Saturday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 40. Sunrise is 6:14 and sunset 5:55 for 11h 41m 07s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 1 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1841, the U.S. Supreme Court rules in the United States v. The Amistad case that captive Africans who had seized control of the ship carrying them had been taken into slavery illegally.
PBS Wisconsin’s Here & Now aired last night a segment on Wisconsin’s new law on reading instruction. That segment is embedded below:
See alsoThe Wisconsin DPI List of Science-Based Reading Curriculums: ‘Wisconsin, and other states, have moved to a public science of reading curriculum as a matter of law. In this way, the course (for now) on the general approach toward literacy in early grades has been set, even if the debate has not been settled between different academic perspectives (the science of reading or balanced literacy). Adopting a science of reading approach is state policy rather than a local decision.’
Thursday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of 52. Sunrise is 6:17 and sunset 5:53 for 11h 35m 17s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 11.1 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1799, Napoleon captures Jaffa in Palestine and his troops proceed to kill more than 2,000 Albanian captives.
Wisconsin’s Early Literacy Curriculum Council and the Department of Public Instruction have released their highly anticipated lists of recommended reading curriculums, as required by the state’s aggressive new literacy law Act 20.
Act 20, signed into law last summer, requires curriculum to be backed by the “science of reading”: a decades-old body of research that explains how the brain learns to read. It includes an emphasis on phonics, which teaches students the sounds letters make and how those sounds combine in predictable patterns to form words.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be mostly sunny with a high of 52. Sunrise is 6:19 and sunset 5:51 for 11h 32m 22s of daytime. The moon is a waning crescent with 20 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1820, the Missouri Compromise is signed into law by President James Monroe. The compromise allows Missouri to enter the Union as a slave state, brings Maine into the Union as a free state, and makes the rest of the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase territory slavery-free.
Gov. Tony Evers signed legislation increasing Wisconsin’s child and dependent care tax credit Monday and at the same time renewed his call for broader state support for child care providers.
“We need a long-term solution to our state’s looming child care crisis—including direct support for providers through Child Care Counts—and I will work with anyone from either side of the aisle who’s ready to work together to get this done,” Evers said.
The governor signed the legislation — AB-1023 — in a ceremony at a Waukesha child care center, La Casa de Esperanza.
The bill raises the state income tax credit for a family’s child and dependent care expenses to 100% of the federal tax credit from the current 50%. It also raises the maximum amount of expenses that can be counted to calculate the credit.
The child care tax credit is the only measure of four Republican-authored tax cut bills introduced in January that won broad support from Democratic lawmakers and the only one the Democratic governor signed. On Friday Evers vetoed the other three bills — changing the state’s second-lowest tax bracket, exempting the first $75,000 to $150,000 of retirement income, and nearly doubling the maximum tax credit for married couples.
More tax reductions are in order, but if one had to pick one of these bills only (although it wasn’t a choice of only one!), the child care credit hike was the best choice.
Sunday in Whitewater will be windy with a high of 68. Sunrise is 6:24 and sunset 5:48 for 11h 23m 40s of daytime. The moon is in its third quarter with 50.1 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
“It was hard to break through but it’s good to get out here for a good cold plunge,” a voice narrates, poking at the icy crust that still glazed the lake. Slowly, the camera pans to reveal a shirtless Hovde, nipple-deep in Lake Mendota.
Hovde, a Republican, is running for a U.S. Senate seat in Wisconsin while also running a company that is not based in the Badger State. He reportedly shot the video near a home he owns on Lake Mendota.
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“So the Dems and Sen. Baldwin keep saying I’m not from Wisconsin, which is a complete joke,” Hovde continued, back hair fluttering in the frigid breeze. “Alright Sen. Baldwin, why don’t you get out here in this frozen lake and let’s really see who’s from Wisconsin.”
U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin had a one-word response to Hovde’s invitation to go jump in a lake to prove how Wisconsin-y she is. “No.”
Wisconsin Democrats were not so amused by the stunt.
“If California bank owner Eric Hovde thinks sitting in a lake is going to stop us from telling Wisconsinites about his California bank, California megamansion, and California ties, he’s going to be swimming a whole lot for the next eight months,” Democratic Party of Wisconsin Rapid Response Director Arik Wolk said in a statement.
Holy Moly, Hovde must be totally nuts a tad insecure to film a stunt like this. He doesn’t need political consultants — he needs counseling.
This Leap Day in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 43. Sunrise is 6:29 and sunset 5:44 for 11h 15m 00s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 78.9 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1796, the Jay Treaty between the United States and Great Britain comes into force, facilitating ten years of peaceful trade between the two nations.
A former Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) warden who served on the agency’s committee to create a new wolf management plan for the state is under investigation by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for killing a wolf in his yard in December. He has claimed self-defense, but he posted on Facebook in November that he was baiting the animals with doughnuts and rice crispy cereal.
The warden, Patrick Quaintance, also sits on the Wisconsin Conservation Congress where he holds positions on the body’s fur harvest and bear committees. The conservation congress serves as an important pathway between residents in Wisconsin and environmental policy makers. In the past, conservation groups have complained that the body is controlled by pro-hunting interests.
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The investigation into Quaintance was first reported by Wisconsin Public Radio and the Ashland Daily Press. The Examiner has confirmed the investigation with the DNR and U.S. Fish and Wildlife.
A month before killing the wolf, in November, Quaintance posted a photo of a wolf from a trail camera on his property to his Facebook page. In the comments, he is asked what he’s baiting them with.
He first responds with an emoji of a doughnut before adding that he used “rice crispy.” Another commenter responds with “snap crackle POP.”
Because wolves are currently listed by the federal government as endangered in Wisconsin and the upper Midwest, a wolf can only be killed in self-defense. The hunting and trapping of wolves, including the use of bait, are currently illegal in Wisconsin.
Quaintance did not respond to a request for comment.
Quaintance’s career places a special burden on him: a warden, or former warden who respects the legacy of his service, cannot uphold the law by breaking it. As a smaller matter, it should be obvious that wolf-hunting with rice crispies is simply a weakling’s method. No bragging rights here, old boy.
Wednesday in Whitewater will be windy with a high of 41. Sunrise is 6:31 and sunset 5:43 for 11h 12m 08s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 85.9 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1983, the final episode of M*A*S*H airs, with almost 110 million viewers.
Readers in the area may remember the sham Harry Potter Warriors & Wizards festival that Jefferson, Wisconsin once held. That so-called festival was a threadbare event that advertised extravagantly yet produced shabbily.
Well, Scotland has its own version of this problem, as different promoters are working from the same promise-big-deliver-nothing playbook. Benj Edwards reports Cops called after parents get tricked by AI-generated images of Wonka-like event (‘Dull in-person warehouse for kids doesn’t live up to technicolor AI-generated promo images’):
On Saturday, event organizers shut down a Glasgow-based “Willy’s Chocolate Experience” after customers complained that the unofficial Wonka-inspired event, which took place in a sparsely decorated venue, did not match the lush AI-generated images listed on its official website (archive here). According to Sky News, police were called to the event, and “advice was given.”
“What an absolute shambles of an event,” wrote Stuart Sinclar on Facebook after paying 35 pounds per ticket for himself and his kids. “Took 2 minutes to get through to then see a queue of people surrounding the guy running it complaining … The kids received 2 jelly babies and a quarter of a can of Barrs limeade.”
The Willy’s Chocolate Experience website, which promises “a journey filled with wondrous creations and enchanting surprises at every turn,” features five AI-generated images (likely created with OpenAI’s DALL-E 3) that evoke a candy-filled fantasy wonderland inspired by the Willy Wonka universe and the recent Wonka film. But in reality, Sinclair was met with a nearly empty location with a few underwhelming decorations and a tiny bouncy castle. In one photo shared by Sinclair, a rainbow arch leads to a single yellow gummy bear and gum drop sitting on a bare concrete floor.
The promise and the reality differed:
apparently this was sold as a live Willy Wonka Experience but they used all AI images on the website to sell tickets and then people showed up and saw this and it got so bad people called the cops lmao pic.twitter.com/tfkyg0G0WG
Good morning. Sunday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 54. Sunrise is 6:35 and sunset 5:39 for 11h 03m 33s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 98.9 percent of its visible disk illuminated. On this day in 1986, the People Power Revolution forces the president of the Philippines Ferdinand…
Good morning. Friday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of 44. Sunrise is 6:39 and sunset 5:37 for 10h 57m 53s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 99.3% of its visible disk illuminated. On this day in 1987, Supernova 1987a is seen in the Large Magellanic Cloud. WisPolitics.com…
Good morning. Thursday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of 56. Sunrise is 6:40 and sunset 5:35 for 10h 55m 03s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 96.7% of its visible disk illuminated. The Whitewater School Board meets tonight beginning at 7:30 PM in open session in the high…
Wednesday in Whitewater will be mostly cloudy with a high of 56. Sunrise is 6:42 and sunset 5:34 for 10h 52m 15s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 92.4% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Parks & Recreation Board meets at 5:30 PM.
On this day in 1918, the last Carolina parakeet dies in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo.
By Huub Veldhuijzen van Zanten/Naturalis Biodiversity Center, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=45550593
All my life, I’ve thought that stories of time machines were mere fantasies. How wrong I’ve been.
As it turns out, WISGOP scientists likely have invented a working time machine:
I’m running for the U.S. Senate because I’m tired of constant division and finger pointing by politicians.
It’s time to send a fighter to Washington who will work to find common ground and restore the American Dream.
After watching the Eric Hovde campaign video, the first explanation1 for his appearance and attire is that WISGOP scientists have, in fact, found a way to travel from 2024 back to 1974, to study that earlier era’s aesthetic.
Astonishing.
Hovde’s style (and background or politics) isn’t going to work in present-day Wisconsin, but this WISGOP technological advance is impressive nonetheless.
1. The second explanation, far less savory, is that Hovde’s campaign team has been studying old 8mm amateur porn films. SeeBoogie Nights.
Tuesday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 53. Sunrise is 6:43 and sunset 5:33 for 10h 49m 27s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 85.9% of its visible disk illuminated.
The Whitewater Common Council meets at 6:30 PM. The agenda for the meeting appears immediately below:
Democratic Gov. Tony Evers signed new state voting maps Monday morning, which he had proposed and which were passed by the Wisconsin Legislature, creating new legislative districts in time for the 2024 election cycle before the Wisconsin Supreme Court was to choose new maps.
The legislative maps represent a break in Wisconsin Republicans’ grip on legislative power and give Democrats the chance to win additional seats — and majorities in the Legislature — for the first time in over a decade.
“It’s a new day in Wisconsin,” Evers said at a press conference in the state Capitol to the cheers of surrounding advocates.
“To me, the decision to enact these maps boils down to this: I made a promise to the people of Wisconsin that I would always try to do the right thing and keeping that promise to me matters most, even if members of my own party disagree with me,” Evers said.
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“I wanted fair maps, not maps that are better for one party or the other, including my own,” Evers said. “Wisconsin is not a red state and it is not a blue state. Wisconsin is a purple state and I believe our maps should reflect that basic fact. I believe that the people should get to choose their elected officials, not the other way around.”
There is a remaining issue of when these new maps take effect. Rich Kremer reports that
Democratic state senators, who got their first look at the legislation just before the Senate voted, accused Republicans last week of including the exception [whereby the maps would take effect in November] to guarantee Vos can run under his old district in a potential recall election. That contest is being pursued by conservatives who are angry he’s stood in the wayof impeaching Wisconsin Elections Commission Administrator Meagan Wolfe.
But that effective date was added to the maps bill by the Legislative Reference Bureau, not Republican lawmakers. A bureau memo said the addition “is our standard practice for addressing the initial applicability of a legislative redistricting plan.”
University of Wisconsin-Madison Associate Professor of Law Robert Yablon, who signed onto a legal brief in the redistricting case, told WPR it’s “an open question” as to which maps should apply between now and the November election.
“So, if an early election needed to be held, the likelihood is that someone would need to go back to the Wisconsin Supreme Court and ask what map would be applied,” Yablon said. “And the Wisconsin Supreme Court would need to provide some kind of guidance or remedy.”
Yablon said that because the court has already declared the existing Republican-drawn districts illegal, “it will have to be another map, perhaps the Governor’s map,” even though that map doesn’t go into effect until the fall.
On Monday, Evers said he will ask the court “to clarify that these maps will be in place for any special elections between now and the fall.”
Monday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 45. Sunrise is 6:45 and sunset 5:31 for 10h 46m 40s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 78.6% of its visible disk illuminated.
The Whitewater School Board will hold a legislative breakfast at 8 AM, and Whitewater’s Library Board meets at 6:30 PM.
On this day in 1954, the Soviet Politburo of the Soviet Union orders the transfer of the Crimean Oblast from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR.
Former Wisconsin Republican Party Chairman Andrew Hitt was nominated to be an elector if former President Donald Trump won the state in 2020, but after Trump lost, Hitt and nine other Republican electors met at the state capitol and signed documents falsely claiming Trump won.
Hitt said lawyers told him the documents they were signing were meaningless unless Trump’s legal team won its lawsuit seeking to dismiss over 200,000 votes in two Democratic counties.
Hitt said he was advised that if a court ruled in Trump’s favor and he and the other Republicans did not meet and sign the documents on Dec. 14, 2020 — when the Democratic electors were required to meet to cast their votes for President Biden — he would be responsible for Trump forfeiting Wisconsin.
“It was not a safe time,” he said. “If my lawyer is right, and the whole reason Trump loses Wisconsin is because of me, I would be scared to death.”
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But Hitt said he didn’t believe there had been widespread fraud in the state.
Hitt said he was advised by the state GOP’s outside legal counsel on Dec. 4, 2020, to gather the other Republican electors at the Capitol on Dec. 14 and, as a contingency, sign a document claiming they were “the duly elected and qualified Electors for President” for Wisconsin.
“In case a court would overrule the election here in Wisconsin,” Hitt said he was told.
On the morning of Dec. 14, in a narrow 4-3 ruling, the state Supreme Court rejected the Trump campaign’s attempt to throw out votes cast in the two Democratic counties. Hitt said he and the other fake Wisconsin electors met anyway to sign documents falsely claiming Trump won, because he had been told the Trump campaign was still planning to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Hitt is, himself, a lawyer. He signed false documents, and now relies on other lawyers’ opinions in place of his own. He signed false documents and now contends that he was afraid not to sign. (Instead: he was not courageous enough to decline.)
Hitt is unfit for the law and should be disbarred. No person of good judgment, whether lawyer or non-lawyer, should have sympathy for him.
Friday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 30. Sunrise is 6:49 and sunset 5:28 for 10h 38m 23s of daytime. The moon is in its first quarter with 50.1% of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1960, the U.S. Navy submarine USS Triton begins Operation Sandblast, setting sail from New London, Connecticut, to begin the first submerged circumnavigation of the globe.
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Multimillionaire Republican businessman Eric Hovde is planning to launch a bid for U.S. Senate against Democratic incumbent Sen. Tammy Baldwinnext week.
Hovde campaign spokesperson Ben Voelkel said Thursday that Hovde, 59, will get into the race next week after months of preparation.
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Hovde’s business empire includes Hovde Properties, a real estate development company founded by his grandfather in 1933, and three banking companies. He is CEO of Sunwest Bank, has appeared in television commercials for them that air out west, and owns a $7 million estate in Laguna Beach, California, in addition to his property in Madison.
He returned to Madison in 2011 after living in Washington, D.C., for 24 years.
Baldwin campaign spokesperson Andrew Mamo derided Hovde as a “mega millionaire California bank owner” who will try to “buy this Senate seat.”
“We look forward to comparing Eric Hovde, a man who was named one of Orange County’s most influential people three years in a row, to Tammy Baldwin, a public servant with a proven track record of standing up to the wealthy and well connected on behalf of middle-class Wisconsin families,” Mamo said in a statement.
Scott Mayer, a Franklin businessman, and former Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke are also considering Senate runs. Other higher profile Republicans, including U.S. Reps. Tom Tiffany and Mike Gallagher, opted against running.
Thursday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of 37. Sunrise is 6:51 and sunset 5:26 for 10h 35m 40s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 38.4% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Community Development Authority meets at 5:30 PM.
On this day in 1862, Confederates commanded by Brig. Gen. John B. Floyd attack General Ulysses S. Grant’s Union forces besieging Fort Donelson in Tennessee. Unable to break the fort’s encirclement, the Confederates surrender the following day.
Wisconsin lost nearly 10% of farms, 30% of dairies since 2017
Wisconsin had 58,521 farms in 2022, census data show, representing a nearly 10% loss since 2017.
Dairy farms, long the state’s calling card, continued to plummet. There were 6,216 dairy farms in Wisconsin in 2022, down from just above 9,000 in 2017. Further, state data show the number has dropped more since the census data was recorded. As of Feb. 1, Wisconsin had 5,644 milk cow herds.
As the number of farms decrease, existing ones are getting bigger. The average Wisconsin farm in 2022 was 236 acres, the largest it’s been in more than two decades. And it’s not just acreage. Herd sizes are getting larger as well. The number of milk cows in the state declined less than 2% since 2017, despite the drop in dairy farms.
