Dealing With Digital Divide: Milwaukee Ald. Ashanti Hamilton wants to help low-income Milwaukee cross the digital divide. He calls it "digital inclusion" and he has a plan that will be heard this week to set up a permanent fund the city can use to help get the poor access to the World Wide Web.

His "Digital Inclusion Initiative" would also allow the city to accept contributions of old computers and software as well as have city departments send its old equipment to the Initiative as well.

There is a funding gap, however, since it was originally intended to be jump started with $150,000 from Midwest Fiber Networks as part of its Wi-Fi deal with the city. Midwest Fiber hasn't been able to get the system up and running, much less donate the $150,000. But city Department of Administration Chief Sharon Robinson says there is $330,000 ready to go to the fund for low-income Internet access, as well as 500 free Internet accounts courtesy of One Economy and AT&T.

More Nurses Hitting the Streets: A one-year grant from Columbia St. Mary's to the City of Milwaukee will help bolster the city's declining home nursing corps. The $500,000 will go toward an intensive home visit effort targeting Milwaukee's low-income population.

Most of the city's focus on low-income health through the Health Department comes from pre-natal and post-natal home visits. The department quit its involvement in two clinics -- one on the North Side and one on the South Side -- that focused on serving low-income clients after federal funding dried up for 2007. The St. Mary's grant also created the Health Department's Center for Health Equity, but funding would not continue if St. Mary's doesn't renew the grant for 2009.

Green Stumps Milwaukee: Major-party candidates make headlines when they pop into town, while Third Party candidates tend to come into our fair city under the radar. It's the American way. But Cynthia McKinney has been generating headlines of her own while in Congress and now as a candidate for president with the Green Party.

To most, McKinney is remembered for an altercation with a Capitol security guard after she forgot to wear a security pin to pass through a Capitol checkpoint. But McKinney also is known for being one of the first members of Congress to call for impeachment proceedings against President Bush. She's also known for her tenacious opposition to the Iraq War and the security measures enacted as a result. She authored several bills that challenge government secrecy and surveillance methods.

McKinney, 52, served in Congress from 1993 to 2003 and from 2005 to 2007, but she lost the Democratic primary in 2006. Backers say her own party targeted her for defeat because she wasn't marching to the tune of party leadership.

She'll be in Milwaukee stumping for the Green Party beginning at 7 p.m. Tuesday at UW-Milwaukee's Bolton Hall, room 150.

Progressives Dig Kucinich: Mainstream Democrats seem content to set up their tents in the Hillary Clinton camp, but the Progressive Democrats of America prefer a much different landscape.

In a straw poll of members taken from late November to early December, Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich is the overwhelming favorite. Of 15,810 votes cast, 41 percent say Kucinich is the man for the White House. John Edwards came in second with 26 percent. That seems a tad odd, since Edwards' liberal credentials are not encyclopedic in size.

Barack Obama was the only other candidate with double-digit support, coming in third with 13 percent. Clinton got nine percent, former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson five percent, Sen. Joe Biden three percent, Sen. Christopher Dodd and Mike Gravel each with one percent. Gravel, a former U.S. Senator from Alaska, is best known for the filibuster that brought an end to the draft as well as his reading of the so-called Pentagon Papers on the Senate floor, which landed him in front of the Supreme Court.

Sex Offenders Get a Break: A Mequon Common Council committee chose not to back a plan that would ban former sex offenders from living in the Ozaukee County suburb. Milwaukee by Ald. Tony Zielinski pushed a similar proposal. The committee dropped the idea after constitutional questions were raised. Franklin and Germantown have already passed similar rules.