomatic" and “phraseology” already in this blog).

Ultimately I think it’s a ridiculous point to criticize Governor Palin on.  If you aren’t going to vote for McCain/Palin because you oppose their policy, well and good.  If you aren’t going to vote for McCain/Palin because the number two name on the ticket speaks like your own mother, well… I hope you've got a better reason than that, guys.

You probably do.  After all, I have a dozen solid, rational reasons not to vote for Barack Obama, but at the end of the day my favorite line is his cultlike status among his rabid T-shirt-wearing followers, the Obamamaniacs (Il Duce, anyone?), who seem convinced he's a second Messiah.  Maybe we can all stick to our guns, which is to say, our policy... I'll leave off the comparisons of Obama to various 20th-century-dictator cults of personality, and you'll have done with the linguistic snobbery.  Deal?  

Doggone it, I sure hope so.

I'm going to be-- well, better to say I'll continue to be-- uber-busy with work for the next two weeks, plus another wedding to attend, etc. etc. so the blog will remain quiet for a little while.  Meanwhile, I thought I'd leave my readers with a handful of random thoughts to ponder until I come back.

• Every team I covered in my South Shore Prep Football Review lost last week, except for the two I skipped, Bay View and Oak Creek.  If all four bounce back to win this weekend, I promise to stop writing about them for the rest of the season.

• I've admitted in the past that I supported John Edwards for President in 2004, and at the time it seemed a good choice. I considered myself moderate, and he was easily the most centrist of the candidates available at the time. Since then, the intolerance and high-mindedness of the Left have pushed me further right of center, to the point that I realize a majority of my views align with what is a more traditionally conservative viewpoint. Through logic and reason I came to the conclusion that I'm really more or less a Republican.  What continues to amaze me is the number of people who seem to disdain this sort of reason, looking past the more wildly reactionary aspects of the Obama platform because he's a polished orator, (relatively) young, Harvard-educated (meet a few Crimson grads before make your own mind up on this one) and not white. It's frustrating.

• The Brewers are in the playoffs.

• Let me say that again: The BREWERS are in the playoffs!!

• If the Brewers don't win it all, I'll be able to accept it better so long as the Cubs lose again.

• Anti-Catholic people need to grow up.  It's one thing to be involved in and excited about your own faith, but do us all a favor and think about the words and life of Jesus Christ before you denigrate mine.  Harmless jokes are one thing; insinuating that all Catholic priests are somehow deviant because of a scandal that seriously hurt and emotionally scarred hundreds of people is thoughtless, cruel, and just plain ignorant.  And yes, I note this here because of something said to me recently by a person who should know better.

• Milwaukee Public Schools needs to be privatized.  A couple hundred administrative jobs need to be cut or given massive pay cuts, teachers need to be held accountable, all the pointless busing needs to stop, and schools need to be safe havens again.  Please raise your hand if you really think the Democratic city government of Milwaukee is capable of doing these things... right.  I didn't think so.  So let's turn it over to the private sector.

And that's about it for now.  See you in two weeks. 

This week we completely drop the "Power Rankings" title and just go to a "Prep Football Report" format, which I like a lot better.

I finally had a chance to see the South Milwaukee Rockets play last week at Burlington.  I have an old coaching friend who happens to be a Burlington native, a guy who had played and coached for the Demons as well as South Milwaukee, so I gave him a call and we met up at the game.  We were hoping for a close, exciting contest between two evenly matched teams.  What we got was three-quarters of the way there, and that doesn't even take into account the shock of seeing the Rockets-- yes, South Milwaukee's own red and white-- in the shotgun formation for the first time in my entire life. (I'm not sure how I feel about that. It was just... well... strange.)

The teams actually were evenly matched talent-wise, and the game was exciting-- featuring some great plays and one or two things that really impressed me-- but thanks to turnovers and some unfortunate field position on the part of South Milwaukee, it was never really close. We got to catch up with a couple old coaching friends after the game, and they told us more or less the same things we'd observed-- with just a little more consistency and attention to detail, the kids wearing red and white could be a lot better record-wise than 0 - 4.

Thing is, it's those little things that always seem to separate the vast majority of teams in high school football. Sure, you've got the rare teams that are either immensely talented or can just plain wear opponents down through attrition (think Arrowhead's 80-man roster), and the unfortunate few that don't have enough players to really stand a chance against their competition, but by and large-- from a "talent level" perspective-- if you've seen one prep team play, you've seen them all.  Or at least eighty percent of them.

What comes between them?  What separates a conference champ from a group that finishes 0 - 8?  More often than not, it's the things we saw (or didn't see, in some cases) on display from South Milwaukee and Burlington last week.  Confidence.  Fumbles and interceptions.  Decent length on kickoffs and kick returns.  Lane integrity on kick coverage.  Hang time and coverage on punts.  Staying true to your assignment.  Trust in the techniques your coaches teach you and in teammates' ability to be where they're supposed to be.  And over and above all of this, momentum, Lee Corso's "Big Mo", because when you get that on your side it can sometimes make up for little slips in all of the above.

Those Rockets do have some good things going for them, and I hope they don't let 0 - 4 get them down.  Two plays in particular stick out in my mind as building blocks. 

1) On a called drop-back pass in the second half, the SM QB (a right-handed thrower) was flushed from the pocket to his left.  Scrambling for his life, a Burlington player in pursuit, the kid turned his shoulders on the run to face up perfectly and throw downfield.  His footwork wasn't quite there yet and the throw fell incomplete as a result, but wow. That kid is a sophomore.  If he works and practices the way he should, next year this kid is going to make that throw, and look out. 

2) Late in the first half, an open SM receiver dropped a deep ball with nothing but green grass (as Coach Brad Knoche used to say) between him and the end zone. The drop happened, plain and simple, because he tried to catch it with his body and not his hands.  Two or three plays later, they hit the same kid on a quick slant.  He reached up and caught a much tougher ball-- with his hands, not his body.  Lesson learned.  That kid was a junior.

You may gather from the above that I'm a big fan of the philosophy whereby a man isn't judged by his successes, but rather how he responds to his failures.  South Milwaukee played a lot of underclassmen against Burlington, and let me tell you this: If those kids respond to these "failures" in a positive way-- if they learn from them and adjust the things they do to eliminate those mistakes, if they work harder in the offseason and at practice to get better-- they will make a lot of noise next year. 

Heck, they can still make that noise next week if they're fast learners.

St. Thomas More Cavaliers: Apparently these guys showed up at Brown Deer and were immediately ushered into a track meet, because the final score hit right around 100 for total points scored by both teams.  Best sign for Thomas More (beyond the first 'W', that is)?  Two running backs going over 100 yards each.  If they can set up that passing game of theirs with a successful running attack (or even the threat of one), they will put a lot of points on the board.  I've seen some lights-out play from their defense before (against Eisenhower) so you know they've got the ability on that side of the ball as well.  If I'm a Cavaliers fan, I'm getting excited about their chances to put those first three games in the rear-view mirror and put a nice second half together.

St. Francis Mariners: I said the game with Springs would be a good one, and it went down to the wire. And I missed it. One of these weeks I'm going to have to catch this team.  Tonight might be a good choice-- facing Rob Stoltz and the Greendale Panthers.  As a split end in Greendale's old Wing-T (I think six teams in the Suburban Park ran that blasted Wing-T), Coach Stoltz single-handedly destroyed our overmatched secondary my senior year in high school.  I wouldn't mind seeing the Mariners hang the first 'L' on his team this year.

Cudahy Packers: Wow. What happened to these guys against Pewaukee?  Hmmm... I did pick them, as it happens.  Maybe if I stop picking Cudahy, they'll win again.  Hmmm.  Then again, they're Cudahy.  I went to South Milwaukee.  Hmmm.  Okay, I can't help myself-- this week, I predict the Cudahy Packers will destroy New Berlin Eisenhower. 

Oak Creek, Bay View: It's hard for me to comment much more on these teams when I haven't seen them play.  I'll take submissions though....

Growing up, I knew that my dad had been a wrestler.  Not the AWA that we watched on TV (like today's WWE), not that silly "professional" stuff... real wrestling.  Early on, I wasn't quite sure what that meant.  Even after we took a wrestling class at the YMCA when I was five or so, it was still a little confusing.  Of course, it might have helped if I didn't have to wrestle more or less blind; I've had corrective vision since I was in kindergarten and the hardest part of wrestling-- or any sport-- was dealing with glasses or worse, competing without them before I had contact lenses.

Still, by the time I was in seventh grade and joining the local wrestling club, I had started to understand a little bit more.  Wrestling wasn't a popular winter sport-- it didn't have the glitz and glamor of basketball because it wasn't on television-- but it was a good sport for me. It takes hard work and effort to be a wrestler, more so than most sports that kids get involved in, because when you're competing it's just you and your opponent.  

Wrestling teaches you a lot of lessons. If your technique slips, if your strength and conditioning aren't what they should be, or if your confidence falters, your opponent will expose you in front of everyone in the stands.  There's nowhere to hide.  It's a tough sport.  Sometimes you even need to defend your sport to people who just don't get it, and while it's fun to put guys like that in a headlock for an object lesson, you can get sick of hearing recycled 'Breakfast Club' one-liners.  A lot of guys who think they're pretty tough never made it through a season of high school wrestling, let alone four years.  Not because they didn't want to, but because they couldn't. (For example, I still class all basketball players in this categorization.)

By the time I finished high school, I was a decent wrestler-- neither good nor bad but somewhere in between.  I won some matches I should have lost, and lost a few matches that I should have won.  Seventeen years later, I realize this wasn't from a lack of technique (though you can always improve your technique) or conditioning... just a lack of confidence.  To be great, you need to believe you'll win every time that you step on the mat, and I didn't have that.  I'm not sure why-- I have it now, as an adult. That's another lesson I learned. 

You can imagine my pride, then, when my dad was introduced at halftime of last week's football game between St. Thomas More and New Berlin Eisenhower high schools.  A three-year wrestler at Don Bosco in the Sixties, member of an undefeated Catholic Conference championship team (they lost State by two measly points), and a State qualifier. STM was honoring their wrestling alumni, and I suppose since he was the oldest, Dad was introduced first in a group of very successful athletes.

This was a moment to remember; family and family tradition are important to me and things that I try to pass on to my boys, who were there with me, my wife, and Mom. It's a big part of why we go to Cavalier football games as much as my own alma mater's. (And why we love TMHS - they are really doing a great job reaching out to build their community.) 

Yet while all this was going on, one thing stuck out in my mind: All those years I was wrestling, I'd known all along that my dad had done the same thing.  I knew what his record was, I knew his favorite takedown (though I couldn't quite master it), I knew how his team had trained with college wrestlers at Marquette University... all the stories.

But I don't think he'd ever told me, back then, that he'd gone to State (or that he had finished in the top eight, either).

That's maybe the greatest lesson wrestling teaches you: Humility.

SOUTH SHORE POWER RANKINGS: WEEK 3

I've decided to stop "ranking" teams because after careful consideration, I have to think that even in fun, ranking teams like this isn't in the true spirit of interscholastic athletics.  I'll still write some observations (when I'm lucky enough to see a game) or thoughts on the past scores (when I'm not) and I'll still strive to be interesting.  But it's so hard to compare Team A from Conference N with Team B from Conference X, when the only way to really do it is on the field... so I'm going to stop.

Now if the rest of the state would just stop doing it... but I suppose that's half the fun.

South Milwaukee Rockets (SEC) - My Rockets lost to Muskego, 25-20, and I really wish I'd been able to watch this game.  Muskego runs the old WAC version of the Wing-T, and that offense used to give us fits in the old days. As a linebacker, you'd try to key the guards and they would take you to the ball, and realistically that happens 90% of the time in this offense, but we played a "wide-tackle six" and with our defensive ends (or "tackles" as we called them in that alignment, in those days) lined up on the outside eye of the OT or head-up on the tight end, there wasn't anyone to keep their tackles off our linebackers.  It's worth noting that when SM switched to a 5-2 Monster, they had a lot more success against that offense. I really wanted to see how they would play it now, fifteen years later, when instead of facing four Wing-T teams a year they see several different versions of the spread, classic pro-style I, and other wacky stuff. Next up: Burlington, with the possibility of Tony Romo in town to cheer on his alma mater. Let's make sure Mr. Cowboy loses twice this weekend, fellas.

Cudahy Packers (Woodland) - For much of last week, a lot of people in Cudahy were wondering just where Mauston was. (I know that I still am.)  Now, a lot of people in Mauston are wondering exactly where Cudahy is.  Geez, these guys throw a lot, though.  It'll be interesting to see how they do against Pewaukee, Eisenhower and Greendale.  84% of respondents in this week's "Prep Football Pick 'Em" have picked the Pirates over Cudahy... I'm not so sure.  As much as it pains me, I'll take the purple and gold.

Saint Thomas More Cavaliers (Woodland) - Every week, these kids have played well in the first half. Last week, they took a 13 - 7 lead into halftime against a New Berlin Eisenhower team that had a lot of press and state rankings through the first two weeks. It was no fluke. The Cavs were flying around on defense, just punishing the ballcarriers and QB for Eisenhower, and their passing game looked sharp. I can't say enough about that defense, either. NBE came back in the second half-- with some big plays, if I read the box score correctly-- and that's a shame. Maybe when TM has trouble establishing the run, they might want to go all Franklin on people and just spread the field more on the more traditional "rushing" down and distance-- they've had success in passing situations, and they have the talent for it on the perimeter. This team is worlds better than 0 - 3 and they have a great chance to prove that against Brown Deer tomorrow.

Saint Francis Mariners (Woodland) - I haven't had a chance to see these guys play yet, but they bounced back with a win last week and now they have an intriguing matchup with Fond du Lac Springs coming up.  Springs is 3 - 0 but people will say they haven't faced the competition St. Francis has.  Not that it matters.  A good team is a good team, and this game features two of them; it should be a heck of a game to watch.

Bay View Redcats (City) - Tough bounce for these guys.  In the first two weeks they go out and drop a nail-biter to Green Bay Preble, then they soundly beat a Classic 8 school in Pius XI.  And then Riverside clobbers them in a game that's hyped as potentially deciding the City Conference race.  Two things about that: (1) No game in Week 3 is going to decide ANY conference race.  (2) Bay View needs to realize that, fix their mistakes, and come out this week ready to make their next opponent pay up.

Oak Creek Knights (SEC) - I'm really proud of Oak Creek for letting my Rockets use their field while SM's new "swamp" (I still liked the old field better) is bouncing back from being flooded out.  Unfortunately they haven't fared any better than South Milwaukee has so far.  Their big rivalry game with Franklin is this week, though, and while neither team comes in with a winning record, you can bet the stakes will still be high on both sides of the field.  Great opportunity for OC to get off the schneid with this one, and turn their season around.

I just wanted to say a brief "Thank you" to everyone who's been reading and commenting on this blog since I re-launched it a month ago. It's so much more fun this time around, what with comments and statistics and entry URLs and all the fun stuff that goes with being on the Community Server blogging platform. Without a doubt, it's the commentary and "dialogue" nature of the blog that keeps me more active as a writer.

So let's just list a few things I've learned from my comments section this past month on Ad Astra....

1. Somebody is sending links to my South Shore Power Rankings around via their Yahoo! mail account. I'm not sure whether this is flattering, frightening or funny.

2. True Bay View people really like Bay View, apparently.

3. I am not a true Bay View person. I don't think I could make this any clearer short of arranging an unfortunate "accident" for that stupid fox before it eats someone's pet. But I do live here for now, and as such, sometimes I'll write about the place.

4. A number of people are beginning to express surprise that I write from such a pro-South Milwaukee standpoint. These same people should not be surprised that I like to make jokes at the expense of Cudahy. This is just the natural order of things. I'm sure people from Cudahy make jokes about SM too; it's just that... well, our jokes are better.

5. People in Bay View dislike garden gnomes.

There's been more, of course, but the point here is that I've had a lot of fun writing back and forth with all of you. Thanks again and I look forward to more to come.

My wife’s youngest cousin is a junior at Wisconsin Lutheran High School, and a member of their formidable varsity football team.  We had the opportunity to watch “Wisco” play Marquette High in Week One of the high-school football season, and while we only saw the first half (our younger son fell asleep and needed to go home) it was a real treat.  Two talented, well-coached, hard-hitting football teams met on the field that night, and while Wisco eventually ran away with the game, what stood out was one thing: Class.  Wisco won with class, and Marquette showed as much of the same in accepting a rare loss.  I’d be happy to send my sons through either program (but we’re Catholic, so that means only one of them qualifies).

Fast-forward to last night, Week Two.  Continuing a tradition we started when he was a baby, I take my older son to watch the Saint Thomas More football team. (For why we support STM, read the blog archive.)  He had a great time, enjoying the game, the popcorn and the crowd.  But he didn’t understand one thing: The fight.

Fight?  What fight?

Why, the fight that broke out when one of the opposing players leveled an STM player after a third-quarter whistle.  That’s not football in most places, but then again, last night’s game was in Cudahy.  I guess I should have expected it from the moment the Cudahy announcer first mispronounced the name of TM’s quarterback—intentionally, we have to assume, because he continued without a change for the length of the contest—as “Swindler”.  After all these years, I’ve come to recognize that sort of amateurish behavior as par for the course from the purple and gold.

You could call the fight an isolated incident I suppose, the case of one player going too far—but that wouldn’t account for half the Cudahy bench rushing the field in the fracas that ensued.  (No ejections, of course; the refs’ backs were turned at the time, trying to break up the scuffle.)  Not just coaches trying to break things up either.  The players were rushing in to join the fray.  You didn’t see that from the Cavaliers’ sideline.  Not a single player in blue and white joined the mob, though it’s an instinct to do so when your friends are being bullied.  Self control?  That equals class. 

So Saint Thomas More’s team played—and eventually lost—with class.  Good for them.  Cudahy won, but from where one observer sits they won without that key ingredient.  It’s a shame, really, because the parents and adults working the ticket and snack counter for Cudahy were friendly, good-natured folks.  They deserve better from their football program.

High school football is about so much more than football, or at least it is at its best.  It’s about learning important life lessons like the value of teamwork, brotherhood, and how to hold your head high whether you win or you lose. It’s about developing character.  With that in mind, I hope Cudahy keeps winning. 

After all, they’re a D3 team, and that means they’ll run into a red, white and blue buzzsaw called Wisconsin Lutheran somewhere down the line.  Then we’ll see how much character they’ve got.

Week Two-and-a-Half South Shore Power Rankings

(I was so busy watching the Republican National Convention last week that I never got around to releasing my rankings on time, so for this column I’ll merge Week Two and Week Three.)

6. Oak Creek (0 - 2)
The Knights are winless and according to the Journal-Sentinel, they run the loathsome spread offense, which in this blog is cause for censure second only to poor sportsmanship. ‘Nuff said.

5. Saint Thomas More (0 - 2) 
This 0 - 2 record is really tragic, because now that I’ve seen them in person, I see a number of really talented players on this Cavalier squad and a willingness on the part of the coaching staff to put the ball in the hands of these playmakers.  The problem is that as a team, they’re not very big and they’re not very deep.  Teams in that position can wear down physically if they don’t stay focused.  They’ve lost to a pair of pretty good teams and if they can maintain a level of confidence in themselves, they’re good enough to rebound in time to make the playoffs.

4. Cudahy (2 - 0)
Last week I took Cudahy to task for running a spread; perhaps my eyes deceived me last year, because while I saw a lot of three-wide sets from the Packers this week, they definitely weren’t running the spread.  Good for them.  Still, there was that fight, and a sneaking suspicion that they wouldn’t be able to hang with St. Francis or run with Bay View, let alone beat a 4- or 5- win Southeastern Conference team (which South Milwaukee has the talent to be).  This won’t make anyone happy down at the K-Ranch, but undefeated Cudahy slots in nicely at #4.

3. South Milwaukee (0 - 1) INCOMPLETE
I’ve had the chance in the past week to receive an honest evaluation of SM’s 60 – 0 loss to Racine Park from a friend on the Rockets’ coaching staff (Mark Hoffman), and in his words, "These type of games.... The loser is not as bad as it seems and the winner is not as good as they seem.  Things got out of control and just snowballed.  One ref said the same thing after the game.  They were not much better than us.  We just made too many mistakes and they capitalized on all of them.  We have a lot to work on, but everything is fixable if they choose to follow our lead."  Racine Park just beat Franklin 27 – 7.  Racine Park is a darn good football team.  SM has yet to play their second game as of this writing—against powerful Kenosha Tremper—but win or lose, I’m taking Coach Hoffman’s words at face value.  Losses to Park and Tremper are… well, not acceptable, but certainly understandable.

2. St. Francis (1 - 1)
Either Whitnall is really good this year, or that loss last night was a complete fluke.  One way or the other, a loss is a loss, and the Mariners hold steady at #2.

1. Bay View (1 - 1)
Bay View beat Milwaukee Pius XI in Week 2, 33-13.  Now, Pius isn’t exactly a powerhouse (even a practicing Catholic like me thinks calling your team the “Popes” completely sacrifices any potential intimidation factor you might start with), but I believe I said they had the talent to be #1 but hadn’t beaten any suburban or private schools yet.  Well, they just did.  I’m a man of my word, so #1 it is.

This just in: Am I the only one who finds the political commentary from supporters of Barack Obama to be completely and utterly baffling?   

Let's paraphrase some of the most common (and ironic) stances we're seeing in remarks from Democratic figures and commentators during the course of the Republican National Convention:

"Our candidate is merely a first term senator with no real leadership experience to speak of, but we're going to make snide remarks about Sarah Palin's experience."

Or...

"We praised John McCain for his bipartisan legislation for years, but now that he's running for President we're going to conveniently forget that and claim he's a George Bush clone."

Or...

"We make a lot of noise about civil rights, but when the other guys put forth an actual female candidate (not just trot one out for the primaries like we did) we say she should stay home and spend more time with her kids."

Or...

"Barack Obama attended the exclusive Punahou School in Hawaii as a prep student, then moved on to Ivy League institutions for his undergrad and graduate education (Columbia and Harvard, respectively).  But John McCain's an 'elitist' because he.. um.. owns a lot of houses."

Come on, guys. Do you really expect intelligent people to fall for any of this?

I'd always considered myself a centrist, but that was before I saw Democrats contradicting themselves like this, left and right, up and down, around and around and around.  Personally, I think it's the soul of arrogance to try to snow the voting public this way. And they really think this kind of behavior is going to win votes from the center?  It smacks of desperation to me; there's no way I'll cast my vote for any candidate from a party like this.

Honestly, I've only ever voted for one Democratic presidential ticket in my life (Kerry/Edwards) and now I'm completely ashamed to admit it. I hope the rational, decent people of the right can forgive me my mistake and welcome my vote back. 

'Cause unlike the Obamamaniacs, at least I can admit when I'm wrong.

Friday morning.  I say my farewells to the kids and wander outside as usual.  I open up my laptop and fire up iTunes because my car stereo was stolen—not to mention the three shattered windows and the glass scattered all over my toddlers’ carseats—right out of our alley a few months ago.  Not a great way to supply the music for my daily commute, but it’ll work until I install a replacement.  I pull into reverse, back up into the alley… and stop.  Cold.

Because now there is graffiti on my garage door.

Not just my garage door, as it turns out, but the garage doors (and garages, and vehicles) of over half my neighbors up and down the block.  Completely senseless vandalism. 

Welcome to Bay View.

In the last six months, my block has been hit by a wave of theft and vandalism.  Garages and cars broken into, stuff missing, now this.   And it hasn’t stopped or even slowed down despite increased police presence.  I can’t help but wonder if this is in any way tied to the house full of teenagers that moved in not far away just before this all started.  After all, they don’t look all that bright, and whoever decorated our alley last night can’t even spell.

Now my garage door presents a mind-bogglingly moronic phrase to anyone who drives down the alley.  It’s so pathetic that I need to disable the spellcheck in Microsoft Word or the phrase won’t even make it onto this blog post.  My wife relays this message to the police dispatcher, and the woman laughs at it.  (Milwaukee's finest, everyone.)  Apparently it’s some hip-hop term of endearment. 

I wouldn’t know.  I’m just an average American citizen who actually respects his neighbors and their property.  Imagine that.

I’m sure somebody will tell me I’m jumping to conclusions, but I’m more or less tired of giving the kids around here the benefit of the doubt.  Why?

Because they loiter at the neighborhood playgrounds, smoking, and curse at adults who ask them to stop because there’s little kids around.

Because they cause over a thousand dollars of damage to my car for a stereo that won’t even fetch a hundred dollars on Ebay.

Because they break into my neighbors’ garage after their garage sale.

Because they write meaningless drivel on our property and the property of our neighbors.

I’d love to get my hands on the little cowards who do this stuff in the middle of the night, but that won’t happen.  We’re left to feel helpless and foolish for ever deciding to live here.

We’ve tried this for three years now; we’ve tried being good citizens.  We call the police to report suspicious activity.  We keep an eye on our neighbors’ homes when they’re out of town.  We enjoy walking down to the Farmers’ Market, the park and the playground and Starbucks.  But this is twice in a summer and now we’re sick of Bay View.  We’re sick of Milwaukee.  We’re sick of urban living and hearing people extol its virtues. 

If you want to champion these things, great.  I’ve got a garage door that needs painting and a brush with your name on it.