October 7, 2014
October 7, 2014
On Track?
by Silence Dogood
The St. Cloud Times Editorial Board penned an article:
"Look no further than attendance at the football game. The university counted 3,856 folks, including 984 students. That's almost double last year's mark and substantially more than attendance in the waning years of homecoming."
This kind of 'fluff' piece is common from the St. Cloud Times. It certainly takes the "glass is half-full approach!"
According to the Husky Data Newsletter, the 10th day enrollment at SCSU was 13,508. The Husky Data Newsletter also shows that enrollments the prior five years increased an average of 2,319 from the 10th day to the 30th day to the final enrollment numbers. As a result, the final fall enrollment at SCSU will be approximately 15,827 students (Enrollment is reported as headcount).
So when the attendance doubles from the prior year and includes 984 students, this is called being "on track." Clearly, doubling attendance should be quite an accomplishment. However, if 984 students attended out of 15,827 total students, that means only 6.2% of the student body attended the game. Since the St. Cloud Times did not report how many students attended last year's football game during a 'Celebrate' weekend it is impossible to determine if the proportion of students to non-students in attendance was different year to year and thus know if more or fewer students were in attendance when the years are compared.
Without a doubt, doubling sounds great but with only 6.2% of the student body and only a little over 1900 more people in attendance it's almost embarrassing rather than "on track."
Just up Interstate 94 a bit west of St. Cloud, last Saturday, St. John's University played Concordia-Moorhead. A portion of the box score is reproduced below.
Attendance is listed at 9,178, which means 2.4 times as many people attended the game at St. John's than at SCSU the prior weekend.
The 10-day enrollment numbers are also listed on the CSB/SJU website.
According to their website, the combined enrollment at CSB/SJU is 3,744. So even though SCSU is over 4 times larger it only draws 42% of the crowd as the institutions to the Northwest.
When the stadium is full with about 10,000 in attendance at a football game, which by the way is about what CSB/SJU draws on average to their games, I'll agree that SCSU is "on track." If SCSU grows by 1,928 in attendance each year, which is the same amount it grew from last year, it will take just over 3 years to reach 10,000 in attendance.
However, until SCSU draws 38,000 spectators to a game, which is the same ratio of attendance at the game to the number of students enrolled at CSB/SJU it will not have "arrived." Growing at a rate of 1,928 in attendance each year, it will only take just over 18 years to reach 38,000. Who knows, by then President Potter may have moved on and it will be called "Homecoming" again. That might be something to CELEBRATE!
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 1:24 AM
No comments.
Recently, I got another smear campaign mailer from the DFL smearing Jim Knoblach. It isn't shocking that the DFL is into smearing Republicans. It's that the DFL's mailer has a picture of a senior citizen with the caption "Tell Jim Knoblach to keep his hands off our Social Security and Medicare."
It's painfully obvious that the DFL knows that state legislators don't have anything to do with Medicare or Social Security. Just because the DFL is without character and can't be shamed because they don't have a conscience, that doesn't mean that they're stupid.
They're just disgustingly unprincipled and utterly without virtue.
While it's true that Jim Knoblach supported giving people the option of putting a portion of their FICA taxes into a government-approved equity account when he ran for Congress in 2006, that's utterly irrelevant in this race. Jim Knoblach, if he's elected, will never cast a vote on Social Security or Medicare because they're federal programs.
This DFL's intent with this mailer is to scare senior citizens into voting for Zach Dorholt. If's apparent that the DFL doesn't care that it's fearmongering at its worst. It's important to remember what Howard Dean said after being elected chair of the DNC:
In Dean's mind, the ends justified the means. If that meant smearing people with lies, that's the path he'd take without hesitation. That's the mindset that Ken Martin brought with him from ABM to the DFL.
In Martin's mind, the only thing that matters is winning elections and checking items off the DFL's ideological checklist. It's irrelevant if it helps Minnesotans. It's only relevant if it makes their special interests' lives better.
The DFL insists that it's for the little guy. That's BS and it's verifiable. The Metrocrat wing of the DFL, made up mostly by plutocrats and elitists, has done everything to prevent PolyMet from getting built. If the DFL cared about Iron Range voters, they wouldn't say that building the mine is important but dragging the regulatory review for 9 years is more important.
If the DFL cared about the little guy, they wouldn't have shoved forced unionization onto child care providers.
Zach Dorholt voted for the forced unionization of child care providers. He voted for major business-to-business sales tax increases and the Senate Office Building. After the session, he caught hell from St. Cloud businesses for creating these new taxes. These businesses lobbied him hard during the session. He ignored them then. It wasn't until after the session that he started listening to these businesses.
Dorholt is chair of the House Higher Ed Committee. That's a position of authority yet he hasn't lifted a finger to investigate the wasteful spending at MnSCU's Central Office nor has he looked into the financial mismanagement at SCSU. Despite the fact that SCSU is facing $8,000,000-$10,000,000 of budget cuts this year and despite the fact that the Potter administration hasn't published a budget report yet, Zach Dorholt hasn't looked into these issues.
All he cares about is whether he can report that he increased spending on Higher Education.
How does that qualify as helping the little guy or middle class families? That's before asking Mr. Dorholt how the Dayton-Dorholt-DFL budget is creating part-time, low wage jobs helps grow the economy from the middle class out?
The truth is that the DFL doesn't care about prosperity. They don't care about great jobs throughout the state. They don't care if public institutions foolishly spend the taxpayers' money. How dare they send out mailers that frighten senior citizens while smearing a great policymaker.
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 5:12 AM
No comments.
True to his 1970s-style anti-war activist days, Rick Nolan is still a pacifist :
That's frightening. ISIL is definitely a threat to the United States. Similarly, there's no question that Stewart Mills' assessment is right:
That isn't just Mills' opinion. It's an opinion he shares with Leon Panetta , President Obama's former Defense Secretary:
Being a pacifist in the 1970s helps inform Rick Nolan's views on national security. We're living in a totally different world, especially after 9/11. If Rick Nolan doesn't want to fight terrorists before they reach America's shores, then he isn't qualified to be in Congress.
Nolan's type of thinking is what helped create the conditions for 9/11 and for ISIL to take over much of Iraq and Syria. We can't afford not to pay attention to ISIL. In fact, we can't afford not to do everything we can to utterly demolish ISIL and other terrorist groups.
Whether Nolan will admit it, the truth is that ISIL and al-Qa'ida are at war with us. The only question left is whether we'll wage war with them. If Stewart Mills is elected to Congress, he'll vote to fight terrorists. If Nolan is re-elected, God forbid, he'll vote for taking a pre-9/11 position.
That's unacceptable.
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 5:45 AM
No comments.
Guy Benson's post on Sen. Mark Udall's recent difficulties highlights why Udall is fighting an uphill fight. Benson highlighted this video especially:
Here's the transcript of the exchange between Sen. Udall and Rep. Gardner:
Sen. Udall clearly didn't want to talk about the size of his tax increase. His answer is typical liberal psychobabble. His answer wasn't about the real world. It was purely in the hypothetical world. The other thing that's clear is that Sen. Udall didn't present proof that the government would be good at putting "a price on pollution." That's yet another piece of hypothetical, wishful thinking liberalism. No proof is needed because everything is settled according to Sen. Udall.
This debate wasn't about debating the merits of their policies. For Sen. Udall, this was a GOTV operation. His statements are filled with pandering to the environmental activists that Democrats need to turn out en masse to offset President Obama's drag on Democrats. It's difficult to believe that Democrats buy climate change. I think it's all about Democrats pandering to environmental activists for money and votes.
Still, Cory Gardner's persistence was smart. He insisted that Sen. Udall put a price tag on Udall's Cap and Trade legislation. Gardner wouldn't let him talk about "the environment" in the theoretical sense. Gardner made Udall talk about it in dollars and cents specifics. I'm betting that the NRSC will soon be up with advertising that talks about higher energy costs hurting families that are already squeezed by the Obama-Democrat economy.
This is high stakes GOTV operations. For his part, Rep. Gardner has the better argument because it's the question that people across the nation are asking.
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 9:51 PM
Comment 1 by J. Ewing at 08-Oct-14 08:40 AM
Comment 2 by Gary Gross at 08-Oct-14 09:04 AM
Oct 07 01:24 Something to Celebrate? Oct 07 05:12 DFL: all smears, all the time Oct 07 05:45 Nolan's pacifism is frightening Oct 07 21:51 Mark Udall's strategy exposed
Prior Months: Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep
Prior Years: 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Something to Celebrate?
On Track?
by Silence Dogood
The St. Cloud Times Editorial Board penned an article:
"Look no further than attendance at the football game. The university counted 3,856 folks, including 984 students. That's almost double last year's mark and substantially more than attendance in the waning years of homecoming."
This kind of 'fluff' piece is common from the St. Cloud Times. It certainly takes the "glass is half-full approach!"
According to the Husky Data Newsletter, the 10th day enrollment at SCSU was 13,508. The Husky Data Newsletter also shows that enrollments the prior five years increased an average of 2,319 from the 10th day to the 30th day to the final enrollment numbers. As a result, the final fall enrollment at SCSU will be approximately 15,827 students (Enrollment is reported as headcount).
So when the attendance doubles from the prior year and includes 984 students, this is called being "on track." Clearly, doubling attendance should be quite an accomplishment. However, if 984 students attended out of 15,827 total students, that means only 6.2% of the student body attended the game. Since the St. Cloud Times did not report how many students attended last year's football game during a 'Celebrate' weekend it is impossible to determine if the proportion of students to non-students in attendance was different year to year and thus know if more or fewer students were in attendance when the years are compared.
Without a doubt, doubling sounds great but with only 6.2% of the student body and only a little over 1900 more people in attendance it's almost embarrassing rather than "on track."
Just up Interstate 94 a bit west of St. Cloud, last Saturday, St. John's University played Concordia-Moorhead. A portion of the box score is reproduced below.
Attendance is listed at 9,178, which means 2.4 times as many people attended the game at St. John's than at SCSU the prior weekend.
The 10-day enrollment numbers are also listed on the CSB/SJU website.
According to their website, the combined enrollment at CSB/SJU is 3,744. So even though SCSU is over 4 times larger it only draws 42% of the crowd as the institutions to the Northwest.
When the stadium is full with about 10,000 in attendance at a football game, which by the way is about what CSB/SJU draws on average to their games, I'll agree that SCSU is "on track." If SCSU grows by 1,928 in attendance each year, which is the same amount it grew from last year, it will take just over 3 years to reach 10,000 in attendance.
However, until SCSU draws 38,000 spectators to a game, which is the same ratio of attendance at the game to the number of students enrolled at CSB/SJU it will not have "arrived." Growing at a rate of 1,928 in attendance each year, it will only take just over 18 years to reach 38,000. Who knows, by then President Potter may have moved on and it will be called "Homecoming" again. That might be something to CELEBRATE!
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 1:24 AM
No comments.
DFL: all smears, all the time
Recently, I got another smear campaign mailer from the DFL smearing Jim Knoblach. It isn't shocking that the DFL is into smearing Republicans. It's that the DFL's mailer has a picture of a senior citizen with the caption "Tell Jim Knoblach to keep his hands off our Social Security and Medicare."
It's painfully obvious that the DFL knows that state legislators don't have anything to do with Medicare or Social Security. Just because the DFL is without character and can't be shamed because they don't have a conscience, that doesn't mean that they're stupid.
They're just disgustingly unprincipled and utterly without virtue.
While it's true that Jim Knoblach supported giving people the option of putting a portion of their FICA taxes into a government-approved equity account when he ran for Congress in 2006, that's utterly irrelevant in this race. Jim Knoblach, if he's elected, will never cast a vote on Social Security or Medicare because they're federal programs.
This DFL's intent with this mailer is to scare senior citizens into voting for Zach Dorholt. If's apparent that the DFL doesn't care that it's fearmongering at its worst. It's important to remember what Howard Dean said after being elected chair of the DNC:
It's a battle between good and evil...and we're the good.
In Dean's mind, the ends justified the means. If that meant smearing people with lies, that's the path he'd take without hesitation. That's the mindset that Ken Martin brought with him from ABM to the DFL.
In Martin's mind, the only thing that matters is winning elections and checking items off the DFL's ideological checklist. It's irrelevant if it helps Minnesotans. It's only relevant if it makes their special interests' lives better.
The DFL insists that it's for the little guy. That's BS and it's verifiable. The Metrocrat wing of the DFL, made up mostly by plutocrats and elitists, has done everything to prevent PolyMet from getting built. If the DFL cared about Iron Range voters, they wouldn't say that building the mine is important but dragging the regulatory review for 9 years is more important.
If the DFL cared about the little guy, they wouldn't have shoved forced unionization onto child care providers.
Zach Dorholt voted for the forced unionization of child care providers. He voted for major business-to-business sales tax increases and the Senate Office Building. After the session, he caught hell from St. Cloud businesses for creating these new taxes. These businesses lobbied him hard during the session. He ignored them then. It wasn't until after the session that he started listening to these businesses.
Dorholt is chair of the House Higher Ed Committee. That's a position of authority yet he hasn't lifted a finger to investigate the wasteful spending at MnSCU's Central Office nor has he looked into the financial mismanagement at SCSU. Despite the fact that SCSU is facing $8,000,000-$10,000,000 of budget cuts this year and despite the fact that the Potter administration hasn't published a budget report yet, Zach Dorholt hasn't looked into these issues.
All he cares about is whether he can report that he increased spending on Higher Education.
How does that qualify as helping the little guy or middle class families? That's before asking Mr. Dorholt how the Dayton-Dorholt-DFL budget is creating part-time, low wage jobs helps grow the economy from the middle class out?
The truth is that the DFL doesn't care about prosperity. They don't care about great jobs throughout the state. They don't care if public institutions foolishly spend the taxpayers' money. How dare they send out mailers that frighten senior citizens while smearing a great policymaker.
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 5:12 AM
No comments.
Nolan's pacifism is frightening
True to his 1970s-style anti-war activist days, Rick Nolan is still a pacifist :
In a statement issued to KBJR, Rep. Rick Nolan said U.S. intervention in "thousands-year-old Middle East war" has cost the U.S. trillions in blood and treasury.
"The arms we supply to any one of these groups inevitably end up being used against us, because we have no friends in this conflict," Rep. Nolan said. "Our involvement is bankrupting us and making us a target for retaliation, and it's time to put an end to it. These monies are needed for deficit reduction and rebuilding America.'
That's frightening. ISIL is definitely a threat to the United States. Similarly, there's no question that Stewart Mills' assessment is right:
"He (Rep. Nolan) is advocating for us not to have involvement in Iraq or in Syria," Mills said in an interview in late September. "But the consequences of us not having involvement in there is that we create a vacuum. And that vacuum is filled up with bad people doing bad things and eventually that will wash up on our shores, probably sooner rather than later."
That isn't just Mills' opinion. It's an opinion he shares with Leon Panetta , President Obama's former Defense Secretary:
By not pressing the Iraqi government to leave more U.S. troops in the country, he 'created a vacuum in terms of the ability of that country to better protect itself, and it's out of that vacuum that ISIS began to breed,' Panetta told USA Today, referring to the group also known as the Islamic State.
Being a pacifist in the 1970s helps inform Rick Nolan's views on national security. We're living in a totally different world, especially after 9/11. If Rick Nolan doesn't want to fight terrorists before they reach America's shores, then he isn't qualified to be in Congress.
Nolan's type of thinking is what helped create the conditions for 9/11 and for ISIL to take over much of Iraq and Syria. We can't afford not to pay attention to ISIL. In fact, we can't afford not to do everything we can to utterly demolish ISIL and other terrorist groups.
Whether Nolan will admit it, the truth is that ISIL and al-Qa'ida are at war with us. The only question left is whether we'll wage war with them. If Stewart Mills is elected to Congress, he'll vote to fight terrorists. If Nolan is re-elected, God forbid, he'll vote for taking a pre-9/11 position.
That's unacceptable.
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 5:45 AM
No comments.
Mark Udall's strategy exposed
Guy Benson's post on Sen. Mark Udall's recent difficulties highlights why Udall is fighting an uphill fight. Benson highlighted this video especially:
Here's the transcript of the exchange between Sen. Udall and Rep. Gardner:
REP. GARDNER: I would just like to ask Sen. Udall this question. What is the price you'd put on carbon?
SEN. UDALL: Congressman, the price I would put on ... is the opportunity we would miss if we don't go all in. We've had floods, we've had fires, we've had doubts, we have the leading climate scientists in this state telling us it's happening. We know it's happening. Farmers know it's happening. The ski areas know it's happening. We all know it's happening. So let's lean forward. Let's create our future. Congressman Gardner is looking backwards. Let's look forward and embrace the future and embrace these technologies. They're right there for the taking.
I'm looking forward to the next energy bill.
REP. GARDNER: What is the cost that you will put on with your tax?
SEN. UDALL: Congressman, the point is that we've shown that you can put a price on pollution. We've done it over and over again.
REP. GARDNER: How much?
SEN. UDALL: When we send those signals to the market. We've got a lot of market-oriented people here today. When we send those signals to the marketplace, our markets respond because we've got the best system of capitalism, we've got the best entrepreneurs. We're going to innovate. That's how we make the future. We're in a global economic race and we're going to innovate to create jobs and grow the economy.
Sen. Udall clearly didn't want to talk about the size of his tax increase. His answer is typical liberal psychobabble. His answer wasn't about the real world. It was purely in the hypothetical world. The other thing that's clear is that Sen. Udall didn't present proof that the government would be good at putting "a price on pollution." That's yet another piece of hypothetical, wishful thinking liberalism. No proof is needed because everything is settled according to Sen. Udall.
This debate wasn't about debating the merits of their policies. For Sen. Udall, this was a GOTV operation. His statements are filled with pandering to the environmental activists that Democrats need to turn out en masse to offset President Obama's drag on Democrats. It's difficult to believe that Democrats buy climate change. I think it's all about Democrats pandering to environmental activists for money and votes.
Still, Cory Gardner's persistence was smart. He insisted that Sen. Udall put a price tag on Udall's Cap and Trade legislation. Gardner wouldn't let him talk about "the environment" in the theoretical sense. Gardner made Udall talk about it in dollars and cents specifics. I'm betting that the NRSC will soon be up with advertising that talks about higher energy costs hurting families that are already squeezed by the Obama-Democrat economy.
This is high stakes GOTV operations. For his part, Rep. Gardner has the better argument because it's the question that people across the nation are asking.
Posted Tuesday, October 7, 2014 9:51 PM
Comment 1 by J. Ewing at 08-Oct-14 08:40 AM
Perhaps the better quantitative question would be to ask exactly how many wildfires/floods/droughts would be prevented if a carbon tax of any size were imposed? Or how many of these disasters have increased because we have not had one? (correct answer to both questions: none)
Comment 2 by Gary Gross at 08-Oct-14 09:04 AM
That's a great point. I'd opt for C. I'd ask both questions.
