Stories related to: Wisconsin

The worst flooding in 15 years has exposed some serious vulnerabilities in the Midwest's aging infrastructure, the Chicago Tribune reports. Levees, bridges, and dams, some a century old, are barely coping with severe storms—while some are collapsing completely. Dikes and levees broke in several states last week after torrential rains, destroying homes and flooding farmland. More »

As climbing rivers knocked out an Iowa bridge and flooded Illinois farms, communities along the Mississippi River are bracing for what could be its biggest overflow in 15 years, the AP reports. The National Weather Service warned of crests of 10 feet above flood stage and higher over the next 2 weeks. “I've been downtown for 37 years and I have never seen anything like this,” said one Cedar Falls, Iowa, resident. More »

A Wisconsin teen didn't take it too well when his relationship turned sour, so he posted graphic nude photographs of his 16-year-old ex on his MySpace page with equally graphic captions, reports the Smoking Gun. The cops got a foul-mouthed refusal when they asked him to remove the photos. That's when they busted him on child porn charges. He's in jail until his hearing next week. More »

A  woman and her self-proclaimed "bishop" have been arrested after cops found the decomposing corpse of a 90-year-old woman on a toilet in the house she shared with her two kids, the Wisconsin State Journal reports. The woman said the bishop of her tiny religious group told her her God would bring the corpse back to life if she prayed hard enough. More »

A cougar shot April 14 in Chicago was spotted earlier in Wisconsin, DNA tests show, suggesting an epic trek. Now, scientists are eager to study the animal, hoping to learn more about how and why it migrated; they aim to pin down its ancestry in an effort to better understand how animals like it adjust to human populations, the Chicago Tribune reports. More »

Funnyman-turned-Democratic candidate Al Franken has announced he'll pay up $70,000 in back taxes to 17 states, AP reports. Franken blamed the backlog on bad advice from his accountant. Most of the income at issue was from speeches and other appearances dating back to 2003. The tax issue has sidetracked Franken's Minnesota Senate campaign, and the state's Republican Party has been quick to pounce. More »

About 15% of Americans drove under the influence of alcohol in the past year, and another 4.7% drove while on drugs, according to a new government survey. Wisconsinites were particularly hammered, with 26.4% driving drunk, followed closely by North Dakota (24.9%) and Minnesota (23.4%). Utah had the national low at 9.5%, Reuters reports. More »

If Bob Fanning dies in the next decade, the buyer of his Wisconsin home—listed at $498,900—will get a half-million dollar payday. That’s because the 69-year-old plans to make the new owner the beneficiary of a 10-year life-insurance policy, a carrot he hopes will sweeten the deal in a tough real-estate market, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports. More »

Police have stepped up campus patrols after a University of Wisconsin-Madison student was found apparently stabbed to death in her apartment Wednesday. The 21-year-old pre-med junior is the first Madison student murdered since 1996, reports ABC News. But police are investigating possible links to an unsolved murder in the city earlier this year, according to the Capital Times . More »

Residents of the nation’s heartland are celebrating Easter weekend besieged by floods and snowstorms, which expected to keep hitting Missouri, Michigan, and Wisconsin, the AP reports. Forecasters predict up to 12 inches of snow for the Ohio Valley, while other areas remain soaked thanks to a foot of rain in just 36 hours, and more still to come. More »

Several states are considering lowering the drinking age, spurred in part by concerns that teenage service members can fight overseas but can’t drink at home, USA Today reports. Kentucky, Wisconsin, and South Carolina are weighing a military-only change to alcohol laws, while other states may lower the legal age for all, with a few stipulations. More »

Pumas, normally prowlers of the Rocky Mountains, are slowly pushing east, ecologists say, which has led to a rash of sightings throughout the Midwest. Wisconsin just had its first confirmed puma sighting in over a century, and since 1990 the big cats have cropped up in Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri and Illinois, the Chicago Tribune reports. More »

With Hillary Clinton’s campaign down to its last moves, her advisers are duking it out over how negative the candidate should go, MSNBC reports. Pollster Mark Penn wants to go ahead full throttle, while communications director Howard Wolfson and ad guru Mandy Grunwald are concerned that Hillary might damage her future—including a potential White House run in 2012. John Heilemann notes in New York that the lopsided defeat in Wisconsin can be interpreted as a rejection of the negative messages she deployed there. More »

Barack Obama's 17-point victory in Wisconsin contains a major warning for Hillary Clinton: not only did the Illinois senator win among his usual coalition of well-educated, young and black voters, but he also captured the vote of the working class, particularly men. The "durable coalition" that Clinton strategist Mark Penn thought would sweep her to victory doesn't seem so impregnable after all, writes Slate. More »

John McCain racked up decisive wins over Mike Huckabee in Wisconsin and Washington state tonight, inching closer to a mathematical lock on the GOP nomination and making solid gains among conservatives. In Wisconsin, he had a lead of 55% to 37% with nearly all results in. McCain split the conservative vote with Huckabee, and two-thirds of "very conservative" voters said they'd be satisfied with him as a candidate. More »

Barack Obama won the Wisconsin primary tonight to continue his impressive streak over Hillary Clinton, NBC reports. Obama has now won nine consecutive political contests, and early results suggest he's going to win his native Hawaii too. In Wisconsin, he led 56% to 43% with nearly all results in, and he made big inroads into Clinton's base of white voters, women, and blue-collar workers. More »

Tomorrow's primary in Wisconsin won’t decide the Democratic nomination, but Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are fighting tooth and nail anyway, Politico reports, airing their first negative ads of the campaign and taking shots at each other through aides. At stake is momentum: Obama doesn’t want to break his winning streak, and Clinton wants to prevent another Potomac-level blowout. More »

Despite a chorus of calls for him to give up his campaign, Mike Huckabee is hitting the trail even harder than John McCain in Wisconsin, where he faces an uphill battle, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. And although McCain leads in the delegate count, Huckabee is getting a warm welcome from conservatives: "We feel this nation needs to get back to moral integrity," says one supporter. More »

A barrage of tornadoes ripped through the South today as cold rain and snow blanketed parts of the Midwest, the AP reports. Twisters left toppled power lines, shattered windows, and wrecked homes in Alabama and Florida, causing injuries but no fatalities. “You see it on TV," said a KFC employee who saw windows blown out. "You can’t imagine how it feels until it happens to you.” More »

Mike Huckabee is unfazed by delegate math, empty pockets, and the sight of Mitt Romney endorsing John McCain. Rather than be “part of the coronation,” the ex-Arkansas governor is telling backers he plans to take the GOP fight to a brokered convention, Politico reports. Once there, all bets are off. "Top candidates will have an opportunity to make an impassioned plea,” he writes in a fundraising letter. More »