"Oh hell, there's nothing wrong with dragging Meade's corpse around behind a city snowplow every so often."

"The little fucker deserved what he got. And yes, his wife is a Grade A toad licker who's need for self aggrandizement rivals that of Sarah Palin. I only hope that Larry the Gardener treats his pups well and never moves to my neighborhood. Our listserv is already full of crotchety old fucks who can't tell the difference between fireworks and gunshots."

From a discussion at the Madison alternative newspaper Isthmus about that article about Meade's blog in the nonalternative Madison newspaper the Wisconsin State Journal.

That's at the end of the thread. Higher up, there's a comment from Stu Levitan quoting my salary and snarking that the UW is "underwriting such a creative and valuable endeavor." Stu Levitan is a longtime Madison politico who is currently the Chairman of Madison's Landmarks Commission!

Levitan does get some pushback, notably from someone with the pseudonym Ninja:

Clearly there's some general unhappiness going on here, but that's no excuse for abusing the Redbook for a petty, personal attack (and involving a spouse rather than the actual target on top of that).

(The Redbook gives access to all the UW salaries.)

It's hard enough to get sunshine/disclosure/open government policies cemented into law, no need to give opponents ammunition or create a chilling effect.

This is why we can't have nice shit, America. Because we're children and we'll just break it.

That's not quite fair to children. It's not so much childish as it is evil politics. Levitan is so partisan that he doesn't see how sexist it is to attack a man through his wife. Levitan's wife [per Wikipedia] — in case you want to flip this thing — is Terese L. Berceau, a Democrat who holds a seat in the Wisconsin State Assembly. (In our district!)

Sunlight, baby!

Mary Burke supporters worry about how she'll do in the debates with Scott Walker.

A discussion at the very intra-Madison, intra-lefty forum at Isthmus. One commenter breaks up the good feeling within the group:

I'm just hoping Burke does better at the debates then she does when asked unscripted questions. It's all very fun to make fun of Walker and act like he's an idiot, but he's been a professional politician for about 20 years now. He knows how to publicly debate political issues. I'm not sure Burke has that skill yet and her inability to answer the plagiarism question was not very reassuring.

That last bit refers to this. Another commenter, local politico Stu Levitan, draws a warm bath for the group:

I thought Mary did really well on For The Record last weekend. I think she'll do fine in the debates.

For The Record! "For the Record" is a local Madison show that reflects local Madison values, where Mary Burke sat down for comfortable chat with 2 friendly reporters. Here, you can watch the show.

"For the Record" has invited Scott Walker to do the show too. It's not surprising he's declined.

MEANWHILE: Michelle Obama was back in Wisconsin, campaigning with Mary Burke, this time in Madison.

"Will de Blasio's promise to let developers build larger and taller in exchange for creating affordable housing overwhelm neighborhoods with hulking buildings that hurt the quality of life?"

That's what "some advocates and preservationists" are asking.

I think if you click through and look at the design, you'll scream yes.

If the developers want people to accept huge buildings, why do they make them so ugly?

Here's Madison's little big-building controversy, as presented by our former mayor Dave Cieslewicz. Don't miss the comments section, with much participation by Stu Levitan, who leads the Landmark Commission that rejected the proposal. ("This column is a disgrace, and shows a shocking disregard for both facts and the laws....")

Here's some background on Levitan, an article that ends, "'Yes, I still have Nixon’s balls,' Stu Levitan said. 'Thanks for asking.'"

I've mentioned Levitan before on this blog, for example in the post "'So Meade, in your marriage, which one of you is the whore?' A question asked in the webpages of Isthmus by Madison politico Stu Levitan." That was back before Meade got blocked from participating in the Isthmus forum for speaking inappropriately. (Isthmus is the Madison alt newspaper, i.e., the main newspaper in Madison. And here's an old post of mine that records ex-Mayor Dave's interaction with Meade at the Isthmus.)

ADDED: Clicking around writing this post, I got to this old piece of Dave's that has Meade in the comments, and I see that Stu Levitan is also in the comments there. Dave's topic is college football, and Meade, commenting with his full name, Laurence Meade, writes:

It's a free market, Dave. Plenty of schools don't have sports. Go to one of those schools.

As far as brain injuries, what else are you going to ban - riding in cars? bicycling? taking showers? drinking alcohol?

A Madison, WI proposal to authorize community street painting projects to "bring people together."

We're not talking about water soluble paint, but permanent paint jobs, the equivalent of murals, but on the horizontal surface that cars drive on. The alderwoman who proposes the new ordinance — Marsha Rummel — got the idea from Portland, Oregon, "where community members paint an intersection to give it a sense of place and create a public square."

There would be a permit process, including a petition "indicating approval from at least 60 percent residents, businesses and non-residential properties within a 200-foot radius of the proposed location"  and "assurances for the city that hold the design's applicant responsible for maintenance of the painting and requires them to have insurance." (I'm quoting the Cap Times article, not the ordinance, so I don't know whom to blame for the irritating ambiguity.)

"You can't just say you want to come in and do this. It needs to be maintained over time. Paint fades. It needs to be repainted from time to time, just as we go and repaint traffic lines," said Arthur Ross, the city's pedestrian-bicycle coordinator.

Which is why it's obviously a terrible idea.

"What it really is is a community building activity. It gets people out of their houses and working on something together," Ross said.

And what about when it breaks them apart because it's ugly, it makes the neighborhood look trashy, and it's not properly maintained.  I loathe these government dreams of bringing people together. Leave us alone! I know it's Madison, but people have their own private ways of getting together.

"So Meade, in your marriage, which one of you is the whore?"

A question asked in the webpages of Isthmus by Madison politico Stu Levitan.

Non-Madisonians may not know the name, but: "Stu Levitan has been a mainstay of Madison media and government for thirty-five years, a leader in both politics and the press since 1975. In addition to Books and Beats, Stu hosts Access: City Hall on the Madison City Channel and serves as chair of the Madison Community Development Authority and on the Madison Landmarks Commission. Since 1987, he has been a mediator/arbitrator for the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission."

Scroll up at the first link for the context, which is a discussion, initiated by Levitan, about the discovery that Madison sports heroine Suzy Favor Hamilton has been working as a call girl.

"It's a free market, Dave. Plenty of schools don't have sports. Go to one of those schools."

Over at Isthmus, the Madison "alternative" newspaper, Meade takes on former mayor/current columnist Dave Cieslewicz who's fretting about all the money spent on college football and the unpaid athletes and their incipient brain damage.

As far as brain injuries, what else are you going to ban - riding in cars? bicycling? taking showers? drinking alcohol?

Pushing back is local politico Stu Levitan, misspelling Meade's first name and gratuitously insulting him:

Lawrence, are you really asserting that the number of brain injuries from showering equals the number of brain injuries from football? My, you are a silly little fellow!

Meade is all:

Stw, what I am asserting is that football is only one of many activities which can lead to traumatic brain injury. Your question reflects poor reading comprehension. Is it possible that you bumped your head while playing Chutes and Ladders when you were a child?

Or maybe you didn't play that game. Maybe you, Cowboy Stu, and your family played Go To The Head Of The Class. You probably should've worn a helmet.

Like Dave!

This is what it's like in a clash of who-knows-how-damaged male brains of Madison.

AND: If you've got a craving for any old-time kids' games, please use the Althouse portal to Amazon. And I recommend Candy Land. Because they don't want you to eat candy.

How does it feel to be called a racist?

Here, in Madison, in the midst of a concealed carry debate, a local liberal (Stu Levitan) comes out with a statement that would be a career-ender if it came from a conservative, and a local conservative (Dave Blaska) refrains from "going 'all-Madison'" on him. What Levitan wrote:

I think it would be fun to have 2 or 3 dangerous-looking black guys testify next week in support of concealed carry. The more gang-banger the better. Let the committee know EXACTLY who they'll be letting carry guns.