Blogging Blue

This just speaks for itself:

On May 21, Alex Barton, age 5, was escorted out of his kindergarten classroom at Morningside Elementary in Port St. Lucie, Fla., by the local police department’s “school resource officer.” Alex, who is autistic, was taken to the assistant principal, to whom he promised he would “not kick students, throw crayons, eat crayons, crawl under the table, kick the table of other students … [or] disrupt the class,” according to a police report. The assistant principal tucked in Alex’s shirt, put his “shoes on the right feet and tied them,” and sent Alex back to class. During Alex’s absence, his teacher, Wendy Portillo, “gathered the students to talk with them” about the youngster’s misbehavior.

When Alex returned, Portillo, who has been teaching in Port Lucie for 12 years, directed the youngster to the front of the room and “asked him to listen to what the children didn’t like” about him. According to Alex, the children complained that he “eats paper, picks boogers … and bites his shoelaces,” and Portillo herself said, “I hate you right now. I don’t like you today.”. Portillo next “polled the class” about whether to let Alex back in. Alex lost the class vote, 14-2, and spent the rest of the school day in the nurse’s office.

This story is disturbing on a lot of levels, but as the parent of an autistic child, I’m disturbed that a teacher would knowingly and intentionally subject a child with special needs - in this case Asperger’s - to that kind of treatment. What’s more, the fact that a teacher of children that young would tell a child she hates him absolutely boggles my mind. This is my worst fear as a parent - that my child is going to end up in a classroom where he’s made to feel different and ashamed of who he is simply because of his disorder. No child should ever be singled out and made to feel the way this child was made to feel.

So today, Wendy Portillo wins my Most Despicable Person of the Day Award.

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After years of running unopposed, it appears State Representative Mark Honadel is going to have an opponent this year in the race for Wisconsin’s 21st Assembly District. Two individuals - Justine Kozanoglu and Glen Brower - have filed the necessary paperwork to become official candidates. I don’t have much information on either of the two candidates at this point, but I’m hoping to be able to get interviews with both Brower and Kozanoglu in the very near future. While it’s too early to say if Brower or Kozanoglu will have a real chance of knocking off Mark Honadel, it’s exciting to see not one, but two Democrats step up and give him a fight after years of running without opposition.

I’ll have more on this race and each of the candidates in the near future.

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I had to reinstall my Wordpress database tonight, and in the process I lost my blogroll. I’ve done the best I can to recreate my blogroll from memory, but if I missed someone, please don’t be offended - just shoot me a message and I’ll re-add you.

P.S. - capper, I think you commented twice, but they got lost somewhere in the shuffle. Sorry!

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…but Cudahy Mayor Ryan McCue is having none of it. Shortly after casting a vote against Wal-Mart, McCue became the subject of a recall effort spearheaded by two Cudahy citizens who support putting a Wal-Mart right in the heart of Cudahy.

Randy Hollenbeck of The Way I See It, a local Cudahy blog, has taken up the issue of putting a Wal-Mart in Cudahy, and among the arguments he uses to justify putting a Wal-Mart in Cudahy is as follows (emphasis mine):

Wal-Mart doesn’t affect Cudahy’s image, just like have Pick N’ Save does not. What it does do is increase the standard of living. Look up what standard living means if in doubt.

While Randy Hollenbeck would like folks to believe having a Wal-Mart in Cudahy will increase the standard of living, the opposite is true. In fact, Wal-Mart has helped employees file for public asssistance, a fact which seems to fly in the face of Randy’s argument. Now sure, I suppose some will argue, “But Zach, you linked to the AFL-CIO…that proves that this is all about unions hating Wal-Mart.” Now sure, I linked to an article on the AFL-CIO website, but here’s proof that Wal-Mart assisted employees in seeking out and applying for public assistance.

And let’s not forget that almost two thousand Wal-Mart employees here in Wisconsin receive BadgerCare, at a cost of almost 1.8 million dollars to Wisconsin taxpayers. Now while Randy Hollenbeck might not mind paying his tax dollars to foot a health insurance bill that Wal-Mart and its billions of dollars in profits should be picking up, I’m not into corporate handouts. But getting back to my main point, the fact that almost two thousand Wal-Mart employees in Wisconsin need BadgerCare just underscores my point that Wal-Mart does little to raise the standard of living, as Randy Hollenbeck asserts.

Putting aside Randy Hollenbeck’s argument about Wal-Mart raising the standard of living in Cudahy, I believe this is an issue of folks in Cudahy settling for a Wal-Mart when they could raise their expectations much, much higher. Why not seek out a development that enhances Cudahy’s reputation, instead of settling for the eleventh Wal-Mart within a twenty mile radius?

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You’re the first sitting Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice to be disciplined by your peers for violating the state’s judicial ethics code. The decision stems from Ziegler’s decision to preside over 11 cases involving West Bend Savings Bank, where her husband, J.J. Ziegler, is a director. In their decision the court called Ziegler’s action in those cases “a serious failing.” In a settlement reached with the State Ethics Board six weeks after her election as a Justice, Ziegler admitted she violated a provision of the state ethics code that says officials cannot act on matters in which they have a financial interest, and she agreed to pay a cash forfeiture and attorney fees for the state.

So congratulations Justice Ziegler…you’ve left your indelible mark on Wisconsin’s Judiciary.

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