Queen Uriel Gomez

It's prom time again.

That means that it's prom controversy time again.

In 2005, Lake Geneva Badger High School student Kerry Lofy was suspended and fined because he went to prom dressed in drag.

Lofy said he thought it would be funny to show up at his senior prom Saturday wearing a dress. Lofy went to the prom with Victor Anderson, a friend. Lofy says the school did not have any problem letting two males attend prom together, but school officials who had heard of Lofy's plan to wear a black dress warned him that he would not be allowed in the dance if he showed up dressed as a woman.

Lofy says he is not gay. He says he agreed to go with Anderson, who is gay, because Anderson is his friend and he wanted to go to the prom but didn't have a date. Anderson confirms this. Lofy concedes that he was uneasy going to prom with another male, and wearing a dress was a way to deflect other people's suspicions.

In 2006, Kevin Logan was denied access to his prom because he wore a pink dress.

A male student who has worn women's clothes to school all year was turned away from his high school prom because he was wearing a dress.

Kevin Logan, 18, went to the West Side High School prom on Friday in a slinky fuchsia gown and heels. He believes officials discriminated against him by not allowing him inside.

This year's prom controversy is a little more complicated than wardrobe choice.

RACINE -- Uriel Gomez didn’t set out to run for prom queen. He’s a young man, and Park High School might not be ready for that.

A star football player in a skirt is one thing. An honor student and thespian in a tiara at prom is something entirely different.

Earlier this week, enough of Gomez’s classmates nominated him to a short list of seniors who might get on the prom court. His name landed on the girls’ side, which meant he could be voted prom queen.

School administrators were less than thrilled by the prospect and wouldn’t let him proceed.

This is Racine, after all, subject of the documentary film “The World’s Best Prom.” The spring formal is serious business in this part of the globe.

Gomez, 18, didn’t expect it. He now finds himself in a strange battle. He wants to be on the ballot and hasn’t heard a good reason why he shouldn’t be included.

If former Park High and current University of Wisconsin football standout John Clay could dress in women’s clothing and win the school’s “Miss Legs,” a homecoming tradition, Gomez and his friends don’t understand why he can’t be prom queen, especially if his classmates vote for him.

“It’s not like I’m forcing myself on the ballot,” Gomez said. “I did it legitimately and I did it fairly.”

...Gomez is going to prom with his friend, Madeline Thompson, a Park graduate. He has a nice suit in mind. He is renting a bus to go to prom with a large group of friends, including Harris, who has stood by his friend’s side for four years.

“Uriel’s not doing this to ruin anybody else’s prom. He’s not doing this to make girls cry,” Harris said. “If anything, he’s doing this to make his prom more memorable.”

So openly gay Gomez plans to dress like a man and his date will be a female. No problem so far.

His classmates voted for him to be on the list of potential female prom court candidates.

Rather than crying harassment and complaining about being demeaned by his fellow students, Gomez is embracing his chance to be prom queen.

He wants to be included on the ballot with the girls. That's a problem.

Gomez is gay. He's not a girl.

Traditionally there is a prom king and queen; a male student and a female student is honored by their classmates.

Call them whatever you want, king or queen or most popular kid, but I do think there should be a male and a female chosen to head prom court.

Like it or not, Gomez is a male. If students want him to be on prom court, let them vote for him to make it as a male.

I don't think he belongs on the girl's side of the ballot.

There's no discrimination. Gomez isn't being kept from attending prom. He's not being kept from being on court. He's being kept from getting there as a girl.

It's not legitimate and it's not fair for him to be considered a female for the voting.

I don't think this is a wise choice of battles by Gomez.

School officials should put him on the ballot with the male students.

If the students want a gay king, terrific.

Measles in Racine

It's shaping up to be a Measles Spring in Wisconsin.

From the Journal Times:

City health and Racine Unified officials will hold a joint news conference at 4 p.m. Tuesday regarding a case of measles at a local elementary school.

The news conference will be held at SC Johnson Elementary School, 2420 Kentucky St. School officials learned late Monday that a fifth grader at the school tested positive for the disease.

Late Tuesday morning, the city health department characterized this as a probable case of measles after conferring with state health officials. According to a city health department official the agency will continue to investigate.

School district officials were trying to get the word out.

“At this point we’re really waiting for direction from the city health department, but we are trying to notify our parents and our staff,” said Stephanie Kratochvil-Hayden, Unified’s communications director.

At this point, district officials plan to send letters home with students Tuesday and they plan to use the district’s phone system to send messages, in both English and Spanish, to district parents.

The district did not plan to close the school.

“The health department has not given us any indication that that was necessary,” Kratochvil-Hayden said. “If they do, then we will obviously follow their direction.”

Why don't officials know if the student had been vaccinated?

Doesn't the school district have the student's immunization records on file?
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More here, from the Associated Press.

Racine Residents Don't Want to Know

*WARNING*WARNING*WARNING*

RACINE RESIDENTS SHOULD NOT VISIT THE "BODY WORLDS" EXHIBIT AT THE MILWAUKEE PUBLIC MUSEUM.

The show certainly is one of the strangest the museum has ever had. "Body Worlds: The Anatomical Exhibition of Real Human Bodies" displays cadavers preserved by a chemical process called plastination. About 20 of the "plastinates" will be complete figures frozen skinless in action poses - "athletes," "dancers" - to demonstrate how the human body works.

The exhibit has drawn nearly 20 million visitors in 35 cities across Asia, Europe and North America.

..."Body Worlds" is a thinking-person's exhibit, a real-life Advanced Biology class where no "student" ever dozes off.

...[T]here are exhibit highlights you won't want to miss. Among them:

Smoker and Non-Smoker Lungs: Nothing like seeing a set of cigarette-ravaged lobes to get you to snuff out that butt. Children have been particularly impressed by this display.

"It's a wonderful thing to show my children," [Cedarburg resident Julia] Wolff said. "Anything that helps illustrate to kids how damaging smoking is, is valuable."

Yes, don't miss those real smoker diseased lungs. That's must-see stuff, a great lesson for kids.

Compare this "amazing" exhibit of real human bodies and body parts in various states on display at the museum with a tiny plastic form of a fetus enclosed in an envelope.

It's quite stunning that the model of a fetus is considered by some to be offensive and in poor taste.

That's right. People in Racine flipped out when they received a little plastic model of a fetus in the mail from the Racine chapter of Wisconsin Right to Life.



Look at it.

It's a tiny baby doll. What's disturbing about it? What's so shocking about it?

Does that little plastic model make you angry?

I don't see what's so offensive about it.

RACINE (AP) -- Peggy Bell didn’t know what to do with the tiny plastic fetus she received in the mail, so she recycled it.

The 51-year-old insurance agent said she wasn’t going to send it back to the anti-abortion group that mailed it to her.

The Racine chapter of Wisconsin Right to Life sent the plastic statues and literature to Bell and other city residents to mark next Tuesday’s anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion.

Bell said she normally isn’t bothered by the mail she receives from the anti-abortion group. But this was different.

“I don’t care what literature you send me, but I just think they went too far,” said Bell, who sent the group a letter expressing her feelings. “I was offended. I think it was in poor taste.”

She found the plastic fetus in her mailbox Tuesday in a manila mailer addressed to “Resident.” The model of a roughly 2-inch fetus came with a card detailing the development of an 11- to 12-week-old “pre-born.”

I really don't see why people would be offended or consider it to be in poor taste.

It's not some sort of pornographic thing.

It's a model of a developing human being. That arouses anger in people?

Oh, how horrible! This piece of plastic is the size of an 11- to 12-week-old fetus.

Horror of horrors!!!

Dave Obernderger, project chair for the Racine chapter of Wisconsin Right to Life, said people react to the issue with varying degrees of emotion, but his group meant the mailing to be informative not offensive.

“We hope that she and everybody else that has received the model that they take it in a positive way,” he said. “We meant it as an educational piece.”

I agree that it is an educational piece. It's a complete fetus, a model of a human being at a stage of its development, not an aborted fetus.

What's the problem?

Plastic pieces depicting a ripped apart, aborted fetus weren't mailed to Racine residents. That sort of model would have been disturbing, albeit realistic.

From The Journal Times:

The manila mailer addressed to “Resident” seemed innocent enough to those who found it in their mailboxes Tuesday, but the neighbors agreed the contents surprised them.

The Racine Chapter of Wisconsin Right to Life sent the mailing to mark the Jan. 22nd anniversary of the passage of Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court ruling 35 years ago that struck down many state laws restricting abortion.

The roughly 2-inch fetus, called the “Young One,” is a model of a “pre-born.” The model, which fits in the palm of a hand, included a card detailing the development of an 11- to 12-week-old “pre-born.”

“We are sending the ‘Young One’ model to all of the residents in Racine to help remind them of the humanity of the unborn baby,” the letter accompanying the model stated. “We hope that you use the model to involve your family and friends in the discussion of human development.”

If people are upset by this two inch piece of plastic, then perhaps they should stay away from any literature and accompanying models of human development. And certainly, they absolutely must stay away from the "Body Worlds" exhibit at the Milwaukee Public Museum.

Maybe they're more comfortable believing the stork brings babies.

Such fairy tales don't require one to confront the reality of what happens in the womb during human gestation.

I guess the fetal model is just too much for the residents of Racine to handle.



Relax, Racine residents. You don't have to acknowledge where babies come from. Don't let the plastic model bother you. Try to forget about it.

The stork delivers babies.

Most Dangerous American Cities

Detroit is the most dangerous city in the country, according to a study by CQ Press, a division of Congressional Quarterly Inc.

Out of 378 cities ranked, Milwaukee is the 36th most dangerous.

Other Wisconsin cities on the list:

Racine came in at 167th most dangerous. Kenosha was 243rd. Green Bay was 245th. Madison ranked 269th.

DETROIT (AP) -- In another blow to the Motor City's tarnished image, Detroit pushed past St. Louis to become the nation's most dangerous city, according to a private research group's controversial analysis, released Sunday, of annual FBI crime statistics.
The study drew harsh criticism even before it came out. The American Society of Criminology launched a pre-emptive strike Friday, issuing a statement attacking it as "an irresponsible misuse" of crime data.

The 14th annual "City Crime Rankings: Crime in Metropolitan America" was published by CQ Press, a unit of Congressional Quarterly Inc. It is based on the FBI's Sept. 24 crime statistics report.

The report looked at 378 cities with at least 75,000 people based on per-capita rates for homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary and auto theft. Each crime category was considered separately and weighted based on its seriousness, CQ Press said.

Last year's crime leader, St. Louis, fell to No. 2. Another Michigan city, Flint, ranked third, followed by Oakland Calif.; Camden, N.J.; Birmingham, Ala.; North Charleston, S.C.; Memphis, Tenn.; Richmond, Calif.; and Cleveland.

The study ranked Mission Viejo, Calif., as the safest U.S. city, followed by Clarkstown, N.Y.; Brick Township, N.J.; Amherst, N.Y.; and Sugar Land, Texas.

CQ Press spokesman Ben Krasney said details of the weighting system were proprietary. It was compiled by Kathleen O'Leary Morgan and Scott Morgan, whose Morgan Quitno Press published it until its acquisition by CQ Press.

The study assigns a crime score to each city, with zero representing the national average. Detroit got a score of 407, while St. Louis followed at 406. The score for Mission Viejo, in affluent Orange County, was minus 82.

Detroit was pegged the nation's murder capital in the 1980s and has lost nearly 1 million people since 1950, according to the Census Bureau. Downtown sports stadiums and corporate headquarters—along with the redevelopment of the riverfront of this city of 919,000—have slowed but not reversed the decline. Officials have said crime reports don't help.

Last year, Milwaukee was ranked the 54th most dangerous city in the nation.

That's not good.

The FBI doesn't put much stock in the study's findings.

"You're not comparing apples and oranges; you're comparing watermelons and grapes," said Rob Casey, who heads the FBI section that puts out the Uniform Crime Report that provides the data for the Quitno report.

The FBI posted a statement on its Web site criticizing such use of its statistics.

"These rough rankings provide no insight into the numerous variables that mold crime in a particular town, city, county, state, or region," the FBI said. "Consequently, they lead to simplistic and/or incomplete analyses that often create misleading perceptions adversely affecting communities and their residents."

I agree that numbers don't tell the whole the story.

Still, it would be much better to have numbers that place Milwaukee on the safer side in the rankings.

As far as metropolitan areas go, Milwaukee ranked the 104th most dangerous among 333 metro areas.

On the up side, the top ten safest metro areas in the nation included three from Wisconsin: Eau Claire (2), Appleton (5), and Wausau (9).

Oshkosh-Neenah (12), Sheboygan (18), and Fond du Lac (20) made the top twenty safest metro areas.

School Uniforms and Civil Rights

In Monday's Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Mike Nichols writes about a mother and her crusade against school uniforms.

When it comes to school uniforms, I know what I'm talking about. I spent years wearing standard-issue Catholic school plaid skirts.

Were my civil rights violated?

Was I victimized?

Should I sue for reparations?

Nichols writes:

Ronda Berkowitz is an unhappy mom.

Her daughter is about to enter McKinley Middle School in Racine, where the powers-that-be are planning a uniform policy that, Ronda says, could violate her daughter's civil rights.

"I believe that it really is against my child's civil rights," she told the Racine paper. "They should be able to express who they are through the way they dress. The child should be able to choose what they wear, within reason."

...Ronda, when I talked to her over the weekend, said she will not sue.

But she really does believe that making a kid wear a uniform is a civil rights violation.

She used the example of a kid who likes to wear soccer garb.

"Should I have him not wear his soccer stuff, which is his identity and part of him?" she asked me.

"They should be able to proudly display their accomplishments and that is, to me, part of their civil rights."

..."I totally disagree with school uniforms," is the way she put it, "totally disagree."

"Basically, they should be able to express themselves within guidelines, and a uniform does not allow them to do that."

Ronda Berkowitz claims she's not going to sue, but she is ticked off enough to talk to the media about what she considers to be a violation of her daughter's civil rights.

Berkowitz says, "I totally disagree with school uniforms."

I totally disagree with Berkowitz.

At the end of his column, Nichols neatly sums up the virtue of school uniforms.

What a uniform does, actually, is force kids to express themselves in different - some would say more important - ways.

EXACTLY!

That's exactly what a uniform does.

Instead of school uniforms stripping kids of their individuality, their personalities, talents, and unique characteristics that set them apart from everyone else are allowed to shine.

Does Berkowitz really think that what her daughter wears to school is so important in terms of defining her, that to require a uniform for students infringes on her civil rights?

I've always thought that using self-expression as an argument against school uniforms is ridiculous.

What could be more superficial?

Rather than taking away kids' freedom of expression, I think the uniforms actually serve to free them from the constraints of a shallow culture grounded in materialism.

The emphasis can more readily be placed on their special qualities as individuals when the focus is taken off their clothes.

I think uniforms provide kids with the opportunity for meaningful self-expression.

I never felt violated wearing my plaid skirt.

I never felt limited.

If anything, uniforms helped teach me to look beyond the material trappings of the surface and get to know the person.

I didn't lose my identity because I wore a uniform.

I really think it played a significant role in allowing me to truly express myself and in giving me confidence in myself as a person.

There's no way I would consider those many years in plaid skirts as a violation of my civil rights.

I didn't look at it as being forced to conform. To the contrary, school uniforms accentuated my uniqueness in ways far deeper than my choice of clothes ever could express.

Vigils in the Heartland

MoveOn wants to thank the hordes that came out last night to support Cindy Sheehan.

On Wednesday, August 17, tens of thousands of supporters gathered at 1,625 vigils to acknowledge the sacrifices made by Cindy Sheehan, her son, Casey and the more than 1,800 brave American men and women who have given their lives in Iraq—and their moms and families. Here are just a few photos from the Washington, D.C. vigil. Many other photos will be posted shortly. Thank you for participating.

Among the THRONGS showing their support for Sheehan were individuals from America's Heartland.

Racine's Journal Times ran a front page story detailing the vigil that took place in the southeastern Wisconsin city of 81,855 people.

From the Journal Times:

Mothers and others marched here Wednesday night in support of one bereaved woman who vows to continue protesting near President Bush's Texas ranch until he talks to her about why her son died in the war.

...Sheehan's efforts at the ground near the ranch that's been called "Camp Casey" have gained international attention. They have also fueled anti-war demonstrators across the United States.

"People are just sick of the killing," said Janet LeSuer, who marched on the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Plaza on State Street in Racine with 16 others for an hour Wednesday night.

The Racine newspaper gave front-page coverage to a gathering of sixteen people!

SIXTEEN!!!

A Cindy vigil also took place in Madison, a liberal hotbed.

Last fall, 80,000 gathered at the Wisconsin Capitol for a John Kerry campaign rally. Bruce Springsteen’s appearance probably had a lot to do with the large numbers attending. Furthermore, that rally coincided with the Wisconsin’s public school teachers’ union convention. All union members were encouraged to attend, which helped to inflate the crowd even more. Still, even taking those factors into account, there is no question that Madison can easily gather together a large group of Leftists at a moment’s notice

It’s not surprising that protesters came out for Cindy Sheehan on Wednesday.

According to the Madison-based Wisconsin State Journal:

About 400 people gathered on the steps of the Capitol on Wednesday night holding signs with messages like "America Stands with Cindy" to support Sheehan's demand for a justification of, and end to, the Iraq conflict that killed her 24-year- old son, Army Spc. Casey Sheehan.

"We stand tonight suggesting that these brave soldiers do not have to make the ultimate sacrifice for a pack of lies," Tammy Markee of Madison told the crowd. "What noble cause have over 1,800 men and women lost their lives for?"

Markee organized the event through MoveOn.org to coincide with about 1,400 other vigils scheduled to take place at the same time around the country, including one in Olin Park and another in Mount Horeb.

Another Madison paper, the Capital Times, reports some different numbers, saying that 400 anti-war protesters gathered at “Olin Park for a spirited candlelight vigil, part of a nationwide network of a reported 1,700 vigils held across the country in a coordinated show of support for Cindy Sheehan.”

According to the Capital Times, the vigil at the Capitol drew another 400 or so people, while the one in Mount Horeb brought out about 100 people.

Not exactly a groundswell. Those numbers are meager compared to what Madison, home to thousands of aging anti-Vietnam War activists, usually delivers.

Even across the street [from Olin Park], at the VFW hall on Lakeside Street, there was little support for Bush or his war.

"He's the dumbest president we've ever had," said Randy Kneebone, who served in the military during the Vietnam War.

Jon Pevehouse, a professor of political science at UW-Madison, said the Sheehan protest has provided a focal point for the anti-war movement.

"It's renewed their vigor a bit," he said. "The media is all of a sudden paying attention."

All of a sudden???

The lib media were against the Iraq war before it began! They've been doing their best to sour the American public on the war.

Abu Ghraib! Gitmo! Gulag!

Notice the Capital Times says "support for Bush or his war” was hard to find. See any bias there? If you don’t, you’re blind.

Believe it or not, even in Madison, there are many Bush supporters. Not everyone there is a radical Leftist.

There was also a vigil in Milwaukee attended by “hundreds” according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

What does “hundreds” mean? Who knows? I suspect if it were more than two hundred, technically "hundreds," the newspaper would have been less vague and jumped at the chance to report a higher, more impressive number.

The bottom line:

In Blue State Wisconsin, very, very few people joined in the protests last night.

Nonetheless, in spite of the small numbers of people involved, the protests received lots of attention from the anti-Bush media—just like in Crawford!

The Phoenix Group

George "Moneybags" Soros is scheming again.

In typical liberal fashion, he and 70 other millionaires and billionaires think the way to the prevent the Democrat Party from slipping into complete oblivion is by throwing money at the problem.

Soros says be patient

The Scottsdale, Ariz., meeting, called to start the process of building an ideas production line for liberal politicians, began what organizers hope will be a long dialogue with the "partners," many from the high-tech industry. Participants have begun to refer to themselves as the Phoenix Group.

Rob Stein, a veteran of President Bill Clinton’s Commerce Department and of New York investment banking, convened the meeting of venture capitalists, left-leaning moneymen and a select few D.C. strategists on how to seed pro-Democratic think tanks, media outlets and leadership schools to compete with such entrenched conservative institutions as the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute and the Leadership Institute.

Senior Democratic National Committee (DNC) officials were quietly briefed about the meeting in recent weeks. DNC Chairman Howard Dean was aware of it, in part though his friendship with Stein, but one senior DNC source said the organizers "kept that list [of attendees] kind of tight."

Sarah Ingersoll, de facto spokeswoman for Stein’s Democracy Alliance, said it was "a very preliminary meeting of committed donors interested in building a community to support progressive infrastructure."

...The money details are several weeks away. "There aren’t dollar figures at this point," Ingersoll said. Soros, a Hungarian-born financier who donated more than $23 million to pro-Democratic 527 groups last cycle, gave the main presentation, said Ingersoll, who declined to name the other presenters.

"Primarily, we’re looking at making recommendations and thinking through with these donors on how they can form an alliance," she added. "This is about creating a network of individuals to share information to be effective in whatever they do going forward."

...Ingersoll denied that progressives are merely trying to replicate Heritage and Fox News.

Another source at the meeting said that it was important for existing progressive groups to coordinate their activities and to avoid the turf wars that have riven progressive causes in the past.

One source at the DNC with direct knowledge of the agenda said that the Phoenix Group had three specific goals at the outset. It wants to create liberal think tanks, training camps for young progressives and media centers.

Despite the general recognition that progressives are several years behind conservatives, liberal activists are confident that technology will help them close the gap. "Technology may allow us to do in a few years what it took the other side 40 years," the DNC source said.
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First, they aren't "progressives." They're liberals.

Second, Soros and the others believe it's possible to replicate what the right has done by coordinating their funds.

They don't get it. They REALLY don't.

It's not a matter of technological issues and the avoidance of turf wars.

All the money in the world can't buy the support they're trying to gather because they are offering no message, no substance, nothing that the majority of Americans believe in.

The liberals have no solutions. They just stomp their feet and throw fits like unruly pre-schoolers, as they attack their opposition.

I know they try to buy power; but their efforts are in vain.

Soros gave $23 million to pro-Democratic 527 groups during the last election cycle and didn't get the job done.

They needed to pay people to register voters. Of course, many of these efforts were rife with fraud. For example, Project Vote paid workers $7 an hour and $1.50 per application after they reached a quota. Is it a surprise that such a system would invite abuse?

Racine, WI, provides an example:

Project Vote filed 1,389 voter registration applications in Racine prior to the Sept. 14 primary. More than 20% had problems, according to the city clerk's office:

Six were for residents who told the city clerk's office they had not signed the forms or authorized them to be filed.

230 applications contained addresses that don't exist or are outside of Racine.

96 could not be processed because they were missing information.

Signatures on applications purporting to be for Danielle Pflugrad, Paul Pflieger and Henry Pflieger were "suspiciously similar." All three were already registered to vote.

About 150 of the applications rejected by the clerk's office were reviewed by the Journal Sentinel:

Eighty had addresses that don't exist or are outside of Racine.

One application attempted to register Tasha Jackson, but the signature on the form was Jackson Tasha.

Signatures appeared similar on three forms purporting to apply for Albert Wells of Austin St. One Project Vote employee dated one application Aug. 4; the other two applications, filed by two other Project Vote employees, were dated Aug. 6.

Project Vote filed 483 more applications in Racine last week that have not yet been reviewed by the clerk's office.

The American people have rejected the Democrat message, which is usually no message at all. The issues they have clear positions end up turning more voters away than winning them over.

Soros and the other billionaires and millionaires think their Phoenix Group can raise the Democrats out of the ashes of their irrelevance.

I doubt that will happen.