Uppity Wisconsin

Wow!

I'm having flashbacks for sure.

UW students will protest on the Madison campus against a recruiting visit by Halliburton.

There's a national antiwar Moratorium on Friday.

And, right on cue, just like when they used to yell "Take a bath!" at protestors in the 60s, the wingnuts complain about what anti-war people look like.

Some fun now, hey?

There's a remarkable story in the NY Times this morning about a University of Wisconsin-Madison program to combat dangerous binge drinking on campus.

A program by Chancellor John Wiley that includes notifying families of students who become so drunk they require detox is the focus of the article.

If that program has been publicized in Wisconsin, it has escaped my notice.

What's remarkable about it is Wiley's determination to tackle a problem that has been pervasive on the campus for time immemorial.

In the 1950s and 60s, beer flowed at 18-year-old bars on the campus end of State Street.

The Madison campus used to pride itself as a party school, ranked #1 by Playboy with the notation that it was in a league of its own, not to be compared with amateurs.

Wiley doesn't think it's amusing, and rightly so.

Fred Mohs, a prominent Madison Republican lawyer, landlord, and former member of the University of Wisconsin board of regents, lost his cool at a legislative committee meeting on the hot topic of affirmative action.

The committee, appointed by Republicans when they controlled both houses of the legislature last year, is chaired by State Sen. Glenn Grothman, a West Bend Republican who wants to end affirmative action at UW, and stacked with people who oppose affirmative action.

The Journal Sentinel reports on Tuesday's contentious meeting:

"What you've done is a disgrace to this committee," [State Sen. Lena] Taylor yelled at Grothman, founder and chairman of the Special Committee on Affirmative Action.

"Can't you just shut up?" Fred Mohs, a Madison attorney and Grothman supporter, snapped back at Taylor.