Recall Scott Walker — the rally at the Wisconsin Capitol today.

Recorded by Meade, edited by me.

IN THE COMMENTS: Curious George says:

Perhaps Meadehouse didn't feel we could handle it, but here is video of the Recall Flash Mob.

While painful to watch for it's lameness, I think it's important, because this is actually representative of the quality of product that public unions produce. 

You know, it may be lame, but it's also pretty charming. Think about the anger, confusion, and the incipient violence you've seen in various Occupy [Your City] situations. After a year of frustration, these people are still smiling and dancing.

At the Recall Scott Walker rally.

There were folks with signs...


(Enlarge.)

... rock musicians...



... and unions...



Today at the Capitol Square here in Madison Wisconsin. Photos by Meade. There were 25,000 to 30,000 people there today, according to news reports. These stills don't show that, but hang on, we've got video coming soon.

ADDED: More on the rally here:

Former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold signed a petition as he helped kick off the rally...

Feingold, the longtime Democratic senator who was defeated in November by Republican Ron Johnson, encouraged volunteers to counteract two pieces of misinformation that he said have been circulated by the movement's critics: that recalls are only allowed in cases of criminal conduct or malfeasance and that the recall movement consists of out-of-state activists.

"Our law says you can do recalls if you simply attack the people of Wisconsin," as Walker has done, Feingold said.

He also praised the recall movement as "all grassroots and all Badger."

Recent polling has identified Feingold as the only Democrat running ahead of Walker in a possible recall election

But despite shouts of "Governor Feingold!" and "Run, Russ, run!" from the volunteers, Feingold reiterated that he won't run against Walker if the signature drive is successful.

"I want there to be a new governor," Feingold told reporters outside the theater. "There will be a new governor in a few months, but it won't be me."

The "South Park" alien...

... in every episode.

Ever notice?

ADDED: Reminds me of the plant named "Arthur" that popped up in Mad Magazine, so many years ago. I'd like to find you a good link for that, but in looking for one, I found this excellent presentation of the Mad fold-in pages, where you can make the fold with your cursor.

Football is better on TV... watched alone.

Asserts Luke O'Neil, whose friends "don't enjoy my company."

Now that a personalized, crystal-clear picture is at everyone's fingertips, it is pure torture to let someone else man the controls. Watching my friends operate a DVR makes me feel like a nervous backseat driver. When I'm at my in-laws’ house, for instance, I have to watch the Patriots game in a separate room because my father-in-law will inevitably flip over to golf during commercials. Personally, I like to pause the action every time there's a stoppage in play or when, say, the damn Patriots defense allows yet another third down conversion. (That happens a lot.) After I hit pause, I'll walk around the house a few times grinding my teeth. If I did that with company around, it would inevitably lead to someone complaining about being behind real time and somebody else whining that he can’t check his fantasy numbers without spoiling the game that’s now on pause. And they would be right to complain, if those hypothetical people still came over to watch football. Thankfully, I’ve scared them all away.

"You're going to see from me extraordinarily radical proposals to fundamentally change the culture of poverty in America and give people a chance to rise very rapidly."

Said Newt Gingrich at Harvard's Kennedy School last night. Asked about income inequality, he said:

"This is something that no liberal wants to deal with... Core policies of protecting unionization and bureaucratization against children in the poorest neighborhoods, crippling them by putting them in schools that fail has done more to create income inequality in the United States than any other single policy. It is tragic what we do in the poorest neighborhoods, entrapping children in, first of all, child laws, which are truly stupid.

"You say to somebody, you shouldn't go to work before you're what, 14, 16 years of age, fine. You're totally poor. You're in a school that is failing with a teacher that is failing.... Most of these schools ought to get rid of the unionized janitors, have one master janitor and pay local students to take care of the school. The kids would actually do work, they would have cash, they would have pride in the schools, they'd begin the process of rising."

... "You go out and talk to people, as I do, you go out and talk to people who are really successful in one generation.... They all learned how to make money at a very early age... What do we say to poor kids in poor neighborhoods? Don't do it. Remember all that stuff about don't get a hamburger flipping job? The worst possible advice you could give to poor children. Get any job that teaches you to show up on Monday. Get any job that teaches you to stay all day even if you are in a fight with your girlfriend. The whole process of making work worthwhile is central."

"During the discussion about the 'propaganda of homosexuality' bill in the St. Petersburg legislature, a city councilor proposed banning the rainbow symbol."

"Russian bloggers started joking that St. Petersburg would next ban the rainbow from nature. I laughed, too, and continued to think that these measures are, above all, ridiculous."

But on Thursday, the day after the St. Petersburg bill was passed and just as Moscow legislators were promising to pass one of their own, my 13-year-old son, who attends a private school with a liberal reputation in Moscow, came home and told me he had removed his new earring after a teacher told him that wearing earrings means you’re gay and is therefore inappropriate.

"Boys Swimming on Girls Teams Find Success, Then Draw Jeers."

Why are boys allowed to swim on girls teams? Because their schools don't have boys swim programs and they have a right under the Massachusetts constitution to equal access to athletics.

Boys swimming is held in the winter, when pool space is limited and expensive to rent, which is a deterrent for many schools. Athletic directors say the sport is not as popular among boys as it is girls, making it hard to field full squads. Some schools in the winter offer coed swimming, where boys and girls compete side-by-side in the dual meets and then separately in the postseason.

Over the years, there have been girls wrestling on boys teams or playing football or ice hockey. Boys have been on field hockey teams and girls have competed alongside boys in golf.

But in wrestling, boys and girls of the same weight compete against each other. And in field hockey and other team sports, a boy on a girls team achieves success through cooperation and collaboration with his teammates.

Equality is complicated.

"Aspects of Gingrich divorce story distorted."

WaPo divulges, after all these years.

"Unbuilt Washington."

The ziggurat that might have been the Lincoln Monument, the gigantic enlargement of the White House, the Kennedy Center that looks like Monona Terrace, the National Sofa... yes, the National Sofa:

In response to the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue — the first of many hysterical security measures since the Oklahoma City bombing and the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 — Allegro and Michel envisioned a wide, arching “sofa” in front of the White House, with a giant video screen giving visitors an insider’s peek into the executive mansion.

"GOP voters know exactly who they want... and it is... NOT MITT ROMNEY."

"Unfortunately, he does not have corporeal form..."

A glass elevator that accommodates your car, taking you up to your high-rise apartment.

It's Porsche Design Tower.

Residents will be able to see their cars from their living rooms.

“So people with fancy cars and antiques, they will actually have a really nice view of them"..

"Maybe we should just abolish drunk driving laws."

"Doing away with the specific charge of drunk driving sounds radical at first blush, but it would put the focus back on behavior, where it belongs. The punishable act should be violating road rules or causing an accident, not the factors that led to those offenses. Singling out alcohol impairment for extra punishment isn’t about making the roads safer. It’s about a lingering hostility toward demon rum."

A daring suggestion. Is alcohol different from distractions like cell phone use, adjusting the radio, eating, and interacting with passengers? Yes, it's not really a distraction. You probably pay more attention when you know your reaction time is impaired by alcohol. But your judgment is bad too. If there's not a specific rule against drinking and driving and people are expected to make nuanced decisions about what they can do, the drunk is making that decision with a drunken brain.

At the Negativity Café...

... it's not all bad.

Evolution of Apple Ads 1975-2002.

Fascinating. It's nice accompaniment for reading the Steve Jobs biography.

One of his pet peeves was Newton, the handheld personal digital assistant that boasted handwriting recognition capability. It was not quite as bad as the jokes and Doonesbury comic strip made it seem, but Jobs hated it. He disdained the idea of having a stylus or pen for writing on a screen. “God gave us ten styluses,” he would say, waving his fingers. “Let’s not invent another.” In addition, he viewed Newton as John Sculley’s one major innovation, his pet project. That alone doomed it in Jobs’s eyes.

“You ought to kill Newton,” he told Amelio one day by phone. It was a suggestion out of the blue, and Amelio pushed back. “What do you mean, kill it?” he said. “Steve, do you have any idea how expensive that would be?”

“Shut it down, write it off, get rid of it,” said Jobs. “It doesn’t matter what it costs. People will cheer you if you got rid of it.” 

Here's the classic Doonesbury cartoon with the memorable phrase — featured in Business Week and the NYT — "egg freckles."

Who's protesting military rule in Egypt?

"Although the demonstration was originally called by liberal activists..."

... most stayed away after it became clear that the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist political parties would dominate the day....

The spark for the Islamists’ protests was a recent set of declarations issued by the military-led government as ground rules for the drafting of a new Constitution. Many of its provisions sought to enshrine protections of individual liberties and minority rights that liberals have sought. But another provision granted the military a long-term political role as guardian of “constitutional legitimacy,” which many Islamists suspect is a reference to the secular character of the state and could give the military an excuse to intervene at will....

"Walker recall effort gets 50,000 signatures in first 48 hours, organizers say."

And since they only need to average 9,000 signatures a day to get to the 540,000 needed by the deadline, they're doing just great, right?

Obviously, not. The eager enthusiasts would have signed on early, and there was tremendous publicity leading up to the kickoff of the signature campaign, with midnight parties and intense press coverage. So 50,000 in the first 2 days looks like weak support to me. And I'm assuming the organizers are telling the truth about the number of signatures collected, and I'm ignoring the potential for invalid signatures and the increasing difficulty of collecting signatures on the darkest, coldest days of the year and when people are preoccupied with holiday travel and celebration.