The good news for Oct. 2, 2009

Friday news dump time! All of it worthwhile. And hey, if you're in the Madison area tonight and are in the mood for some fine tunes and even finer ladies, my band, Little Red Wolf, will be playing a show at the High Noon Saloon at 9:00 p.m. - opening for Brighton, MA and Company of Thieves. We'd love to see you there! More here.

• [Channel3000] Chicago loses out on its bid to host the 2016 Olympics in the first round of voting. A great wailing and gnashing of teeth can be seen and heard to the south. While I think it would have been fun to have had the cycling events up here in Wisconsin, I'm not all that bummed about the decision. Honestly, getting the games is always a mixed bag at best for the host cities, and we should really be focusing our time and money on things like education, the environment, and transportation (our lack of current light rail may have been a factor in the no vote, and I suspect the less-than welcoming environment for foreign visitors seeking visas was as well).
• [Badger Herald] Erstwhile Dist. 5 Dane County Supervisor Wyndham Manning has decided not to run for re-election. The Herald handled the announcement with relative kid gloves, considering the pretty harsh criticisms their editorial board has lobbed at Manning in the past. Personally, the times I've met the guy he's always been friendly and approachable, but I've also gotten the distinct impression that he was perhaps unprepared for the full duties of this particular job. It is perhaps best, then, that he's recognized that a run for second term would be unwise.
• [Wisconsin State Journal] A new club that opened on the outskirts of Middleton, Outer Limits, really wants to let their ladies show some skin to patrons waving dollar bills. And Middleton's efforts to stop them are, like, totally unconstitutional. Never mind that the club originally applied for and got their liquor license under the guise of just being a "sports bar." And never mind that they're skipping right past applying for a permit and going straight for the lawsuit. I actually think the "no nudity" laws we've got in Dane County are bull, but it doesn't help the cause when you act like douchebags about it.
  
• [Yale E360] So those big bad beasties we're so prone to vilify and kill off? Things like wolves, bears, big cats and the like? Yeah, turns out depleting their numbers so drastically ain't such a great idea, as it leaves the so-called "mesopredators" to run rampant, and they can wreak some serious havoc on local ecosystems. Baboons, for instance, have apparently flourished so much in parts of Africa that they've been destroying crops and "menacing villagers" (which, though it sounds hilarious, is a bad thing).