You Gave It A Hell Of A Try, Greg

Greg Kowalksi, author of Franklin Today, did what many of us bloggers don't do. Instead of sitting at the computer day after day, telling people how he thinks things should be, he put himself out there and actually ran for a seat on the Franklin Common Council.

Unfortunately, the voters in his district decided to stick with the inept incumbent, but Greg did put in a heck of an effort and came very close to actually pulling off the upset.

I would like to congratulate and to thank Greg on taking the risk, offering to serve his community, and for standing up for what he believes in. I hope that this one loss does not turn him off from trying again. He did a great job and should not feel any shame in the way he conducted himself in this race.

I am proud to have him as a friend.

Bad News For The Lakefront

Greg Kowalski, at Metro Milwaukee Today, tells us that the patch of land on the lakefront is probably not going to have the right thing happen to it:

For many months the site that the former Pieces of Eight restaurant operated off of has been considered as the future UWM School of Freshwater Sciences. This received flak from some Milwaukeeians who’d still like to be able to dine along Lake Michigan. Now both sides of the aisle might be getting their wish. According to today’s Business Journal publication, Milwaukee-area philanthropist Michael Cudahy, who purchased the lease on the Pieces of Eight property, is speaking to upscale restaurant operator Joe Bartolotta for a possible restaurant on the site. This restaurant would be constructed in tandem with the UWM freshwater school.

What is it with Milwaukee these days? Where are our leaders that will put the good of the community first?

First we have Walker and the County Board playing the sell out and giving the county grounds away to a private developer, who wants to build a high end restaurant, a hotel, and oh yeah, supposedly an engineering school, which would have been better served being either on the UWM campus or downtown, say the Park East Corridor.

Now we see some the land at the lakefront being scooped up so that it could be used as a Freshwater School/Restaurant. What, will they be teaching the students the proper methods of preparing sushi?

Not one person that I am aware of has brought up that it should be just turned into a park, for the community to use, instead of just the wealthy.

This is a very disturbing trend that we find ourselves in, when the rich are allowed to snatch up public lands and turn them into something for their own profit and to keep the common people out.

The right keep screaming about how scared they are of the government taking over things. Meanwhile, we are just seeing the return of the feudal system, and no one even blinks.

Another Reason Not To Privatize The Airport

Greg Kowalski, at Metro Milwaukee Today, discusses the news of Southwest Airlines coming to Milwaukee. He makes quite the astute observation at the end of his post:

Lastly, to insert some politics into this, Southwest’s entry at Mitchell is a primary reason as to why Mitchell International shouldn’t be privatized, as Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker wants so badly. The airline’s entry at our airport shows that there are reasons to fly out of Milwaukee, and that Milwaukee is becoming a bigger part of Chicagoland travel. If Mitchell can expand by adding a larger runway and perhaps adding more gates and another concourse, you could see an airport that could take on Midway Airport and impress over 10 million people within 150 miles of the airport. Privatizing isn’t a good option for both reasonable travel and positive investment at the same time.

Besides the fact that privatizing the airport would be a risky venture as illustrated by the problems they're having at Midway, this only goes to show that Walker is a bad county executive and would be an even worse governor.

Lazich's Arguments Are Unmoving

From Greg Kowalski, on State Senator Mary Lazich and mass transit:

It goes to show that if there is a will, there certainly can be a way. State Senator Lazich refuses to acknowledge the will, and automatically goes to the claim that there will never be a way due to “few riders” and the “failure to reduce congestion and pollution”. Indeed, senator. So in the meantime, Lazich and her pals in the legislature enjoyed spending $1.9 billion of your tax dollars to reconstruct and add two additional lanes on I-94 from the I-894 interchange to the Illinois State Line. Furthermore, the state plans to spend upwards of $1.1 billion of your tax dollars on highway improvements in the Fox Cities, as well as upwards of $1 billion of your tax dollars to reconstruct the Zoo Interchange. Also, don’t forget the $810 million

of your tax dollars already spent on reconstructing the Marquette Interchange downtown.

Add those numbers up, folks. $4.81 BILLION of your tax dollars spent on freeways, $3 BILLION of which is in the Milwaukee metropolitan area. In the meantime, Lazich is having a hoot over a regional transit authority collecting funds to construct a $300 million commuter rail line, and conservative talk radio hosts have a bird over a $50 million downtown streetcar system and $100 million in bus rapid transit ideas. If you put the KRM, the streetcar, and BOTH Walker’s and Barrett’s bus rapid transit ideas in action, it would be roughly $550 million - which would only be a little over 1/4 what the total cost is for the I-94 project currently underway.

That alone places doubt in Lazich’s anger and points, and raises questions as to the true motives of why other means of transportation aren’t wanted by some conservative leaders and talkers.

It does make one wonder how she was able to run unopposed last year.

Kowalski: Don't Privatize Airport

Greg Kowalski, a man that knows development, has got it figured out:

Milwaukee area transit, in my opinion, needs a little more than $1 billion to truly get up to par with similar-sized cities such as Portland or Denver. The KRM commuter rail line alone is planned to cost somewhere in the ballpark of $300 million, and that’s connecting several southern suburbs, Racine, and Kenosha with Downtown Milwaukee. If the area wants to get serious on transit, that KRM needs to expand on several angles, including links to Waukesha, Port Washington, and West Bend. That alone, in future phases, could easily triple or quadruple the total investment in the system when the time comes.

But just looking at what is needed currently, a $300 million KRM and a revamped busing system could use up half of what Walker visions to be an excellent privatization investment. What’s missing is the fact that the $1 billion over 50 years would likely be nothing too spectacular. Items such as a 1% increase in sales taxes at this time seem to be a more doable solution and isn’t limited in return. While the increases now are balked at, if the dollars are invested wisely the area can begin to revitalize itself and make it a true, strong competitor in the United States.

Do read the whole thing.

If Palin Had Said No To McCain*

Last week, my friend, Greg Kowalski, despite sage advise from yours truly, as well as others, was lamenting about not making the top twenty in the BNN Influence Index. In the comment thread, I pointed out that this index rating system is, to be kind, a bit bizarre and rather meaningless.

To make my point even stronger, this week shows that Cog Dis, with my 2.3 readers, is now ranked number 19 for the state. What I find even funnier is that this site, for the second straight week, is listed as the second most influential liberal blog, right after the might folkbum's (of which I was a regular, but now only, occasional, contributor).

In all honesty, most any of the liberal bloggers on the blogroll in the right column should be higher than moi, in my opinion. But like I said before, these indices should be taken with a grain of salt.

Or so I thought. Apparently, some really do take them a bit more seriously than I do.

Apparently disappointed about not getting the nod to be McCain's pick for Veep, John Heneghan of Georgia, has put his BNN ranking as one of his qualifications to run for public office. (Tip of the crown to David Mastio.)

Perhaps this explains why James Wigderson is so interested in his rankings. He is apparently planning on running against Owen Robinson for some office or another.

Whoever wins that runoff doesn't matter. My money is on Jay Bullock.

*Watch the comments to see if I get scolded by David again.

The Cheesecake Factory

For some reason which is unfathomable to me, people like my restaurant reviews, so I will give you another one.

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of joining Greg Kowalski, author of Metro Milwaukee Today, for lunch. We agreed to meet at the Cheesecake Factory by Mayfair Mall. It is one of his favorite restaurants, and I wanted to see what all the hullabaloo was about.

We met there just as the lunch rush was ending, and were seated right away. I took a few moments to look around the restaurant. It was decorated in some sort of Egyptian/Byzantine design, and I wondered why they chose that theme. More on that later.

The menu was very expansive, and it would be hard for even the most finicky eater to find something that he or she didn't like. I ordered the lunch-portion of plain grilled salmon. After the waitress put in our order, she brought us a bowl of fresh bread. There was a selection of what appeared and tasted like French bread, as well as a dark rye bread, both of which were made in a more of a bread stick type of form. I opted for one of the French breads, and was pleased to find it still warm and rather tasty.

In a relatively short amount of time, the waitress brought our meals. The salmon fillet was accompanied by a serving of broccoli florets, french fries and, strangely, tartar sauce. I was kind of surprised by the tartar sauce. To me, putting tartar sauce on salmon would be akin to putting ketchup on a T-bone steak. I gave my bowl of tartar sauce to Greg, who had ordered a fish fry.

The salmon was very good. The portion was a little small for the price, but it was cooked to perfection. It was moist and delicately seasoned. (I am usually trepid about ordering salmon in most restaurant. They tend to drown the fish in one sauce or another and ruin the taste of the fish, in my humble opinion.)

It was also the best part of the meal. The broccoli was not fresh, and overcooked. It was soft and rather tasteless. The fries were OK, but way over-salted. Due to trying to keep from developing high blood pressure, which runs on both sides of my family, I tend to cook without any salt, unless it is included with some of the ingredients, and so I have developed a strong sensitivity to it. There was enough salt on those fries that I could barely taste the fries themselves.

As we were waiting for the bill, I took a closer look around. While the restaurant was bright and well lit, it was also rather busy with the decorations, including having the ceiling painted in what looked like something Michelangelo might have done...when he was three years old. To me, the gaudy decorations were rather ostentatious and distracting.

The service was prompt and attentive. While it was apparent that the management was trying to emphasize a personal feel, they obviously decided that the way to do that would be to have the wait staff follow a scripted set of lines, thereby destroying any attempts at homeyness, and making the poor waitress sound like a phone solicitor.

Overall, the restaurant was OK, but I don't know that I would go back there, unless it was part of a function. The food had its good and bad points, but it was on the expensive side, especially for what you get. It might be a nice restaurant for a young man that wanted to impress his date, or for an occasional change of pace, but for an established family with tight finances, it would not be a regular stop.