St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, 217 Houston St., Ripon, will hold its annual Shrove Tuesday pancake supper Tuesday, Feb. 21 from 5 to 7 p.m.
The public is invited to attend the free pancake supper in the church’s undercroft (basement).
Shrove Tuesday is the term used in the English-speaking countries of the United Kingdom to refer to the day before Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. Shrove Tuesday, also known as “Pancake Tuesday” in the U.K., was also called “Fat Tuesday” because British households tried to use the remaining fat in their households before Lent, which brought with it a stricter diet. “Shrove” is the past tense of the English verb “shrive,” to obtain absolution for one’s sins by confessing and doing penance. Shrove Tuesday gets its name from the shriving, or confession, that Anglo–Saxon Christians were expected to receive immediately before Lent.
St. Peter’s is an Episcopal church in Ripon, Wis., with a chapel in Wautoma, Wis. St. Peter’s is part of the Episcopal Diocese of Fond du Lac, which has more than 6,600 baptized members in northeast Wisconsin, the Episcopal Church of the United States of America, and the worldwide Anglican Communion. The St. Peter’s building, constructed in 1860, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Regularly scheduled services are held Sundays at 9:30 a.m. (English) and at noon (Spanish), and Wednesdays at 6 p.m. at St. Peter’s; and Saturdays at 5:30 p.m. at St. Mary’s Chapel in Wautoma. The mission of St. Peter’s is to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ.
The Beatles had quite a schedule today in 1963. They drove from Liverpool to London through the night to appear on the BBC’s “Parade of the Pops,” which was on live at noon.
After their two songs, they drove back north another three hours to get to their evening performance at the Swimming Baths in Doncaster.
The number one song today in 1965:
The number one album today in 1971 was the soundtrack to “Jesus Christ Superstar”:
Today in 1976, the four members of Kiss had their footprints implanted in the concrete outside Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood.
At the Grammy Awards today in 1977, the Album of the Year was Stevie Wonder’s “Songs in the Key of Life”:
The cover of “Chicago X” got the award for Best Album Package:
The number one single today in 1988:
The number one album on both sides of the Atlantic today in 2005, with artist name and title the same:
Today in 2010, 40 finches became musicians at the Barbican in London:
Birthdays begin with J. Geils of his own band:
Walter Becker of Steely Dan:
Randy California of Spirit:
Kurt Cobain of Nirvana:
One, or 100, deaths of note today: Ty Longley of Great White, killed with 100 people when explosives set fire to the building during a Great White concert in 2003:
Today in 1956, Elvis Presley performed three shows at the Fort Homer Hesterly Armory in Tampa, Fla. Presley closed the final show by announcing to the crowd of 14,000, “Girls, I’ll see you backstage.”
Many of them took Presley at his word. Presley barely made it into his dressing room, losing some of his clothes and his shoes in the girl gauntlet.
The number one single today in 1961 posed the question of whether actors can sing:
(Answer: Generally, singers act better than actors sing. Read on.)
The number one single today in 1966 here (on the singer’s birthday) …
… and over there:
Today in 1982, Ozzy Osbourne was arrested in San Antonio for urinating on the Alamo.
Osbourne also was wearing a dress because wife Sharon hid all his clothes so he couldn’t go outside.
Osbourne, who apparently confused rubble for the Alamo, was banned from playing in San Antonio ever again. “Ever again” turned out to be 10 years.
The number one British single today in 1983 certainly didn’t apply to Osbourne:
The number one single today in 1983:
Today in 1996, British morning TV viewers saw this strange scene involving Bjork:
Today in 2004, Johnny Cash’s family vetoed an attempt to use one of his songs for a hemorrhoid relief medication. You can probably guess which song the company wanted to use:
Birthdays begin with one-hit wonder Lee Marvin, who as previously noted probably should have stuck to acting:
Smokey Robinson and Bobby Rogers of the Miracles:
Pierre Van Den Linden, drummer for Focus:
Toni Iommi, guitarist of the aforementioned Osbourne’s group, Black Sabbath:
Mark Andes of Spirit:
Johann “Falco” Hölzel:
Seal Henry Samuel, known by his first name:
Daniel Adair, drummer for 3 Doors Down:
One death of note today in 1980: Bon Scott of AC/DC:
Today in 1962, the Everly Brothers, on leave from the U.S. Marine Corps, appeared on CBS-TV’s Ed Sullivan Shew:
The number one British single today in 1965:
The number one single today in 1967:
Today in 1980, Rolling Stone Bill Wyman said he intended to retire from the Stones upon their 20th anniversary in 1982.
He was 11 years off.
The number one British album today in 1984 was Simple Minds’ “Sparkle in the Rain”:
The number one single today in 1987:
The number one British album today in 1989 was Fine Young Cannibals’ “The Raw and the Cooked”:
Today in 2008, fans of the Carpenters objected to plans to bulldoze the family’s house in Downey, Calif., immortalized on their “Now and Then” album cover:
The owners of the house were tired of fans peeking into the windows and leaving floral tributes for Karen Carpenter.
Birthdays begin with Robert Luke Harshman, better known as songwriter Bobby Hart:
In 10 days, the 400 or so high school basketball teams in the state will start on a journey that they hope ends in Madison.
Only 20 boys and 20 girls basketball teams get to go to Madison for the WIAA state basketball tournaments. But possibly as soon as next season, the road to state looks like it won’t go to Madison, but Green Bay.
The WIAA will move the state high school basketball tournaments to the Green Bay area unless the the University of Wisconsin athletic department can make the Kohl Center available in 2013 and 2014.
The decision, confirmed by WIAA executive director Dave Anderson on Thursday, inspired a top UW athletic official to accuse Anderson of waging a personal campaign to relocate the event, which brings tens of thousands of players, coaches and fans and generate about $9 million for Madison’s economy annually.
Well, that’s a great start to the last Madison state basketball tournament in who knows how long, isn’t it?
Anderson said it’s unclear if the WIAA’s contract with the UW, set to expire after the 2013 tournaments, would change if the Kohl Center is not available next year. If it is, he said the move to Green Bay would take place then.
He indicated the university had not altered its initial offer for 2013 and ’14 to play the WIAA tournaments Tuesday through Thursday. He also reiterated the WIAA is not interested in moving the basketball tournaments to the Dane County Coliseum or the UW Field House.
The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association moved a step closer toward moving its state boys and girls basketball tournaments to the Green Bay area, but at the same time dangled Madison and the University of Wisconsin one last carrot.
The Board of Control supported an executive staff recommendation to enter into a five-year deal with the Resch Center in Ashwaubenon if UW is unable to accommodate the tournaments according to the terms of the existing agreement.
The WIAA’s news release, posted Thursday night, is similarly opaque:
The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association Board of Control supported an Executive Staff recommendation to enter into a five-year agreement with PMI and the Resch Center in Green Bay, as soon as 2013 and extending through 2017, if the University of Wisconsin is unable to accommodate the State Boys and Girls Basketball Tournaments in accordance with the terms of the existing agreement.
Seeking a change in venue became necessary because of conflicts with the University of Wisconsin athletics schedule for 2013 and beyond. The traditional weekends of the State basketball tournaments in the Kohl Center have been reserved for the Western Collegiate Hockey Association playoffs in 2013, and initially, the Big Ten Conference Hockey playoffs beginning in 2014.
Now, a time out for some history: The first state invitational basketball tournament was held at Lawrence College (now University) in Appleton in 1905. The state normal schools (think of them as the UW four year schools not called Madison) started a state tournament in 1916, which the WIAA recognizes as the first state tournament. Except for a one-year visit to Wisconsin Rapids in 1936, UW–Madison has hosted every state tournament since 1920 — first at the UW Fieldhouse, and since 1998 at the Kohl Center (except for a few state girls tournaments at the Fieldhouse and the Dane County Coliseum).
The biggest state tournaments — football, basketball, hockey, wrestling, softball and golf — are held in Madison. Track was moved from Madison to La Crosse in 1990, and soccer moved from Madison to Milwaukee in 2003. Girls volleyball is held at the Resch Center, which is where state basketball apparently is headed.
The possibility of moving state basketball out of Madison first came up because of a set of potential conflicts with the Kohl Center with Big Ten hockey, which will begin as a conference-sanctioned sport in 2013–14. The Big Ten’s original plan was to have the conference’s regular season champion host the conference tournament. That would have required Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State and Penn State to reserve their hockey facilities (the Kohl Center in UW’s case) for tournaments they may or may not host. That obviously would crowd out any other potential use, particularly, in UW’s case, basketball.
Ultimately, UW prevailed on the Big Ten to do what UW’s current hockey conference started doing in 1988 and the Big Ten should have done in the first place — hold the tournament at a neutral site. Within the Big Ten geographic footprint, there are, by my count, at least eight facilities that host either National Hockey League or American Hockey League (the top hockey minor league) facilities large enough for a proper college hockey tournament.
The problem with having your regular-season champion host your conference tournament is what happens if the host fails to make the tournament final — your favorite cable sports channel broadcasts a conference championship game, with an NCAA tournament berth at stake, in an arena with thousands of fans dressed as empty seats. As fun as it would be to have the Kohl Center host a title game, NCAA tournaments moved out of on-campus hockey arenas years ago, and Division I conference tournaments don’t belong on campus.
Beyond a few additional conflict issues, there is one big issue that the Wisconsin State Journal’s Rob Hernandez pointed out:
WIAA executive director Dave Anderson has dropped hints since this facility conflict emerged that playing the state basketball tournaments in Madison — while rich in tradition — has come, in recent years, at a steep price.
Anderson is not the only one who sees the financial elephant in the room on this debate. Witness this email I received from a Madison man who worked a Camp Randall Stadium concession stand during the WIAA state football finals:
“I was embarrassed at the $8 cost of a Coke and hot dog,” the worker wrote. “Popcorn? $3.50! This courtesy of the UW “W” Club.
“I also heard stories of cars being towed for street parking violations. I would love to see a comparison of the proposed facility expense to be charged to the WIAA by Green Bay compared to that charged by the UW Athletic Department.” …
Indeed, the cost of attending these events is not cheap.
An Internet check this week of eight downtown hotels during the upcoming state boys basketball tournament showed the cheapest rates ranging from $107 to $206 per night.
Parking costs continue to be a major issue for WIAA events.
Anderson said the cost to park in lots run by UW Transportation Services has doubled in less than five years, from $6 in 2009 to $12 this winter. The WIAA had been told last year’s hike would convert the fee from a per-session rate to an all-day pass, according to Anderson, but it was not sold that way to those of us who parked next to Goodman Diamond for the state softball tournament and might not be practical given the limited parking near the Kohl Center.
Contrast that to what reportedly has been offered by PMI Entertainment Group, which runs the Resch Center in Ashwaubenon. According to the Green Bay Press-Gazette, PMI has offered to cap parking rates at $6 (at nearby Lambeau Field) and, with the Packers, split the revenue with the WIAA while Green Bay-area hotels have guaranteed affordable rates and no required two-night stays.
Madison’s past and present mayor, Paul Soglin, begs to differ about several points of contention:
MYTH
#2. Madison hotels require a two night minimum.
REALITY
Madison hotels are abundant and affordable. The vast majority of hotels have not, and do not require a minimum stay. There are 25 hotels that are participating in a Fan Package that begins in 2012, offering great rates and no minimum stays. The Greater Madison Convention and Visitors Bureau has offered to assist in developing fan hotel packages in the past and is delighted that WIAA agreed to pursue that option.
MYTH
#3 Parking costs in Madison are high.
REALITY
Event parking rates at City of Madison and UW-Madison campus parking ramps will be in effect. Parking in city ramps near the Kohl Center will be only $4. The University is guaranteeing their rates until 2020. There will be free shuttles from other locations to help offset parking costs. …
MYTH
#5 Madison doesn’t care about the WIAA.
REALITY
Financial assistance and support from the University, City of Madison, Dane County, Greater Madison Convention & Visitors Bureau as well as the hotel and restaurant community are included in current proposal. There has been an incredible collaborative effort to put together the proposal. Madison has a long history, and continues to host many other WIAA state tournaments throughout the year. We welcome our high school athletes and their families and fans from around the state year-round.
Madison’s parking rates are not high if you’re comparing them to Milwaukee. Madison’s parking rates are high if you’re comparing them to anywhere else in Wisconsin. (If you think east-side-campus parking is bad now, you should have been in Madison in the 1980s.) Soglin, a native of Chicago, also appears to have an interesting definition of “affordable” if that means $107 to $206 per night. And where was all this fan-affordability collaboration before now? At those prices, you might hope your team loses its first state game.
Whether the tournament is in Madison or Green Bay, the WIAA may need to rethink how it does state basketball anyway, based on people voting with their feet:
Attendance at the state boys basketball tournament has dipped greatly in the past two years and, overall, in four of the past five.
In 2011, the first year of the five-division state tournament, total attendance fell to 73,094. That was 12,359 fewer than 2010, the last year of four-division play with one extra session, and the first time attendance fell below 80,000 since 1990 — the last year of a three-division format.
It’s been the same with the state wrestling tournament, which has seen a decline in the past four years, dropping from 66,206 — an all-time high — in 2007 to 60,902 last year.
The switch from four to five divisions took away the Thursday morning session, so an attendance drop isn’t surprising. But if you’re concerned about dipping attendance, playing two fewer games won’t improve attendance. Moving state from Madison to Green Bay won’t improve one, shall we say, delicate issue that has been the case ever since I’ve been paying attention to state: Milwaukee teams don’t draw well at state. (For related but converse reasons, the chance of state basketball in Milwaukee is approximately zero.)
One improvement with moving state from Madison to Green Bay might be in atmosphere. The UW Fieldhouse can best be improved with a wrecking ball, but the atmosphere of a full Fieldhouse was great once you maneuvered around the buckets picking up melting snow from the leaking roof. The Kohl Center has all the amenities fans could ask for, but at 17,000 capacity it is not remotely close to full for state games, particularly state girls games. (Back in the 1990s, UW briefly considered putting in grass at Camp Randall Stadium, which would have forced the state football championship games to go elsewhere, or at least most of them. The flip side to that is that having your football stadium one-eighth full for a state title game doesn’t really make for great atmosphere either.)
The WIAA’s share of blame for dipping attendance goes back to the regular season and the WIAA’s current apparent policy of arranging conferences by their schools’ enrollment instead of by geography. Three of Ripon’s six Eastern Valley Conference opponents — Freedom, Waupaca and Clintonville — are one hour or more away from Ripon by car or bus. The WIAA always swings between geography and enrollment in deciding conference lineups, but enrollment affects football much more than other sports. And with the economy what it is today and gas prices what they will be later this year, fans are increasingly deciding the time off of work and/or the cost of driving to Madison isn’t worth the trip.
Madison isn’t letting state go without a fight:
It’s odd that the video doesn’t show why the first person on the video is famous, so I will:
There is also one big potential unintended consequences of the state basketball tournament’s leaving Madison. Wisconsin is the only state in the U.S. in which the entire state boys and girls basketball tournaments are on free TV. It’s helpful for the originating station for the state tournament to be in Madison; that will not be the case when the tournament moves to Green Bay. There is no guarantee moving state out of Madison will mean games before Saturday, and perhaps even the entire tournament, won’t move to Fox Sports Wisconsin, which will take state away from those without cable or satellite TV.
Readers might think from my anti-Madison rants that I would like to see state basketball leave Madison. Readers would be making the wrong assumption. Having state on the UW campus gives high school students statewide a taste of the UW, something that won’t happen with a Green Bay state tournament. (The Resch Center is on the opposite side of Green Bay from the UW–Green Bay campus, even though UWGB’s men play at the Resch Center.) Neither Madison nor Green Bay is remotely close to the geographic center of the state, but Madison is slightly closer to the population center of the state (which as of 2000 was, believe it or don’t, Markesan) than Green Bay.
So sad that money has got in the way of giving our children a great experience.
When I was in school. Going to state, meant Madison. Why? Madison is our Capitol. (Regardless of current politics) Madison is home to The University of Wisconsin and our Badgers.
Going to State meant playing on the same floor, grass, ice, etc. as our heroes from the Badgers. Have our team and players name on the same scoreboard, sitting on the very benches.
Too bad our WIAA has become so greedy. Our UW has lost its sense of civic duty to the youth of our state. And once again The City dropped the ball. (To busy building bike boxes to even know the ball was in the air)
On the other hand, other comments make you understand why Anderson wants state basketball to leave Madison (if that really is the case):
Good, two weeks of less traffic in Madison each spring.
UW should have priority over their own facilities. If the WIAA couldn’t run it on Tuesday – Thursday, then too bad. Green Bay is a ghost town in March. Nice people, but hardly a destination that I’d want to go to be in the state tournament.
Madison put itself in this position and deserves what it gets. Hopefully the mayor will wake earlier from his nap next time. The UW just made it clear what it thinks of a tradition going back to 1920 and its loyalty to the community it lives in.
It became open for discussion and competitive bidding. But Madison doesn’t know how to compete with other cities, or considers itself beneath such things. And the UW didn’t see that it was weighing a tradition that engaged the entire state community vs 300 yahoos from St. Cloud State. We are paying for our entitled sensibility. If you look at Epic, the Edgewater, Spectrum, Madison Prep,and now the tournament, you see a city that has lost its way. We don’t like competition. Our chief product is acrimony. Other cities are more than willing to exploit it. This trend will continue unless we become honest about ourselves and change things. Madison may be livable, but we aren’t as great as we think we are. Losing the tournament isn’t about lost revenue. It’s about lost leadership.
As a native of Green Bay who now lives in Madison, I say good for Green Bay. I get so sick of the arrogance around here that the sun rises and sets around this town. … People in this part of the state seem to think that Green Bay is a one-horse town and some backwater. If Green Bay can accommodate 70,000 plus fans every weekend for a Packer game, I think they can handle entertaining 10,000 people for a basketball tournament.
And then there are comments that are completely irrelevant, yet understandable:
Perhaps the liberal retards in Madison can organize an anti-Walker rally for that weekend instead and invite their government union thug buddies from out of state for a big group hug. And don’t forget to bring the tractors. This way all the restaurants, bars and hotels can still get the revenue.
The GB/Fox Valley area has everything and more that Madison has when it comes to entertainment, shopping and lodging minus the protesters and socialists. Some of the comments here just prove what a pretentious entitlement attitude some Madison residents have. I can’t blame them, I wouldn’t want to come here either.
Of course, Recallarama had nothing to do with the WIAA’s decision to move its biggest state tournament out of Madison. (For one thing, most high school coaches are teachers, and most WIAA management are former teachers.) But Madison is about to let leave an event that has more economic impact than any winter/spring sports event other than an NCAA basketball first- and second-round That’s something UW should have thought about
My prediction is that if state goes to Green Bay, a Madison-area state legislator will introduce a proposal to have the Department of Public Instruction run high school sports instead of the WIAA. The rationale, which I first brought up in the WIAA’s fight to preserve for itself broadcast rights, will be that high school sports are funded by tax dollars, and the WIAA uses tax dollars with no public accountability. At least it would make Superintendent of Public Instruction elections more interesting.
The Wisconsin Alumni Association is planning its annual Alumni Weekend April 27–28.
In keeping, I guess, with the Wisconsin Idea, that the University of Wisconsin’s boundaries are the boundaries of the state, the WAA plans a fish fry.
The WAA further whets your appetite for their fish fry by showing off everything you’d ever want to know about the Wisconsin fish fry:
According to the WAA, the thousands of fish fries statewide tonight combine the best traditions of our immigrant heritage, our specifically German heritage, our state’s Catholic heritage, and our state’s civil disobedience to the idiotic idea called Prohibition. (The latter is a bit ironic, since Prohibition was a byproduct of the Progressive Era, something progressives usually decline to remember or point out.)
Other than our honeymoon, which included the 8-foot-long 115-pound marlin that now adorns our living room wall, I have rarely fished, but I have always eaten fish. Having southwest Wisconsin relatives means we now occasionally get supplied with fish caught on the Mississippi River backwaters this time of year. I don’t see the appeal of ice fishing, but I certainly enjoy its results. I’ve also eaten shrimp ever since a family vacation to the Forest County Butternut Lake and the restaurant next door to our cabin. (I avoid the Christmas in-law tradition of oyster stew, however.)
The only thing I’d quibble about in this graphic is the mention of the beer to the exclusion of other adult beverages, specifically the official mixed drink of Wisconsin, the brandy old fashioned.
This does not, by the way, make me more inclined to go to Alumni Weekend, seeing as how I’m the only UW alum in the house. But it does help tonight’s dinner plans.
Today in 1969, Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash recorded the album “Girl from the North Country.”
Never heard of a Dylan–Cash collaboration? That’s because the album was never released, although the title track was on Dylan’s “Nashville Skyline” album.
Today in 1970, during her concert in the Royal Albert Hall in London, Joni Mitchell announced her retirement from live performances … a retirement that lasted until the end of the year.
The number one British album today in 1979 was Blondie’s “Parallel Lines”:
Today in 1989, David Coverdale of Whitesnake married Tawny Kitaen, who had appeared in Whitesnake videos:
The marriage lasted two years.
Birthdays start with Orville “Hoppy” Jones of the Ink Spots:
Tommy Edwards (the singer, not the legendary WLS radio DJ):
I hesitate to post this lest this give a tax-happy legislator near you an idea, but …
For those who (correctly) believe Wisconsin is a tax hell, Greg McFarlane of Investopedia passes on the fact that some places are even worse tax hells — not necessarily because of the size of the tax bite, although there are big tax bites …
New York City in particular has taken cigarette taxes to unforeseen places, collecting a tax that dwarfs the price of the cigarettes themselves. The city and state levy a per-pack tax, meaning that if you buy a pack anywhere in the five boroughs, you’ll remit 61 cents in prepaid sales tax, an additional $1.50 to the city, and $4.35 more to the state. Add the wholesale price of the cigarettes themselves, plus the additional markup retailers have to charge their remaining customers (after all, fewer people are now buying cigarettes in New York for some reason), and a pack can now cost you around $15.
… but because of what gets taxed:
Want to park your vehicle in a commercial lot in D.C.? That’ll cost you 12%. Perhaps you live in Chicago and enjoy eating. The Second City is one of the few jurisdictions that charges a tax on groceries (2.25%.). Meanwhile Hawaii charges an accommodation tax to “transients,” i.e. vacationers, of 7.25%, in addition to roughly 4% sales tax. The state of Hawaii has you where they want you: it’s not as if you can vote with your feet, and drive over the border to enjoy the beaches in a neighboring state. …
In 1991, the Los Angeles Lakers and Chicago Bulls met in the NBA Finals. The Bulls were a media phenomenon at the time, employing Michael Jordan at his professional zenith and a supporting cast of lesser millionaires. Since each Bull earned half his money on “business trips,” the state of California reasoned it was only fair to take a cut. Other states and municipalities followed suit, and today’s traveling pro athlete has to maintain quires of paperwork to cover his obligations. …
For activities more taboo than playing sports, various jurisdictions are ready with an outstretched palm and another form for you to fill out. For instance, the Internal Revenue Service charges 0.25% on wagers that any state or Indian nation has determined to be legal. If you think that operating in the black market excuses you from paying a tax, think again. The IRS also charges 2% onillegal wagers, even using the word “illegal” on its FAQ page. (The relevant document, Form 730, uses the less inflammatory language “Tax on wagers other than wagers described on line 4a.”) As to why you’d ever confess to illegal gambling on your tax return, that’s between you, your conscience and the IRS.
McFarlane also mentions a tax that no longer exists:
Up until 2009, the state of Tennessee attempted to thwart the illegal drug trade by unconventional means. In addition to search-and-seizure and prosecution, the state employed good old-fashioned “revenuing.”
When the “crack tax” was authorized in 2005, it required sellers of cocaine, marijuana and, yes, moonshine to pay on the proceeds of their sales. Dealers were supposed to pay anonymously at the state revenue office, at which point they’d receive proof of payment. At the very least, the law didn’t require the dealers to issue receipts to customers and state a refund policy.
And believe it or not, people actually paid. In the year after the “crack tax” was passed by the legislature, drug dealers contributed $1.8 million to the state coffers. Fortunately for the illicit drug underworld throughout Tennessee, a state court of appeals struck down the law as unconstitutional, ruling that a legislature can’t outlaw a substance yet charge people a fixed amount for creating and selling it. Drug dealers in neighboring states then presumably rejoiced. To put the absurd cherry on a sundae of lunacy, after the law’s repeal some dealers had their tax payments refunded. With interest.
Wisconsinites know that “the flag for the local union” is actually the Wisconsin state flag. The only union it represents is Wisconsinites. (For non-Wisconsinites, the “1848” is the year of our statehood, on May 29. This little kerfuffle shows that the decision several years ago to add “Wisconsin” and “1848” to the flag because it looked too much like other state flags had unintended consequences.)
Since the premise of the entire story is based on that flag, erase the first three sentences, and what do you have? Obama saying something about something that has to do with his reelection.
Besides being sloppy, Donovan Slack’s reporting describes the nature of today’s media. You have technology, you use it to get the latest story out online, apparently whether correct or not. (Then again, read a Gannett Wisconsin newspaper, and you’ll see Gannett’s commitment to proper English. Or not.) This basic error is the sort of thing that is supposed to be the province of inexperienced, untrained bloggers, not supposedly professional reporters.
The worst part of this is that one of Politico’s founders, Jim VandeHei, is from Oshkosh.
On the other hand, Stuff Journalists Like blows the lid off the actual work of journalists following the latest Internet trend:
Steve Prestegard.com: The Presteblog 