ANGLICIZING FORM B. The March issue of Railway has reached Cold Spring Shops, with news of line closures for maintenance of way (engineering possessions there) on the West Coast Main line and on the suburban lines out of London Liverpool Street, and a passenger protest on First Great Western.


The issue also includes a brief report on Santa Fe, er, BNSF, trebling over Cajon Pass (there is a distinct fourth line, part of Union Pacific's, originally Southern Pacific's Colton to Palmdale line that avoids much of the Los Angeles traffic) that concludes with,

It should be recorded that while all this work was ongoing, the BNSF and UP Railroads continued to run their normal services. At times of light traffic flows, one of the lines would sometimes [be] taken out of use and given over to the engineering departments but, in the main, the work fitted in with the normal flow of trains.

Unlike in the UK, where engineering work governs the running of a railway, the US demands that engineering and track work fits in with the core business of running trains and earning revenue.

The columnist, Colin J. Marsden, introduced his article with the observation that the Cajon Pass line is the "world's busiest freight artery," hosting some 150 movements per day on busy days. There are other lines east from Los Angeles, but these are also, despite expansions, at capacity. US railroads have no option but to keep maintenance of way forces from occupying tracks at the same time as trains. The procedure I am most familiar with is the Form B track bulletin. It's most commonly used to protect one track whilst trains running in both directions use another track.

THE TRAGEDY OF DEFINING THE COMMONS. If there is to be a water war, it could start in our back yard. There is a procedure for what the states so delicately call a "diversion" of water from the Great Lakes. There are some amendments being considered.

The existing law already requires unanimous governor approval for Great Lakes diversions, and some states will see a switch away from that as a step backward in Great Lakes protection. The Wisconsin legislators say they only want to change the compact so the diversions require a majority vote, rather than a unanimous vote, but compact proponents say the results could be disastrous.

It seems like a small detail, although the situation is not one where perfect is the enemy of good enough.

[David] Naftzger [of the Council of Great Lakes Governors] notes that the rules were drafted with input from business leaders, environmentalists and political leaders from both parties. He said the process included more than 60 public meetings and generated more than 13,000 public comments.

He said more than just the compact could be at stake here, because the existing rules governing diversions are considered by most to be too weak and arbitrary to withstand a court challenge - and such a challenge could lead to an opening of the Great Lakes floodgates. That's why passing the compact is so important to so many people.

But in order to prevent a court from granting Arizona, let alone southern parts of Illinois or Ohio from running water mains from the Lakes accompanied by treated sewage discharge to the Lakes, parts of Wisconsin almost in sight of the Lakes could be cut off.

[Wisconsin state representative Scott] Gunderson's district covers areas of Waukesha County, which has become famous in the debate over who should be allowed access to the Great Lakes because it is so close to the shores of Lake Michigan but just outside the basin. Many of its residents are in dire need of a fresh source of water because the wells they have historically relied upon are contaminated with radium, a naturally occurring but potentially cancer-causing substance.

One consequence of revising the compact, which defines property rights to the water, is that a decision to build mains and discharges once taken by Waukesha officials, perhaps with Wisconsin state funding, will now require consent of all eight governors of the Great Lakes states. The role of the two Canadian provinces has yet to be settled.

ICE FISHING, HERE? It's a sunset view from my deck. That's a retention pond, part of the flood control cum beautification that accompanies modern developments. Across Malta Road is a cornfield. When the rains are heavy, all the runoff from that cornfield goes into the pond.


The cloud bank foreshadows the panhandle hooker to come. Most of the day we had sunshine. There were more people on campus, coming to terms, signing a second message board, leaving flowers and teddy bears. Offices open on Tuesday, February 19. Classes will resume Monday, February 25. Exam week will begin Monday, May 12.

NOW TO SLEEP. University officials moved tonight's memorial service inside, to the Duke Ellington Ballroom. University officials, our state representative and senator, our musicians, and Rev^d Jesse L. Jackson spoke. The program had a proper mix of requiem and civil rights rally. Note the candles, lighters, and cell phone screens.

Outside, a message board is available for people to leave messages.

There are many more flowers, balloons, and notes at the snowy hill.

Thanks for looking in, and good night.

FLOWERS FOR ALGERNON. I recently tracked down a copy of the Scholastic Book anthology Night in Funland to refresh my memory about a short story involving a chess game on a train. That story is "Exchange of Men" by Nemerov and Johnson. The book also includes "The Most Dangerous Game," the best campfire story ever. Then there's "Flowers for Algernon" which provides the storyline for a 1968 movie, Charly, which I recall as being popular with some of the hippyish types in my high school.

The storyline involved a medical therapy that turned a retarded man into a genius. In fact, the therapy gave the man such cognitive powers that he was able to figure out that the therapy would depreciate, and he would revert to form. His doctors were not able to see it.

I'm wondering if our campus shooter doesn't pose a Charly-like problem to mental health professionals. Medications might have sufficiently tamed his inner demons that he could demonstrate his potential as a scholar, or perhaps as a superintendent of corrections. On the other hand (everything involving tradeoffs) they might have had side effects, or effects that depreciated. Thus for the practitioners and ethicists, and thus also for that fine line between genius and madness.

HELP FROM MY FRIENDS. I want to acknowledge the kind remarks people, including some who I haven't heard from in years, have left in the comments and in electronic mails. Thanks, also, to supportive posts by Jim and Phil and John and King and Bill and Dave. (Those are the links I was able to locate on Site Meter and Technorati.)

Welcome, also, to readers from The Unofficial Stanford Blog and The Lede from the New York Times and Brickmuppet and Joanne Jacobs (who appears to be having server difficulties). Thank you for your interest. Look in again, when we might be able to think about academic culture, or economics, or public policy, or things that run on rails.

My doctoral training did not include anything on dealing with shootings.

COLD AND QUIET.


The first thing visitors to campus who approach from the northeast see is these crosses. I lost it when I saw them. It happened here.


At 1.30, it's early for the 1 pm classes to dismiss, but on a Friday, this walkway is pretty busy with students having completed long lunches or otherwise getting a head start on their weekend getaways.


Television station KSTP is in the Twin Cities.

Cole Hall is being repaired. Our able buildings and grounds people are being assisted by Aftermath,a firm specializing in crime scene repairs.


The press tent is east of Watson Creek, or the drainage ditch, if you wish. That's the library in the background.


The largest of several improvised memorials is on the west side of the King Commons, not far from the press tent. A number of satellite trucks have deployed in the bus turnaround at the Student Center.


Someone has left a wreath at the memorial flagpole that overlooks the East Lagoon.


The Chicago-area television stations used their local knowledge to secure spaces in front of Altgeld Hall.


There were very few people about. Newscasters were asking passers-by for reactions. The setting lends itself to reportage without narration: small knots of kids, on the verge of tears, family members leaving flowers on that snowy hill, a steady trickle of people using the one open entrance to the student center, where the counselors are on duty.

IT HAPPENED HERE.

The shooter is a former Northern Illinois student who earned one of the deans' awards conferred for undergraduate work. He worked with criminologist Jim Thomas, a good man who should also be in your thoughts. In the ongoing press conference, Chief Grady has characterized the shooter as "a student revered by faculty and staff." The chief mentioned something about the shooter recently discontinuing some medications, but that he did not have the criminal background that would have disqualified him from purchasing the guns, which a representative of BATF notes were lawfully purchased in Champaign, "six days ago." He transported the weapons in a guitar case. This graphic of the Jameson Auditorium in Cole Hall shows the rear access door, stage right, that the shooter used for access to the room. The Chicago Sun-Times has obtained an interview with lecturer Joseph Peterson, an aspiring vertebrate paleontologist who was teaching Introduction to Ocean Sciences and was himself wounded by the shooter.

The recriminations are likely to begin soon, if the press questions are at all predictive. The shooter's use of mood-altering drugs will keep practitioners and ethicists busy. The university's emergency-response procedures worked as they were intended to. We have excellent assistance from security and counter-terrorism professionals on campus, and none of them found any failings in the procedures. The wireless communication infrastructure in DeKalb proved not to be robust enough for the traffic.

To prevent future occurrences is unlikely to be easy. As the Chicago Tribune editorialists remind readers,

Our thoughts go to the broader NIU diaspora as well. When the setting is a university, any assault, on one person or a hundred, is a siege against a community of thousands.

A campus is like the college experience itself -- the tempo is fluid, the atmosphere unconstrained. In factories or office towers, bosses sit here and workers toil there. On a campus, anyone can materialize virtually anywhere and instantly belong. Momentary fates mix and separate people. You skipped class to finish your project? Oh. You sat in on this one because you missed the prof's same lecture to his 10 o'clock section? Oh.

Campuses draw their energy from all these freedoms they enable. Freedoms an assailant can exploit. Not every corridor is locked, not every stranger is suspicious. To the contrary: Corridors are inviting, strangers are potential lifetime friends.This day we are left to mourn just how vicious that exploitation can become. Left to mourn people who, for multitudes of serious and rollicking reasons, followed their dreams to NIU.

Dean Dad notes you can't put the city in a bubble.

The editorial team at the Northern Star realizes what a challenge we face.

Kishwaukee Hospital updated its site at 9.35. Eighteen patients, seventeen by ambulance and one walk-in; one 22 year old male, deceased; seven critical patients transferred to hospitals in Rockford or nearer suburbs; one male patient remains in good condition and one female patient in fair condition; eight patients discharged.

That will be all until after sunset.

THE GOODWILL WILL HELP US.

The radio call-in shows I listened to overnight revealed a great deal of regard for our university from residents of the northern tier counties, from university employees of all jobs, from students. Many residents of what we understand as Chicagoland have Northern Illinois connections, either as students or graduates or as friends of students or graduates. News reporters were impressed that somebody in the university made time, in the middle of the troubles, to arrange for coffee and hot chocolate for law enforcement and press people.

I regret to report that a sixth seventh person died overnight.

We know the names of four five fallen students.

Dan Parmenter, 20 of Westchester
Catalina Garcia, 20 of Cicero
Ryanne Mace, 19 of Carpentersville
Julianna Gehant, 32 of downstate Meriden.
Gayle Dubrowski, 20 of Carol Stream.

(Editorial notes, 10.34: because people were choppered to hospitals in Winnebago and Kane counties, more than one coroner was involved in confirming identities. As of this morning, the death toll is the five students named above, and the shooter. As biographical information becomes available, I will add links to the list.)

I've learned of a Facebook condolence book.

Northern Illinois University has received messages of support from several universities. The site will be updated. A service called Legacy.com has opened condolence books for each of our fallen students. There's also a general purpose condolence book.

There will be a gathering at 9 pm Friday evening on the King Commons. The university plans a more formal convocation, at a date yet to be determined.

There's extensive print media coverage from the Chicago Tribune and the DeKalb Chronicle.

The Northern Illinois University press conference will be at 9 AM (Central Standard Time). Chicago's WGN and WBBM have committed to stream it. Kishwaukee Hospital's briefing will be at 11 AM. The briefing is available at the hospital's home page, which has reverted to its standard content. At 6.30, one patient remains at Kishwaukee, in fair condition after orthopedic surgery.

There will be additional links added to this post as I receive information.

IT CAN HAPPEN HERE.

UPDATES 9.03. Here's a DeKalb Chronicle photograph of Chief Grady at the 5.30 briefing.


The chief was activated by the reserves to advise the Baghdad police, to return safely to today's events. And self-defense instructor Erin Weed, who is to visit campus in the near future, had a difficult day.

Normally on Valentine’s Day I would post something light, cute and funny. I find it hard to do that today, as shots rang out at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb. NIU is a stop on my spring tour, and my staff has been working with a member of Panhellenic Council to plan the event. I wrote her a note today, after hearing what had happened. What’s there really to do, besides tell someone you care and are keeping the entire campus community in your thoughts and prayers. I am just about to leave the office, and I heard back from her. She says her friend was killed, and her mom is coming to pick her up. It reminded me of the day of the Virginia Tech shooting. I had spoken at VA Tech just a few months before that mass murder, and I facebooked all my friends during that day to check in. It’s just heartbreaking that students have to be concerned about getting shot in the head while listening to a professor’s lecture. Sadly, I know what it feels like to lose a friend to cowardly homicide…and there really aren’t words. I just hope they don’t plaster this killer’s face and name all over the place. The best punishment is to not give any recognition at all. All of us at Girls Fight Back are sending some warm thoughts and peace to all affected by this tragedy.

I'm going to stand down for the evening. Milt Rosenberg has altered his evening programming for further discussion of the social psychology of such events. It hasn't sunk in completely for me.

UPDATES 8.49. Kishwaukee Hospital will hold a news conference at 9 am Friday. President Peters announced a Northern Illinois University news briefing for about the same time. The Huffington Post provides additional information on the fatalities.

Seventeen victims were brought to Kishwaukee Community Hospital in DeKalb, according to spokeswoman Theresa Komitas. One died, two were admitted and three were discharged; five are being evaluated and six others were transferred to other hospitals in critical condition. At least one male died at OSF St. Anthony Medical Center in Rockford, an official said.

The article also notes,

The school was closed for one day during final exam week in December after campus police found threats, including racial slurs and references to shootings earlier in the year at Virginia Tech, scrawled on a bathroom wall in a dormitory. Police determined after an investigation that there was no imminent threat and the campus was reopened. Peters said he knew of no connection between that incident and Thursday's attack.

The shooting was the fourth at a U.S. school within a week.

On Feb. 8, a woman shot two fellow students to death before committing suicide at Louisiana Technical College in Baton Rouge. In Memphis, Tenn., a 17-year-old is accused of shooting and critically wounding a fellow student Monday during a high school gym class, and the 15-year-old victim of a shooting at an Oxnard, Calif., junior high school has been declared brain dead.

A weblogger is contemplating the possibility of copycat crimes. In my exploration of websites, I've discovered a number of less scientifically sound recriminatory posts on a variety of topics, and expect that there will be more, although they won't figure in my coverage.

UPDATE 8.14. A student files a report.

I am OK, but this is bad. Very surreal. Nobody should have the experience that I am having right now. The shooter is confirmed dead which is good, probable suicide. Keep the 15+ victims in your prayers. For those that don't know, the shooting was inside Cole Hall, which is located almost at the center of campus. Keep the university students in your prayers.

Luckily my class was located in Barsema at the time, as farthest away as I could be. Walking up to the building, all I heard were people talking on their cell phones about seeing ambulances and the shooting. I couldn't believe my ears. The building was properly locked down for an hour or so and we were let out and finally got cell phone service so we could call our families.

Cole Hall. I remember taking one of my finals in that place, thinking to myself and saying to my friends that this would be the place a shooting would maybe happen. Truly unbelievable. The biggest auditorium on campus. I have friends in critical condition and wish for their recoveries.

UPDATE 8.08. President Peters reports six fatalities, four females and two males, four people dead at the scene and two at hospitals. Twenty-two people were injured or killed. All casualties, to use President Peters's expression, are students, including the lecturer, a graduate assistant in the geography department. The shooter is a former sociology graduate student, last enrolled in the Spring 2007 semester. All university functions are closed until further notice.

UPDATE 8.01. Good evening, visitors from University Diaries and Instapundit. Thanks for your concern.

UPDATES 6.06. Summary of news conference from WMAQ broadcast. President Peters reports the shooter dead, "apparently of a self-inflicted gunshot wound." Chief Grady reports that the shooter has been identified, although his identity cannot yet be released. The shooter is not a Northern Illinois student. The chief strikes the right balance of professionalism and impatience with the newsies. "I don't know" means "I don't know." University Police were at Cole Hall two minutes after the first emergency call. The shooting appears to have ended by then. Kishwaukee Hospital continues to report the 5.26 situation: no reported fatalities other than the shooter. A caller to WMAQ claims some cell-phone video will be available.

UPDATES 5.30. News sources agree the shooter is dead, but whether by his own hand or by law enforcement is not settled. The university is providing a press briefing at this hour in the Altgeld auditorium (see it here in a happier setting). The university is encouraging all students to ring their parents. WMAQ is reporting several students airlifted to Rockford and at Kishwaukee Hospital: two to five critical, eight serious.

UPDATES 4.42. Campus is closed Friday. Several sources confirm the shooter is dead. Some students interviewed by WMAQ are still reporting people hurt in DuSable Hall although the university reports the situation is confined to Cole Hall. (This interactive map provides the location of buildings. Cole is a lecture hall with four or five large classrooms just west of the central commons. DuSable is a large classroom building to the southwest.)

I only know what's on the news. Streaming video from Rockford here.

Several people have been shot at Northern Illinois University, according to information heard Thursday afternoon over a police scanner and from eyewitness reports.

Kishwaukee Community Hospital said they were treating at least 15 people from the shooting.Reports have said the shooter is down but that has not been confirmed by law enforcement officials. Police have established a perimeter around Cole Hall, and 15-20 emergency vehicles were in the area.

Students are praying and many students are on cell phones or crying.

Shortly before 3 p.m., one shooter went into Northern Illinois University's Cole Hall auditorium armed with a shotgun and opened fire at random, according to witnesses at the scene. There reportedly were as many as five possible victims.

Early reports can be misleading.

As of 3:45 p.m., two shooting victims were being tended to at nearby Neptune Hall, a student residence hall. Shortly before 4 p.m., another victim was pulled out of Cole Hall, according to eyewitness reports. The northern door to Cole Hall was smashed, according to eyewitness reports.

A Daily Chronicle photographer on the scene reported five people going by on stretchers. Blood was apparent and obvious, the photographer said.

At least two people are reported down in DuSable Hall, and one person was shot in the head, according to eyewitness reports. It could not be confirmed if it was from a gunshot.

On scene information as of later in the afternoon confines the shooting site to Cole Hall, with ambulances using the bus turnaround near DuSable Hall.

At 4.17 this afternoon, I received the following message from the college office.

CAMPUS ALERT
2/14/08
4:10 p.m.

Campus police report that the scene is secure. Only essential personnel should remain on campus.

The following hotlines are available for students & parents.
815-753-1573
815-753-6143
815-753-1574
815-753-1575
815-753-9564
815-753-6257

Counseling is also available on campus for students at the Neptune Dining Hall, Campus Life Building 100 and the Psychological Services Center in the Psychology/Computer Science Building.

Please continue to check the NIU website for further information as it becomes available.

That's all for now. This post remains on top and I will update it as new information becomes available.

THE EUROPEANS CAN'T MATCH THIS. Railroads invest to move the goods.

The upgrade is part of a railroad renaissance under way across much of the U.S. For the first time in nearly a century, railroads are making large investments in their networks -- adding sets of tracks, straightening curves that force engines to slow and expanding tunnels for bigger trains. Their campaign is altering the corridors of American commerce, more so than any other development since interstate highways spread to the interior.

In some cases, the upgrades create new transportation corridors, off the historic routes.

The buildout comes as the industry transitions away from its chief role in recent decades of hauling coal, timber and other raw materials in manufacturing regions. Now, increasingly, railroads are moving finished consumer goods, often made in Asia, from ports to major cities. Their new higher-volume routes, called corridors, often serve the South, where the rail system is less developed and the population is rising.

Railroad operators are pressing for advantage over their main competitor, long-haul trucking, which has struggled with rising fuel prices, driver shortages and highway congestion. Railroads say a load can be moved by rail using about a third as much fuel as it takes to haul it by truck. And rail transport is becoming more efficient still, they say, as operators speed their lines and logistics companies build huge warehouse areas along routes.

The legacy shippers are not happy.

The expansion is stirring conflict with some old customers, the shippers who move raw materials such as chemicals, grain and logs, who feel they're being charged unnecessarily high rates to pay for capital improvements. Trade groups representing such shippers are seeking federal legislation to rein in railroad rate increases.

I fear that there is no pricing system for a railroad (or any other multiproduct enterprise with sharable inputs) that makes everybody happy. The old system of regulation really wasn't better, with many prices based on the regulators' perception of the value of service.

The article includes some interactive maps showing great railroad engineering of the last century and the present. It also leaves out some other contemporary engineering accomplishments: imagine three and four tracks across Nebraska and Wyoming that do not see a passenger train.

YOU CAN'T PIN THESE ON THE STUDENTS. Two posts at Rate Your Students illustrate that the real problem is with the universities. Here's one anonymous whinge about the hassles of disciplinary hearings.

I'd learned that retention, especially of students who helped with recruiting and / or retention, trumped integrity every time. So I just failed you for my course.

That's a policy decision. Identify the enablers in your university. (It is no accident that one of the four ingredients of a diploma mill figures in the complaint.)

Another anonymous whinge describes faculty required to assist with special pleading.

My college requires that students who seek exemptions from the ordinary plan of courses must appeal directly to the dean's office for a syllabus waiver. This didn't sound too painful to implement until I received the unwritten instructions to decode "direct."

Direct means "you must write a letter to the dean that is edited by the department's undergraduate advisor/ 2nd year assistant professor who really has nothing better to do with her time."

What could possibly be the reason for having the undergraduate advisor ghost write student's syllabus appeal letters you ask? Well, I was told that "too many illegible letters of appeal end up in the dean's hands,” so I am to "ensure that our student’s appeals are coherent and justified."

May I ask the students to rewrite their letters themselves? "No, the dean strongly prefers well written appeals that he can process quickly."

Yessir, sure thing. You own my future since you sign off on all personnel matters. I'll be happy to do that. Let me get right to that.

So, on this cold Sunday evening, I'm ignoring my own work to edit appeals from Sue B, Wingo, and Fred who all could not bear to be in the new "fills the requirements" class with the new professor in our department "because we herd [sic] he grades really really hard," "because the course time crashes into abnormal psych, which is my favorite class," and "because I can't make it to a 9:30 class, it's just too early."

Incidentally, I'm also thinking of editing my resignation letter. I really hope the dean won't mind a faculty resignation letter penned in the same incomprehensible style as all of the letters I edit for him.

That last paragraph is the only sensible statement in the post. I have trouble respecting any faculty member who places such a high value on tenure at such a crappy job (that's the scientific term) that he or she accedes to so ridiculous a request (from a chairman? a dean?) Such an institution is not deserving of loyalty from anyone with integrity: either exit, or use your voice to start an insurrection on the curriculum committee. Ambitious students are starving the seat-selling institutions of enrollments. It takes ambitious faculty to starve them of staffing.

THE END OF TENURE, AND OF GRADES? A Phi Beta Cons post quotes a definition of diversity issued by a college committee at Virginia Tech. The committee comes from Tech's College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, an intriguing amalgam of some social sciences, some humanities, education, and military science.

The college diversity committee is reflective of the merger of two units, the former College of Human Sciences and Education and the Division of Liberal Arts which was partitioned from the College of Arts and Sciences. Both units have a long and distinguished history of diversity work. The college diversity committee serves in an advisory capacity to the dean and is led by a steering committee consisting of faculty and the Associate Dean. Membership on the committee is open to faculty, staff, and students in the college. Representation from each department is encouraged. Four to six meetings are held during the academic year; sub-committee meetings are held as needed.

The racing sailor in me rejects the notion of a "steering" committee, and the open invitation calls forth the expected mix of the usual suspects. (A department's non-participation on such a committee can be a signal of seriousness of purpose among its faculty.)

As is often the case, the diversity statement is part of a time-sucking strategic plan (as .pdf). (How about a simple one: More like North Carolina than like a diploma mill?) And it's an attempt by the Diversity Boondoggle to respond to, and head off, another massacre. (A tougher policy toward loonies strikes me as more practical.) And, at the next meeting (as .pdf) a draft statement emerged. That draft contained what became the first part of the statement Phi Beta Cons posted.

We, the CLAHS Diversity Committee, use the term diversity to mean socially constructed differences among people that serve to create and sustain privileges for some while creating and sustaining disadvantages for others. These differences include but are not limited to race, ethnicity, gender, class, ability, health status, sexual orientation, gender expression, age, and geographical location.

As it stands, it's incoherent. Perhaps "diversity" refers to the existence of "differences" but that "socially constructed" covers a multitude of phenomena. Health status "constructed?" We could wish the flu away? Age? We count by something other than years, or in something other than base ten?

Somebody did a bit of wordsmithing. I haven't located those minutes. Any Virginia Tech readers are welcome to provide the link in the comments.

We, the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, use the term ‘diversity’ to mean the desirability and value of many kinds of individual differences while at the same time acknowledging and respecting that socially constructed differences based on such characteristics as gender, race, ethnicity, class, ability, health status, sexual orientation, gender expression, age, and geographical and cultural background exist within systems of power that create and sustain inequality, hierarchy, and privilege.

The revision suggests that there are differences that are not "socially constructed" but it still doesn't resolve the incoherence. Now "diversity" means desiring and valuing individual differences (including acting asocially in writing class?) rather than recognizing differences.

Then comes this:

The College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences is determined to eliminate these forms of inequality, hierarchy, and privilege in our programs and practices. In this sense, diversity is to be actively advanced because it fosters excellence in learning, discovery, and engagement.

Aren't standards for tenure, or for grading, socially constructed systems of power that create and sustain inequality, hierarchy, and privilege? I leave the generalization to excellence, discovery, or engagement to the reader as an exercise.

I'd appreciate any clarification: what socially constructed systems of power does this committee view as acceptable?

IT'S CLEARED THE AIR. Tuesday's weather forecast noted that we lack dust particles to form snowflakes.

I HATE "Alberta Clippers"! Not only are they the most unpredictable snowstorms to predict, but this one, with the atmosphere solidly below freezing, is producing a little sleet and freezing drizzle and seemingly defying the laws of physics to the uninitiated. What is happening is this: the air is so clean right now, that drops of frozen liquid have no nuclei to form onto and freeze (nuclei being a speck of dust or something similar). Lacking it, the moisture falls as supercooled water droplets---and then freezes on contact. So, we throw that into the mix of the forecast today, and then we catch a break tonight and tomorrow and much of Thursday...before we get a wintry, snowy and/or icy mix Thursday evening.

The forecast did not attribute the cleansed air to the recent spell of snowstorms. We had plenty of snow before Christmas, but it melted in such a way as to preclude a white Christmas, and some more just before New Year, and that melted in a system that brought in tornadoes, and the recent spate of snows arrived just too late for the planned snow sculpting contest.

I HAD A SPORTS BAR IN MIND. Professor McCracken characterizes the open kitchen as a "material manifestation of feminism."

Women complained that the dining room made them servants in their own home, obliged to leave their guests and ferry things to and from the kitchen, charging through heavy doors, turning their backs on the festivities and otherwise obliged to absent themselves from the occasion.

The open kitchen also suits new models of parenting. Americans are inclined to raise their kids in a way that privileges emotional and physical freedom over ceremonial perfection. From this point of view, the dining room was always a problem. It insisted that kids be formal, still, observant, when their natural condition, especially in an over stimulating America, was more active and spontaneous.

Whatever.


It's now in use, and, at the moment, a little less tidy. Some wooden swivel-back bar stools and some dining room chairs to match would go well, no?

PUT SOME SALMON STRIPES ON IT. The French roll out something that looks like a cross between a Space Shuttle and an Electroliner.

ALSTOM’s Automotrice Grande Vitesse (AGV) will supplant the famed TGV on France’s highest-speed electrified rail lines, traveling at speeds up to 360km/h (224mph), and powered not by locomotives but by under-floor mounted traction motors.

Under-floor traction motors, Westinghouse-Nuttall drive, cut in the field shunts, put some bigger wheels on it? Hey, maybe they could sell a Mellow-tang cheese sandwich.

Ryan Road, late winter, 1959.

QUOTE OF THE DAY. Melanie Scarborough of the Examiner newspapers:

The failure of secondary education means that a college degree is roughly the equivalent of what a high school diploma was a generation ago. Consequently, college instruction is not necessarily higher education; in many cases, it’s remedial, with universities having to teach freshmen basics they should have learned in ninth grade. Employers know that, which is why even the most menial of jobs now requires a college degree — spawning lower-tier state universities that are essentially seat-selling operations.

Her conclusion: "Throwing money at schools that don’t need it to spend on students who don’t deserve it defines government waste." Cato's Neal McCluskey concurs. At Phi Beta Cons, George Leef concurs in part and dissents in part.

I don't disagree, but there is another factor that I think should be considered — the rising wealth in the country. There is a huge amount of wealth owned by older Americans. The sellers of luxury cars, glamorous jewelry, posh condos and similar things have been charging more for their goods, too. They know how to separate rich people from their money. Colleges and universities also know how to play that game. Grandparents with big estates don't hesitate to write out the checks so Johnny and Suzy can get their degrees. My guess is that we would see tuition rising even if it weren't for federal subsidies, although not as rapidly and widely perhaps.

The bursting of the real estate asset bubble will make a lot of wealthy people significantly less wealthy. That should do much more to slow down the rise in tuition than anything the politicians could cook up.

Yeah, let's have a depression to tame the positional arms races. Great idea. Since the positional arms race that Oma and Opa are underwriting reflects access-assessment-remediation-retention at the seat-selling operations, the simplest fix involves strengthening the academic environment at the land grants and the mid-majors, which isn't that hard to do.

SWITCHING OUT THE SCRAP LINE. Villainous Company is back, with observations on a silly piece by a rather selfish woman who notes,

As the only single woman in my son’s mommy-and-me group, I used to listen each week to a litany of unrelenting complaints about people’s husbands and feel pretty good about my decision to hold out for the right guy, only to realize that these women wouldn’t trade places with me for a second, no matter how dull their marriages might be or how desperately they might long for a different husband. They, like me, would rather feel alone in a marriage than actually be alone, because they, like me, realize that marriage ultimately isn’t about cosmic connection—it’s about how having a teammate, even if he’s not the love of your life, is better than not having one at all.

The writer, however, is likely to be disappointed.

Now, though, I realize that if I don’t want to be alone for the rest of my life, I’m at the age where I’ll likely need to settle for someone who is settling for me. What I and many women who hold out for true love forget is that we won’t always have the same appeal that we may have had in our 20s and early 30s. Having turned 40, I now have wrinkles, bags under my eyes, and hair in places I didn’t know hair could grow on women. With my nonworking life consumed by thoughts of potty training and playdates, I’ve become a far less interesting person than the one who went on hiking adventures and performed at comedy clubs. But when I chose to have a baby on my own, the plan was that I would continue to search for true connection afterward; it certainly wasn’t that I would have a baby alone only to settle later. After all, wouldn’t it have been wiser to settle for a higher caliber of “not Mr. Right” while my marital value was at its peak?

The real deal-breaker, however, is that turkey-baster baby, as she is beginning to figure out.

Just as the relationship books fail to mention what happens after you triumphantly land a husband (you actually have to live with each other), these single-mom books fail to mention that once you have a baby alone, not only do you age about 10 years in the first 10 months, but if you don’t have time to shower, eat, urinate in a timely manner, or even leave the house except for work, where you spend every waking moment that your child is at day care, there’s very little chance that a man—much less The One—is going to knock on your door and join that party.

They also gloss over the cost of dating as a single mom: the time and money spent on online dating (because there are no single men at toddler birthday parties); the babysitter tab for all those boring blind dates; and, most frustrating, hours spent away from your beloved child. Even women who settle but end up divorced might be in a better position than those of us who became mothers on our own, because many ex-wives get both child-support payments and a free night off when the kids go to Dad’s house for a sleepover. Never-married moms don’t get the night off. At the end of the evening, we rush home to pay the babysitter, make any houseguest tiptoe around and speak in a hushed voice, then wake up at 6 a.m. at the first cries of “Mommy!”

Try bringing a guy home to that.

Somewhere in my files, I have an op-ed piece from the Badger Herald, going on 20 years ago, in which a collegiate columnist anticipates exactly these outcomes from the emerging fad of sperm-donor babies.

There's a Marginal Revolution post on the suboptimality of the "settling" strategy, with or without the baby, and a Pandagon post that offers a dissenting view. Spirited bull sessions in progress at all the sites mentioned.

BATTLE OF THE SEXES. She's independent and gripes about men unwilling to commit. He's feckless and gripes about women unwilling to commit. There's a lengthy conversation following this post about a marriage strike. (Via Joanne Jacobs.)

QUOTE OF THE DAY. Speech codes: not restricted to the land-grants and the mid-majors.

Colleges should be centers of learning, not indoctrination. The tenured left and sympathetic or compliant administrators have stigmatized or marginalized traditional thought that doesn't comport with the dominant liberal agenda. They're no longer honest brokers of intellectual heterodoxy. They've increasingly become advocates for liberal orthodoxy's vision of societal change. You'd think the model was the "re-education camps" into which "reactionary" South Vietnamese were herded by the victorious North after the war.

I quibble with the columnist's characterization of students as "customers" rather than "novitiates" (where I think he means "postulants"). "Clients" seeking intellectual development is more like it, and the Perpetually Aggrieved are stifling intellectual development. On that we can agree.

THE CASE FOR SOCIAL DISTANCE. Princeton economist Gene Grossman likes the camaraderie of the gym, with limits.

The gym can play a relatively unique role in campus social life. It is one of the few places where students, faculty and staff mix, and on entirely equal footing! Now I will admit that Stephens is not my favorite place to be asked whether the required readings are fair game for the exam (they were, after all, required) or whether the growing trade between Burkina Faso and Belarus would make a good topic for a dissertation chapter. Still, there is nothing like seeing the pained expression of a professor in the act of lifting to make a him seem more human to his students and vice versa.

He'd also like a better gym. Recruitment committees: please note.

THEY'RE ALSO CATCHING ON. Professors: dress for success.

Professors, it’s been said, are the worst-dressed middle-class occupational group in America. Instead of being role models, we’ve convinced everyone to slum. As clothing theorist Nicholas Antongiavanni explains in The Suit: A Machiavellian Approach to Men’s Style, “[M]any came to believe the protestation of academics that taste was nothing but a fraud perpetrated by the great to keep down the people.

I'll leave aside the idea of a clothing theorist for now. There is a better way.

Trying to look like students is partly self-denial, but scruffily dressed faculty also have highfalutin goals. Some sartorial underachievement is aimed at furthering a “nurturing” atmosphere. The classroom setting should be non-confrontational, it’s argued, with professors and students hangin’ out as buddies.

But it doesn’t work, except perhaps for sexual poaching. Radical economist Bob Lamb discovered “that if I buy my suits at Brooks Brothers and look like a banker, it is much easier to get Harvard students to believe what I am telling them.” Bonding is nice only if you don’t expect intellectual activity.

The comments to the post are active. I took my stand years ago.

THEY'RE CATCHING ON. The meaninglessness of the multiculturalism-to-math ratio.

This is a useful undertaking, but it leaves some possibilities open. For one, teachers might learn how to instruct on math in classes that aren't exclusive to math — classes without "math" in the title. In addition, some of the "diversity" classes might not be totally devoted to left-wing social goals; in a lot of areas, teachers have to deal with situations they've never seen before, and it's not unreasonable for an education school to prepare them for it.

We knew that.

PENCIL-NECKED GEEKS. I miss Fred Blassie singing a verse about this.

Their waists, like that of Mr. Svetlichnyy, measure 28 or 30 inches. They have, ideally, long necks, pencil thighs, narrow shoulders and chests no more than 35.5 inches in circumference, Mr. Brown said. “It’s client driven,” he added. “That’s just the size that blue-chip designers and high-end editorials want.”

In Mr Blassie's absence, imagine your daughter bringing one of these, er, gentlemen home.

You see if you take a pencil that won't hold lead,
Looks like a pipe cleaner attached to a head,
Add a buggy whip body with a brain that leaks,
You got yourself a grit eatin', pencil neck geek.

QUOTE OF THE DAY. An American Thinker essay identifies where much elite opinion went wrong. Start with the (overrated?) Kennedy presidency.

The early 60s was one of the most youth-obsessed periods in American history. There's no simple explanation for this, and we don't really require one beyond noting the fact. It was reflected in the presidency of John F. Kennedy, who was characterized as "young" although, like Obama, he was actually on the cusp of middle age. What youth thought, wanted, and believed was subject to endless public dissection and analysis. Youthful opinion on all sorts of complicated topics, ranging from Cold War strategy to Vietnam to race relations, was actively courted and given serious consideration. At one point, Time magazine chose the "Youth of America" as its Man of the Year.

More specifically, that was the Class of 1965 at Pacific Palisades High, in a very rich part of greater Los Angeles, and a more screwed up bunch of young adults you'll be hard pressed to find.

As the decade wore on, rhetoric concerning the younger generation grew more extreme. Rather than simply having opinions of interest, youth were now said to possess the Answer to all sorts of critical matters. Youth, the public was assured, had important things to say. Youth must be listened to. And finally, "Older people have screwed things up. Let's give the kids a chance." All sentiments that would sound familiar to the Roger Cohens of our day.

And out went core curricula, dress codes, single-sex dorms, curfews, and common sense. Note, though, the real villain of the piece.

All this might have been harmless but for the collapse of the previous generation -- the so-called "Silents". (Actually merely a subset of the GI generation.) Possibly the most overlooked factor of the entire decade is the manner in which this generation, just coming into their prime years, abdicated responsibility in favor of what we've come to know as the 60s lifestyle. It was this, rather than anything the kids did, that caused much of the later trouble.

No, the Silents are not a subset of the GI generation. It's more precise to identify the most destructive Silents as too young to be called to Korea and too old to be called to Vietnam. A large chunk of that cohort had the opportunity to climb the career ladder quickly owing to an expanding economy, and, in education, a relatively small cohort faced the growing population of what we now call the Baby Boomers. The following assessment, however, is more accurate than not.

There's no difficulty explaining this turn of events. Every generation has a strictly limited leadership cohort -- the number is generally held to be approximately 5%. The U.S. lost over a quarter-million men in WW II. A substantial number of the GI generation's natural leaders were killed at places like Kasserine, Tarawa, and Omaha Beach. This is one kind of deficit that simply can't be made up. As a result, positions in the postwar world that required hard-charging alphas were filled by whoever was available, too many of whom weren't up to the job.

One of the older heads in my department recalled that there was sufficient churn in the academic job market that the way to get rid of an uncollegial colleague was to not recommend that person for a pay increase. Tenure was relatively unimportant. The same dynamic might have been at work elsewhere -- remember the conglomerate merger wave?

YOU HEARD IT HERE FIRST. At Phi Beta Cons, George Leef recommends an editorial questioning the oversold degree.

For all the talk about college being crucial to gainful employment in today’s society, the Bureau of Labor Statistics finds that bachelor’s degrees are no antidote to outsourcing, underemployment and lagging pay. Among 40 occupations on the BLS’ watch list for likely outsourcing are computer programmers, aerospace engineers and microbiologists.

Meantime, blue-collar trades people — from truck drivers to plumbers to electricians — are perpetually in demand. And none of these fields requires post-secondary degrees.

Even the education sector itself reflects this dichotomy. Indian River County School District, for example, hired an audio-visual coordinator fresh out of high school and paid him $15,000 more than a beginning teacher with a master’s degree.

None of this is to suggest that higher education isn’t important for the knowledge it imparts. A college degree can enrich life and, in some fields, ensure upward
mobility.

But Paul Barton, a senior associate at the Educational Testing Service, poses a provocative question in the title of his report: “How many college graduates does the U.S. labor force really need?”

Welcome to the conversation. Note, however, the tension between job preparation and intellectual growth inherent in that fourth paragraph.

Now, think about this.

As things stand now, businesses complain about the lackluster skills of high-school graduates. Such concerns prompt Liam Julian of the education research center at New York’s Fordham Foundation to opine: “If high-school diplomas actually meant something, conventional wisdom would be less likely to demand college diplomas.”

Where is the trustee or university president who will put the onus back on the high schools, which has the potential to improve faculty morale. As would more self-selection.

For high school students, an unsentimental analysis of supply-and-demand is called for. Bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees are entirely appropriate pursuits for the academically inclined and they help keep future options open, but sheepskins aren’t for everyone. And there’s no shame in that.

But there is shame in suggesting that slackers and corner-cutters are somehow able to carry water for a patternmaker.

In the real world, lawyers appear to be everywhere, while a good, skilled craftsman is increasingly hard to find — at any price.

That's always been the case.

AND THE SNOWS PREVAILED. Check out some time-lapse photography from Milwaukee. Note the traffic first churns the snow faster than it can fall, then the snow overwhelms the churn.

STRATEGIC VOTING. Illinois does not require advance party registration for primary elections.

If I have to have the smart and malign Hillary in there, or the naive but probably well-intentioned Obama, give me Obama.

The lesser of two evils is still evil.

SNOW DAY. There have been worse.

Milwaukee, late January 1947.

LINEAR THOUGHT IS DESIRABLE. One of these things is not like the others.

Rising costs and tuition in American colleges cannot be addressed without also examining the rising demands being placed on our institutions. American universities are expected to do many things besides deliver classroom instruction, including offering residential life in buildings with the latest technology, producing new knowledge through research and supporting athletics on a major scale. All these correctly belong in American higher education, and all are subject to increasing demands from the public and from the academy itself.

Catch that Divine Passive? Who is expressing the expectations? Is it parents and students who would like to live in quarters that aren't LeCorbusier's nightmares? Premium services at premium prices, requested by clients. Is it students who would like to know the latest developments in the pricing of contingent claims? Perhaps somebody who has contributed to that work will be a more effective presenter of it than someone hired to read somebody else's notes. These two "expectations" are distinct from the third, and the demand for the third might be self-inflicted. (Northern Illinois has gone from attention by the BCS and a bowl victory to the Bottom Ten. The buzz from the attention allowed us to call attention to our academic efforts, which were in place long before the team's run and remain in place -- if headquarters and Springfield will let us -- at present.)

The column becomes less coherent.

To begin to equate cost and price would require a complete rethinking of what is necessary for an excellent undergraduate education in the U.S. Our model demands competition and the constant addition of new programs. Cost and tuition continue to escalate because of what is demanded by the public and higher education itself. Unlike a traditional business model, where competition lowers prices through factors such as economies of scale, in higher education, competition actually increases cost because new programs and buildings, fueled by a desire to provide “the best,” are expensive.

Right. Medical care would be cheaper in the absence of organ transplants, improved pharmaceuticals, or radiation therapy. But life expectancies would be shorter. The columnists miss an opportunity to consider a positional arms race, in which universities compete to offer inefficiently opulent amenities or inefficiently generous salaries and job descriptions, which might lead to higher costs and higher prices. I suspect, however, that as long as there is excess demand for perceived prestige degrees, there is a lot of upside potential in tuitions.

If we want to establish a correlation between cost savings and decreased tuition, and if we want to advance affordability, we must radically shift some longstanding expectations. Are universities willing, for example, to reduce their emphasis on faculty research, athletics, student-life services, the quality of physical campuses, smaller classes, study-abroad options and technology? Are there other strategies, such as programmatic cooperation among several institutions, to reduce costs? Or, will higher education reaffirm the point that there is a cost to providing a high quality, distinctively American college education?

Why not reaffirm that point? The columnists focus on the excess of symbolism over substance in a few overrated private institutions skimming a bit more of their endowments to lower prices to families in the 94th percentile of earnings. A tuition subsidy at a state university, whether disguised as a merit scholarship or not, is a regressive transfer. As long, however, as an earnings premium to a college degree exists, there is an incentive for the providers to seek some of the gains from that trade.

STILL RUNNING A POLISH POST OFFICE. Years ago, a purchaser of technical manuals from Wayne State University's computing center had to deposit the money at the bursar's office, obtain a receipt, take the receipt to the computing center, and take possession of the manual. Anyone who has made a transaction in a Communist country (including China's Friendship Stores) knows the drill. I had visions of babushkas in the back room calculating with abacuses and making entries with a scratchy fountain pen in ledgers that had to be stitched together with leather straps. Perhaps they're still at it.

Wayne State University officials have broken the trust between themselves and students who -- as one junior said -- have been ripped off for $5.3 million.

That's the money students paid in contingency fees ahead of anticipated cuts in state funding. The cuts never happened. But the Detroit-based university decided to keep the bonanza instead of returning it to students.

The move is unquestionably wrongheaded for an urban university in the one of the poorest cities in the country. A college education is a ticket to the middle class, and Wayne State should not burden students by, in effect, keeping money earmarked as contingency.

Last year, Wayne State University set the extra tax at a pricey $13 per credit hour above normal rates. For an undergraduate taking 15 credits last year, the fee totaled $195 on top of a 12.8 percent tuition hike.

University officials plead incompetence.

The Wayne State Board of Governors took the low road. Board Chairman Eugene Driker said it would be an administrative "nightmare" to return the money to students. Well, Ferris State managed refund checks without dreadful dreams, suggesting it operates more efficiently than Wayne State.

I'm envisioning babushkas leafing through ledgers.

The policy implications the columnist draws are less persuasive.

Overall, Michigan colleges were designed to serve the Michigan public. But the state's big institutions abandon the role when they levy huge annual tuition hikes instead of managing costs and increasing productivity.

Some also pad revenue by taking in a large number of out-of-state students at higher tuition rates. The tactic crowds out Michigan applicants. And it runs against efforts to give state residents a leg up in adapting to a changing economy.

One could reduce costs and increase productivity by ending the fantasy that a credential from a less-than-selective university functions as a "ticket" to anything. Admittedly, that would do to excess capacity in access-assessment-remediation-retention what Nucor did to excess capacity in steel and Toyota did to excess capacity in automobiles. But there still are automobile factories in Michigan, and it probably doesn't bother the folks at the Detroit News when those car companies crowd out Michigan car-buyers by selling their product in California or, horrible dictu, Ohio. Is a current-account surplus in higher education different?

Perhaps Michigan will be driven, by default, to the efficient solution: fewer, but more selective, state colleges and universities, with more generous tuition subsidies for state residents. Call 'em merit scholarships if you want.

LOOKING FOR THOSE GROWNUPS. Some people will find joy in seeing their colleagues discomfited.

Let's get to the real reason you want to vote for McCain (or whoever else wins the Republican nomination: you want the sheer thrill of listening to the wailing of the especially fatheaded supporters of Obama and Hillary. I don't mean the hustlers who are looking for jobs; both parties have those. And I don't mean the tolerably normal people who will vote for the Democrat because, well, who knows. I mean the people you really, really want to suffer. On an academic email list I belong to, a professor at an Ivy League law school said the best part of Bush's victory in 2004 was walking the halls of his law school the next morning.

The post goes on to identify some individuals who make the common room commonplaces look profound.

YOU THINK? Disposable income, not many intellectual challenges, the world looks better through the bottom of a bottle.

"What we're trying to promote is a culture of caring for each other," said Thomas Tunks, associate provost and a task force member.

On the academic side, ideas include holding more Friday morning classes, to cut down on Thursday night partying. One study found that undergraduates drink more alcohol on Thursdays when they have no early Friday classes.

Others recommendations try to change the social atmosphere on campus.

The task force said students need more reasons to stay on campus and have fun – without alcohol. Ideas include keeping the student union open until 2 a.m. and having late-night events around campus, such as flag football and basketball games, all-night dance marathons and midnight movies.

Another proposal is opening a pub on campus that would serve beer to legal drinkers and food. Several campuses, including Rice University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, do so.

Fraternities, sororities and other student groups would also be able to serve beer on campus to students of legal drinking age. Parties could only happen Friday and Saturday nights, and student groups would have to hire bartenders and security. The thinking is that otherwise, a total ban on alcohol chases students off campus.

The university's motive intrigues. (Hint: midnight basketball is not a diversity initiative.)

The suggested changes come at a time when SMU is trying to raise its academic standing and recruit more high-achieving students. This year's freshman class has the highest average SAT scores ever, and the greatest number of President's Scholars.

What, a party-school gut-course image doesn't raise academic standings? Quelle surprise.

THE IRON HORSE IS UNMOVED BY IDEOLOGY. Some time ago, I borrowed E. A. Rees's Stalinism and Soviet Rail Transport, 1928-1941, to get some idea about the thinking behind A. Andreyev's eponymous light-axle-loading super power. That Book Review N^o. 9 appears only now suggests it wasn't the most compelling reading in the world. True enough. It should come as no surprise that in the absence of price signals (yes, even of the crude form permissible under Interstate Commerce Commission rules in force on the U.S. railroads of that era) the Soviet railroads (in those days, the People's Commissariat of Ways of Communication, NKPS) could never find the right balance between investment in improvements to ways, structure, and stock, and making more productive use of the existing ways, structure, and stock. Despite the absence of wage signals, changes in work rules that worsened the working conditions of train crews led to an exodus of experienced train crews (the book does not say to where.)

Unsurprisingly, given the tenor of the times, the troubles of the railroad led to ideological struggle, including "bourgeois specialists" who, not surprisingly, had to be repressed, "limiters" whose recognition of the laws of physics manifested a false consciousness not conducive to the interests of the working classes, and "wreckers", a catch-all category including Trotskyites, White Guardists, and fascists who somehow put aside their differences long enough to hamper the railroads. It all sounds like some of the loopier theories about the Kennedy assassinations, except that Stalin and his inner circle had more power than Oliver Stone to act on the information. In a macabre twist, some of the people who attempted to improve the performance of the railroads using Stakhanovite methods were also purged. Despite all the troubles, the NKPS were able to re-equip the railroad with a stable of simple, dependable steam locomotives that served the country in war and tempted ferroequinologists in the waning days of the Cold War. Ah, but for a few Santa Fe or Norfolk and Western comrades on the lines.

Several individuals whose names you might know served as "narkoms" (that's Russian for capo di tutti capi) of NKPS, including L. D. Trotsky in 1920, F. E. Dzerzhinsky from 1921 to 1924, A. A. Andreyev from 1931 to 1935 (the push for the seven-coupled locomotive rather than the more practical FD class mudsuckers occurred on his watch and could have contributed to his firing) and L. M. Kaganovich, the last of the Old Bolsheviks to die, for most of the nine years from 1935 to 1944. Andreyev, Dzherzhinsky, and Sergo Ordzhonikidze had classes of locomotives named for them (the latter an early form of "rehabilitation?") although Kaganovich, Trotsky, and the other narkoms did not.

CHOICES AMONG ECHO CHAMBERS. There appears to be not a sou's worth of difference among the remaining presidential hopefuls in each party, although there are differences between the major parties.

OUR NEIGHBORS AT WAR. Remembering Staff Sergeant Robert J. Miller, gymnast, master of languages, horseman.

ONE WISHES THEY'D GROW UP. A law professor discovers the dynamics of junior high on the faculty.

I have been quite surprised to learn how "silenced" I feel by my many colleagues who are enthusiastically supporting Obama (a wonderful group of whom went to work in South Carolina and are now working hard in Maryland for him, which I think is terrific). On the issues we likely feel mostly the same --end the war in Iraq and bring the troops home, do more to deal with our stubborn problems of poverty, inequality and inequities, restore some sense of a positive reputation for our nation in its internal and external affairs, provide health care for all and restore faith in our beliefs in inclusion, justice, and social equity and opportunity. Yet, in conversation after conversation I feel like a Republican in a Democratic world for expressing any positive views about Hillary (and until yesterday about John Edwards too).

The usual suspects weigh in on the prospects for appreciating or expanding viewpoint diversity on the faculty.

That's probably too adult a concept for the faculty. There is no viewpoint to argue over, there's only wishful thinking. Here's a quick history lesson. Let's back up to 1971-1972. George McGovern's campaign slogans substitute for thinking in more than a few discussion sections, probably because they're precisely the common room commonplaces I put in the blockquote. That campaign flopped, but the same commonplaces were in the air in 1976, and Jimmy Carter's victory was cause for much optimism. Is malaise a color for a cardigan? Next comes twelve years of Reagan and Bush (yet another common room commonplace, and it doesn't recognize deregulation or entrepreneurialism or the end of an evil empire as positive developments in those years.) Then Bill Clinton becomes president, and the spirit of 1976 returns to the common room. You'd think we'd either see some progress toward those goals, or perhaps a reappraisal of the policy solutions in light of reality.

AN INTRIGUING FISH STORY. With workforce development.

In Milwaukee's Riverwest neighborhood, Kim Wall is raising the profile of Ma Baensch herring, while providing meaningful work to one of the toughest segments of the labor force - ex-offenders.

There's a bit of tough love involved.

"I've had to get in the face of some of these guys and let them know that I'm not a pushover," she said.

Most often, Wall gets respect from her employees. That's because men like Johnny Nash are grateful to have work after serving time in jail. Nash, 32, who has been employed at Baensch for nearly two years, served 12 years in prison for reckless use of a weapon.

"I feel like this was just the blessing in disguise that I needed," said Nash who has two children and six stepchildren. "You've got something to look forward to every day that takes your mind away from the things that put you in those negative situations in the first place."

And some intriguing marketing.

For generations, Ma Baensch herring was a mainstay for holidays and deer hunting season. But under Wall, the product has broken out of those familiar niches, thanks to aggressive marketing.

Wall promotes herring as a food that can be eaten anytime. And she has worked hard to lure young, urban consumers - particularly those with a taste for sushi.

Must consider this. I'm partial to the wine and vinegar version of marinated herring, although I miss the Smith Brothers' Appe'Tang line.

COMPASSION FASCISM. How else interpret the latest refinement of "mandatory purchase."

In a day dominated by familiar stump speeches, Hillary Clinton made news by saying she might allow workers' wages to be garnisheed if they refuse to buy health insurance. She has criticized Obama for pushing a health plan that she says would not require universal coverage.

Pressed on how she would enforce her mandate, Clinton said: "I think there are a number of mechanisms" that are possible, including "going after people's wages, automatic enrollment."

She said such measures would apply only to workers who can afford health coverage but refuse to buy it, which puts undue pressure on hospitals and emergency rooms. Under her plan, she said, health care "will be affordable for everyone" because she would limit premium payments "to a low percent of your income."

(And Gisele will dump Tom Brady and pay me a visit.)

Substantively, the senator's proposal is not that different from determining eligibility for financial aid. But to tie premiums to income (the shortfall from garnisheeing a few dollars from the minimum-wage alcoholic's check made up from a rather larger garnishment of the salary and bonus of the hedge-fund manager) further distorts the incentives people have to take care of themselves. Is there a more effective way than rationing by waiting time to discourage inefficient use of the emergency room? When I'm feeling provocative I sometimes suggest that claimants of gratis emergency room services be charged with theft.

CHURLISH. I hold no brief for Mike Holmgren, but retired Packer general manager Ron Wolf's carping, ten years after the fact, is over the top.

It wasn't a great day for any number of key Green Bay participants, including the late Fritz Shurmur, coordinator of the defense; quarterback Brett Favre; and defensive end Reggie White. But Wolf kept coming back to Holmgren because the simplest solution was his and he didn't execute it.

In the just-concluded AFL-NFL game, the Giants evidently wanted that second shot at New England very badly.

SECURING THE BLESSINGS OF LIBERTY. But if they're not online, they can't be secured.

But, regarding the {date} and {date} pieces, "Articles of Federation," and "U.S. Constitution," no authors were listed and I'm having some trouble locating the exact articles. And, when I search within the JSTOR database for "articles..." and "constitution..." there are a number of results.

-It just helps to have the author's name to narrow down the search to fewer articles within JSTOR and find the piece more easily.

Tango Sierra.