Feingold Operative Tapes Johnson

OK, I just realized how naughty that headline sounds… in any case… from Real Debate.

According to Johnson campaign staffers a person from the Feingold campaign has been following Johnson taping everything he does.

The operative came to Drinking Right, sat at the bar, ordered a Heineken and discretely held a video recorder in his lap taping everything Mr. Johnson did. The manager at Papa’s noticed and did not take kindly to having his customers video taped without having any permission asked.

The Feingold operative was asked to erase the recording and asked to leave. Apparently he drove away in a vehicle with Virginia plates.

Chewbacca

Paying For Bad Behavior

Wonderful… not. 

Taxpayers have paid out nearly $1 million per year in settlements to congressional employees who have been harassed or otherwise treated badly by their political bosses over the past 14 years, according to records from the Office of Compliance.

The payouts stem from hundreds of complaints from employees, some of whom may have been sexually harassed or treated so poorly that third-party mediators were brought in to negotiate cash payoffs to settle the cases.

In fiscal year 2007, for example, the OOC — an agency that administers a confidential dispute resolution system — settled 38 cases, with 25 resulting in monetary awards worth $4 million. In fiscal year 2009 — the most recent year reported by the OOC — the office settled 13 cases for nearly $830,000.

Duct Tape to the Rescue

lol

The most talked-about phone in the U.S.—Apple’s iPhone 4—has a design flaw that’s best fixed with a sliver of duct tape, according to Consumer Reports.

“It may not be pretty, but it works,” writes Mike Gikas on that nonprofit consumer group’s electronics blog.

The patch—which sounds like it’d be more appropriate for kitchen plumbing than for a phone that retails for $200 to $300, plus an AT&T contract—is supposed to correct an apparent problem with the iPhone 4’s metal antenna.

In a controlled test, Consumer Reports found that people who hold the iPhone 4 in a way that covers up an antenna connector on the phone’s lower left side will experience poorer reception and possibly dropped calls.

But if you slap a piece of duct tape over that antenna connection, the reception problems go away, the group says.

Glenn Grothman Chooses Not to Run for Lt. Governor

Mark Belling reported this afternoon that State Senator Glenn Grothman will NOT run for Lt. Governor.  Grothman began circulating papers a few days ago.  I caught wind of it yesterday, but was not at liberty to disclose it. 

The time for games is over

My column for the Daily News is online.  It’s called, “The time for games is over.” Here’s the conclusion:

Ultimately, politicians will usually respond to what their constituents want, so it’s incumbent on all of us to be fiscally responsible and demand the same from them. We can’t be lured in by false promises of increased spending on the things we may value because the money simply isn’t there.

  We have all been tightening our belts lately, and the state government must do the same if we are to avoid ending up like California or Greece. It’s time to elect serious leaders to do the serious work.