Over a pitcher of beer after a city-league, softball game at the Harmony Bar in Madison, Wis., I'm sure I heard one of the most open-minded political conversations going on anywhere among a group of people who will definitely not vote for the person they were discussing.

The conversation was about why Hillary should stay in the race.

An outfielder said, "If you were the first woman to have a serious bid for the presidency of the United States, would you drop out before everyone had a chance to vote? Would you want written in the history books that you were a quitter that way?"

Beer glasses were refreshed and the conversation poured.

So far, Jim Burkee is Wisconsin’s only hope to de-throne the 40-year incumbency of fifth congressional district Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Menominee Falls), and what a slog it’s going to be.

Elected to office and enjoying his gov’t power-broker benefits since 1968, is it even possible to unseat this millionaire and lottery winner?

House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers sent a letter to President Bushlast week warning that the possibility of an impending pre-emptive strike against Iran, without Congressional approval, will result in impeachment proceedings.

Here's the super creepy part of Conyers' letter:

"Our concerns in this area have been heightened by more recent events. The resignation in mid-March of Admiral William J. "Fox" Fallon from the head of U.S. Central Command, which was reportedly linked to a magazine article that portrayed him as the only person who might stop your Administration from waging preemptive war against Iran, has renewed widespread concerns that your Administration is unilaterally planning for military action against that country. This is despite the fact that the December 2007 National Intelligence Estimate concluded that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in the fall of 2003, a stark reversal of previous Administration assessments."

Get Uppity!

Contact your Wisconsin Congressional reps and ask them to co-sign Conyers' letter.

The Dane County Sheriff's Department endorsed Kathleen Falk when she ran for Attorney General in 2006.

Now, former Dane County Sheriff's Deputy and current Dane County 911 Center Director Joe Norwick has been loudly, and justifiably criticized for the handling of Brittany Zimmermann's call for help. 

It doesn't help that Norwick had no public safety management experience on the level his current position requires. That stands in sharp contrast to this:

“We searched far and wide, and found the best candidate here at home,” Falk said of Norwick.

Is Falk's support of him payback for a past political endorsement?

"The best thing to have happened during the Bush administration is something that did not happen. We did not privatize Social Security ... And anyone who thinks the market will shortly regain all the ground it's lost over the last few years, has been drinking Wall Street Kool-aid."

- Robert Reich, Berkeley Professor, former Clinton Labor Secretary

WAR, RELIGION, AND IRONY:
Reflections on Lincoln, Bush, and American Leadership
By David R. Cook
From the earliest settlements on the American continent the image of this new nation-to-be was suffused with a providential ethos. Whether it was surviving privations or enjoying the fruits of abundant resources, Americans have tended to equate fortuitous circumstances with the blessings of God.
This is the source of our American exceptionalism. American interests, American actions, American power is always deployed on the side of “good”. Our wars are always moral and we always are fighting on the side of righteousness. As noted, this national sense of ourselves has a very long history which continues unabated in the 21st Century world of global commerce and the threat of terrorism.
That America is a very “religious” nation is an undebateable fact. Unfortunately, this aspect of the American character has too often been expressed without awareness of the ironic situations into which American religiosity so often propels us. The vices which are hidden in our virtues go essentially unnoticed, especially by our leaders. The great exception to this tendency was Abraham Lincoln.