News 10.17.16
17 October 2016 News
Russ Feingold and John McCain largely made their names in the Senate fighting the power of special interest money. But now as McCain fights for re-election in Arizona and Feingold tries to return to the Senate in Wisconsin, the authors of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law are benefiting from the same sources of funding they once scorned. Feingold defends his position saying the political fundraising landscape has changed dramatically since his first Senate run in 2002. But his opponent Republican incumbent Sen. Ron Johnson has branded him a hypocrite. McCain is tapping super PAC funding to help his re-election bid. McCain has argued that he’s simply taking advantage of the law as it stands after the Supreme Court’s seminal Citizens United ruling.
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The University of Wisconsin-Madison is urging all undergraduates to get vaccinated against a rare form of meningitis that put two students in the hospital last week. University Health Services is offering the vaccine free to students starting Thursday. It’s effective against the B strain of the disease. Few students are vaccinated against the strain because the two-dose vaccine is relatively new. Most students have been vaccinated only against four common strains — A, C, Y and W. The university says the two students who became ill with the B strain are expected to make full recoveries, but the disease can be devastating. Type B meningococcal disease has been linked to outbreaks on at least six college campuses across the country since 2013, including a death at UW-Madison in 2013.
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A Kenosha mother has pleaded guilty to killing her two children. 35-year-old Lucia Hernandez-Alvarez wept quietly as she pleaded guilty Friday to two counts of first-degree homicide for the 2015 deaths of 1-year-old Javier Arellano Hernandez and 3-year-old Alicia Arellano Hernandez. She was accused of killing them by giving them pain medication to make them sleep, then smothering them with plastic bags. A trial is scheduled for Nov. 7 on her mental state. If she’s found not guilty due to mental disease or defect, she’ll get sent to a mental health facility. If that defense fails, she faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison. Hernandez-Alvarez told police she’d been “sad” before the killings and was worried the children’s father was going to leave her.
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A 33-year-old Madison woman has been arrested on suspicion of child abuse for allegedly encouraging two 14-year-old girls to fight, then kicking one of the girls in the head while she was down on the ground. Police say the fight happened in a parking lot Thursday afternoon, and that the woman knew one of the teens. Police spokesman Joel DeSpain tells the Wisconsin State Journal that the girl who got kicked suffered facial injuries, while the other girl was cited for battery and disorderly conduct. DeSpain says the woman admitted to encouraging the fight, but denied getting physically involved.
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Jackson County’s elk population is slowly growing as wildlife officials focus on reintroducing the animals to the area. The Wisconsin State Journal reports that bringing elk back to the area was discussed nearly 20 years ago, but it wasn’t until July that elk from Kentucky were released in the Black River State Forest. The project, with about 60 elk in the herd, is a joint effort that includes the Ho-Chunk Nation, Department of Natural Resources, Jackson County Wildlife Fund, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and Jackson County Parks & Forestry. The groups together have spent at least $550,000 on the project. Officials have a goal of growing the herd to 390 elk. Sand Creek Brewing in Black River Falls donates $1 from each case of Bugler Brown Ale to the county’s wildlife fund. It generated $1,300 last year.
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