Saturday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 24. Sunrise is 7:05, and sunset is 4:22, for 9 hours, 17 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 0.5 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1939, the Soviet Red Army crosses the Finnish border in several places and bombs Helsinki and other Finnish cities, starting the Winter War.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 40. Sunrise is 7:02, and sunset is 4:23, for 9 hours, 21 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 12 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
A record number of Wisconsinites are expected to travel for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, according to AAA. The group says nearly 1.6 million residents are expected to drive or fly this week.
Wisconsin’s last record for Thanksgiving travel recorded by AAA was set in 2019. Midwest Public Affairs Director Nick Jarmusz told WPR that holiday travel overall declined in subsequent years due to concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Between Tuesday and Monday, Dec. 2, AAA projects more than 1.4 million Wisconsin residents will hit the roads for their Thanksgiving holiday festivities. Around another 115,000 are expected to fly to their family gatherings.
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“It’s a reflection of what we’ve seen throughout the year with other travel holidays during the summer that we monitored, and just you know, a reflection of people’s improving confidence in the economy and their ability to spend the money necessary to take trips like these,” [American Automobile Association Midwest Public Affairs Director Nick] Jarmusz said.
This many would not have been traveling over the summer of 2024 and would not travel over Thanksgiving 2024 if economic conditions were poor. The summer of 2024 and Thanksgiving 2024 precede January 20, 2025. It’s not until then but instead right now that we have good economic conditions.
Tuesday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 36. Sunrise is 7:00, and sunset is 4:23, for 9 hours, 23 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 18.9 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
[A]fter moving from the temporary capital in Burlington, Iowa, the Wisconsin Territorial Legislature assembled in Madison for the first time. Two years earlier, when the territorial legislature had met for the first time in Belmont, many cities were mentioned as possibilities for the permanent capital — Cassville, Fond du Lac, Milwaukee, Platteville, Mineral Point, Racine, Belmont, Koshkonong, Wisconsinapolis, Peru, and Wisconsin City. Madison won the vote, and funds were authorized to erect a suitable building in which lawmakers would conduct the people’s business. Progress went so slowly, however, that some lawmakers wanted to relocate the seat of government to Milwaukee, where they also thought they would find better accomodations than in the wilds of Dane Co. When the legislature finally met in Madison in November 1838 there was only an outside shell to the new Capitol. The interior was not completed until 1845, more than six years after it was supposed to be finished.
One might imagine that Speaker Robin Vos has never been right about anything. It’s not true! He’s right about at least one thing:
In a Sunday morning interview on WISN-TV’s “Upfront,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos repeated calls for former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, who he hired, then fired, to investigate the 2020 election, to be disbarred and “never allowed to practice law in Wisconsin again.”
“I certainly hope Michael Gableman loses his law license. I hope he goes back to work at Home Depot, where he was working prior to working for us,” Vos said. “As I look at what the Office of Lawyer Regulation is saying happened, it’s an embarrassment for anybody who practices law.”
The Wisconsin Office of Lawyer Regulation filed a disciplinary complaint Tuesday alleging Gableman violated the Rules of Professional Conduct for Attorneys, including engaging in “disruptive behavior” during a court hearing, making false statements about the integrity of a judge and violating the state’s open records law.
Monday in Whitewater will be cloudy with afternoon showers and a high of 46. Sunrise is 6:59, and sunset is 4:24, for 9 hours, 24 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 26.2 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
The Whitewater School Board’s Policy Review Committee meets at 5:30 PM, and the full board goes into closed session shortly after 6 PM, resuming open session at 7 PM. The City of Whitewater’s Urban Forestry Commission meets at 5:30.
In a statement, the Schimel campaign said “leftist judges in Wisconsin and around the country are failing to enforce our laws,” and called the Nov. 5 election “a repudiation of the left’s radical agenda that made life more dangerous and expensive for Wisconsinites.”
“From opening the border, to releasing criminals on our streets, to rogue judges on Wisconsin’s Supreme Court breaking norms to advance their radical agenda. Brad Schimel is a judge of the people who will stop the madness and defend what is right,” the statement said.
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In a statement, Crawford said the state needs a court that is “committed to upholding the rights and freedoms of all Wisconsinites.”
“I’ve spent my career standing up for Wisconsin values like safe communities, reproductive rights, clean air and water, and fair elections. As a prosecutor, I took on tough cases to hold criminals and sex offenders accountable and bring justice to victims. As an attorney, I fought for working people, families, and teachers when their rights were threatened and being trampled on,” she said. “Now, as a circuit court judge, I work every day to deliver justice impartially, keep our communities safe, and treat everyone fairly under the law.”
Sunday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of 47. Sunrise is 6:58, and sunset is 4:24, for 9 hours, 26 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 35.2 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1971, during a severe thunderstorm over Washington state, a hijacker calling himself Dan Cooper (aka D. B. Cooper) parachutes from a Northwest Orient Airlines plane with $200,000 in ransom money. He has never been found.
Friday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of 45. Sunrise is 6:56, and sunset is 4:25, for 9 hours, 30 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 54 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1963, President John F. Kennedy is assassinated and Texas Governor John Connally is seriously wounded by Lee Harvey Oswald, who also kills Dallas Police officer J. D. Tippit after fleeing the scene. U.S Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in as the 36th President of the United States afterwards.
Doubtless, the next Trump Administration will be looking to fill thousands of federal positions with supporters who have the same level of judgment as Mr. Trump himself. Wisconsin, it turns out, can supply a candidate for one of those positions. Alyssa Guzman reports on a fine gentleman from Green Lake who’d fit right in:
They learned in October that Borgwardt had crossed the border into Canada a few days after his disappearance and had been communicating with an Uzbek woman who spoke Russian.
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Before his disappearance, he changed all the email addresses linked to his bank accounts and moved money to a foreign bank account.
Borgwardt’s devastated wife, Emily, and their three children, have been grieving their loss, believing for months he was likely dead.
She is now being urged to join support groups for women with ‘runaway husbands’ as her friends and community rally around her.
‘An Uzbek woman who spoke Russian.’ Heart of gold, I wouldn’t wonder.
Borgwardt needs to return to America, find a word processor, and spiff up his résumé. He’s possessed of the top-shelf judgment that will fit well in the new federal administration.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be windy with snowy conditions in the evening and a high of 41. Sunrise is 6:53, and sunset is 4:27, for 9 hours, 33 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 73.5 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Parks and Recreation Board meets at 5:30 PM.
On this day in 1945, the Nuremberg trials against 24 Nazi war criminals begin at the Palace of Justice at Nuremberg.
These many years later, former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice and current conspiracist Michael Gableman now finds himself the subject of a professional disciplinary complaint:
The Wisconsin Office of Lawyer Regulation (OLR) filed a disciplinary complaint against former Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman on Tuesday. In 10 counts, the complaint alleges Gableman violated numerous provisions of the Wisconsin Rules of Professional Conduct for Attorneys during and after his much-maligned investigation of the 2020 election.
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The first two counts against Gableman involve statements and actions he took after filing subpoenas against the mayors and city clerks of the cities of Green Bay and Madison. The complaint alleges that Gableman mischaracterized discussions he had with the lawyers for both cities, communicated with Green Bay’s city attorney when the city had obtained outside counsel in the matter, lied to Green Bay city officials about the work of his investigation and mischaracterized those actions when he filed a petition with a Waukesha County Circuit Court attempting to have the mayors of both cities arrested for not complying with his subpoenas.
The third count alleges that Gableman made false statements in his testimony to the Assembly Committee on Campaigns and Elections when he accused officials at the Wisconsin Elections Commission, as well as the mayors of Green Bay and Madison, of “hiring high-priced lawyers” to conduct an “organized cover-up.”
Redman’s reporting summarizes all ten Office of Lawyer Regulation complaints against Gableman. The full complaint appears immediately below:
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The Wisconsin Supreme Court adjudicates complaints from the Office of Lawyer Regulation alleging attorney misconduct under a set of published court rules. See SCR 20A, 20B (2023).
The Wisconsin Supreme Court will decide what, if any, sanctions Gableman merits against him. Apart from any disciplinary action (rightly decided only on the rules and facts before the court) one can say even now that Gableman’s political influence over the last four years has been among the most controversial of recent memory.
Tuesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 59. Sunrise is 6:52, and sunset is 4:27, for 9 hours, 35 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 82.1 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1863, Pres. Lincoln delivers the Gettysburg Address at the dedication ceremony for the military cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
Eric Hovde has not once — not once — disappointed his critics during his U.S. Senate race. He’s been consistently and unfailingly unworthy of the office. Even during his stubbornly-delayed concession, Hovde proved himself worthy, offering a concession speech laced with lies:
Twelve days after news organizations called the Wisconsin U.S. Senate race for Democratic incumbent Tammy Baldwin, Republican candidate Eric Hovde conceded the race.
Hovde announced on Nov. 18 that he would not seek a recount. In the same video posted to X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, he repeated falsehoods about Milwaukee’s absentee ballots.
“The results from election night were disappointing, particularly in light of the last-minute absentee ballots that were dropped in Milwaukee at 4 a.m., flipping the outcome,” Hovde said.
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Wisconsin election experts told PolitiFact that this early morning influx of ballots was expected — and they not only don’t signal anything nefarious, they resulted from adherence to the law.
That’s because state law does not allow election workers to process absentee ballots before Election Day — a bipartisan bill to change that passed the Assembly, but Republicans in the state Senate did not take it up.
“This is something that everybody who’s familiar with elections in Wisconsin understands will happen,” said Jay Heck, executive director of the public advocacy group Common Cause Wisconsin.
Hovde’s not a conservative populist, but the conservative populists traffic in conspiracy theories (about elections, vaccines, ‘a deep state,’ fluoride in the water, etc.). This out-of-state man knows his party’s base, and it’s simply impossible for him to leave them with an admission of his undoubted failure. Something, somewhere, had had to go wrong, had to be untoward: the populists will never blame themselves, and so will never admit an honest and lawful defeat.
Monday in Whitewater will be rainy with a high of 58. Sunrise is 6:51, and sunset is 4:28, for 9 hours, 37 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 89.5 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Police and Fire Commission meets at 6 PM, and the Library Board meets at 6:30 PM.
On this day in 1928, the Walt Disney Studio releases the animated short Steamboat Willie, the first fully synchronized sound cartoon.
Saturday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 51. Sunrise is 6:48, and sunset is 4:30, for 9 hours, 41 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 99 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1821, Missouri trader William Becknell arrives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, over a route that became known as the Santa Fe Trail.
Friday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of 54. Sunrise is 6:47, and sunset is 4:31, for 9 hours, 44 minutes of daytime. The moon is full with 99.8 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
While Eric Hovde lost the race for U.S. Senate in Wisconsin (see below), he’s doing better with conspiracy theorists on X:
Social media posts about election fraud in Wisconsin have surged since Election Day, surpassing all other battleground states, according to data collected by PeakMetrics, a software analytics company.
Between Nov. 6 and Nov. 12, the number of posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, mentioning election fraud in Wisconsin surged from 2,570 to 22,589 — an approximately 789% increase, according to the report. There has been no evidence to suggest voter fraud is a common issue in Wisconsin.
Hovde’s claims about his loss to Tammy Baldwin are easily debunked, as Ricardo Torres writes at the Journal Sentinel:
Hovde went on to say that at 4 a.m. Milwaukee updated its count to include roughly 108,000 absentee ballots and that Baldwin won “nearly 90% of those ballots.”
“Statistically, this outcome seems improbable,” Hovde said. “As it didn’t match the pattern from same day voting in Milwaukee, where I received 22% of the vote.”
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Absentee ballots are just a portion of the total votes in any election. But since Hovde is focused on absentee ballots, it’s fairly easy to see his claim is incorrect by going to the city of Milwaukee’s election results page. It should be noted that some absentee voters chose third party candidates for U.S. senate or skipped that race.
Milwaukee received 108,964 absentee ballots by Nov. 5, according to the unofficial count.
Of that group, Baldwin received 88,229 and Hovde received 17,699 absentee ballots.
So Baldwin got about 80.9% of the absentee vote and Hovde got about 16.2% of it.
Clearly Baldwin did not get “nearly 90%” of the absentee ballot vote.
Baldwin’s absentee ballot vote in Milwaukee was similar by proportion to her Election Day in-person vote in Milwaukee. Torres continues:
On Election Day itself, there were 140,043 votes cast in Milwaukee, according to the unofficial count. Of that number Baldwin received 102,598 and Hovde received 29,574.
So Baldwin pulled down 73.2% of the vote on Election Day compared to Hovde’s 21.1% of that vote.
The wide disparities that Hovde claims are false: Baldwin did somewhat better with absentee ballots, but there was no statistically improbable result as Hovde claims.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with evening showers and a high of 54. Sunrise is 6:45, and sunset is 4:33, for 9 hours, 48 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous, with 92.9 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Lakes Advisory Committee meets at 4:30 PM.
Although it has been suggested the Leonid meteor shower and storms have been noted in ancient times, it was the meteor storm of November 12–13, 1833 that broke into people’s modern-day awareness. One estimate of the peak rate is over one hundred thousand meteors an hour, while another, done as the storm abated, estimated in excess of 240,000 meteors during the nine hours of the storm, over the entire region of North America east of the Rocky Mountains.
It’s been over a week, in a state where margins of electoral victory survive scrutiny (despite conspiracy theories and speculation), and yet losing candidate Eric Hovde admits he lost, but won’t concede. In this, Hovde is true to form, confirming what critics (as I am) saw about him. Wisconsin Public Radio describes Hovde’s stance accurately:
Tuesday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of 49. Sunrise is 6:43, and sunset is 4:34, for 9 hours, 50 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous, with 85.5 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Public Works Committee meets at 5 PM, and the Public Art Committee meets at 5:30 PM.
A conservative prosecutor’s attorney struggled Monday to persuade the Wisconsin Supreme Court to reactivate the state’s 175-year-old abortion ban, drawing a tongue-lashing from two of the court’s liberal justices during oral arguments.
Sheboygan County’s Republican district attorney, Joel Urmanski, has asked the high court to overturn a Dane County judge’s ruling last year that invalidated the ban. A ruling isn’t expected for weeks but abortion advocates almost certainly will win the case given that liberal justices control the court. One of them, Janet Protasiewicz, remarked on the campaign trail that she supports abortion rights.
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The ban stood until 1973, when the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion nationwide nullified it. Legislators never repealed the ban, however, and conservatives have argued the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe two years ago reactivated it.
Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul filed a lawsuit challenging the law in 2022. He argued that a 1985 Wisconsin law that prohibits abortion after a fetus reaches the point where it can survive outside the womb supersedes the ban. Some babies can survive with medical help after 21 weeks of gestation.
Urmanski contends that the ban was never repealed and that it can co-exist with the 1985 law because that law didn’t legalize abortion at any point. Other modern-day abortion restrictions also don’t legalize the practice, he argues.
Dane County Circuit Judge Diane Schlipper ruled last year that the ban outlaws feticide — which she defined as the killing of a fetus without the mother’s consent — but not consensual abortions. The ruling emboldened Planned Parenthood to resume offering abortions in Wisconsin after halting procedures after Roe was overturned.
Urmanski asked the state Supreme Court in February to overturn Schlipper’s ruling without waiting for a lower appellate decision.
As noted in yesterday’s post there is, however, a constitutional Supremacy Clause that, if relied upon following federal restrictions, would make state action moot.
Veterans’ Day in Whitewater will be windy with a high of 50. Sunrise is 6:42, and sunset is 4:35, for 9 hours, 52 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous, with 75.7 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Plan & Architectural Review Commission meets at 6 PM.
On this day in 1918, Germany signs an armistice agreement with the Allies in a railroad car in the forest of Compiègne.
Planned Parenthood is currently providing abortions at several clinics in Wisconsin, citing a lower court decision. But a ruling from the state’s highest court could provide more finality and clarity about the legal status of abortion in Wisconsin.
There is, however, a Supremacy Clause that, if relied upon following federal restrictions, would make state action moot.