News

-- By Mary Bottari and Harriet Rowan

In honor of "Sunshine Week," a national initiative to promote a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information, the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) would like to recognize Wisconsin's champions of backroom deals, secret pledges and cloaked campaign contributions.

Sunshine Week, March 12-16, is celebrated by newspapers, governments and citizen's groups across the land, but not in Wisconsin, whose reputation for clean and open government has taken a pounding this year.

First, CMD would like to honor Wisconsin Rep. Joel Kleefisch for literally blocking the view of the State Assembly chamber. On the first day of Sunshine Week, black plastic was placed on the swinging Assembly doors, blocking the view of interested citizens of the Assembly floor.

Hundreds of protestors showed up to the "Mad as Hell" rally on the Wisconsin State Capitol steps March 13 to protest a series of bills being pushed by Republican lawmakers that would take away a number of women's rights and interfere with women's access to health care in the state.

The rally was led by The Wisconsin Alliance for Women's Health, Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin and a number of other women's rights groups.

"Unfortunately, we have one of the most anti-women's health, anti-choice, anti-birth control legislatures that Wisconsin has ever seen," said Tanya Atkinson, Executive Director of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin.

One of the few tools for Wisconsin citizens to protect their health and land from the hazards of expanded frac sand mining across the state could be weakened by a newly introduced bill in the state legislature. The state's Senate is considering a piece of legislation today aimed at "limiting the authority" of Wisconsin cities, villages or towns to enact a "development moratorium ordinance" -- a mechanism used recently by several local governments across the state to set aside time so they can investigate the effects of proposed mining on their community.

A product made by grinding up connective tissue from cows and beef scraps that used to be made into dog food is too disgusting to serve at McDonald's, Burger King or Taco Bell, which have all dropped it due to public pressure, but the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) thinks it's fine to serve in school lunches. The USDA plans to buy seven million pounds of the "Lean Finely Textured Beef" (LFTB) from Beef Products Inc. (BPI) and serve it to school children this spring.