April 21, 2016 - Wisconsin Gazette

Transcription

Milwaukee Rep
swings for ‘Fences’
Acclaimed August
Wilson interpreter Lou
Bellamy takes up the
tale of a black family in
the 1950s.
page 23
April 21, 2016 | Vol. 7 No. 11
Milwaukee, throw some shade
page 10
14 Battle over the courts
4 Jews divided over sanctions
A largely generational rift has
arisen over a pro-Palestinian, antiIsraeli movement on campuses.
Millions of dollars from dark
money groups are fueling shockingly expensive partisan battles
for control of state courts
around the nation.
Also see
the editorial
on page
12.
32 Space Raft sails onward
Expectations are high for ‘Rubicon,’ the
second album for Milwaukee rockers
Space Raft, and they think it’s even
better than their well-received debut.
35 Sweet on sour
Sour beer’s suddenly all the rage,
but New Glarus
brewmaster Dan
Carey has a jump
on the competition — he’s been
experimenting
with the unique
style since the
brewery opened.
2
WI S CON S ING A Z E T T E . CO M | A p r i l 2 1 , 2 0 1 6
News with a twist
Taking a whack
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker
came up way short in his presidential bid, but we all know he
isn’t lacking in the ego department. Earlier this spring he compared himself to Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers, perhaps
the most popular guy in the state,
and also to Green Bay great Brett
Favre. The governor said Donald
Trump’s attack on his record was
like “taking a whack” at Rodgers
or Favre.
Frame this
Speaking of our governor,
Walker is offering T-shirts from
his short-lived presidential campaign in exchange for $45 to help
pay off the campaign’s lingering
$1.2 million debt. Walker can’t
guarantee colors and sizes, but he
said people who receive unwearable shirts could frame them or
use them for “craft projects,” such
as making decorative pillows or
bags.
wear veils in public.
Now a gay steward
with the airline has
launched an online appeal
against gay cabin members having to travel to Iran. One of them
started an online petition titled:
“Gay stewards from Air France
don’t want to fly to the death
penalty in Iran.” Wobbling away
NASA scientists say global
warming is shifting the way the
Earth wobbles on its polar axis.
Melting ice sheets are changing
the distribution of weight on the
planet, causing Earth’s wobble to
pull toward the east. Yes, we realize this isn’t funny.
Hello, Sweden speaking
Sweden has created a phone
number for the entire country.
Call and you’ll hear the message,
“You will soon be connected to
a random Swede somewhere in
Sweden.” And you will. Callers
can talk to Swedes about anything within reason — from IKEA
Fly the deadly skies
First, female Air France flight to Abba. The Swedish Tourist
attendants didn’t want to fly to Association created the project to
Iran because they didn’t want to increase interest in the country.
WiGWAG
Clinton’s Cutlass
By Lisa Neff and Louis Weisberg
Naughty North
Carolina
star Daniel Craig. Last year, Sanders’ campaign twice sent Cary Lee
After North Carolina Republi- Peterson “cease and desist” letcans rushed to enact anti-LGBT ters, but they went ignored until
legislation, many in the entertain- Hollywood got stung. Now Peterment industry decided to boycott son is in federal custody.
the Southern state. Most notably, Bruce Springsteen canceled a Fined for flags
A man in West Long Branch,
concert on April 10. Less notably,
but not without consequence, the New Jersey, called police to
porn site XHamster.com decided complain about vandalism of his
to block users with North Caro- “Trump Make America Great
lina IP addresses from its steamy Again” flags. Police responded
streaming services. XHamster and ticketed the man for violating
spokesman Mike Kulich said an ordinance that says political
Quite a bite
A Florida woman saved half of judging by North Carolina sign-on signs can’t be displayed until 30
days before an election. New Jera grilled cheese sandwich for 10 stats, the punishment is severe.
sey’s primary takes place June 7.
years because, she says, it bears
the imprint of the Virgin Mary. Thanks for the help
This year, she posted a picture
A white nationalist super
of the perfectly preserved sand- PAC tried boosting Donald Trump
wich, missing only one bite, on ahead of Wisconsin’s GOP prieBay, where it sold for $28,000. mary by making robo-calls to
The sale was announced on April prospective voters. The call from
12, which was National Grilled the American National super PAC Sugar shock
A man arrested for stealing
Cheese Day. The buyer, who is the promised that Trump would put
CEO of the online casino Golden- “America first.” He finished last in $31 worth of candy bars in New
Orleans is being prosecuted for a
Palace.com, said he planned to the primary.
felony because of multiple prior
use the sandwich to raise money
“theft of goods” convictions. If
for charity. “It’s a part of pop The name is sucker
culture that’s immediately and
The creator of a bogus pro-Ber- convicted of stealing candy, he
widely recognizable,” his spokes- nie Sanders super PAC collected could be sentenced to 20 years to
man told The Miami Herald. “
nearly $50,000 from James Bond life in prison.
A retired White House gardener put Hillary Clinton’s 1986
Oldsmobile Cutlass — with a
“Clinton for Governor” sticker on
the back windshield and Arkansas
plates — up for sale. Mike Lawn
bought the car at an auction for
White House workers in 2000 to
give to his daughter. But he’s kept
it parked in a garage because she
refused to drive what she said
“looked like an old lady’s car.”
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4
W I S CON S INGA Z ETTE . COM | A p r i l 2 1 , 2 0 1 6
Pro-Palestinian campaign divides Jewish community
By Louis Weisberg
Staff writer
As Jewish college students headed home
to celebrate Passover with their families on
April 21, there was one topic on many of
their minds with the potential to disrupt the
joyous mood around their Seder tables: the
BDS movement.
BDS stands for boycott, divestment and
sanctions — against Israel. It’s a growing movement on college campuses, where
students are stepping up protests of Israel’s
human rights abuses against Palestinians,
as well as the nation’s continued occupation of land that BDS supporters say
belongs to Palestinians.
BDS as proxy
The BDS movement — although focused
primarily on human rights — has become
a proxy for disagreements over a much
wider and longer-standing set of issues. As
such, the movement has pitted Jews against
Jews, pro-Israelis versus anti-Israelis, and
pro-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu supporters versus Netanyahu critics.
It’s also created rifts in the progressive
movement, which attracts Jewish followers
because of the faith’s culture of tolerance
and identification with the underdog.
Reform Judaism — the largest branch
of Judaism — was the first major religious denomination to support same-sex
marriage, and Israel is the only nation in
the Middle East that recognizes same-sex
marriages. It also is the most progressive
nation in the region by far. Arab countries
stone adulterers to death, throw gays off
skyscrapers to their deaths and some do
not allow women to drive or even show
their faces.
Given the human rights abuses of other
countries in the region, a lot of Jews believe
Israel is singled out due to anti-Semitism,
and they’re blaming the BDS movement for
anti-Semitic incidents on campuses. While
the Anti-Defamation League, which tracks
and fights anti-Semitic hate crimes, said it
hasn’t seen a dramatic rise in such crimes
on campuses, a spokesman said, “The BDS
movement does fuel anti-Semitism. We
have some serious concerns about BDS.”
He noted that anti-Semitic hate crimes
in the United States routinely exceed antiMuslim hate crimes.
Elana Kahn, director of the Jewish Community Relations Council for the Milwaukee
Jewish Federation, said part of the problem
she has with BDS is that “when we talk
about Israel being grounded on injustice,
we’re applying different standards to Israel
than every other nation.”
The University of California-Davis held
a hearing last month to
consider divesting university holdings from
companies that do business with Israel. After
the meeting, the school’s
Jewish fraternity Alpha
Epsilon Pi had its house
defaced with swastikas.
Fraternity leaders said
they believed they had
been targeted over their
support for Israel. However, the coalition of student groups that
supported divestment condemned the vandalism.
Fighting anti-Semitism
on campus
The Simon Wiesenthal Center issued a
report last year titled “Anti-Semitism on
Campus: A clear–and-present danger.” The
report called the growing rate of anti-Semitism on campuses “alarming” and “getting
worse.” It referenced “grim examples of
Jewish students being blocked from participation in student government and being
harassed.”
Last month, the University of California’s Board of Regents became the first to
adopt a “Principles Against Intolerance”
policy in response to a series of high-profile
anti-Semitic incidents — including swastikas found on Jewish fraternities and the
attempted exclusion of a student government candidate because of her Jewish faith.
The document, which took months to
prepare due to the charged political environment, states, “Anti-Semitism, antiSemitic forms of anti-Zionism and other
forms of discrimination have no place at the
University of California.”
But to many Jews, especially older ones,
anti-Zionism is inherently anti-Semitic.
“The well-being of Israel is really a critical
part of what it means to be a Jew today,”
said Rabbi Mendel Matusof, director of
the Rohr Chabad Jewish
Student Center at UWMadison.
The reality is that living in peace in the Middle
East is impossible in these
times, said Matusof. As
WiG was preparing this
story, the terrorist bombing of a bus in Jerusalem
injured 21 people, two
of them critically. And,
the same day, an Israeli
military court charged a soldier with manslaughter after he was caught on video by
an Israeli human rights group fatally shooting a wounded Palestinian attacker.
“Israel doesn’t live in a friendly neighborhood,” Matusof said.
“What frustrates me now is the way we
talk about Israel these days in America,”
Kahn said. “We eliminate complexity. The
problem is that real life is more complex
than these really simple reductive narratives that people are drawing. They’re drawing cartoon characters. There’s good on one
side and bad on the other. I would challenge
people to find a place in their heart to care
about Palestinians and Israeli Jews at the
same time.”
While Kahn doesn’t believe the BDS
movement is inherently anti-Semitic, she
believes it’s “a magnet for people who hold
Jews in great disdain.”
Jews against Israel
Most Jews, especially older ones, want a
two-state solution to the conflict between
Israel and Palestine. But many who support
the BDS movement, including members of
groups such as Jewish Voices for Peace,
want Jews to abdicate their control of Israel.
They reject the notion of Zionism, which
guarantees a Jewish state in perpetuity.
“Anti-Zionism, non-Zionism is more common in Jewish history than Zionism,” said
Rachel Ida Buff, faculty adviser to a recently
formed JVP chapter on the UW-Milwaukee
campus.
JVP is a pro-Palestinian campus group
whose supporters believe the conditions
that led to the creation of a Jewish state
no longer exist and do not justify what JVP
national media coordinator Naomi Dann
called a situation that “privileges Jews at
the expense of Palestinian lives.”
“The impact of Zionism … has been widescale displacement, dispossession of millions of Palestinians and nearly 50 years of
a brutal military occupation,” Dann wrote to
WiG in an email. She said her group values
the fundamental equality of all people and
cannot support Zionism because it devalues Palestinian lives.”
“This is a generational issue that I think
is reaching the fever pitch that it is because
the Zionists are beginning to be scared of
it,” Buff said.
Buff said there’s a kind of McCarthyism
in the Jewish community that stigmatizes
and disavows Jews who speak out against
Israeli military and social atrocities, as she
does.
She said she’s stepped on the equivalent
of a “third rail.” But she said she will not be
silenced for her beliefs.
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BDS from prior page
“It is up to me to decide what my government does with its tax dollars,” she said.
“Stop arming the occupation. The Zionists
are being played by Netanyahu. American
Jews are a little bit mistaken if they think
the State Department is supportive of Jews.
Israel is on the brink of (becoming) a pariah
state. American geopolitical involvement is
not going to make the world safe for Jews.”
Progressive roots
The BDS movement in the United States
is emerging “from the heart of the American left,” according to Cary Nelson, a
retired English professor at the University
of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He’s co-editor of the book, The Case Against Academic
Boycotts of Israel.
BDS is the current cause célèbre of the
left, and its presence can be seen at rallies
and protests for virtually every grievance on
the progressive agenda. Advocates for Palestinians have linked divestment to social
justice movements against racism, militarization, globalization and other issues that
are important to many college students.
Campus divestment advocates often
come to student government hearings with
the backing of student associations for
blacks, South Asians, Mexican-Americans,
gays and others. Last year, anti-Israeli protesters unraveled a sign several yards long
behind speakers at a Black Lives Matter
rally in Milwaukee’s Red Arrow Park. The
rally was intended to draw attention to the
April 14, 2014, police shooting of Dontre
Hamilton, an unarmed black man.
The BDS sign was by far the largest
at the rally. Jody Hirsh, a world-renown
Jewish educator and WiG contributor who
attended the rally, left because of it.
“I went to the rally because I really feel
(police shootings) are an American problem that needs to be dealt with and the
first thing I saw was a sign that said, “Milwaukee, Ferguson, Palestine. Resistance to
occupation is heroism,’” he said.
“I was so upset, because it’s not the
same thing at all,” he continued. “I felt that
this very important American issue was
hijacked by something different and I felt
that I couldn’t participate in the rally.”
Nevertheless, the BDS movement is
growing on the backs of other issues.
“Drawing these connections cross-struggle has been huge for our movement,” said
Tory Smith, a 2012 Earlham College graduate and member of National Students for
Justice in Palestine.
UW students’ experience
While BDS activism is taking a toll on
Jewish life on some campuses, that’s not
happening on campuses in Wisconsin, multiple sources told WiG.
At UW-Madison, which reportedly has
the nation’s eighth largest number of Jewish students — a statistic that Matusof
questions — BDS is a very visible movement. Nonetheless, Jewish life on campus
is thriving.
UW-Madison offers a major in Jewish
Studies and it has a number of active Jew-
ish organizations, including fraternities and
sororities.
UW-Milwaukee has a small Jewish population of around 200, said Marc Cohen,
interim executive director of Hillel Milwaukee. Hillel International supports Jewish life
on campuses throughout the world. Cohen
described Hillel in Milwaukee as a kind of
“Switzerland,” where pro-Israelis and proPalestinians can talk freely and openly in a
neutral, non-threatening environment.
Hilary Miller, a Milwaukeean enrolled in
Jewish Studies at UW-Madison, contrasts
the Wisconsin experience with that at other
schools. She has attended conferences at
UC-Berkeley and UC-Irvine, and she’s felt
the tension on those campuses. There, she
said, some people in the BDS movement are
“absolutely using this as a wedge against
Jews. … Sometimes it reminds me of what
I’ve studied about anti-Jewish propaganda
in Nazi Germany.”
Indeed, critics of Israel often complain
that Jews have all the power, money and
influence in the region. The re-emergence
of what sounds similar to the myth of Jewish wealth and secret control of society
frightens older Jews, because it echoes
Nazi propaganda.
But Miller said she’s encountered nothing
like that sort of extremism at UW-Madison,
which she described as a very comfortable
environment for Jews. In fact, she’s highly
engaged in Jewish activities.
Miller founded the independent group
Student Alliance for Israel, which she said
is apolitical and promotes understanding of
Israel’s traditions and culture. She attends
pro-Palestinian events and rallies because
she “wants to understand the other side,”
she said.
Miller identifies politically with progressives, but she feels almost apologetic
at times in progressive circles about her
involvement in Jewish activities. She knows
Jewish students who are afraid to put such
involvements on their resumes out of fear
it might affect their job prospects, she said.
And, based on what she witnessed in
California, she’s afraid the situation on
campus could deteriorate if BDS becomes
a stronger force at UW–Madison.
Ongoing internal conflict
There will always be Jews who say that
precisely because of their history of persecution, Israel should be more compassionate.
But Jews such as Matusof and Kahn are
alarmed “that the Jewish community is not
seen anymore as a minority deserving of
the same sensitivities that the progressive
community really holds strong,” Matusof
said. “Jews in America,” he added, “are seen
as a white privileged class, while we still are
a minority and there still is discrimination.”
At any rate, analyzing and arguing are
essential elements in Jewish theology and
culture. There’s an old joke that goes, “If
you ask 10 Jews for advice, you’ll get 11
opinions.”
The number is probably higher.
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Caring Partners Invites You to
a Lunch ‘n Learn:
Art & Music Therapy
in Memory Care
Kids take on feds, fossil fuel
industry in climate case
Tuesday, May 10 • 11:30 am – 1 pm
Moderator: Chazzan Jeremy Stein
Panelists:
Sarah Cohen, MSW
Kimberly Roseneau, AP-BC
Malia Fischer, Activity Director
Dawn Adler, RTA
RSVP by May 4 to Elaine Gauger
[email protected] or 414.277.8801
P H OTO : O u r C h i l d r e n T ru st
1414 N. Prospect Ave. • jhccmilwaukee.org
A group of young people — ages 8 to 19 — is suing the federal government in a landmark
climate change case.
By Lisa Neff
Staff writer
Caregiver Support Group
1-2 pm • Tuesdays, June 21, July 19,
August 16, and September 20
Chai Point Private Conference Room
Are you providing care and support for a loved one with
dementia? Do you want to connect with others who
know what you’re going through? We understand and
are here to help. Please join us as we explore dementia,
discuss challenging behaviors, and offer practical tips
and strategies.
Facilitated by social workers:
Dana Rubin–Winkelman MSW, CAPSW,
JHCC Adult Day Center
Carolyn Schuman, MSW, CAPSW,
Chai Point Senior Living
Light refreshments will be served.
This program is free & open to the public.
Please call 414.289.9600 to RSVP.
Free parking is available under the building at
1414 N. Prospect Ave.
1400 North Prospect Avenue, Milw. • 414-289-9600
www.chaipoint.org • Like us on Facebook • Twitter@jsliving
Environmental leaders call the case the
most important lawsuit on the planet — and
it’s been filed by kids.
The plaintiffs, ages 8–19, expect the “trial
of the century,” and they recently gained a
U.S. magistrate’s clearance to go forward
with their landmark climate change complaint against the federal government.
The case will “determine if we have a
right to a livable future or if corporate
power will continue to deny our rights for
the sake of their own wealth,” said plaintiff
Kelsey Juliana of Eugene, Oregon.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas Coffin
recently rejected motions for dismissal
from the federal government and fossil fuel
industry, delivering a victory to the plaintiffs, who accuse the government of violating their constitutional rights by permitting,
encouraging and enabling the exploitation,
production and combustion of fossil fuels.
“Now these young plaintiffs have the
right to prove that the government’s role in
harming them has been knowing and deliberate for more than 50 years,” said Julia
Olson, executive director of Our Children’s
Trust and a co-counsel in the case.
“The court upheld our claims that the
federal government intensified the danger
to our plaintiffs’ lives, liberty and property,”
said plaintiffs’ attorney Philip Gregory.
Specifically, Gregory’s clients accuse the
government of failing to curtail fossil fuel
emissions and allowing increased carbon
pollution through fossil fuel extraction, production, consumption, transportation and
export. According to the suit, these failures
infringe on the young people’s right to life
and liberty, as well as violate their substantive due process rights.
Coffin, in denying the requests for dis-
missal, wrote, “Plaintiffs give this debate
justiciability by asserting harms that befall
or will befall them personally and to a
greater extent than older segments of society. It may be that eventually the alleged
harms, assuming the correctness of plaintiffs’ analysis of the impacts of global climate change, will befall all of us.”
The magistrate heard oral arguments in
March in Eugene, during a hearing attended
by hundreds. So many turned out that the
arguments had to be streamed to the overflow assembled in three additional courtrooms.
Continuing in court
The young people have a guardian in the
case, who is a named plaintiff — climate
scientist James Hansen.
Hansen said earlier this month, “Science clearly establishes that our planet’s
increasing energy imbalance — caused in
substantial part by our government’s support for the exploitation and combustion of
fossil fuel — imposes increasingly severe
risks on our common future.
“Now, from Eugene, Oregon, comes a
prescient and insightful ruling from a federal district court. Judge Coffin in effect
declares that the voice of children and
future generations, supported by the relevant science, must be heard. We will now
proceed to prove our claims.”
The youth plaintiffs include Victory Barrett, 16, who said, “People label our generation as dreamers but hope is not the only
tool we have. I am a teenager. I want to do
what I love and live a life full of opportunities. I want the generation that follows to
have the same chance. I absolutely refuse
to let our government’s harmful action, corporate greed and the pure denial of climate
science get in the way of that.”
7
Woman’s Party HQ becomes U.S. monument
By Lisa Neff
Staff writer
President Barack Obama marked
Equal Pay Day by designating a home
central to the women’s rights movement as a national monument.
The Washington, D.C., property is
the Sewall-Belmont House and Museum, now designated the Belmont-Paul
Women’s Equality National Monument. The president dedicated the
monument named for Alva Belmont
and Alice Paul, key figures in the
women’s rights and suffrage movements, on April 12.
“I want young girls and boys to
come here, 10, 20, 100 years from
now, to know that women fought
for equality, it was not just given to
them,” Obama said.
“I want them to be astonished that
there was ever a time when women
earned less than men for doing the
same work,” the president continued,
addressing an audience that included tennis legend Billie Jean King and
U.S. Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski. “I want
them to be astonished that there was
ever a time when women were vastly
outnumbered in the boardroom or in
Congress, that there was ever a time
when a woman had never sat in the
Oval Office.”
The house was built more than 200
years ago and is one of the oldest
homes near the Capitol. In 1929, the
home became the National Woman’s
Party headquarters, from which party
members led the equality movement.
They authored more than 600 pieces
of federal, state and local legislation
in support of equal rights.
Belmont was an activist and suffragist and a major benefactor of the
party.
Paul founded the party and was
a chief strategist in the movement,
playing an instrumental role in passage and ratification of the 19th
Amendment guaranteeing women’s
suffrage.
Later, working from the house, Paul
drafted an update to the Equal Rights
Amendment text, wrote provisions
that were included in a civil rights
act to prevent gender-based discrimination and worked to get women’s
equality language incorporated in the
charter of the United Nations.
The president dedicated the monument on Equal Pay Day to call attention to the pay disparity between men
and women. April 12 is the date in the
current year that represents the extra
days a typical woman working full
time would have to work just to make
Proud Founding Member of
LGBT Chamber of Commerce.
Jordan
5th Generation
the same as a typical man did in the
previous year.
“I’m not here just to say we should
close the wage gap,” said Obama. “I’m
here to say we will close the wage
gap. … If you don’t believe that we’re
going to close our wage gap, you need
to come visit this house, because this
house has a story to tell.”
Efforts to protect the house date
to the early 1970s. The more recent
proposals to include the site in the
National Park System garnered congressional backing led by Mikulski,
D-Maryland, as well as support from
community leaders, women’s organizations, historians and conservation
groups.
“The Sewall-Belmont house and
its historical archives of the women’s
rights movement are a fitting addition to our National Park System,”
said Sierra Club executive director
Michael Brune. “As we celebrate the
National Park Service Centennial and
look ahead to the next century of conservation, it is public spaces like this
that can help broaden our outdoor
legacy. We look forward to continuing
to work with the Obama administration to increase opportunities for
people to connect with nature, history
and each other.”
PHOTOS: Library of Congress
Alva Belmont circa 1910, above, Alice Paul, left.
‘I want young girls and boys to
come here, 10, 20, 100 years
from now, to know that women
fought for equality, it was not
just given to them.’
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collected at time of purchase. See store for details. Sale ends Saturday, April 30th, 2016.
©BRF
8
Wise words: Commencement season to begin
Compiled by Lisa Neff
Staff writer
Students may be shaking spring-break
sand from their flip-flops, but graduation
celebrations are just weeks away for colleges and universities.
Many Wisconsin colleges and universities — public and private — plan commencement ceremonies in May and are
lining up speakers.
NFL quarterback Russell Wilson will
deliver the spring commencement address
on May 14 at the University of WisconsinP H OTO : Co u rt e sy
Madison.
“It’s an honor to be asked to speak at NFL star Russell Wilson, featured on the
any commencement ceremony, but I’m par- cover of Rolling Stone.
ticularly excited to return to a place where
I have so many great memories,” said the
Super Bowl-winning Seahawk, who attend- tarian, will deliver the keynote the same day
at Marquette University.
ed UW-Madison.
At Ripon College on May 15, the class
Also in Madison, former Attorney General Eric Holder will give the keynote at the of 2016 will hear from soccer coach Pia
University of Wisconsin Law School hood- Sundhage, who led the U.S. women’s team
ing ceremony on May 13. “I’m thrilled to to two Olympic gold medals.
Elsewhere, graduates of 2016 will hear
have the opportunity to talk to these graduates about the road ahead,” Holder said in a from Vice President Joe Biden, who will
news release. “And I hope by sharing some deliver commencement addresses at the
of my own experiences, they see that it’s a U.S. Military Academy, Delaware State Unibig world just waiting for them to make a versity and Syracuse University’s College
of Law.
positive impact.”
First lady Michele Obama will address
On May 22, House Speaker Paul Ryan,
R-Wis., will address the graduating class at graduating seniors at Jackson State UniverCarthage College in Kenosha, while alumna sity in Mississippi, as well as City College of
Judith Mayotte, a TV producer and humani- New York and the Santa Fe Indian School in
Santa Fe, New Mexico.
WiG ushers in the commencement season with a look at wise words delivered to
previous graduating classes. Some favorites:
• Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s
address at Harrow School in 1941: “Never
give in. Never give in. Never, never, never —
in nothing, great or small, large or petty —
never give in, except to convictions of honor
and good sense.”
• President John F. Kennedy’s address at
American University in 1963: “No problem
of human destiny is beyond human beings.
Man’s reason and spirit have often solved
the seemingly unsolvable.”
• Tennis legend Billie Jean King’s address
at the University of Massachusetts in
2000: “The most important words that
have helped me in life when things have
gone right or when things have gone wrong
are ‘accept responsibility.’”
• Apple founder Steve Jobs’ address at
Stanford in 2005: “Your time is limited, so
don’t waste it living someone else’s life.
Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions
drown out your own inner voice.”
• Actor and politician Arnold Schwarzenegger’s address at the University of
Southern California in 2009: “You can’t
climb the ladder of success with your hands
in your pockets.”
• Country singer Dolly Parton’s commencement address at the University of
Tennessee in 2009: “Now I usually try not
to give advice. Information, yes, advice no.
But what has worked for me may not work
for you. Well, take for instance what has
worked for me. Wigs. Tight clothes. Pushup
bras.”
• President Barack Obama’s address at
Arizona State University in 2009: “A relentless focus on the outward markers of success can lead to complacency. It can make
you lazy.”
Commence career search
College graduates from the class
of 2016 face sunnier prospects in the
job market than those who graduated
a year ago, according to a new report
from the National Association of Colleges and Employers.
The report shows employers expect
to hire 5.2 percent more new graduates than they hired in 2015.
Another report, released by an institute at Michigan State University, estimated national employers would hire
15 percent more graduates with bachelor’s degrees in 2016 than in 2015.
Additionally, about 80 percent of
the employers that answered the MSU
survey described the U.S. labor market
for college graduates as “good” to
“excellent.”
— L.N.
App to provide anti-viral drugs prompts praise, concern
9
By Lisa Neff
Staff writer
A new app has the potential of
broadening the use of a prescription
drug that can prevent HIV infection
among those at high risk.
But some HIV/AIDS activists are
raising concerns because the app
allows people to order prescriptions
online for pre-exposure prophylaxis, commonly known as PrEP, without direct contact with a doctor.
PrEP can reduce the risk of HIV
infection by 90 percent. It’s recommended by the U.S. Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention for
people at high risk, including sexually active gay men and people with
infected sex partners.
Earlier this year, Nurx, a company
headquartered in the San Francisco
P H OTO : Co u rt e sy
area, announced it would add PrEP
Nurx
is a Californiato the prescriptions available to
based
startup that
users of its innovative app.
allows
customers
to
The service currently has limited
fill
prescriptions
via
reach, delivering prescribed oral
contraceptives to customers in Cal- an app.
ifornia and New York. On its website, Nurx promotes its services: “If
you have health insurance, Nurx is
free. If you pay cash, you can get
birth control from $15 per month.
“Whether you are currently on the pill or new to
birth control, Nurx is for you. We always ship you three
months of birth control, for your convenience.”
Most recently, Nurx announced the availability of PrEP
“right from the app with our clinical team. No need to go
into the doctor’s office, or to the pharmacy.”
Customers would apply online with Nurx and receive a
prescription after completing a health survey and undergoing lab tests that show normal kidney function and no
HIV infection.
Some public health officials see services like Nurx as
a new way to help lower new HIV infection rates, especially in areas that lack HIV/AIDS services or where such
services are overburdened.
However, others, such as activists with the Californiabased AIDS Healthcare Foundation, are concerned.
“While the goal to improve access to effective HIV
prevention tools is admirable, removing any or all direct
contact with a physician or medical provider is not,” said
Michael Weinstein, president of AHF. The organization
has taken a position against widespread deployment of
PrEP as a communitywide public health strategy. In 2014,
Weinstein referred to Truvada, the anti-viral medication
used for PrEP, as a “party drug.”
AHF does support the use of PrEP on a case-by-case
basis that’s decided between a medical provider and
patient.
Weinstein said STD rates are skyrocketing, particularly among young people using hookup apps like Grindr
and Tinder.
“We challenge the wisdom and ethics of an app that
allows people to order a drug to prevent HIV as readily
as ordering pizza,” he said. “PrEP is not simply a pill taken
in isolation: It is a four-part HIV prevention strategy that
can be highly effective, but one that offers no protection
against any other STDs. Eliminating primary contact with
the physician or medical provider from this equation is
really a disservice to the patient.”
PrEP primer
PrEP as a prevention strategy includes the use of Gilead Sciences’ medication Truvada to prevent HIV infection in non-infected individuals.
Truvada was first approved for treatment of HIV/AIDS
patients in August 2004. The FDA approved use of Truvada as PrEP in July 2012.
Guidelines issued by the FDA for PrEP include:
• An initial baseline negative HIV test.
• Daily adherence to the Truvada medication.
• Ongoing periodic HIV testing to ensure the individual
on PrEP remains HIV-negative.
• Continued use of other prevention methods, such as
condoms.
In Wisconsin, a key resource for information and
access to PrEP is the AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin,
which announced expanded access to health care services across the state on World AIDS Day in December
2015. ARCW is online at arcw.org.
— L.N.
GY T
GET YOURSELF TESTED
FREE STD TESTING
IN APRIL
SAME DAY AND NEXT DAY APPOINTMENTS
1-800-230-PLAN or PPWI.ORG
JOIN THE CONVERSATION:
facebook.com/ppawi
@PPAWI
10
Milwaukee’s trees, vital to urban well-being, are vanishing
By Virginia Small
Contributing writer
To paraphrase Smokey Bear, only you can
prevent the loss of our urban forest.
Shade trees are essential to our quality of
life, forming a canopy of foliage that plays
an important environmental role. But the
tree canopy is dwindling and local property
owners are largely responsible.
Only one in five shade trees on private
property that are lost to disease, old age
and storm damage are being replaced —
and that rate is far too low. According to
Joe Wilson, executive director of the nonprofit Greening Milwaukee, the situation is
especially worrisome within Milwaukee’s
city limits.
“Property owners are no longer enamored
of planting trees,” Wilson says. Instead,
urban dwellers are investing in pergolas,
awnings, umbrellas and other strategies to
create shade. Changing lifestyles and successful marketing by landscape and homeimprovement industries are making people
forget about trees, he explains.
Fire pits and patios made
of pavers or concrete
are leaving less space
for substantial trees in
urban yards that often
are postage-stampsized.
Why does the
declining tree
population
matter?
Shade trees
— the tall ones
that form a
canopy
of
leaves — are
as essential to life
as water,
Wilson
s a y s .
T h e y
provide
respite, beauty and habitats for wildlife. But they also contribute to clean air
and water. They decrease stormwater flow
and noise pollution. They reduce energy
WiG pLants a tree
WiG advertiser Johnson’s Nursery is donating a musclewood tree, also known
as American hornbeam, to be planted behind our office on East Capitol Drive. The
musclewood is a not a shade tree, but a native tree that’s limited root system makes it
perfect for small spaces near buildings and pavement.
According to the Urban Ecology Center: “Musclewood … usually grows in the understory of our mixed-hardwood forests. The foliage, bark and fruits are important food
for lots of different songbirds, as well as squirrels, grouse, turkeys, foxes, cottontails
and beavers.” As we headed to press, the tree was slated to be planted on Earth Day,
Fri., April 22. Send your #EarthDay thoughts and activities to @wigazette.
Download our
FREE Whitening Guide:
http://smile.dewandental.com/teeth-whitening-ebook
consumption.
The City of Milwaukee is doing its part
to maintain trees in the city. City forestry
manager David Sivyer told WiG that 98
percent of all felled trees on city streets are
being replaced. In fact, the city has earned
accolades for its urban forestry program.
Milwaukee County also does its part in
maintaining and replanting trees on public
land.
Trees on public land, however, provide
only part of our urban canopy.
Trees and well-being
Rich Cochran, president of Western
Reserve Land Conservancy in Cleveland,
cites research documenting a correlation
between tree canopy and the health of
communities. For example, in cities where
the emerald ash borer wiped out tree canopies almost overnight, mortality from cardiovascular diseases jumped 10 percent.
The mapping of trees in Cuyahoga County
revealed a direct correlation between a
small tree canopy and rates of crime and
poverty.
He said the canopy varies among the
Cuyahoga County’s municipalities, from
about 20 percent coverage in poor areas to
80 percent in wealthy suburbs.
“We have to reforest our cities together,”
he told a TED-X audience at Cleveland
State University. “It’s not going to happen
otherwise.”
Reforesting can transform an urban area
into “a new kind of city … based on foundational laws of biology,” Cochran says.
He proposes that simply planting more
trees in sparsely treed urban areas will dramatically change the overall environment.
Re-greening Milwaukee
Both public and private efforts are underway to address Milwaukee’s declining canopy.
City forestry manager Sivyer reports that
Milwaukee’s tree canopy covers only about
half of what it did in the 1970s. The canopy
stood at about 23 percent of the city in 2013,
down from around 30 percent in the 1990s
and 55 percent in the 1960s and 1970s. A
great deal of the loss is due to the blight of
Dutch elm disease, which wiped out trees in
Milwaukee and across the nation.
Greening Milwaukee, which is affiliated
with Keep Greater Milwaukee Beautiful,
has set a goal of reaching a citywide canopy
rate of 40 percent, which is closer to rates
that are common in suburbs and small
towns.
Wilson acknowledges the goal is ambitious. To encourage tree planting, Greening
Milwaukee offers 2,000 donated saplings
each year. In 2015, only 500 city residents
signed up for the free trees. Greening Milwaukee has planted the remaining trees in
parks or on public land near the Milwaukee
River that may be subject to erosion.
The City of Milwaukee is proactive in its
canopy efforts, and that’s not gone unnoticed. The conservation organization Urban
Forests named Milwaukee among the top
10 of the 50 most populous U.S. cities for
its urban forest in 2013. (Others are Austin, Charlotte, Denver, Minneapolis, New
York, Portland, Sacramento, Seattle and
Washington, D.C.) The honor was based on
factors that include civic commitment to
maintaining the urban forest, governmental
strategies for management and addressing
challenges, accessibility of urban forests
and other green spaces, overall health of
the city’s urban forest and documented
knowledge of the city’s trees.
THREATS TO CANOPY
City government also has taken a proactive approach to another major threat to
tree canopy: the emerald ash borer. For
now, the city is succeeding in keeping the
scourge at bay through effective treatment
before trees get infected.
The borer was discovered in Milwaukee
in 2012 and the city has since ordered the
removal of 603 ash trees on 222 private
properties. The city’s preventive treatment
of ash street trees to avert borer infestation
has proven successful thus far.
Although ash trees are indigenous to
Wisconsin, their dominance in the landscape, both naturally and through planting,
has made the tree canopy vulnerable. John
Lunz, who volunteers several days a week
to remove invasive species from county
parks and nature centers, laments the fact
TREES next page
TREES from prior page
that urban foresters did not learn to prioritize biodiversity
following the devastating loss 20,000 of elms to Dutch
elm disease.
“Municipalities have been guilty of planting trees of little
or no ecological value and also planting a near-monoculture of them — inviting disaster when a pest arrives,” Lunz
says.
Wilson notes that the emerald ash borer crisis has
finally gotten cities, including Milwaukee, to plant a more
diverse array of street trees. But while street trees were
replanted, property owners did not replace lost elms and
other mature trees, he says.
Experts on sustainability warn of dire consequences if
people fail to recognize the necessity of planting and maintaining large trees. For instance, Milwaukee will become
hotter through the “heat-island” effect, which is caused
by large areas of concrete surfaces that absorb heat and
clusters of buildings that throw off heat. Heat islands contribute to global warming, which in turn exacerbates the
problems created by warming. Green roofs and trees help
to mitigate the damage.
Increasing the number of trees on private property
will require mindset changes. Wilson says homeowners
will have to start considering the community benefits of
planting trees on their properties instead of focusing on
concerns about possibly having to remove a mature tree
someday or prune its limbs away from power lines.
It’s also crucial that homeowners commit to planting
shade trees and not just ornamental or orchard trees,
Wilson says: The latter do not significantly add to canopy
cover.
Wilson says city officials can help by requiring developers to plant trees as a contingency for approving projects.
For example, he doubts the new Bucks arena project is
mandating an appropriate number of trees to be planted.
Wilson also thinks governments could take steps to
incentivize planting trees on private property.
He hopes Milwaukeeans will “fall in love with shade
trees” again, and look no farther than their own backyards
for enjoying them.
Tips for choosing and planting trees
Consider various types of trees. While all trees
benefit humans and the environment, shade trees are
especially needed on private property to maintain sufficient urban tree canopy. Shade trees can vary in size
and other traits, including fall color.
Evaluate your site carefully for tree-planting
options. Even small yards can accommodate a shade
tree if it is sited correctly. Check for potential barriers
and challenges to long-term growth both above and
below ground. Then research the mature size and
growth pattern, as well as light, soil and water preferences of potential choices.
Opt for native trees and ones not overly dominant
in a neighborhood or city. Biodiversity makes ecosystems more resilient, while monocultures are more
fragile. Trees that are indigenous to a region provide
habitat for birds and others species.
Carefully follow planting and care guidelines.
Poorly planted trees may not thrive. Sufficient water
and protection also are essential.
Attentively maintain your trees. Ensure the ongoing health of trees with proper care, including effective
pruning and timely attention to any problems. Consult
a tree expert periodically to assess your trees’ health.
For more information on selecting and planting
trees, visit the Arbor Day Foundation’s website at
www.arborday.org/trees/tips
Get a tree
FOR FREE
Homeowners
and
community
groups can request
free saplings by
calling 414-473TREE or visiting
Greening Milwaukee’s website. Individuals can also
make a donation
to have Greening
Milwaukee plant
a tree as a gift for
a wedding, birthday, anniversary,
memorial or other
occasion.
11
12
Please recirculate & recycle this publication.
E ditorial
Merit selection: Best way to undo judicial corruption
P r o g r e s s i v e . A lt e r n at i v e .
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To help build a strong, informed community;
promote social equality and justice; support
immigration and electoral reform; expose
government secrets and call out political
corruption; celebrate and support the arts; and
foster appreciation and respect for the state’s
extraordinary natural resources.
CEO/Principal
Leonard Sobczak, [email protected]
publisher/Editor in Chief
Louis Weisberg, [email protected]
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Lisa Neff, [email protected]
ARTS EDITOR
Matthew Reddin, [email protected]
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Production coordinator
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Distribution
Paul Anderson, Andy Augustyn,
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CONTRIBUTORS
Roger Bybee, Colton Dunham, Jamakaya,
Rachele Krivichi, Bill Lamb, Kat Minerath,
Mike Muckian, Jay Rath, Kirstin Roble,
Anne Siegel, Gregg Shapiro, Virginia Small,
Julie Steinbach, Larry Zamba
The Wisconsin Gazette is published every other
week and distributed throughout the Milwaukee
area, Madison, Racine, Kenosha, and 40 other cities
statewide. Have WiG mailed to your home for $65 per
year. Contact [email protected] or call
414-961-3240, ext. 101.
WiG Publishing, LLC. © 2015
3956 N. Murray Ave. Shorewood, WI 53211
In the almost 4,000 years since Hammurabi codified
Babylonian law, Western cultures have held judicial fairness
and impartiality as an ideal. To be sure, it’s an ideal sometimes honored more in the breach than in the keeping, but
it’s an unchanging ideal nonetheless.
Today, in Wisconsin, that ideal is under attack, from
enemies both old and new.
Wisconsin elects its judges and elections mean donations
and donations mean influence. The more money that flows
into a judge’s coffers, the greater the chances that fairness
and impartiality are at risk.
It’s critical for Wisconsin to reconsider the way judges are
selected. The American Bar Association has advocated for
merit selection since 1937. Merit selection, which is used in
two-thirds of the states, relies on neutral experts and nonpartisan boards to select a qualified pool of candidates from
which the governor can choose. In some states, approval of
the senate also is required.
Under the system, judges must stand for retention after
a determined number of years. The public is asked to vote
only on whether to keep them. There are no competitive
elections.
Alternately, the Wisconsin Bar Association has proposed
a constitutional amendment that would limit justices to
a single, 16-year term. According to WAB, the term limits
would “engender greater public confidence in the court’s
ability to pursue justice independently of political influence.”
We don’t think term limits are strong enough to solve
the problem. Only merit selection upholds the ideal of blind
justice.
Wisconsin’s already corrupt system has been further
damaged by two high court rulings, one from Washington
and the other from Madison.
In its Citizens United ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court ratcheted up brazen judicial bribery by removing limits on how
much donors can contribute secretly to PACs to influence
elections.
In Wisconsin, the problem is compounded by a state
Supreme Court decision that campaigns can coordinate
WiG’s WEB
PICKS
Some of our favorite recent
pictorials from cyberspace
election strategies directly with dark money groups. The
story of how such coordination became legal demonstrates
how this kind of corruption works.
Several dark money groups were charged in a state
“John Doe” case with illegal coordination during Gov. Scott
Walker’s 2012 recall campaign. The same groups had given
$8 million to four of the conservative justices on the bench.
So, when the case arrived at the high court, its outcome
was a foregone conclusion. But the paid-for justices went
further than anyone imagined they would. They not only
dismissed the case against their donor, but ignored all legal
precedent and tossed out the law banning such coordination. Then they ordered the evidence to be destroyed.
Why weren’t those justices recused from a case in which
there was such a blatant conflict of interest? Just because,
they said.
On April 5, with nearly four times the anonymous cash
spent for her as for her opponent, Supreme Court Justice
Rebecca Bradley won a 10-year term on the high court. Now
the dark money groups have five-two control over justice in
the state.
Money over merit: A majority of area lawyers said Bradley
was unqualified. She’d never served on a judicial bench until
2012, when Scott Walker appointed her to a Milwaukee Circuit Court position. Last fall, following the death of Justice
Patrick Crooks, Walker elevated her to the high court to
finish out Crooks’ term, making her the incumbent in the
election.
WiG is not alone in calling for reform. On April 5, 11
diverse towns in Wisconsin held referenda asking whether
to amend the U.S. Constitution to undo Citizens United by
declaring that money is not speech. Between 74 and 88
percent of voters said yes. That brought the total number of
Wisconsin communities who’ve voted to nix Citizens United
to 72. Forty-four percent of the state’s citizens live in those
jurisdictions.
We need Citizens United to be thrown on the trash heap of
history, and we must stop electing justices and appoint them
on merit. Fair and impartial justice must not be negotiable.
ON THE RECORD
“Just because he has a Hispanic last name
does not mean he’s Hispanic. His mind is white.”
— EDNA FERRER, a 57-year-old hairstylist in
the Bronx, telling the New York Daily News that
GOP presidential candidate Ted Cruz had no business visiting the majority Hispanic borough of the city. Cruz
had to cancel appearances there on April 7 due to protesters.
“If you feel as though somebody is doing something wrong
against you, can you just get over it?”
— GOP presidential candidate JOHN KASICH’s advice to
LGBT people suffering discrimination.”
“The big takeaway from last night: The Republican machine
in Wisconsin that Scott Walker and the Republican Party of
Wisconsin have honed over the past four years is stronger
than ever.”
— U.S. SEN. RON JOHNSON in a statement about the election of Scott Walker’s hand-picked Supreme Court justice
Rebecca Bradley to a 10-year term on April 5. Outside groups
supporting Walker’s candidate Rebecca Bradley outspent
those supporting challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg almost four
to one.
“There’s no such thing as a free lunch. Somebody pays. And
I think we ought to know who it is.” — MSNBC host CHRIS MATTHEWS pressing former Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton, a Bernie Sanders supporter,
on how he would pay for the free college education that he’s
promising voters.
“They had a long time to register, and they were unaware
of the rules, and they didn’t register in time. So they feel very,
very guilty. They feel very guilty. But it’s fine, I mean, I understand that.”
— DONALD TRUMP telling Fox and Friends that his children
Eric and Ivanka Trump would not be able to vote for him in New
York’s April 19 primary.
“This issue is very personal for me, obviously. I’m disappointed for several reasons. First of all, Mississippi is the only
state I know how to spell. Second of all, that is the definition
of discrimination. It is also something that the Supreme Court
already ruled on when they made marriage a right for everyone. Everyone.”
— ELLEN DEGENERES talking to her television audience
about Mississippi’s enactment of a law that allows religious
fundamentalists to deny public accommodations and services
to same-sex married couples.
“I simply believe that if you want to be the nominee for our
party, to be the president, you should actually run for it. I chose
not to do this, therefore, I should not be considered. Period.
End of story.”
— House Speaker PAUL RYAN trying to put an end to
speculation about whether he’d accept the GOP presidential
nomination if none of the current candidates tallies enough
delegates in the primaries to win outright.
“We’re proud of our operations and employees in Cary and
regret that as a result of this legislation we are unwilling to
include North Carolina in our U.S. expansion plans for now.
We very much hope that we can re-visit our plans to grow this
location in the near future.”
— Deutsche Bank co-CEO JOHN CRYAN in a statement
saying that his institution is canceling plans to employ 250
additional personnel at its North Carolina software application
development center. The bank is among a growing number
of companies that are dropping projects in
response to the state’s discriminatory law targeting transgender people.
13
Recommended Earth Day reading
Opinion
JAMAKAYA
When spring begins and Earth
Day rolls around, I join my neighborhood cleanup efforts and catch
up on books about our environment.
This year I read Elizabeth Kolbert’s The Sixth Extinction: An
Unnatural History. In this fascinating tour of our biosphere, I learned
again how interdependent and vulnerable all species of flora and
fauna are.
I haven’t studied science in many
years, so the book helped me brush
up on different aspects of geology,
biology and zoology. It synthesizes
in a very readable format the many
crises posing an existential threat
to life on our planet.
The introductory chapters show
the way extinction events have
been viewed historically, including
theories about what caused the
first five great extinction events on
our planet. There is not one cause
for all of them; some were gradual,
and at least one was sudden and
catastrophic.
Through discussions and observations with many scientists in the
field, Kolbert argues that we may
be starting to experience a sixth
extinction due to human intrusion
and global warming.
I found the testimony of the
many scientists she spoke with
compelling. They include herpetologists, botanists, marine biologists, paleontologists, ornithologists and more. All are conducting
field studies whose findings point
to rapid, alarming changes in plant
and animal ecosystems.
The scientists reveal damage
caused by invasive species and the
collapse of tree populations and
coral reefs. They document the
loss of animal habitat due to overhunting and over-fishing. They testify to the damaging impacts of
warming waters and ocean acidification.
Kolbert reminds us that although
humans have known since the late
19th century that burning fossil
fuels warms the planet, we are
failing to change our destructive
habits.
Some people hate The Sixth
Extinction and its thesis because
they either cannot or do not want
to believe that people are responsible for any of this. Or they cling to
their faith that their God will somehow resolve everything in the end.
There are also huge industries
whose wealth is built on ecological
destruction and whose riches support the campaign to deny global
warming.
How we are going to reverse or
ease the damage already done is
the greatest moral and practical
challenge we face. The science is
pretty clear and Kolbert’s book is
an excellent wake-up call.
I also read Pilgrim at Tinker Creek,
Annie Dillard’s nature essays published in 1974. Dillard kept a diary
of a year spent in Virginia’s Roanoke Valley observing and interacting with nature.
Dillard is not a scientist, so her
approach is one of a lay observer
writing with curiosity, wonder and
sometimes horror about the beauty and cruelty of nature. She draws
vivid pictures of insect mating habits, aquatic diversity, bird migration, animal predation, and the
rebirth of plant life in the spring.
Her writing is expository but also
poetic.
This is how she describes the
falling leaves and coming of winter: “When the leaves fall, the
striptease is over; things stand
mute and revealed. Everywhere
skies extend, vistas deepen, walls
become windows, doors open. …
All that summer conceals, winter
reveals.”
Ultimately, Dillard is a pilgrim
on a journey of faith, searching for
the Creator who built a world of
such complexity. I don’t share her
conclusion about a creator, but I
respected and enjoyed her journey.
Same work is worth the same wage
Opinion
Rep. Jonathan Brostoff
April 12 was Equal Pay Day, a
day to reflect on the appalling fact
that in Wisconsin women earn 79
cents for each dollar men earn
when working the same job. Equal
Pay Day is the day when the average woman’s earnings for that year
plus the prior year equal those of a
male counterpart’s earnings for the
prior year alone.
The pay gap between women
and men has been shown to be a
constant issue regardless of the
educational level of the workers.
Since the initiation of the Fair Pay
Act of 1963, there has been a continual decrease in the pay gap.
However, the pace is so slow that
wage parity will not be reached
until 2133.
The pay gap for women of
color is even wider. For every dollar earned by a white man, Asian
women are paid 65 cents, AfricanAmerican women are paid 61 cents
and Hispanic women are paid a
mere 53 cents.
Nearly half of Wisconsin households are headed by women, 31
percent of which exist below the
poverty line.
In 2009, Wisconsin’s Equal
Pay Enforcement Act took effect,
increasing access for women to
press charges when their rights
were violated. Within one year
of the law’s inception, Wisconsin
jumped up 12 places from 36th
to 24th in the nation’s gender/
wage parity rankings. Additionally,
hardworking Wisconsin women
saw their median earnings rise 3
percent.
Despite these accomplishments,
just a few years later every Republican legislator in Wisconsin voted
to repeal the Equal Pay Enforcement Act. Every Democratic legislator in the state voted against the
repeal, but they were outnumbered
and Gov. Scott Walker signed the
repeal into law.
Earlier this session, I co-sponsored Senate Bill 145, which would
have reinstated Wisconsin’s Equal
Pay Enforcement Act. It defies
logic that the Republican-led Legislature failed to pass this bill before
session ended — without even giving it a public hearing — when
the wage gap results in Wisconsin women earning an average of
$10,000 less per year than their
male peers.
By ignoring this issue, Wisconsin’s economy is deprived of an
additional $8 billion annually in
consumer spending. My Democratic colleagues and I will continue to fight for what is right and
fair, including bringing back the
Equal Pay Enforcement Act, and
doing more to close the wage gap
for good. Wisconsin families and
our economy depend on it.
Rep. Jonathan Brostoff is a Milwaukee Democrat who represents
the 19th Assembly District.
14
State battles are being waged for control of courts
From AP and WiG reports
Much attention is being paid to the
U.S. Supreme Court vacancy, but equally
partisan battles are being waged for control
of state courts around the nation.
In states where voters elect Supreme
Court judges — Wisconsin is one such
state — millions of dollars are being spent
to reshape the courts for years to come.
Judicial watchdogs say spending by national
groups overwhelmingly favors judges on
the right of the political spectrum and is
mostly aimed at maintaining or improving
the courts’ responses to corporate interests
while countering state-level spending by
labor unions and other interest groups.
Lawmakers are busy too, debating
proposals to tip the balance of power by
expanding or reducing their courts’ sizes, or
making it easier to impeach judges whose
rulings upset the legislative majority.
“State courts are the final word on a host
of state law issues that have high stakes
for businesses’ bottom lines, legislatures’
agendas and the rights of individuals,” said
Alicia Bannon with the Brennan Center
for Justice at New York University. “Who
sits on state courts can have a profound
impact on the legal landscape in a state, and
special interest groups and politicians are
increasingly paying attention.”
High-dollar campaigns
State supreme court elections, like the
one decided on April 5 in Wisconsin, have
begun to resemble the rough-and-tumble,
high-dollar campaigns associated with
races for governor or Congress.
Spending for two Arkansas Supreme
Court seats alone topped $1.6 million,
setting a state record for TV ad buys in a
judicial election.
The Judicial Crisis Network, which is
spending millions campaigning against
President Barack Obama’s Supreme
Court nominee Merrick Garland, and the
Republican State Leadership Committee
were successful in seeing their candidates
elected in Arkansas, including a new chief
justice who says he’s guided by “prayer, not
politics.”
The races were so acrimonious that some
Arkansas Republicans are considering
ending popular elections for the top
court, while some Democrats want more
transparency by outside spending groups.
In Wisconsin, voters were exposed to
months of TV ads over a Supreme Court
seat ahead of the April 5 primary. Most of
the ads supported Justice Rebecca Bradley,
a conservative whom Republican Gov.
Scott Walker promoted through the judicial
system and onto the state’s top court in just
three years.
On Election Day, Bradley won a full,
10-year term.
After Election Day, a tally of documented
spending in the Wisconsin race showed the
P H O T O : G r aph i cStoc k
In states where voters elect Supreme Court judges, millions of dollars are being spent to
reshape the courts for years to come.
invested dollars rose to at least $4,3 million
for a single seat, according to the watchdog
groups Justice at Stake and the Brennan
Center for Justice.
Bradley’s campaign received a boost
from the Wisconsin Alliance for Reform, an
outside group that spent an estimated $1,8
million on television ads.
Her campaign also benefited from
$114,049 in other advertising by the
Republican State Leadership Committee,
the biggest multi-state spender in Supreme
Court races in the 2013–14 cycle.
An outside group supporting Kloppenburg,
the Greater Wisconsin Committee, spent
$381,360 on television ads. The Greater
Wisconsin Committee also spent $107,323
on other advertising.
According to the Brennan Center, outside
spending by special interest groups was 29
percent of total spending in Wisconsin’s
2013–14 cycle, which was a record high at
the time. But in this year’s race, outside
spending was 56 percent of total spending.
Reported fundraising by Bradley and
Kloppenburg totaled a combined $1,610,115,
according to state disclosures.
Partisan plays, payments
Meanwhile, partisan control of
Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court flipped last
fall after six candidates for three open
seats received a combined $12.2 million in
contributions, and two independent groups
spent an additional $3.5 million. Democrats
swept all three races, taking five of the
seven seats after six years of Republican
control.
A race in Kansas is likely to be another
big-money battleground. Groups supportive
of Republican Gov. Sam Brownback and the
GOP-controlled Legislature will be looking
to oust four of the five justices up for
retention elections in November, enabling
Brownback to select their replacements to
the seven-member court.
Lawmakers also are weighing changes
to their systems of electing, appointing or
retaining judges, mostly trying to limit the
power of state courts to overrule them.
A bill in Oklahoma would allow voters
to overturn some state Supreme Court
decisions. Washington lawmakers are
weighing whether to not only shrink their
Supreme Court from nine justices to five,
but also force judges to run in districts
rather than statewide. One lawmaker said
this could prevent an “intensely liberal
concentration” in the Seattle area from
diluting the influence of Republicans in the
rest of the state.
“There has been an anger and frustration
that legislative efforts have been enacted
and then within one, two or three years
those statutes have been struck down
as unconstitutional,” said Bill Raftery, an
analyst at the National Center for State
Courts, a nonprofit research organization.
After the Kansas Supreme Court ordered
the legislature to restore school funding,
the state’s senators approved a bill enabling
the impeachment of justices who attempt
to “usurp the power” of lawmakers and
executive branch officials. The House has
yet to take it up.
Critics have said the measure would
remove the court’s independence by
threatening the justices’ careers if the court
strikes down a law.
“It totally handicaps the Supreme Court,”
Republican state Rep. Steve Becker, a retired
district court judge. “It would render the
Supreme Court useless, basically.”
Missouri lawmakers also proposed a plan
to make it easier to impeach justices.
(See editorial, page 12)
wisconsingazette.com
updated all day.
15
To veg out is in Activists organize Milwaukee Veg Expo
By Lisa Neff
Staff writer
The moment for Pete Woodward of Milwaukee came when he read the bumper
sticker, “Eat plants for the planet.”
Something clicked, said the 29-year-old
mechanic, and he began the cycle to following a vegetarian diet.
For Molly Risser of Madison, the commitment came after an afternoon in a dog park.
The 34-year-old office assistant recalled,
“A friend was trying to get me to go vegetarian and she said, ‘Just imagine those … are
chickens instead of dogs.’ I did. I know it
sounds absurd, but your mind bends when
you picture people playing in the park with
a bunch of chickens.”
Both relatively new converts to the vegetarian lifestyle, Woodward and Risser are
looking forward to a new event on Milwaukee’s calendar — the Veg Expo, which takes
place at Hart Park in Wauwatosa 10 a.m.–6
p.m. on May 7.
An announcement for the event invited people to “come veg with us!” and by
SAVE THE DATES
Milwaukee’s first Veg Expo takes
place 10 a.m.–6 p.m. on May 7 in Hart
Park, 7300 W. Chestnut St., Wauwatosa. There is no cost to attend the
event, though some vendors will be selling food and beverages. For more, go to
mkevegexpo.com.
Also of interest:
• World Day for Laboratory Animals,
April 23. In Dane County, activists will
gather at 1 p.m. at Hawthorne Library
and carpool to a protest site.
• Mad City Vegan Fest, 10 a.m.–5
p.m. on June 18, Alliant Energy Center
Exhibition Hall. The festival features
vendors offering vegan food, as well
as information about the vegetarian
lifestyle, animal welfare, animal rescue
and more.
that the organizers mean come learn from
experts about the varied benefits of a vegetarian lifestyle for animals, people and the
planet.
BEHIND THE EXPO
The primary organization behind the expo
is Citizens United for Animals or CUFA, a
Milwaukee-based nonprofit dedicated to
promoting, defending and respecting “the
inherent rights of all nonhuman animals
to live lives free from suffering, abuse and
exploitation.”
Members of the organizing committee
also represent other groups, including the
Madison-based Alliance for Animals and
the Environment.
Those who attend the expo can expect to
hear about animal cruelty, including abuses
in the factory farming of animals. Attendees also will learn about animal rescue
campaigns and efforts to re-home dogs
and cats and other animals in southeastern
Wisconsin.
Tim Swartz, a volunteer with the Alliance for Animals and the Environment and
member of the expo organizing committee,
became involved in promoting veg culture
about a year ago after reading The Bond:
Our Kinship with Animals, Our Call to Defend
Them, a book by Wayne Pacelle, the president of The Humane Society of the United
States.
“It was my first exposure to just the problem of factory farming, to how animals are
treated on factory farms,” Swartz said. “I
was appalled.”
Swartz knew he wanted to make personal
changes in his life: “That caused me to
decide that I didn’t want to support what
was going on any more and to pursue a
vegan diet. … It took me a little time to fully
get there.”
He also knew he wanted to get involved
in a greater cause. “I wanted to make an
effort to educate other people,” he said.
“And when I learned about the environmenSPONSORED BY:
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tal impacts of animal agriculture, well, that
compelled me even more.”
Consider these environmental benefits
of a plant-based diet versus the impact of
animal agriculture:
• A plant-based diet free of meat, dairy
and eggs can save more carbon emissions
than driving a Toyota Prius — about 50
percent more, according to ChooseVeg.
com and Mercy for Animals.
• Raising animals for food uses about 30
percent of the Earth’s land mass.
• About 70 percent of the grain grown
in the United States is used to feed farmed
animals.
• About 80 percent of the land deforested in the Amazon is used to pasture cattle.
PRODUCE PATCH
The Dane County Farmers’ Market,
a Madison tradition since 1972 and the
largest producer-only farmers market
in the United States, opened its outdoor
season April 16 and continues on Saturdays at the Capitol Square into early
November.
The county’s Wednesday Market,
located in the 200 block of MLK Jr. Boulevard between the Capitol and Monona
Terrace, opened April 20.
Both markets take place rain or shine.
For more, go to dcfm.org.
— Lisa Neff
16
Community Bulletin Board
Open house for vets
Funding for reforms
Wisconsin Veterans Network, a new collaborative offering a range of services to
veterans and their families in southeastern
Wisconsin, holds an open house 9 a.m.–
noon April 23 at 6317 W. Greenfield Ave.,
West Allis. For more, go to www.wisvetsnet.
org.
Pride seeks scholar
Milwaukee Pride, in partnership with Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design, created
a fund to provide an annual $3,000 Rising
Star scholarship to a MIAD student. “We
have a mission to create opportunities for
LGBTQ people, their friends and families
in Milwaukee,” said Wes Shaver, Milwaukee Pride president-elect. “As an emerging
brand, we’re very excited to tap into MIAD’s
culture of creative energy, diversity and
innovation. The Rising Star scholarship will
be both an opportunity for us to teach and
learn.” Candidates can apply to [email protected].
Fest’s fiscal sponsorship
Milwaukee Film is launching a “fiscal
sponsorship” program to support filmmakers and film projects that advance its
organizational mission. Sponsored projects
would be able to solicit funds from government, foundation, individual and other
philanthropic sources without needing to
obtain their own nonprofit status. Milwau-
Endowment for the birds
The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur
Foundation awarded a $2 million grant to
Milwaukee County to implement reforms
aimed at reducing the jail population and
addressing racial and ethnic disparities in
the justice system. The grant is part of the
Safety and Justice Challenge. The county
will implement reforms to address the main
drivers of its jail population, which include
people with mental health and substance
abuse and people accused of non-violent
misdemeanor offenses. The goal is to
reduce the average daily jail population by
18 percent over two years. For more, go to
www.safetyandjusticechallenge.org.
The Natural Resources Foundation of Wisconsin established a new
endowment fund for bird conservation
thanks to the Society of Tympanuchus
Cupido Pinnatus. The Wisconsin Bird
Fund will support programs and projects that protect and conserve birds
that breed, migrate or winter in Wisconsin. Tympanuchus Cupido Pinnatus
is the prairie chicken. For more, go to
wisconservation.org.
kee Film would provide financial reporting
support and more. For more information, go
to mkefilm.org.
Compact coalition’s
challenge
More than 99 percent of people who
registered comments in a regional review
explicitly opposed or expressed concern
over Waukesha’s request to divert Great
Lakes water. More than 11,200 public comments were submitted to the Regional
Body and Compact Council on the issue,
and most of them opposed the proposal,
according to a review of the comments
completed by a coalition of environmental groups. The Compact Implementation
Coalition consists of River Alliance of Wisconsin, National Wildlife Federation, Milwaukee Riverkeeper, Midwest Environmental Advocates, and Clean Wisconsin. Next,
the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River
Basin Regional Body and Great Lakes and
St. Lawrence River Basin Compact Council,
which is composed of the eight Great Lakes
governors and two Canadian premiers, will
meet to reach a decision on the application.
For more, visit www.protectourgreatlakes.
org.
First Nations launch
Book lovers bargains
The Spring Book Sale sponsored by
Friends of the Whitefish Bay Library is May
7–8 at the library, 420 N. Marlborough Ave.
The sale is 9:30 a.m.–3:30 p.m. May 7 and
noon–3 p.m. May 8. The semiannual book
sale is a tradition among area book lovers.
For more, go to wfblibrary.org.
The Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium
hosts the nation’s largest high-powered
rocket competition for Native American
college students April 23 at Richard Bong
State Recreational Area in Kansasville. The
launch is part of a First Nations program
scheduled from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on April
21–23 at Carthage College in Kenosha.
Care and choice conversation
The adult spiritual enrichment committee of Unitarian Church North in Mequon
presents “Compassion and Choices: Care
and Choice at the End of Life” at 11:30 a.m.
on April 24. Dr. Bruce Wilson, a board certified cardiologist and Milwaukee hospice
physician, is the featured speaker. Wilson
is a former board member of Compassion
and Choices, the largest organization in
the United States advocating for people’s
rights at the end of life. For more, go to
ucnorth.org.
— Lisa Neff
Keynote at Women’s Center anniversary
Tanya Brown, sister of the late Nicole
Brown Simpson, delivers the keynote
address at The Women’s Center’s
anniversary luncheon May 13. Brown
will talk about abuse and domestic violence, “where it starts and where it can
end.” Domestic violence survivor Teri
Jendusa Nicolai also will offer remarks.
The program will be at 11 a.m. May 13
at the Italian Community Center in
Milwaukee. For more, go to twcwaukesha.org/event/anniversary-luncheon.
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17
Pet
Stay up to date
on canine flu
and heartworm
protection
Canine influenza seems to present as a
severe respiratory infection — coughing,
running fevers, not eating or drinking
and acting lethargic.
By Julie Steinbach
Contributing writer
Does anyone really enjoy being administered a
shot at the doctor’s office? While we might dread
heading in for our yearly flu shot each year, certainly one prick must be better than catching this
year’s version of the flu.
For your canine companion, that time of year
is here for them. It is an interesting development
for pet medicine, as dogs in the United States historically were not threatened by canine flu — not
until it found its way to the Midwest in 2015.
What is Canine Influenza Virus?
According to the American Veterinary Medical
Association, in the dog world, strains of canine
influenza — or CIV —
have by and large been
limited to international pups — dogs in Asian
countries, particularly Thailand, South Korea and
China. CIV is thought to have developed directly
out of avian and equine influenzas, strains H3N2
and H3N8, respectively.
In 2015, we started seeing the H3N2 variety
crop up in parts of the Midwest, clustered in the
Chicago area. The AVMA has determined that
in the case of H3N8, the entire genome of the
equine influenza strain evolved specifically for
canine hosts, making it a particularly interesting
virus from an medical standpoint.
The first U.S. detection of CIV H3N8 came in
2004, when it was found in racing greyhounds in
Florida and nearby states. It has spread to more
than 40 states.
The most prevalent strain in the Midwest, seen first in the Chicago area
last year, is H3N2, a mutation of avian
influenza.
How can we prevent CIV?
Just as our flu is not fatal to the
majority of our young and healthy population, canine influenza will likely not
threaten Fluffy’s life. But it might make
Fluffy very uncomfortable.
According to Dr. James Frank, DVM
at Lakeside Animal Hospital, “(Canine
influenza) seems to present as a severe
respiratory infection with dogs —
coughing, running fevers, not eating or
drinking and acting lethargic.” Many
veterinarians are offering vaccinations
for both strains.
So what can you do to keep Fluffy
healthy?
Knowing the risk factors is one of the
first steps to determining if a dog might
be susceptible to CIV.
“If you have a high-risk dog, if you go
to dog parks, groomers or if you go to
doggie day care, you have better chances of picking it up,” Frank says. “What
people should be aware of and weigh
ahead of time is that should they pursue
the vaccine, they don’t get protection
until after they’ve received the second
of two shots, which are spaced about a
month apart.”
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18
PREVENTION from prior page
Once the initial influenza vaccinations
are done, the immunization becomes a
once yearly shot.
So far for 2016, cases of H3N2 are
down significantly in our area compared
to the level of cases seen in Chicago last
year. This could be for a variety of reasons, including preventative vaccination
by pet owners last year.
Heartworm season
While you’re at the vet looking into
the CIV vaccination, remember it’s the
time of year for dog owners to be diligent
about heartworm testing and prevention.
Heartworms begin in a larvae stage,
when they’re initially transmitted to a dog
from a mosquito bite. As the adult worms
form, they find their way to and set up
shop in the dog’s lung and heart blood
vessels, causing permanent damage and
enormous discomfort. Affected dogs will
tire easily, cough and show other signs of
distress.
The two pieces of good news here: it is
generally agreed that the heartworm risk
season does not last all year and preventing the disease is as easy as remembering
to pill your pup once per month. With
heartworm, it is always better to be proactive with prevention than to try to treat
the disease once it has taken hold.
Heartworm season generally lasts from
March/April through November, which is
the active and breeding season for mosquitoes. During this time, it is important
for dogs to be on a monthly heartworm
preventative.
way into homes — heartworm prevention
is an important part of every dog’s yearly
health profile.
How do monthly heartworm preventatives keep my dog safe?
You might not know that heartworm
prevention works differently from a vaccination. When you give Fluffy his heartworm medication, it actually works to
help him clear out any parasites that may
have snuck into his system during the
prior month. Stopping the heartworm larvae from maturing into adult heartworms
is essential to keep heartworm disease
out of your pup’s system.
“While canine influenza isn’t a deadly
disease, heartworm is both deadly and
sneaky. Remembering to give the medication is key,” says Frank. “Everyone has
their own system at home to keep themselves on track. It is a very good drug
when given correctly.”
What can I do?
Staying up to date on all of Fluffy’s
vaccinations and check-ups will greatly
reduce your chances of contracting anything this year. Your local veterinarians
can answer your questions, so don’t hesitate to ask.
Also, look for brochures and information available at clinics and online for
further reading.
Who is at risk?
Remember, both indoor and outdoor
dogs should be tested and put on preventative medication, as even a dog who
only goes outdoors occasionally is still
considered at risk for the disease. Since
mosquitoes do not limit themselves to
the outdoors — they can and will find a
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ut on the town April 21 – May 5
19
A curated calendar of upcoming events
‘Ernest in Love’
April 22 to May 15 at In Tandem Theatre,
Milwaukee. $30, $25 seniors/students.
intandemtheatre.org.
The Importance of Being Earnest is nearuniversally recognized as one of the funniest
plays in the English language. So it seems the
only way to improve upon it is to add music.
Ernest in Love presents the plot of Oscar
Wilde’s original, with two young aristocrats
prevented from marrying their loves by the
trivialities of Victorian society forced to use
their wits to prove their worth. The musical
addendums only heighten the fun, as will the
antagonistic role of Lady Bracknell — played
in this production by the irrepressible Angela
Iannone. (Matthew Reddin)
‘Masterworks V’
8 p.m. April 22 at Overture Center, Madison. $15 to
$80. overturecenter.org.
Irish pianist John O’Conor will get a chance to
celebrate his heritage at the Wisconsin Chamber
Orchestra’s final concert of the year, performing
fellow Irishman John Field’s imaginative First Piano
Concerto, as well as a Mozart concerto. The
program also will include the first symphony by
early Romantic master Carl Maria Von Weber,
opening the concert, and Stravinsky’s short
neoclassical work Suite No. 1 for Small Orchestra.
(Matthew Reddin)
‘Pete Rose: The Hit King’
‘Rachmaninoff’s Third Concerto’
11:15 a.m. April 22 and 23 at the Marcus Center, Milwaukee. $17 to $107. mso.org.
Decorated young pianist Natasha Paremski joins the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra
with conductor Francesco Lecce-Chong for an evening of classical favorites. The program
begins with Barber’s Essay No. 1 and Shostakovich’s First Symphony, before concluding with
the main event: Rachmaninoff’s explosive Third Concerto. (Rachele Krivichi)
2 p.m. April 23 at the Pabst Theater,
Milwaukee. $40 or $50. pabsttheater.org.
Legendary and controversial baseball
player Pete Rose is finally being inducted
into the Hall of Fame — the Bobblehead
Hall of Fame. The National Bobblehead Hall
of Fame and Museum will make Rose their
inaugural inductee, with a ceremony that
highlights his career and bobblehead history,
and also includes a moderated Q&A session
with fans. And, of course, there’s an actual
bobblehead involved. All fans in attendance
will receive a limited-edition one produced to
commemorate Rose’s induction. Meet-andgreet options are available for an additional
fee. (Colton Dunham)
21st Annual Milwaukee River Spring Cleanup
9 a.m. to 12 p.m. April 23 at various locations, Milwaukee. Free.
milwaukeeriverkeeper.org.
Join more than 3,500 volunteers to help keep the Milwaukee River clean in this
annual Earth Day event. In 2015, volunteers removed 70,000 pounds of trash from
the river. Milwaukee Riverkeeper will provide bags, gloves and T-shirts. You provide
the hard work to keep Milwaukee and its water systems clean. After the river is
cleared, volunteers are welcome to join in the “Trash Bash” 12-2 p.m. at Estabrook,
Hoyt or Pulaski parks. (Rachele Krivichi)
20
ut on the town
MAM After Dark: ‘J’Adore’
David Sedaris
8 p.m. April 22 at the Milwaukee Art
Museum. $12 at the door, $10 in advance, free
for members. mam.org.
Experience an evening of French romance
in a MAM After Dark event inspired by
the world’s most beautiful city: Paris. Until
midnight, you will dance and swoon to
the music of The Fox & the Hounds and
DJ Urbane while drinking hand-selected
reds and whites from the Corvina Wine
Company. You can also tour the galleries
with Milwaukee artist Reginald Baylor or
browse works of textile and printmaking
by artist Jamie Bilgo Bruchman. Haven’t
had enough glamour? The afterparty starts
at Plum Lounge & Firebar at midnight.
(Rachele Krivichi)
7 p.m. April 23 at the Pabst
Theater, Milwaukee. $47.
pabsttheater.org.
Humorist and writer David
Sedaris can turn any story
— a trip to Japan to quit
smoking, an attempt to learn
French — into a brilliant piece
of creative nonfiction. Sedaris
hasn’t released a collection
of essays since 2013’s Let’s
Explore Diabetes with Owls, but
this humorist doesn’t need
something to sell in order to
have a good time. He’ll retell
stories from that collection and
others in this one-night event.
(Rachele Krivichi)
‘A Vigil in the Woods’
7 a.m. April 23 to 7 a.m. April 24 at American Players Theatre,
Spring Green. Free. americanplayers.org.
There are a lot of ways to commemorate the life of
Shakespeare, especially on the 400th anniversary of his
death, and American Players Theatre has latched onto the
simplest: reading his words. The classical theater company, in
preparation for its summer season, will spend 24 hours on its
stage, with core company actors, administrators and friends
each taking a turn reading from the Bard’s plays. Visitors are
free to come and go as they please throughout the day and
night. (Matthew Reddin)
Hilary Hahn
7:30 p.m. April 24 at the Wisconsin
Union Theater, Madison. $28 to $51.
uniontheater.wisc.edu.
World-renowned violinist and twotime Grammy winner Hilary Hahn, who
famously learned to play violin at the
age of 3, will perform in Madison with
Cory Smythe on piano. The performance
will include works by Bach, Mozart and
Copland. Hahn’s flawless technique,
combined with Smythe’s improvisational
skills, is sure to result in a mesmerizing
performance in Madison’s grandest
concert hall. (Rachele Krivichi)
Felicia Day
7 p.m. April 25 at Boswell Book
Company, Milwaukee. $17.
boswellbooks.com.
You may recognize her from CW’s
Supernatural or SyFy’s Eureka, but did
you know that the “queen of geeks”
Felicia Day also is a New York Times
best-selling author? Day, who got her
start with web video work such as Dr.
Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, will be at
Boswell Book Company to sign copies
of her latest book. You’re Never Weird
on the Internet (Almost) is a memoir
about her upbringing, her rise to fame
on the internet and embracing her
weirdness. She also opens up about
rough patches along the way, such as
her gaming addiction, severe anxiety
and depression. Admission for one
includes a paperback copy of the
memoir and an opportunity to have
it signed by the digital misfit herself.
(Colton Dunham)
21
A curated calendar of upcoming events
‘The Naked Magic Show’
8 p.m. April 27 at the Pabst Theater,
Milwaukee. $20, $35, or $50.
pabsttheater.org.
A magician wearing clothes can hide
a lot of impressive tricks up his or her
sleeve, but what happens when that
magician isn’t wearing any clothes at
all? The Naked Magic Show — which has
sold out shows in the U.S., Australia,
New Zealand, and Asia — will be making
a stop in Milwaukee to answer that very
question. The show, which has been
slyly described as “cheeky,” features
magic and mayhem as two magicians
take the craft to a new (and nude) level.
Be warned, as this is very much an
R-rated show (18+ only). They say good
magicians don’t need sleeves. Great
magicians don’t need pants. (Colton
Dunham)
April 21 – May 5
Milwaukee Underground
Film Festival
7 p.m. April 28 and 29 at UWM Union Cinema,
Milwaukee. Free. uwm.edu.
The Milwaukee Underground Film Festival — a
student-run, international film festival — is returning
for another year showcasing contemporary
and innovative works of film and digital video.
The nationally recognized nonprofit based at
UW-Milwaukee aims to showcase independent
works of art that exemplify a visionary sense of
originality and experimentation. This year’s festival
jurors include filmmaker and former UWM Union
Cinema film programmer David Dinnell, Los
Angeles-based artist Alee Peoples and Chicagobased artist Eileen Rae Walsh. (Colton Dunham)
‘Some Men’
April 29 to May 14 at Soulstice Theatre, St. Francis.
$20. theatricaltendencies.com.
Theatrical Tendencies, Milwaukee’s LGBTfocused theater company returns to the work of
gay playwright Terrence McNally in their latest
production. Some Men opens and closes with a same
gay wedding in modern times but bounces back and
forth across 80 years, reflecting on the lives and
loves of more than four dozen characters played
by nine actors. Sometimes painful and other times
hilarious, the play is a kaleidoscope of gay history.
(Matthew Reddin)
’Hope Shining Blue’
8 p.m. April 27 at Turner Hall Ballroom, Milwaukee. $75.
aurorahealthcarefoundation.org.
Denim Day has been marked for years as an international day of awareness for victims
of sexual assault — and health care systems like Aurora are joining the fight. To raise funds
for multiple abuse response programs throughout the state, Aurora will sponsor the Hope
Shining Blue event, a denim fashion show where the focus is on inspiration and triumph. The
“club atmosphere” will feature music, hors d’oeuvre and a ceremony honoring Rhonda BegosZolecki and Mindy Lubar Price, two local women who have dedicated themselves to helping
survivors. (Colton Dunham)
Keep reading for…
‘Fences’: The Milwaukee Rep ends its season with this
classic August Wilson play about an African-American
family’s hopes and dreams in 1950s America, directed by
one of Wilson’s greatest interpreters. April 29 to May 22.
See page 23.
‘It’s Only a Play’: A revised, modern-day version of Terrence McNally’s scathing send-up of Broadway makes its
Midwestern debut at Milwaukee’s Off the Wall Theatre.
April 28 to May 8. See page 24.
MSO Brahms Festival: Notorious perfectionist
Johannes Brahms only published four symphonies and
the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra will perform all four over two weekends at the
Marcus Center. April 30 and May 1; May 6 and 7. See page 26.
‘Carmina Burana’: One of the most iconic works of 20th-century orchestral music
provides a big finish for the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s 2015–16 season. April 29
to May 1. See page 27.
Judy Collins: “Sweet Judy Blue Eyes” comes to Madison’s Overture Center as part
of Unique Lives, North America’s leading women’s lecture series. April 25. See page 31.
OPPORTUNITIES TO FIND
YOUR MISSION IN LIFE.
Theater Performance: Little Shop of Horrors
Friday, April 15 - Sunday, April 24, 2016
Music Concert: New Chicago Brass
Wednesday, April 27, 2016 — 7:30 p.m.
Mission-Driven Leaders Speaker Series
Featured Presenter: Anselmo Villarreal, Ph.D., ’14
Thursday, May 5, 2016 — 6:00 p.m.
Cardinal Stritch University
6801 N. Yates Road, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53217
Find more events and register to attend: go.stritch.edu/events
OUR MISSION IS TO HELP YOU FIND YOURS.
22
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Boardman and Clark law Firm Atrium
4th Floor of U.S. Bank Building
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denny Caneff of the river Alliance of wisconsin
(Conservation in Action)
hilary Carroll (Youth and Leadership)
wisconsin Gazette (Business and Environment)
Brown County Conservation Alliance (Community Partnership)
Buy Tickets online at
conservationvoters.org/thenelsonawards
or call 608-208-1131 for more info.
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23
The Milwaukee Rep takes a swing at ‘Fences’
By Matthew Reddin
Staff writer
After a long season, the Milwaukee Rep
is looking for one more home run to close
out the year. So they’re taking a swing
at Fences — arguably one of the greatest works written by American playwright
August Wilson — and sending up to the
plate a director whose batting average with
Wilson plays is equally exceptional.
That director is Lou Bellamy, who founded
the acclaimed African-American company
Penumbra Theatre in St. Paul, Minnesota.
That theater is where Wilson’s professional
career began and where Bellamy’s long
association with Wilson’s works — as an
artistic director and actor as well as a stage
director — began.
Over the past 40 years, Bellamy says
he’s been involved with dozens of productions of Wilson’s plays, including his entire
10-play Pittsburgh Cycle tracking the lives
of African-American families in the 20th
century. Fences, set in the 1950s, is a part of
that cycle (sixth in its internal chronology,
but the third written, in 1983), and Bellamy
says it’s one of Wilson’s best — a “wonderful” production that tells the story of a black
garbage man, Troy Maxson, who grapples
with his family’s hopes and dreams in a
rapidly changing world.
Bellamy has directed Fences and played
the role of Troy multiple times, but he says
the Rep’s production (co-produced with Arizona Theatre Company and Indiana Repertory Theatre) features one of the strongest
casts he’s ever worked with. He attributes
that strength in part to the presence of two
Penumbra company members, David Alan
Anderson (Troy) and Lou’s brother Terry
Bellamy (playing Troy’s brother Gabriel),
who have helped him anchor the production and emphasize the ensemble feel he’s
cultivated at Penumbra.
Within that ensemble, Bellamy says he’s
worked with each actor to develop versions of their characters that play to their
strengths — an approach different from
that of many directors, who walk in with a
vision and ask actors to adhere to it. “I tend
to be the kind of director that looks for the
strong points of actors and makes choices
that they’re capable of excelling in,” he
says. “It’s different always depending on the
company. These are pros. I’m not pouring
my will into their head.”
There are some core themes Bellamy has
made sure to emphasize in this production,
though. The more immediately apparent
one is the father-son relationships Troy
has with his two children: Lyons (James
T. Alfred), the elder son from a previous
relationship, and Cory (Edgar Sanchez), his
son with wife Rose (Kim Staunton). Bellamy says both times he’s played the role of
Troy, he’s been struck by the universality of
the troubled character, with patrons of all
ethnicities approaching him after produc-
tions to tell him they see their own fathers
in the role.
More complex, Bellamy says, is Troy’s
depiction as a tragic hero. He is clearly the
protagonist of the play, yet Bellamy says he
is nonetheless “difficult to like.” Over the
course of Fenc- es, we see how racism
has shaped Troy’s life
— an exceptional
baseball player,
he was unable
to play in
Major
‘He’s warped by the
racism that is part
and parcel of
American
society …
but he
has no
idea that
it has shaped
him.’
League Baseball due to the color barrier
having not yet been broken, and in the present day he faces opposition to moving up
even in his job as a garbage man.
But we also see how those injustices
have made it difficult for Troy to realize that
he’s developed defensive, myopic biases
that sabotage his efforts to fight back. For
instance, Troy opposes Cory’s participation
in football, despite the fact that a scholarship would give his son an otherwise unobtainable path to college. “(Troy) is blind
to the issues that are affecting him, while
everyone around him, including
the audience, sees them,” Bellamy says. “He’s warped by the
racism that is part and parcel
of American society … but he
has no idea that it has shaped
him.”
Bellamy says he’s anticipating the chance to see how Milwaukee audiences respond
to the work, especially
since this is his first time
working with the Rep. He’s
been gradually passing the
reins of Penumbra along to
his daughter, co-artistic director Sarah Bellamy, and as his
duties with the company have
declined, he’s taken on more
freelance work across the
country with companies like
the Rep.
It’s not as easy to translate
the work he’s done with Penumbra to other companies as
his fellow artistic directors
would like, Bellamy says. But
that hasn’t stopped him from
venturing out anyway, using
the knowledge he’s acquired
in decades of theater work to
tell stories like Fences — stories
that need to be told by directors who, like him, have spent
their lives learning to convey
the social and cultural nuances
of black life onstage.
P hoto s : T i m F u l l e r
Fences, set in the late 1950s, tells the story of Troy (David
Alan Anderson, above left and right), a bitter patriarch who
was shut out of a baseball career by the color barrier, and his
family, all struggling together to achieve the American Dream.
On STAGE
The Milwaukee Rep’s production of
Fences runs April 29 to May 22. Tickets
start at $20 and can be purchased at
414-224-9490 or milwaukeerep.com.
24
Off the Wall’s ‘It’s Only a Play’ skewers theater world
By Michael Muckian
Contributing writer
Who doesn’t like a little gossip, a little
dish and countless celebrity names falling
from the lips? Add to that a little brass and
a lot of sass and you have some of the driving forces behind Terrence McNally’s show
business send-up It’s Only a Play, the next
production from Milwaukee’s Off the Wall
Theatre.
It’s the Midwest premiere of the newly
revised version of the McNally work, which
the playwright updated in 2014 to reflect
today’s personalities and issues. Originally,
the work started as a show called Broadway,
Broadway in the late ‘70s and was presented
in its more definitive form off-off-Broadway
in 1982.
According to Off the Wall artistic director Dale Gutzman, the play is as funny as
when it was first written, but still acts as a
catharsis for McNally and anyone else who
has ever spent time in the theater.
“I saw a production in 1978, so I knew the
play,” says Gutzman, who directs the current production. “I saw it on Broadway again
last year and fell in love with it.”
The storyline is pure show business, but
takes a pause from the usual palaver to dig
a little deeper into the lives of its unusual,
but ultimately familiar theatrical characters,
Gutzman says. “It’s funny and moves like
a sitcom, but being McNally, there is more
going on there than you first might think.”
The plot goes something like this: It’s
opening night of a new play by Peter Austin (Mark Hagen) called The Golden Egg.
Friends and foes gather at the cast party to
await the first reviews. Among them are a
television sitcom star (Randall Anderson),
a drugged-out former film actor (Marilyn
White), an eccentric British director (Jeremy C. Welter), a vapid but well-meaning
producer, (Laura Monagle), a vitriolic critic
(Lawrence Lukasavage) and a naive young
actor (Patrick McCann) who has come to
New York to become a star — though for
now, he’s just handling the coats.
To add greater dimension to what otherwise might be prosaic proceedings, McNally
has set the action in a bedroom-turnedcoatroom above the party proper. It is here
where his characters gather to snipe and
sneer at the people downstairs while they
await the critical reviews that will determine
the play’s fate.
“In a way, this is Terrence McNally’s
love letter to the theater and his life and
it draws on every show he’s ever worked
on,” Gutzman says. “He pokes fun at playwrights, actors and a lot of critics. However,
the play’s deeper themes deal with what
artists are looking for and why they create.”
Critics can make or break a show,
Gutzman allows, and even the most revered
theater pieces have suffered at their hands.
Shows like Porgy and Bess, West Side Story
and The Fantasticks were greeted with criti-
P hoto : O f f th e wa l l th e at r e
Terrence McNally’s It’s Only a Play, which originally premiered in 1982, recently
received a modern-day update for its Broadway premiere.
cal disdain when they first premiered, but
each has gone on to make its mark in theatrical history. The need to create, it seems,
is enough to help artists overcome the odds
and, in some cases, provide them with the
success they seek.
“Artists who are honest with themselves
understand that they have an innate drive to
make their views of the world public,” says
Gutzman. “Performing in front of others terrifies most people, which makes us fans of
those who have an almost masochistic drive
to bare their souls. This play wonderfully
explores this idea.”
Gutzman also admires the out playwright’s treatment of gays in the theater.
Where many shows presented before It’s
Only a Play’s original production in 1978
addressed the gay struggle in America,
McNally’s matter-of-factly treats gays
as another part of everyday life. But that
doesn’t mean they escape the playwright’s
wrath.
“There are some references and jokes
about who knew and worked with whom,
and one character is decried for being less
masculine than Harvey Fierstein,” Gutzman
says. “There are still lots of issues that gays
face, but it’s refreshing that the gay characters aren’t filled with angst about being gay
and simply function in the plot like anyone
else.”
Gutzman had to make adjustments to
the play’s staging to accommodate Off
the Wall’s small space. McNally originally
developed his play for a wide stage, and
Gutzman had to adjust the proceedings for a
more vertical rather than horizontal format,
something that proved challenging given the
play’s rapid-fire dialogue.
“Working out the puzzles of each show
has been the great joy of my life in the theater,” Gutzman says.
He found a model in the traditional drawing room comedies of Noël Coward. The
famous playwright and actor also offered a
piece of advice from which Gutzman says all
theatrical impresarios could learn.
“Noël Coward used to say, ‘Say your lines
clearly and try not to bump into the furniture,’” Gutzman explains. “I think the lesson
there is that we less-than-Broadway theater
companies work too hard and should let the
lines themselves get the laughs.”
For Gutzman, directing comedy is much
harder than directing drama. In drama, the
public response is unknown until the end. If
the audience isn’t laughing, then you know a
comedy is missing its mark.
“The actors need to find the right balance to be totally in the moment, and yet
real in relating to the audience,” Gutzman
says. Play too much to the audience and
the production becomes slapstick and overwrought, while too little relation with viewers may result in a play that’s charming, but
fails to connect, he explains.
In the case of a drama, he says, the actors
only have to relate to each other. For a
comedy, even the atmosphere in the theater
can have an impact on the success of the
performance, requiring a more concentrated
effort to hit that desired balance with the
audience.
Given Gutzman’s track record, we can
expect those laughs. And a minimum of
furniture bumping.
On STAGE
Off the Wall Theatre’s production of
Terrence McNally’s It’s Only a Play runs
April 28 through May 8 at 127 E. Wells
St., Milwaukee. Tickets are $25 (with
reduced student prices at some performances), and can be purchased at 414484-8874 or offthewalltheatre.com.
Duncan Sheik reconsiders ‘American
Psycho’ and makes beautiful music
By Mark Kennedy
Associated Press
The first time Duncan Sheik read the
disturbingly gory novel American Psycho, it
didn’t go well. He got halfway through the
book before throwing it across his dorm
room in disgust.
“I remember being, frankly, kind of offput by the style and the tone of the book
and obviously the violence was just very
hard to read in my tender, 21-year-old soul
at the time,” the singer-songwriter says.
Some two decades later, he was urged to
try again by producers hoping to turn the
novel into a musical. Sheik bought another
copy of Bret Easton Ellis’ book ahead of a
trip to Japan. This time, he kept it.
“I was completely absorbed by it and
completely amazed by how prescient Bret
Easton Ellis had been in this crazy story
that he had written. He kind of predicted
so much of where the culture was headed,”
says Sheik, who wrote the music for the
Tony Award-winning Spring Awakening.
Now Sheik is ready to let Broadway audiences hear how he turned the provocative
1991 novel about a psychopath into one of
the season’s bravest pieces of musical theater, now at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre.
“Even though it’s violent and it’s bloody,
it’s also beautiful and really avant-garde
and really cool,” says Sheik, who grounded
the musical’s sound in electronic dance
music of the era.
The story centers on yuppie serial killer
Patrick Bateman who is obsessed with highend clothes and beauty products as he
slashes his way through Manhattan. Chris-
P hoto : J e r e m y Dan i e l
Benjamin Walker stars as Patrick Bateman in the musical adaptation of American
Psycho, now on Broadway.
tian Bale starred in the 2000 film version.
“The book really is an allegory to me.
Patrick Bateman is an avatar of a lot of
impulses that happen to a lot of people in
our culture, including myself,” says Sheik,
a Buddhist who bikes around the city and
whose new album is the terrific Legerdemain. “I see these incredibly materialistic
sides to myself and this weird judgmental
and non-compassionate part of my being.
It’s part of the human condition. We all
have it to some extent.”
Sheik, a Brown University graduate who
had the 1996 hit song “Barely Breathing,”
channeled the music he heard getting past
the velvet ropes of trendy, late-1980s Manhattan clubs such as Tunnel and Nell’s
into the score for American Psycho. In one
standout song, “You Are What You Wear,”
he even reached out to old girlfriends to
ask a question: “What were you really
into wearing in the late ‘80s?” He put the
answers into the tune about high fashion
that rhymes Giorgio Armani with Norma
Kamali.
The result is producer Jesse Singer’s
favorite song from the musical and proof of
how playful and clever Sheik can be. “Duncan is really a genius and an intellectual
and brings something both uniquely his but
importantly of this period to the stage,”
says Singer.
Because Bateman — played onstage by
Benjamin Walker — is an armchair music
critic who likes Huey Lewis and the News
and Phil Collins, Sheik also peppered his
score with sly reworkings of “In the Air
Tonight” and “Hip to Be Square.”
The show, directed by Rupert Goold and
with a book by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa,
made its premiere in late 2013 at the Almeida Theatre in London. The version in New
York much wilder.
“We were all sort of worried that it might
be too violent for people and it might seem
too misogynist,” says Sheik. “But, in fact,
the truth is this piece is a critique of a
certain way of thinking about things. So in
truth it’s better to go all-in.”
He even got a chance to ask Ellis whether
the craziness that Bateman gets up to is
really happening or is just in his head. “Brett
would not answer the question because I
think he wants it to be really ambiguous,”
Sheik says.
Either way, Sheik is hoping his brash
soundscape for American Psycho does the
same thing his fresh songs for Spring Awakening did a decade ago: Attract new audiences to something bold onstage.
“I feel like it’s become my project to drag
different people who might not normally
go to musical theater pieces to come see a
piece of musical theater,” he says.
25
26
Milwaukee Symphony
devotes two weekends to
Johannes Brahms
By Kirstin Roble
Contributing writer
FINE ARTS
QUA RTE T
“The Fine Arts Quartet is one of the gold-plated names in
chamber music.” - The Washington Post
SUNDAY MAY1, 3PM
UWM Helene Zelazo Center for the Performing Arts
Performing Edward Elgar, Ralph Evans, & Camille
Saint-Saëns with guest pianist Xiayin Wang joining.
Pre-concert talk 2pm.
arts.uwm.edu/tickets
Categorizing German composer Johannes
Brahms can be difficult. From his position at
the end of the Romantic era (the late 19th
century), the composer was both rooted in
the old world of classical music and ahead
of his time.
Over two weekends, the Milwaukee
Symphony Orchestra will give audiences
the opportunity to decide for themselves
Brahms’ place in history. The MSO’s Brahms
Festival, taking place at the Marcus Center
the weekends of April 29 and May 6, will
feature Brahms’ entire symphonic repertory:
four impressive, significant pieces.
That may not seem like a large number,
but it is for Brahms, a notorious perfectionist who frequently destroyed his own
works when they did not measure up to
his high standards. Brahms was rumored to
have destroyed more than 20 string quartets
before he finally presented his first public
example in 1873. Brahms also destroyed several of his early works, including pieces that
he had performed earlier in his career. This
extreme perfection and dedication to his
craft led to a smaller but exceptional legacy.
The works that did survive Brahms’ composition chopping block, including the four
symphonies, are now considered standard
repertoire — which provides its own unique
set of problems. “The challenge with these
pieces comes from their notoriety,” explains
MSO principal clarinetist Todd Levy. “There
is an expectation with pieces like this since
many of the audience members know and
love these works. They may already have
their own interpretive ideas as they listen to
the works.”
On April 30 and May 1, music director and
conductor Edo de Waart will begin the festival by conducting Brahms’ Symphony No. 1
in C minor and Symphony No. 2 in D Major.
The first symphony runs roughly 45 minutes
in its entirety, and, like many of Brahms’
works underwent several drafts over many
years. The earliest sketches of the work date
back to 1854, but the finished work did not
premiere until 1876, almost 18 years later.
The work is considered universally to be a
masterpiece and frequently harkens back to
the works of other great German composers,
including Beethoven.
In contrast, Brahms composed his Second
Symphony over the summer of 1877, during
a visit to the Austrian province of Carinthia.
This composition period was far briefer than
for its predecessor. Like the First Symphony,
the Second reflects the work of Beethoven,
this time most similar to the pastoral and
lush harmonies of Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony.
The following weekend, May 6 and May 7,
will feature Brahms’ other two symphonies,
also conducted by de Waart. Symphony No.
3 in F major, composed in 1883, is Brahms’
P hoto : W i k i m e d i a co m m on s
Brahms only wrote four symphonies in his
lifetime, due to his perfectionism.
shortest symphony and is often identified as
his most personal, a slight shift away from
the more traditional, non-programmatic
works he is better known for. It features multiple motifs reminiscent of works by composer Robert Schumann, a close friend of
Brahms and husband to the woman Brahms
famously pined for: Clara Schumann. Brahms
also uses a recurring motif — a rising F,
A-flat, F pattern — that is meant to signify
Brahms’ half-serious personal motto frei aber
froh, or “free but happy.”
Brahms’ final symphony is darker and
more complex, a noble work in E minor that
premiered in 1885. Its minor key is only the
first contrast to the preceding symphony. It
concludes, famously, with a passacaglia, a
serious-sounding musical form defined by
its repeating, stately bass line.
With orchestras needing to cover so many
artists in a given season, it’s rare for patrons
to have a chance to hear so much work by a
single composer in a two-week period, Levy
says.
“It’s a great opportunity to hear these symphonies live performed by a great orchestra,”
adds Levy. “Though the pieces are standard
repertoire, they are not always performed in
this short of a time frame.”
On STAGE
The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra’s Brahms Festival will span two
weekends: April 30 and May 1, and
May 6 and 7. Tickets range from $17 to
$107. For concert times and additional
information, visit mso.org or call 414291-7605.
27
Colossal ‘Carmina Burana’ ends Madison Symphony season
By Michael Muckian
Contributing writer
In the world of classical music, sometimes
size does matter. When it comes to sheer
musical scale, few pieces can compete with
Carl Orff’s 24-movement cantata Carmina
Burana, which will close the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s 2015–16 season later this
month.
“With its driving rhythms and lyrical opulence, Carmina Burana has become one of
classical music’s most popular treasures,”
writes MSO maestro John DeMain on the
orchestra’s website.
What DeMain neglects to mention is the
number of musicians required to give this
work from the early 20th century its due.
From its most familiar movement, the opening “O Fortuna,” to its raucous drinking and
love songs, the 59-minute composition commands a cadre of players and singers rarely
matched in the classical canon.
How big is big? MSO’s 91 musicians under
DeMain’s direction will be joined on Madison’s Overture Hall stage by 140 volunteer members of the Madison Symphony
Chorus led by Beverly Taylor. Add to that
the roughly 80 members from the Madison
Youth Choirs’ Boychoir, under Michael Ross’s
direction, and soloists soprano Jeni Houser,
tenor Thomas Leighton and baritone Keith
Phares, and the musician roster blossoms
to well over 300 artists, quite a company for
what is essentially a musically simple work.
“It’s wonderfully lyrical and sounds great,
but I wouldn’t say it’s a walk in the park,”
says DeMain, who has closed each of his
past 22 MSO seasons with a work of similar scope and magnitude. “In the end, it all
comes together nicely.”
DeMain has paired Orff’s work with The
Pines of Rome, a more impressionistic work
composed in 1923 and 1924 by Ottorino
Respighi. In the conductor’s mind, the tone
poem both complements and contrasts
Orff’s 1935–36 composition, which comes
with its own interesting backstory.
Orff based his work on 12th and 13th
century poetry written in Church Latin and
medieval German found compiled at the
Benedictine monastery in Benediktbeuern,
south of the composer’s hometown of
Munich. Orff built the composition around
24 of the poems to create a “secular cantata” of raucous drinking songs, courtly and
bawdy love poems, and humorous stories
to create Carmina Burana, literally “Songs of
Beuern.”
The work’s Germanic “volk” roots and
bombastic score eventually made Orff a
favorite among the Nazi regime rising to
Come ‘out’ at mSO closer
The Madison Symphony Orchestra will
celebrate the Capital City’s LGBT community and the close of its 2015–16 season
April 30 with its fifth annual “Out at the
Symphony” celebration.
In addition to enjoying MSO’s rendition
of Respighi’s The Pines of Rome and Orff’s
Carmina Burana, attendees are invited to
power in the
On STAGE
1930s, allowing
Madison Symphony Orchestra will perthe composer
form Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana and Ottorino
to continue his
Respighi’s The Pines of Rome April 29 to May 1
career during the
at Overture Center for the Arts, 201 State St.
war while many
Tickets run $16 to $85 and can be purchased
of his contemat 608-258-4141 or overturecenter.org.
poraries were
forced to flee to
America.
Orff was never a party member and, in
fact, had been friends with academician Kurt
Huber, a leading voice in Germany’s White
Rose resistance movement. The composer
distanced himself for professional reasons
from Huber, whom the Nazis eventually
arrested, tried and executed by guillotine in
1943. After World War II, Orff rehabilitated
his reputation by reminding critics of his ties
P hoto : G r e g A n d e r s on
to Huber, dodging criticism for Nazi accom- The 140 volunteer members of the Madison Symphony Chorus will perform Carmina
modation.
Burana with the MSO and numerous guest performers.
For all its musical sturm und drang, Orff’s
composition is surprisingly fundamental in
its construction, according to DeMain. The
cantata lacks polyphony (the combination
Orff’s compositional style also makes to the work’s simpler musical structure and
of differing melodies that harmonize with learning the choral pieces easier for the sing- primitive tonality, both of which make Careach other), and counterpoint (deliberately ers and appreciating the composition itself mina Burana more accessible to the average
playing polyphonous phrases with different more fulfilling for the audience, she adds.
listener.
rhythms simultaneously). But that very sim“We’re always reaching out to bring more
“For Orff, fast is good, loud is better and
plicity may account for the work’s enormous fast and loud are the best of all,” Taylor says. people to the symphony and this is one of
popularity.
“Each verse gets a little faster and a little those pieces that does that,” he adds. “This
“The melodic nature of the choral writing louder and the rhythms are very dance-y. In piece has the potential to do big box office
and sheer energy that comes out of the work the end, this is a real toe-tapper.”
for us.”
gives it a primitive tonality,” DeMain says.
DeMain agrees, especially when it comes
“Orff’s compositional vocabulary is more
vertical than horizontal and it’s not a difficult
piece for the orchestra to play.”
Vocal performers face a more daunting
challenge, according to Taylor. While MSO
members may first look at the score the
Monday before the performance, DeMain
says, the choristers have already been practicing for several months.
“It’s a big enough project, but not as difficult as some of the things we’ve done,”
Taylor says. “The songs are very catchy and
easy to learn and, while there is a lot of text
in dialect German and Latin, there aren’t too
many harmonic variations.”
Taylor notes that last season’s production of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony was
much more difficult, even though the choral
section lasted just 20 minutes. She anticipates even greater challenges for her singers
in performing Brahms’ Requiem, which will
serve as next year’s season finale.
“Carmina Burana is fun to sing and easy to
learn, almost like a musical comedy,” Taylor
explains. “It’s raucous, good humored with
rhythms that are really dense, and exuberance that draws listeners along with it.”
an exclusive afterparty at Overture Center’s Promenade Lounge that will feature
food, drink and music.
Combined tickets for the concert and
after-party are $40 for mezzanine-level
seats and $60 for orchestra seats and can
only be purchased through the MSO website at madisonsymphony.org/out. The
deadline for purchasing tickets is April 28.
28
MOWA challenges a photographer to
go from black-andwhite to living color
On DISPLAY
Landscape photographer Gregory Conniff’s
Watermarks is on display through June 19 at the
Museum of Wisconsin Art, 205 Veterans Ave.,
West Bend. For more information, call 262-3349638 or visit wisconsinart.org.
By Michael Muckian
Contributing writer
P hoto : M O WA
In Gregory Conniff’s Watermarks series, the photographer steps outside his black-and-white tendencies to play
with color and reflections.
Landscape photographer Gregory
Conniff’s artistic world once consisted
solely of saw-toothed picket fences,
tangled brush and deep, evocative
shadows that appeared to lengthen
the longer one looked at his blackand-white gelatin silver prints. It was
imagery filled with nuanced and subtle
emotion, void of human occupancy,
yet alive with an untold vibrancy.
A challenge from the curators at the
Museum of Wisconsin Art, located in
West Bend, recently changed Conniff’s
way of looking at nature. Armed with
a high-definition digital camera and
tasked with taking color photos rather
than black-and-white shots, the Madison attorney-turned-photographer
took a closer look at images once seen
only through a monochromatic lens.
What he found has given his imagery
even greater detail and dimension,
and taken his work in new, expressive
directions.
Watermarks, MOWA’s exhibit of 43
photographs by Conniff that opened
on April 9, displays his newly evolving
and carefully articulated vision. It’s a vision,
the photographer says,
that holds as much promise for the
viewers as for the artist himself.
What made you want to become a
photographer?
I’ve had a darkroom since I was
13. I photographed for all the usual
publications in schools and then never
stopped. One appeal of photography
for me is its speed of capture and its
extended length for contemplation of
results, the way a picture does — or
doesn’t — age.
How did you find your way to Madison and what made you give up practicing law?
I grew up in New Jersey and, while
I found myself in Wisconsin many
decades ago, I am still from New Jersey. This allows me to appreciate both
the order and beauty of the Wisconsin
rural landscape and to feel familiar
with the state’s exploration of the sort
of political and economic geography I
grew up with. In the late 19th century,
painter George Innes studied the rural
New Jersey landscape that gradually
became Sopranos country (and the territory of my youth). Innes would have
recognized the Wisconsin I saw upon
my arrival here. Tony Soprano would
be comfortable with how the state is
changing.
During the 1970s, I did a number
of things, one of which was practicing law, another of which was making
photographs. I found that I was a better self when I was making pictures
and so restricted my professional life
to photography around 1978, when I
felt my images were at least as good
as the worst of what I saw on exhibition.
Why landscape photography?
I like working outdoors and am not
suited for sitting at a desk. The vernacular American landscape has been
and still is my territory, but its evoluMOWA next page
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29
MOWA from prior page
tion in my mind has been through an increased focus on the
simple fact of beauty and our need for its nourishment. The
essence of my thinking is that “it matters how things look.”
What caused you to take up MOWA’s challenge and
change your style?
Apparently I’m a sucker for some thrown gauntlets.
What I’ve learned over the past year and a half is how much
more there is to see in my immediate world and how the
character of my tools has enlarged the range and complexity of what I can learn to see.
How difficult was it for you to make the change after
decades of black-and-white work?
I jumped into the challenge from the museum wild and
blind, hoping that light would fall on the world in a way that
was new to me. My biggest hurdles were learning to use
new equipment of radically different character, learning
new software to meet the demands of drastically increased
output and learning where my subject lay and how to trust
it. I ended up with three bodies of work, one of which continues under the radar, another of which wasn’t news and
the third of which exploded and is hanging now in West
Bend. I wish I lived closer to the show, because the pictures
are so fresh that I’ve just begun to learn what they contain.
Tell me about the current exhibition.
The pictures that make up Watermarks, while coherent
and organized, are so new to me that I have no words to
break them down into components. I count this as a mercy.
This show went up wet. I did a 180-degree turn and am
traveling a road with no signage and indistinct margins. I’m
not even sure I’m on a road. The show is also an installation
— no labels, just one thing and meant for lingering immersion. It would be great if I could talk around Watermarks in
such a way that a reader would want to dive in, but I can’t.
P hoto : M O WA
Watermarks consists of 43 photographs, in a style
totally new to their creator.
In general, what does an artist’s work say about him or
her? What does your work say about you?
When an artist’s work feels inevitable — its ideas shaped
into fact without obvious effort or ego — I trust that I’m in
the presence of someone who cares about both the piece
and its audience. I give over my initial attention with gratitude. I say “Of course,” and then I look and look.
I like work that lasts, that slowly releases new understandings as the viewer ages and changes alongside the
work. I respect work that isn’t afraid to be both beautiful
and confounding. The odd couple of Pieter Bruegel the
Elder and Robert Irwin has enlarged my world with each
artist’s quiet insistent immediacy and inherent joy. They
happen to be on my mind right now for different reasons,
but the company of visually generous artists is large,
diverse and extends back to the walls at Lascaux.
What would you like viewers to take away from your
MOWA exhibition?
If a viewer leaves the show with the thought that daily
life contains wonders that will reveal themselves to sufficient attention, then Watermarks will have done its job. If
the viewer also feels a desire to experience the show again,
then it’s possible to think that what I’ve made is art.
MOWA’s Spring Exhibitions
Watermarks, the landscape photography of Gregory
Conniff, is one of three concurrent exhibitions that
opened April 9 at the Museum of Wisconsin Art in
West Bend.
Lois Bielefeld/On Faith chronicles the work of MOWA’s
first artist-in-residence abroad with photographs of
churches and religious personnel and parishioners
in the largely Catholic country of Luxembourg. Bielefeld’s exhibit, which closes June 26, includes audio
interviews with many of her subjects.
Roadside Attractions incorporates the work of six
landscape photographers who examine neglected or
forgotten subjects along Wisconsin’s highways and
byways. The exhibit, featuring photos of rundown
houses, abandoned deer stands and other societal
remnants, closes July 3.
30
MAM’s ‘Collaboratory’ key for curious collectors
By Kat Minerath
Contributing writer
Cabinets, shelves and collections can
be mysterious. They gather books and
trinkets, hinting at treasures and knowledge to be discovered. They are something
to rummage through and hold the promise of unknown things. These conjoined
sensibilities of knowledge, curiosity and
intellect invariably influence us everyday,
and are distilled into a new exhibition at
the Milwaukee Art Museum named The
Collaboratory.
The gallery housing The Collaboratory
is something of a hidden place, tucked
away on the first floor behind luminous
galleries displaying 17th and 18th century
art. Its location is so obscure that I had to
ask a gallery guard where it was. Winding
my way along, I came upon it: a small set
of rooms apart from the other exhibition
spaces and with an atmosphere unlike the
others.
The gallery is lined with large display
cases of dark wood, rising from floor to
ceiling. Its dim lighting and leather benches allude to something like a library, one
that would be found on a large country
estate where a collector proudly shows all
sorts of items gathered from exotic travels
and historic locales.
This is very much the intended effect.
The gallery text explains the installation
was inspired by Englishman Horace Walpole (1717–1797) and his estate called
Strawberry Hill, outside of London. Walpole was respected as an art historian,
antiquarian and collector. The exhibition
further characterizes him as “a true citizen
of the Enlightenment … he focused on
what stories the objects had to tell, rather
than adhere to tradition and classify them
according to a rigid system.”
The Collaboratory takes this manner of
thinking as inspiration for our own observation, avoiding the traditional categorizations used elsewhere in the museum. The
refreshing approach allows for stimulating
juxtapositions between objects from different times and places. Things like an
18th-century atlas, a 17th-century Dutch
still life painting, Old Master-style portraits and luxuriously styled household
items such as salt cellars and tiny boxes
are intermingled, but not haphazardly.
There are visual connections that the
viewer may puzzle out and opening semisecret drawers yields further clues to their
connections.
The various pieces in the exhibition
are organized in compartments, placed
individually or in groups on shelves, but
what is most enlivening is how they cross
boundaries. Frequent museum visitors
may recognize ancient Greek vases or the
tiny Egyptian statue of Sekhmet, which has
P hoto : Kat M i n e r ath
The Milwaukee Art Museum’s new exhibit, The Collaboratory, juxtaposes items from
different times and places to create unique collections.
found a new home here. It is something
of a revival for these pieces, which were
previously placed with other ancient art
at the entrance to the main galleries as a
brief preface to the full collection. Offering
them in a new context inspires distinct and
different views.
A spirit of experimentation underlies
The Collaboratory, and in honor of that,
there is also a room-sized camera obscura
in the gallery. The ancient optical device
that served as a precursor to photography
consists of a small opening that bends
light through a lens, projecting an upsidedown image of what is outside. Here, you
can see the world through technology that
remains novel in our own time.
Augmenting the exhibition is a contemporary piece that is among MAM’s
favorites: Beth Lipman’s monumental glass
sculpture called Laid Table. It is like a
banquet gone awry; the elaborate vessels
and decorations glisten in the light but
the details only come out slowly. Many
items are broken or in decay. It is dazzling, beautiful, but also faintly eerie as
these purposeful notes are revealed. It is a
work described as a depiction of transient
states, referencing the truth that all things
change over time, and eventually come to
an end. However, as a piece of The Collaboratory, it becomes about careful perception
too, staying in the moment to find details
that are not immediately revealed.
On DISPLAY
The Collaboratory runs through
March 2017 in the Richard and
Suzanne Pieper Gallery at the Milwaukee Art Museum, 700 N. Art Museum
Drive. For additional information on
this and other exhibits, as well as
admission information, visit mam.org.
Gift certificates available for purchase at:
www.ayoungeryou21.com
31
Judy Collins shares her life from ‘Both Sides Now’
By Michael Muckian
Contributing writer
Incomprehensible as it sounds, there was
a time when Judy Collins didn’t know she’d
grow up to be a singer. Fortunately for fans
worldwide, a song Collins heard by chance
on a radio broadcast while in high school set
a course for the woman who has become
one of the industry’s most prolific folk and
pop music artists.
A 15-year-old Collins walked into the
family home in East Denver after school
one spring day in 1954, ready to sit down
at the Baldwin grand piano to practice for
what she’d planned to be a classical music
career. On the family’s old Emerson, a radio
announcer was discussing the recently
released Alan Ladd film The Black Knight
while “The Gypsy Rover,” a song from the
film, spilled into the living room.
“(The song) stopped me in my tracks. It
literally made me tremble,” recalls Collins
in her 2011 autobiography Sweet Judy Blue
Eyes: My Life in Music. “I knew it was meant
for me.”
Her family and music teacher, the famed
conductor Dr. Antonia Brico, did not approve
of her sudden change in course. But the budding musician heard the clarion call of her
heart and headed off on a career that would
eventually earn her four Grammy Awards
and an honorary doctorate in fine arts from
the Pratt Institute.
“You have to become an activist in your
own life,” says Collins, who turns 77 on May
1. “The lessons come from inside you, and
you’re the one who’s going to have to take
action.”
Collins plans to share that and other life
lessons as part of the latest installment in
the Unique Lives program coming to Madison’s Overture Center on April 25. Billed
as the country’s foremost women’s lecture
series, Unique Lives also will make stops this
year in San Jose, California, and Toronto.
To paraphrase from Collins’ 1967 Grammy-winning hit single, the singer/songwriter/activist has looked at life from both sides
now, managing incredible highs and debilitating lows to emerge as a spokeswoman for
her gender and for humanists everywhere.
Both the good and bad will provide fodder for
the singer’s 60-minute lecture, which will be
followed by a Q&A session, but during which
there will be no singing.
Collins, best known for her eclectic choice
of musical material, released her first album,
A Maid of Constant Sorrow, in 1961, toward
the end of what comedian Martin Mull once
referred to as “the Great Folk Music Scare”
of the 1950s and ’60s.
Over the next five decades, Collins
released 53 albums, including last year’s
Strangers Again, comprised of duets with
Willie Nelson, Jimmy Buffet, Marc Cohen
and others. Her newest album, Silver Skies
Blue, recorded with Bronx singer-songwriter
Ari Hest, will be released on June 3.
Throughout her career, Collins has risen
in the pantheon of folk-rock music, introducing audiences to Joni Mitchell and Leonard
Cohen, appearing on Sesame Street and The
Muppet Show and turning Stephen Sond-
‘You have to become
an activist in your
own life.’
heim’s “Send in the Clowns” and the old
Christian hymn “Amazing Grace” into Top
20 hits.
Former lover Stephen Stills wrote “Suite:
Judy Blue Eyes,” one of Crosby, Stills, Nash &
Young’s first hits, about his hopes of heading
off a breakup in their relationship. Collins
admired Stills’ song, but broke up with him
anyway.
Collins sang Mitchell’s “Chelsea Morning”
at President Bill Clinton’s 1993 inaugural (the
Clintons claim to have named their daughter
after the song) and for the next eight years
was a frequent White House guest. She
also has been a political activist and today
represents UNICEF and campaigns against
landmines.
“I learned my work ethic from my father,”
Collins remembers. “He was a Type A, as well
as a singer and radio personality. I learned as
much about professional discipline from him
as from anything else in my life.”
Unfortunately, Chuck Collins also was
blind and an alcoholic. Judy, who survived
polio at age 11 and tuberculosis at age 23
shortly after her Carnegie Hall debut, inherited her father’s taste for the bottle. Despite
experimentation with other drugs, she suffered for years from what she calls her drug
of choice, finally entering a rehab program in
1978. She’s been sober ever since.
Collins also attempted suicide at age
14 and in the 1970s quit smoking, only to
launch headlong into bulimia. She married and divorced Peter Taylor, a union that
produced her only child, Clark Taylor, who
also became an alcoholic and suffered from
clinical depression. Clark Taylor committed
suicide in 1992, resulting in Collins joining
suicide prevention advocacy efforts.
Collins plans to offer the secrets of her
survival and overcoming the odds those who
attend the lecture.
“It’s all about being a person of action,”
Collins says. “Don’t listen to people when
they say you shouldn’t talk about your troubles. You need to tell it like it is so you can get
comfortable in your own skin.”
Collins, who is married to designer and
activist Louis Nelson and lives in Manhattan,
follows a strict diet, as well as a regimen
that includes daily exercise and meditation
to keep the demons at bay and stay focused
on her work.
She also maintains a rigorous international touring schedule — including dates in
Europe — that would tire a performer half
her age.
On May 8, she will depart from the usual
schedule to perform in A Love Letter to Stephen Sondheim at the Boettcher Concert Hall
in Denver. The concert, which will be filmed
for a PBS special, focuses on the Broadway
composer’s musical catalog and his contributions to music.
P hoto : B r a d T r e nt
Judy Collins, who turns 77 in May, will share the lessons she’s learned in a life of folk
and pop music at Madison’s Overture Center on April 25.
In addition to “Send In the Clowns,” Collins
has recorded and regularly performs “Green
Finch and Linnet Bird” and “Pretty Woman”
from Sweeney Todd and “I Remember (Sky)”
from Evening Primrose.
“I’d like to be the one to give Stephen
his next Top 20 hit,” Collins says. “He’s a
remarkable talent.”
Describing herself as “an unbridled optimist,” Collins still sees her life as a work in
progress and plans to continue evolving both
as an artist and a person.
“My life as a singer/songwriter leads me
to new and unexpected places, which is what
it is supposed to do,” Collins says. “I still
believe in things like peace, women’s rights
and equal pay, and I still have faith in what’s
going on in the world. Many people are doing
wonderful things and I am extremely grateful to have had this career, which shows no
signs of stopping.”
The current political environment is not
among those wonderful things, but the activist declined to comment on the ongoing
presidential race.
“I have nothing to say because they
have said it all, including some things that
shouldn’t have been said,” Collins quips.
“I leave them to (be) hoist (on) their own
petards, as they say, and maybe fall on their
swords.”
On STAGE
The Madison Unique Lives series presents Judy Collins at 7:30 p.m. on April
25 at Overture Center, 201 State St.
Tickets run from $49 to $85 and can be
purchased by calling 608-258-4141 or
visiting overturecenter.org.
sandal season
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32
Space Raft sails onward with release of ‘Rubicon’
By Colton Dunham
Contributing writer
“Sometimes good things happen and they
happen big,” said Jordan Davis, lead vocalist
and guitarist of the Milwaukee-based band
Space Raft. It’s a statement that rings true
for him and his three fellow performers.
The energetic rockers caught on quickly in
Milwaukee after they released their selftitled album via Dusty Medical Records in
2014. Their much anticipated sophomore
effort Rubicon, released on April 15, seems
to have them on track for more success and
accolades.
Davis and his bandmates Tjay Christenson (keyboard), Tyler Chicorel (drums) and
Job Heibler (bass) got a bit of a head start,
having previously been part of such local
acts as Temper Temper, Mystery Girls and
Call Me Lightning. But Davis says that credibility alone didn’t prepare them for the
rapturous response to Space Raft or its lead
single “We Are Not Alone.”
With such a positive response comes the
pressure to live up to the hype. Although
Davis says the band’s debut record was more
of a solo project, Rubicon is a solidified group
effort, expressing a broad palette of musical
strengths and ideas.
Space Raft will perform at Mad Planet on
May 7 to celebrate the release of Rubicon.
WiG recently caught up with Davis to talk
about the album, the upcoming show and
the band’s recent performances at Bernie
Sanders’ campaign rallies in Madison and
Milwaukee.
What’s the inspiration behind the new
album? How does it differ from Space Raft?
The first album was my personal pet project and I shepherded it through writing the
material and finding people and producing
it and making sure all the pieces were where
I had all imagined. A lot of the first record
is stuff that I had sat down previously by
myself and recorded.
This new record, Rubicon, instead of demoing it, essentially what I did was bring my
rough song ideas to the band and we all
worked them out together. It definitely felt
like more of a communal effort all around. I
really feel like everybody’s influences are a
lot clearer on this record.
Everybody in the band had brought something to the table and specializes in certain
types of music. John, our newest bass player,
was into late-1950s, early-1960s bubblegum
music. Our drummer Tyler is pretty much
into rock music. Tjay is more into experimental stuff. I’m more into pop and blues as
well. We all rolled that up and I think it’s well
represented on the new record.
So, essentially, the album is like a potpourri of different sounds?
To me, it sounds more like a melting pot.
When I hear other people’s input into a project, it really makes it feel like more than my
own, so I’m really proud that on this record
I feel like everybody’s personalities had the
chance to shine.
What was putting the album together
like?
It was actually a lot simpler in a lot of
ways. The first record had a lot of layers
on it. We did a lot of overdubs and a lot of
extra guitar stuff and keyboard parts. This
new record is essentially what we sound like
live. It’s just the parts we play live and we’ve
doctored those to make them sound bigger.
For the most part, this album is much more
indicative to a band playing in a room rather
than being assembled later on in a studio.
What have you learned from your selftitled debut that you were able to apply or
avoid when you guys worked on Rubicon?
Our first record was very well received
critically and among fans. It seemed to gather a lot of steam without us having to do very
much promotion on it. And that was a very
humbling thing for people to latch onto the
band right out of the gate, you know? I think
I’ve built myself up with a fair amount of
anxiety thinking about the follow-up record
Rubicon just because if people like this without us asking them to, I feel like there’s much
more responsibility that goes into following
it up.
We tried to spread ourselves around on
this record evenly enough where we’re trying
to honor some of what people liked about
the first record, but we’re also sort of trying
to move it ahead from where we started. I
feel like we tried to maintain some of the elements from the first record that people really
latched onto. Overall, just the whole process
and situation of banding together made for a
heavier record.
What has been the response been like
from those who have heard your new music
from the album?
We’ve played it for five or six different
people and everybody seems to think that
it’s a step forward for us, which is really
great. The reaction to our first record was
overwhelmingly positive and to hear that
this record is a step forward for us is pretty
encouraging. We put a lot of work into Rubicon and I hope people can appreciate that.
You guys recently opened for Bernie
Sanders at his rallies in both Madison and
Milwaukee. How did that come about?
It actually came about through people
that our label were talking (with) to drum up
some press for the record release and it just
turned out that one of the people they had
contacted started working on the Sanders
campaign. This contact basically put us in
contact with the Sanders campaign and we
basically cleared our schedule to do that.
It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for
us and it was a great honor to be included
in that.
What was your interaction with Sanders
like?
We got to meet Bernie after the speeches
both nights. There were a few opportunities
to take pictures with him. We were basically
being shepherded around by Secret Service
the whole time, so it wasn’t really like we
really had opportunities to hang out with
him. He’s a busy guy. There was an honest
appreciation and gratitude to us for coming to do it. It’s hard to really describe, but
the Sanders campaign was very supportive
of us and just gracious that we were able
to make the time to participate, which felt
really great.
In my lifetime, I’ve seen very little politics
that’s gone very far to support the arts in our
country. To be a part of a campaign that does
was an honor. It’s hard to quantify how big of
an effect it can have on a band like us, but to
have the arts included in the conversation
is a big deal to me. So many of my friends
are artists, musicians, painters and creative
people in general and I feel that no matter
what creative endeavor you’ve chosen for
your life, it’s always a struggle in this country
and to see it embraced on a presidential
campaign is just mind-boggling to me.
Are you guys planning on sending Sanders a copy of Rubicon?
Now that you’ve mentioned it, we probably should (laughs).
What are you most looking forward to
about your show at Mad Planet coming up?
I’m just excited to get this thing out in the
open. We’ve been working on it for about a
year and a half. Some of these songs I started
writing as soon as the last record came out.
You just work on something for so long and
hard and then all of a sudden here it is and
it’s out in the world — I mean, that feeling is
indescribable. We’ve got a bunch of friends’
bands playing; all bands that are on our
record label who are supporting us. We’ll
have a bunch of friends and family there. It’s
going to be a really good time.
On STAGE
Space Raft’s album release party for
Rubicon will take place at 9 p.m. May
7 at Mad Planet, 533 E. Center St., Milwaukee. $7 cover. Visit mad-planet.com
for details.
The Sets List
9 p.m. April 28 at Cactus Club, Milwaukee. $9, $10 at
the door. cactusclubmilwaukee.com.
Baltimore indie pop quintet Sun Club just wants
to have a good time and promises to do so at Cactus Club. The band is sure to be performing “Tropicoller Lease” and other songs from the album The
Dongo Durango. The band has been touring around
the country and in Europe since the release of the
EP Dad Claps at the Mom Prom and has distinguished
itself as a band on the rise, garnering accolades
for an energetic stage presence. Thick Paint opens.
(Colton Dunham)
9 p.m. April 29 at Cactus Club. $5 cover, $10 suggested donation. cactusclubmilwaukee.com.
The Hip-Hop Hates Cancer benefit concert is
back for one last show to raise money for Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin’s oncology department. This year’s impressive line-up features
Milwaukee artists including SAFS CREW, Klassik, Automatic, and Pharaoh Mac & DMT. Jank
One of WMSE 91.7 FM, the Milwaukee Journal
Sentinel’s Those Hip Hop Guys and JC Poppe
will host the event. All proceeds at the door will
be going toward the charity. (Colton Dunham)
Sturgill Simpson :: ‘A Sailor’s Guide to Earth’
Frightened Rabbit
7 p.m. April 28 at the Pabst Theater, Milwaukee. $15.
pabsttheater.org.
Hailing from the hills of Scotland, indie band
Frightened Rabbit returns to the Pabst for the
first time in three years as part of a tour for a new
record, Painting of a Panic Attack. The band is known
for the debut album The Midnight Organ Flight,
a raw breakup record that helped to secure the
band’s place in listeners’ hearts around the world.
The Brooklyn rockers of Caveman open. (Rachele
Krivichi)
Little Green Cars
9:30 p.m. May 6 at High Noon Saloon, Madison. $15.
high-noon.com.
When the five musicians of Little Green Cars
were discovered and recorded the debut Absolute
Zero, they were only teenagers— still learning
about themselves and the world around them even
as they criss-crossed the globe on multiple tours.
The new album, Ephemera, records that journey,
as the quintet watched romances collapse, family
members die, and their relationships change over
more than two years of travel. It’s a “transitional”
album, soaked in emotion and featuring textured,
harmonic pop songs all about the tough work of
growing up. (Matthew Reddin)
Pet Shop Boys :: ‘Super’
Pet Shop Boys take another drink from the fountain of youth on
their 13th album Super, yet another impressive dance record coming more than 30 years after their debut
single “West End Girls.”
Producer Stuart Price takes his second look at the work of Neil Tennant
and Chris Lowe with this record, written
in Berlin and recorded in Los Angeles,
and the record delves into the nightclub
scene with the usual aplomb. Tennant
is a keen observer with sharp storytelling skills, best seen on tunes like “The
Pop Kids,” a tale of 1990s club-goers,
and “Twenty-something,” another song that looks 15 years back
and reflects on how traditional careers have become more elusive
in the modern age. Lowe has an uncanny ability to keep even the
most overfamiliar keyboard sounds from drifting to the far side of
cheesy and there’s enough variety to ensure that none overstays its
welcome.
Some slow tunes and instrumentals cleverly break the dance
music dominance. The protagonist of “The Dictator Decides”
agrees the world would be better off without him, and Tennant
sees the tracks of the machines’ tears on the poignant “Sad Robot
World.” (Pablo Gorondi/AP)
Sun Club
Hip-Hop Hates Cancer
Music reviews
33
Sturgill Simpson defies categorization, and exceeds expectations,
with A Sailor’s Guide to Earth, an exploration of life’s journey inspired by the birth
of his first child.
Simpson funks up his country twang
with a rousing horn section while keeping
a rocking and rollicking edge underneath
his probing lyrics. Heck, he even throws
in bagpipes, a cello, a violin and a killer
cover of Nirvana’s “In Bloom.” Simpson,
like all great interpreters, makes the Kurt
Cobain song sound like his own, and it
fits in perfectly with the mood and theme of A Sailor’s Guide.
The record’s final tune, “Call to Arms,” is just what it sounds
like. Simpson decries what he’s hearing on TV and radio, and with
the horns and guitars growling behind him, urgently declares, “The
bull----’s got to go!”
Rock, country, Americana. Whatever. A Sailor’s Guide to Earth is
a thrill. This compact 39 minutes of pure joy has got the kind of
energy that makes you instinctively lean forward just to try and
keep up. (Scott Bauer/AP)
Ronnie Spector :: ‘English Heart’
Tori Kelly
8 p.m. May 7 at the Orpheum Theatre, Madison. $25.
madisonorpheum.com.
Tori Kelly didn’t make it to the Top 24 when she
auditioned for American Idol in 2010, but the show
still changed everything for her. After leaving, the
teenager doubled down on her dream, teaching
herself guitar and beginning to write her own material, releasing much of it on YouTube and in selfrecorded EPs. The effort paid off. A few years later,
Kelly scored a deal with Capitol Records and has
had bona fide hits with soulful pop singles “Nobody
Love” and “Should’ve Been Us” from her debut
Unbreakable Smile. (Matthew Reddin)
In 1964, Ronnie Spector toured Britain with the Ronettes just
weeks before the Beatles arrived in
America. English Heart is her tribute to
that British Invasion, in turn influenced
by her band and former husband Phil
Spector’s “Wall of Sound.”
While Spector is often cited for the
power of her pipes, these 11 songs are
styled more around subtlety and insinuation, and producer Scott Jacoby has
wisely favored the feel of the 1960s
originals over exact recreations of their
sounds. There are exceptions, like the thumping drums and Farfisa
organ on the Dave Clark Five tune “Because.” Conversely, electronic
percussion on “You’ve Got Your Troubles” (originally by The Fortunes) lends a contemporary touch, contributing to the accommodating combination of old and new.
Spector wisely covers smaller but superior U.S. hits like Lulu’s
“Oh Me Oh My (I’m a Fool for You Baby)” and Sandie Shaw’s “Girl
Don’t Come” instead of the usual smashes. A version of the Rolling
Stones’ semi-obscure “I’d Much Rather Be With the Girls” — with
the daughter of her late sister (and fellow Ronette) Estelle Bennett
and cousin Cindy Mizelle — is pure joy. (Pablo Gorondi/AP)
34
Etsy brings new makermanufacturer partnership
program to Milwaukee
By Rachele Krivichi
Contributing writer
STILL ROCKIN’ AT 35
JOIN US FOR THE NON-STOP PARTY
THROUGHOUT 2016.
If you’re a designer or craftsperson hoping to earn money from your work, you
know it’s easy to feel stuck — whether
you’re just starting out or have a growing
operation. Maybe it’s just that you can’t
make things fast enough. Or you’ve got
great ideas you don’t know how to execute.
Or all you need is for someone to drop out
of the sky and give you a little nudge.
That last problem might be easier to fix
than you think.
Riverworks, the Wisconsin Women’s
Business Initiative Corporation and the
Greater Milwaukee Committee are teaming up with the online store Etsy for a
“manufacturing meetup,” scheduled for
April 26 in Milwaukee.
This event, part of an experimental program by Etsy to connect designers with
manufacturers, has been held in Boston,
New York and Pittsburgh.
Etsy’s manufacturing initiative was
started last year when the company
became aware that many small businesses
on its site were unable to grow because
they weren’t able to scale up their design
or manufacturing abilities. The program
allows Etsy users to meet and collaborate
with designers and makers in the areas of
apparel and textiles, machining and fabrication, jewelry and metalsmithing and
printing.
Amber Miller, regional project director
at WWBIC, says she was contacted by
Etsy several months ago to see if there was
interest in an Etsy Manufacturing Meetup
in Milwaukee. When she got the call, Miller says she knew it “just made sense” for
Etsy to come to Milwaukee because there
is so much talent in the city.
One person planning to attend the
meetup is designer Kelly Fitzpatrick, who
owns Velvadeer Jewelry. Fitzpatrick says
she has been in business about a year as
a jeweler, specializing in a process called
“electroforming,” which uses electricity
to coat found objects with metal. She has
been selling her jewelry at craft markets
like Hovercraft and Maker Market and her
business is thriving.
But her unique process is time-consuming and Fitzpatrick says she can no longer
keep up with demand. She is attending
the Etsy meetup, which she heard about
through WWBIC, for advice on refining her
process.
At the event, she’ll meet guest speakers Anna Warren and Sarah Kirkham from
Tactile Craft Works, a woman-owned
leather goods shop; Rocky Marcoux, the
commissioner of city development for the
City of Milwaukee and a supporter of small
businesses; and Shannon and Kent Knapp
of Milwaukee Blacksmith, a family-owned
business that performs small-batch manufacturing and offers blacksmithing classes.
Miller says the event will be a strong
networking opportunity with them and
other artisans and manufacturers, and is
hopeful it will strengthen Milwaukee’s creative community.
IF YOu Go
The Etsy Manufacturing Meetup will
be held at 6 p.m. on April 26 at Goat
Palace, 3740 N. Fratney St., Milwaukee.
For more information, visit wwbic.com.
SEE OUR FULL LISTING OF FUN AT WMSE.ORG
P hoto : E T SY
This motto, from Etsy’s offices in New York, could be one day spoken by Milwaukee-area
artisans who attend Etsy’s “manufacturing meetup” this April.
35
Sour beers’ growing appeal sweet for New Glarus
By Michael Muckian
Contributing writer
Ask Dan Carey about the growth in sour
beers, the ubiquitous Belgian-style brews
that until recently were an acquired taste
for most American beer drinkers, and he
smiles almost wanly.
“It’s mostly written about in the media
by journalists that are intrigued with the
style,” says Carey, co-founder, co-owner
and brewmaster at New Glarus Brewing Co.
“It’s not a big part of our business, but it’s
a fun part.”
Carey is sitting in the afternoon sun outside the Green County Brewery’s Wild Fruit
Cave, where he produces two styles of
Belgian-inspired sour beer.
The cave isn’t a cave at all, but a separate
building adjacent to the brewhouse of the
original and now smaller of Carey’s two
brewing facilities, the one devoted to his
experimental beers.
Carey has been making sour, or Lambic,
beers since the brewery opened in 1993
and these beers have won multiple national
and international awards over the years.
They’re a few of the many awards earned
by Wisconsin’s third-largest brewer, best
known for such brands as “Spotted Cow”
farmhouse ale and “Moon Man” pale ale.
The Wild Fruit Cave opened in 2014 and
now the brewery produces about 10 sour
beer batches, annually totaling 3,000 to
4,000 barrels, a small drop of the 230,000
barrels overall that the brewery will produce this year. The cave also houses the
wooden winery and distillery barrels and
stainless steel tanks in which Carey’s sour
and other beers are aged.
Some consider the term “sour beer,” with
its images of skunky brews and spoiled
stock, an unfortunate misnomer for what
might better be termed as “tart” varieties.
But veteran drinkers know that sour taste
is the happy byproduct of a very deliberate
Old World brewing process.
At one time, all beers were sour to a
greater or lesser degree. The sterile facilities used in modern brewing keep beers
protected from bacteria and other agents
that can create sour flavors, but early brewers didn’t have that luxury. They relied
instead on the wild yeast strains that naturally exist in the environment and float
through the air, and later on hops (used first
as a preservative) to temper the influence
of unwanted yeasts and bacteria.
Some modern brewers intentionally add
bacteria to make their beers sour. They will
inoculate their wort — the barley mash that
eventually becomes beer — with species of
Lactobacillus, Brettanomyces and Pediococ-
P hoto s : N e w G l a r u s B r e w i n g C o .
Left: New Glarus co-founder and brewmaster Dan Carey stands beside barrels of sour
beer that he brews at his Wild Fruit Cave, an offshoot of his experimental brewing
facilities.
cus, which produce the sweet-sour combination of flavors and funky barnyard aromas that characterize sour beers.
Others, including Carey, prefer to let
nature take its course. He employs those
traditional methods in producing his sour
blonde ale and his red Flanders-style ale,
both of which are used to form the bases of
his many sour and fruit-based beers.
During the WiG interview, Carey is in
fact waiting for that process to conclude.
Within the brewhouse, wort liberally laced
with four garbage can-sized containers of
hop cones is just finishing up its three-hour
boil in a large copper kettle. Very shortly,
the wort will be transferred through a series
of pipes from the brewhouse to the cave for
the next steps in the brewing process.
Once there, the wort will be strained and
emptied into the koelschip, a large open
top container also known as a “coolship”
or, at New Glarus, the “cookie sheet.” The
koelschip has a large surface-to-mass ratio,
which allows for efficient cooling of the
wort, which today will equal 115 barrels of
finished beer.
The room housing the koelschip has windows on three sides that can and will be
opened to allow the night air to more efficiently cool the brew. It’s through these
same open windows that wild yeast and
bacteria strains will find their way into the
wort and begin the spontaneous fermentation process. Wooden beams mounted in
Above: Once a batch of sour beer has been boiled, it’s transferred into the “koelschip,” a
large, open-top container that cools the beer efficiently. It also leaves the beer exposed
to the elements, allowing wild yeast and bacteria strains to begin to ferment the brew
as they’re blown in on the wind.
the ceiling of the room serve as a home for
the bacteria and a base from which they can
continuing feeding the fermentation cycle,
Carey says.
There is no way to control the type of the
bacteria that blows in through the windows,
but there are seasons that are better for
open-topped brewing than others. Spring
planting and fall harvesting by local farmers
both generate a lot more airborne “activ-
ity” from which the beer can only benefit,
Carey says.
Once the beer is completed, it is casked
and cellared for aging, where exposure to
the wooden barrels and their own bacteria
can complete the process. Eventually, the
resulting beers will be tasted and blended, often with newer beers, for maximum
aroma and flavor, providing the deeply comSOUR next page
36
SOUR from prior page
plex brews that have come to characterize
the sour beer category.
“There is a bright future for this type
of beer, but the interest is just getting
underway,” says Carey as he stands next
to the “cookie sheet” and watches the wort
cascading into the koelschip, sending up
billowing clouds of steam.
The large room eventually fills with steam
as he shares samples of a previous batch of
sour blonde ale, with its blend of sparkle,
acidity and funky Brett characteristics, and
his Oud Bruin, the red Flanders-style ale
with complex flavors and balanced blend of
sweet maltiness and tart vinegar.
The steam that flooded the room eventu-
ally cools, creating falling rain inside the
fruit cave. But the unexpected shower does
little to dampen the appreciation and the
bright future of at least these two sour
beers.
On TOUR
New Glarus Brewing Co. offers free
self-guided tours daily
of its Hilltop Brewery, 2400 Wis. Hwy
69 just south of New
Glarus. Tours run
Monday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
and Sundays noon to
5 p.m. Behind-thescenes “Hard Hat”
tours commence at
1 p.m. on Fridays and
include the Hilltop
and Riverside breweries. The cost is $30
per person, tours are
limited to 15 people
each and reservations
are required. Dial 608527-5850 for details.
P hoto : N e w G l a r u s
New Glarus’ Wild Fruit Cave opened in 2014 and is attached to the brewery’s original brewing facility,
now the place where Dan Carey makes his experimental batches.
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37
Matzo lasagna: a vegetarian Passover dish anyone can love
By Sara Moulton
Associated Press
Let’s say that most of the folks coming
to your place for the Passover feast are
vegetarians. And let’s say that you want to
cater to them without breaking the hearts of
the die-hard carnivores whose mouths water
at the very thought of pot roast. Is there a
ZUCCHINI MATZO LASAGNA
Start to finish: 1 1/2 hours (1 hour active) Servings: 8
Ingredients:
2 pounds medium zucchini
Kosher salt and ground black pepper
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 cup finely chopped yellow onion
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1/3 cup packed fresh dill, chopped,
plus extra chopped dill to garnish
16-ounce container cottage cheese
2 cups whole milk
3 large eggs
1 tablespoon lemon zest
8 ounces cream cheese
6 ounces feta cheese, crumbled, divided
6 matzos (6- to 7-inch squares)
Directions:
Heat the oven to 400 F. Coat a 13-by-9-inch baking dish
with cooking spray.
Trim off and discard the ends of the zucchini. In a food proces
sor fitted with the
grating disk, coarsely grate the zucchini. Transfer the zucchi
ni to a strainer and
toss with 1 1/2 teaspoons salt. Let drain over the sink or
a bowl for 15 minutes. Set
the food processor, unwashed, aside to puree the sauce
in. After the zucchini has
drained, using your hands and working with small handfu
ls, squeeze out as much
moisture from it as possible.
In a large skillet over medium, heat the oil. Add the onion
and cook, stirring
occasionally, until golden, about 10 minutes. Add the garlic
and cook, stirring, for
1 minute. Add the zucchini and cook, stirring, for 2 minute
s. Remove from the heat
and stir in the 1/3 cup dill. Season with black pepper.
Fit the food processor with the regular cutting blade. In
it, combine the cottage
cheese, milk, eggs and lemon zest. Process until smoot
h. Set aside 2 cups of the
mixture, then add the cream cheese to the mixture remain
ing in the processor.
Process until smooth, then pour the mixture into the zucchi
ni mixture along with
1 cup of the feta. Stir well, then set aside.
Stack the matzos in a deep dish (such as a square baking
pan) and pour the
reserved cottage cheese mixture over them. Let stand for
15 minutes, rotating the
crackers every so often so they get evenly soaked.
Arrange 2 of the soaked matzos in a single layer in the
prepared baking dish.
Top with half of the zucchini filling, spreading it evenly. Cover
with 2 more matzos,
then the remaining filling. Top with a final layer of matzo
. Scoop any remaining
filling from the bowl that the matzos were soaked in and
spread it over the final
matzo layer. Sprinkle with the remaining feta.
Bake on the oven’s middle shelf until golden, 30 to 35 minute
s. Let stand for 15
minutes before cutting and serving.
centerpiece dish that will make everyone
happy?
Yes. As long as your vegetarians can tolerate dairy, this “lasagna” is a winner.
Passover forbids the eating of most foods
made with flour, which is why this recipe
calls for whole matzos (an exception to that
rule) in place of lasagna noodles.
Matzo turns out to be
a perfect stand-in. Thin
and square, a whole
sheet of matzo is a tailor-made bed on which
to layer other ingredients. It also absorbs
flavors beautifully, holds
its shape when baked
and browns nicely in the
oven.
I’ve paired the matzo
with zucchini, which
loses its watery blandness and gains a spring-like assertiveness
once it’s been shredded, salted, squeezed
and sauteed briefly with onions and garlic. The zucchini then is combined with my
cheating version of a cream sauce.
Typically, that would be a bechamel —
milk or cream thickened with a roux. That’s
too much work. It’s much easier simply to
use a food processor to whiz together cottage cheese, milk, eggs and cream cheese.
The result is a sauce as creamy and delicious
as a bechamel without any of the gummy
flour taste that can mar the classic sauce.
The matzos need to be soaked in some of
the cheese mixture to soften them slightly
before baking. To do so, stack them in a
deep container that isn’t much wider than
the matzo. I used a square brownie pan
and rotated each matzo’s place in the stack
every so often to make sure they all were
evenly soaked. This is a way
to counteract the fact that
the liquid sinks to the bottom
half of the container.
Once you set the matzos
in a rectangular baking pan,
it’ll take two of them side-byside to form a single layer.
If your matzos are 7 inches
square, they’ll overlap a bit
lengthwise, even as they fall
slightly short of the pan’s
width. Not to worry. The
filling will indeed ooze out
slightly beyond the edges of the matzos, but
as the dish bakes all the parts come together
beautifully, allowing you to cut it into individual servings with no problem.
I dreamed up this dish as a Passover
entree, but it would work equally well as
the centerpiece for a brunch any time of the
year. As for your Passover guests, here’s a
prediction from someone who married into
the tribe: As soon as they realize they can’t
argue about the food, they’ll happily move
on to politics.
38
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SAYS WHO?
ACROSS
1. Urn contents
6. Mischief-maker
9. Yahoo
13. Turf, as opposed to surf
14. Bygone bird
15. Slow, musically speaking
16. *”I’ll knock you off your
broom!” he said
17. Barley bristle
18. Type of flu
19. *”My precious!”
21. *”I’ve a feeling we’re not
in Kansas anymore”
23. ____ Francisco
24. Hindu woman’s dress
25. Apple’s opponent, 2016
28. *”Never let the fear of
striking out get in your
way”
30. *”Et tu, Brute?”
35. Not to be broken?
37. Finish a road
39. Chef’s headgear
40. Seed covering
41. *”Sign your name across
my heart,” sang Terrence
____ D’arby
43. Botticelli’s Venus, e.g.
44. Tsar’s edict
46. *”Hang down your head,
Tom Dooley,” sang The
Kingston ____
47. It propels some boats
48. Abscond
50. Month of Purim
52. Disk operating system
53. Inlaid furniture
decoration
55. Witness
57. *”May the Force be with
you”
61. Slanting character
64. Roundish
65. *”If you can’t change
your fate, change your
attitude,” said Amy ____
67. ____ of Pergamum,
Ancient Greece
69. Short for pinafore
70. Santa’s helper
71. Leaning
72. Middle of March
73. *”If you want to be
happy, be,” said ____
Tolstoy
74. Not o’er
DOWN
1. Mary Kay’s last name
2. Rudolph, e.g.
3. *Bette Midler: “Did you
ever know that you’re my
____”
4. ____ Grey and James ____
Jones
5. U.S.’ first manned space
station
6. Mosque VIP
7. Yard work
8. Shoots-eating bear
9. Prefix in levorotary
10. *The Fonz: “Sit ____
____!”
11. Home to Bryce Canyon
12. *”They’re grrreat!” he
exclaimed
15. Cowboy’s rope catcher
20. Unsuitable
22. Middle-earth creature
24. More than one
25. Ponzi scheme, e.g.
26. Dr. Preston ____ of Grey’s
Anatomy
27. Relating to #62 Down
29. *”Ai, caramba!”
31. Ages and ages
32. Small group of soldiers
33. A in AV
34. Rods and ____
36. *”The cold never
bothered me anyway”
38. Children’s author Blyton
42. Breakfast side
45. Personify
49. Afghan monetary unit
51. *”Mr. Gorbachev, tear
down this wall”
54. The Eagles’ “____
California”
56. Make one ecstatically
happy
57. Arizona Indian
58. Like a devoted fan
59. Master of ____ on Netflix
60. Deadly ones
61. Facts and figures
62. Hipbone
63. Medieval Northern
European
66. Draft pick
68. Indefinite degree
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Scott Walker will give you a T-shirt for
a $45 donation, but not in your size
Racine nonprofit builds tiny
houses for local veterans
James Patrick Fenlon: Gotta get me one of
those T-shirts so we can put it on our burn pile. But I
won’t because I won’t give one red cent to our greedy
and nasty governor!
Christopher Olig: August 27th the
Milwaukee Building Trades will be doing
a poker run for Harley›s and classic cars
along with Witts End to help this organization!
Don Prestia : Want to make a REAL contribution
to the state? Donate to these candidates that are
running for the State Assembly against incumbent
Republicans. You won›t get a T shirt but you will be
electing some people with common sense and a
respect for the residents in Wisconsin.
Sue Gores Gruber : Has he no shame.......................
.....asking people to help him with his debts, when he
won›t even raise the minimum wage in Wisconsin to
anything higher than $7.25. Unbelievable.
Tracy DiPiazza: Not one red cent after all he›s
taken from the people of Wisconsin.
Don Prestia : The small house movement is alive and well in Ireland. This is a
concept that should be continued in the
USA.
Luke Fischer: Used mobile homes cost
a whole lot less , have practical floor plans
and working plumbing, but hey be trendy.
Judith Johnstone: This is very nice,
but our tax dollars should be used for this
instead of all the other crap.
Obama’s Supreme Court pick
Merrick Garland fits no easy mold,
likely to frustrate both left and
right on alternate days
Daniel Knapek: Check him out, he is a
gun grabber that wanted to overturn the
newly minted D.C. concealed carry law. Put
another way, he is against the Constitution, ergo, he could not be relied upon to be
impartial. Scalia made decisions that were
against his beliefs because he was a Constitutionalist.
Michael Clay: The question is will he
uphold the Constitution. We won›t know
the answer because republicans are too
frightened to ask the question.
Bill Lund : Sounds to me like the perfect
fit for the court.
40
Eastmore‘s eclectic mix of vintage and
modern apartment homes are located
in Milwaukee’s most desirable spots of
Whitefish Bay, Shorewood, East Side
and Downtown. Within walking distance
to grocery stores, coffee shops, boutiques,
galleries and restaurants. It’s where you
want to be.
East Side, Shorewood, Downtown &
Whitefish Bay Apartment Homes
eastmore
you’re more at home
eastmore.com
|
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April 21, 2016 - Wisconsin Gazette

Transcription

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