Green Bay News

Oshkosh North played Appleton East at Fox Cities Stadium on Thursday. East won, 2-1.

MARATHON COUNTY (WSAW-TV) – In less than one week, the Go-Fund-Me campaign for a Central Wisconsin widowed new mother of eight has reached a milestone as one of the top 20 most raised pages ever.

Support has been pouring out for Niki Rogan, who lost her husband, Mike, in a tragic accident last week just before giving birth to their eighth child.

Family friend, Dominic Gruetzmacher and his wife started a Go-Fund-Me page with the goal of raising $5,000.

It has now grown to $400,000 with the help of almost 5,400 people.

“We hit that $5,000 within six, eight hours and we decided to double the goal then, and we went to $10,000, we hit that, by night and then the next morning we went to $25,000 with the goal, the next day we gained $35,000 in 1 day,” said Gruetzmacher.

Click here to see the Go-Fund-Me page.

A Go-Fund-Me spokesperson says their campaign is one of their fastest growing ever. In a statement they said, “It’s incredibly heartwarming to see so many generous people come together to help this family. Their campaign is a shining example of what can happen when Go-Fund-Me is used to its fullest potential. Our hearts go out to the Rogan family during this incredibly difficult time.”

Gruetzmacher says the donations are coming in beyond the web, with countless envelopes in the mail. He says it’s all incredible, as most donations are from people they don’t even know.

“We blew past that goal so quickly. My wildest dreams were maybe to get at $25,000 or $50,000, it would be an incredible impact on the family. It’s gone 10, 20 times that and it’s, it’s humbling,” said Gruetzmacher.

If the campaign reaches $500,060, it will be one of the top 5 Go-Fund-Me pages ever.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – Gov. Scott Walker’s nonprofit political group says it will reimburse the state for costs related to the likely presidential candidate’s political travel.

Our American Revival spokeswoman AshLee Strong said Thursday that the group will pay for the travel costs, including those related to Walker’s state patrol security detail.

Strong says taxpayers will not pay for any of the costs on political trips, which include money spent on hotels, flights and rental cars.

Taxpayers will continue to pay for official trips, like Walker’s recent trade missions to Europe.

The commitment to pay for the costs came a day after Democrats on the Legislature’s budget committee slammed Walker for his extensive travel. Republicans rejected a Democratic-backed attempt to require quarterly reports on his travel.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – A federal grand jury in Madison has formally indicted a Wisconsin man accused of attempting to join the Islamic State group.

Prosecutors said the grand jury returned the indictment accusing Joshua Van Haften with trying to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization on Thursday.

The grand jury indictment is essentially a formality. Online court records indicate prosecutors charged Van Haften with the same count via complaint in October. The complaint was unsealed last month and Van Haften was arrested at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago on April 9.

Van Haften is scheduled to be arraigned in federal court in Madison on Friday morning. Online court records didn’t list an attorney for him.

The smoke from a controlled burn more than 80 miles away from Green Bay in the Horicon Marsh was easily visible on FOX 11’s StormTracker radar Thursday afternoon.

The normal radar view that StormTracker typically shows, tells us that objects are there and something is in the air and reflecting the radar beam. Correlation Coefficient is a different, fairly new product that we can also show using our StormTracker radar.

It became available once the Green Bay National Weather Service radar was upgraded to what’s called “Dual Polarization” a couple years ago. Dual Polarization means that in addition to the standard horizontal Doppler radar beam we have been using, there is now a vertical beam also being used. This allows the radar to determine the size and shape of objects it detects, not just that they are present.

The Correlation Coefficient product allows us to determine how similarly the horizontal and vertical beams are reflecting. Highly correlated objects are similar in shape and size to one another, like rain, snow and hail. Moderately correlated objects are mainly similar in size and shape but are showing some differences, like sleet, wet snow, soft hail, and mixed precipitation.

Objects that have very low correlations are typically not meteorological. These are things with a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Sometimes we see birds and insects with very low correlation. Key objects that we see with low correlations are smoke plumes from fires, like in the graphic, and tornado debris within thunderstorms.

While we can make educated guesses that a tornado may be occurring by radar through normal radar views and looking at the winds inside the storm, if low correlation coefficients are shown on radar it tells the meteorologist that debris is probably present– which means a tornado is likely on the ground and doing damage.

Allouez resident Drew Farwell has taken some fantastic imagery of the heavens above Green Bay and Northeast Wisconsin.

His equipment has seen some upgrades over the years, but he started pretty small.

“The first thing I did was, I had 150 dollars, and I begged and pleaded with my wife to let me get a little 4.5 inch Newtonian reflector. So we take it out and we were able to see Jupiter the first night. And when you see that target that you’re looking for come into view that’s in focus, it absolutely blows you away,” says Farwell.

His YouTube channel is FY Astronomy, which stands for Front Yard Astronomy.

It’s named after his largest telescope, a massive 11-inch one taller than him, which he had to use in his front yard to have enough space.

But you don’t need a big budget to start stargazing.

With just a good pair of binoculars– we’re talking in just the 50 to 100 dollar range– Farwell says you’d be surprised at what you can see.

“The Orion Nebula, you can start to resolve the little blog at the tip of the sword. The Andromeda galaxy, which you can actually see with your naked eye, but definitely does well with magnification. Even the moon. People are astonished when you show them the moon through a good set of binoculars.”

If you’d rather try out someone else’s equipment before buying your own, this Saturday’s National Astronomy Day has clubs across the area hold events, including the Neville Public Museum’s Astronomical Society.

“Hopefully on Saturday night we’ll have a dozen or more telescopes out for the public… When you’re at a public star party, you can try looking through the telescope, you can get an idea of what you like for telescopes from non-computerized to computerized ones,” says club president Gerry Kocken.

But remember, any night of the year, you can just take a seat and look up.

You never know what you’ll see.

For more information on the Neville Public Museum’s Astronomical Society and their upcoming events, click here.

The Barlow Planetarium is also hosting events all Saturday long, and you can find more information about them here.

Check out Drew Farwell’s YouTube channel here, at FYAstronomy.

As Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker continues to consider a run for the White House, some of the national focus from both sides has shifted to his stance on both illegal and legal immigration.

Walker says his top priority is protecting Americans’ wages and their jobs. He’s suggested he’d support limiting legal immigration if he thinks it’s hurting the U.S. economy.

The issue of legal immigration is always on Patrica Bos’ mind.

“We have been waiting and waiting and waiting,” said Bos, a Town of Freedom resident. “I want to bring my son in the legal way here to the United States. I am legal here. I have been always legal in this country.”

Bos was born in Mexico, but says she’s lived in the U.S. for seven years.

In some recent national interviews – and Wednesday in Grand Chute – Walker explained his views on legal immigration.

“For the next president and Congress, as they look at legal immigration in this country we should focus on ways in doing so that promote a strong economy and in doing so make sure that first and foremost we protect American workers and American wages,” said Walker. “And if that can be done, then certainly we can continue to have legal immigration, but we should make sure that American workers, American wages and American jobs are our number one priority.”

Lawrence University government professor Arnold Shober says Walker’s immigration views still aren’t entirely clear.

“He’s got to kind of thread the needle,” said Shober. “His view seems to be a little bit unsettled at the moment about where he’s actually going to come down should he be the nominee on the Republican side of the ticket.”

As candidates and contenders carefully craft their public messages, they’re focused on Republican bases in early primary states.

“Jeb Bush from Florida is very clearly on the pro-immigration side,” said Shober. “There’s no question about it. It’s one of his key things, which could hurt him in the Republican primaries. Other candidates, Ted Cruz perhaps, are going to be on the other side of that line.”

The issue will likely attract a lot of attention as Republicans try to win back the White House.

“They know that one of the difficulties the Republican Party has demographically is with Latinos, Hispanics and other folks who have come to the United States recently who are typically much more pro-immigration,” said Shober.

Bos says she fears the legal immigration process will get tighter.

“It’s really tough right now to be waiting,” she said.

According to facts on legal immigration from the Congressional Research Service, around one million people considered aliens became U.S. legal permanent residents two years ago.

About two-thirds of those people were approved because they have family in America. As for most of the remaining people, 16 percent were approved under employment conditions and 12 percent were approved on refugee status.

Under existing federal law, out of all people approved for residency countries generally can only have no more than seven percent of the total each year.

Walker also addressed federal illegal immigration concerns Wednesday.

“First and foremost that we need to have a secure border for reasons far beyond immigration,” he said. “That we need to enforce the laws when it comes to immigration with an effective and workable e-verify system that every employer in this nation uses.”

MILWAUKEE (AP) – Working quickly works best for Kyle Lohse.

Once he gets in a groove, the right-hander can be tough on any lineup.

The Milwaukee veteran bounced back from a poor start this season with seven neat innings, and the Brewers snapped an eight-game losing streak with 4-2 win on Thursday over the Cincinnati Reds.

Closer Francisco Rodriguez pumped his right arm and yelled after recording the final out. The win was a relief for the Brewers, whose 3-13 mark is the worst in the majors.

“We needed to get something going here,” said Lohse, who allowed three hits and two runs. “I feel like it was a total team effort.”

Marlon Byrd homered for the Reds, a two-run shot that tied it at 2 in the fifth.

Otherwise, Lohse (1-3) was in control. He worked ahead in counts with a sinker and slider in the early innings.

He then kept the Reds off balance with his fastball. With Lohse pounding the strike zone, hitters started swinging at pitches early in counts.

Lohse gave up three hits, walked one and struck out four.

“When I’m on, I want them to swing early. I want them to get those quick outs,” said Lohse, who lost this first three starts with a 10.34 ERA.

Jean Segura drove in the go-ahead run with a two-out single in the seventh. The hit off Kevin Gregg (0-2) went to center field, and Billy Hamilton’s throw home was up the third base line, allowing Logan Schafer to score.

The Brewers tacked on an insurance run in the eighth off reliever Manny Parra when Ryan Braun stole third and dashed home after third baseman Kristopher Negron allowed the throw from catcher Tucker Barnhart to squirt away.

“We have to come in throwing strikes and challenging opponents,” Reds manager Bryan Price said. “We’ve taken some leads into the late innings and they’ve gotten away from us so we have to be better.”

Reds starter Homer Bailey gave up two runs in 5 2/3 innings in his second start since coming off the disabled list on April 18 with a right forearm injury.

CLOSING TIME

Setup man Jonathan Broxton struck out the side in the eighth.

Rodriguez posted his second save of the season and 350th of his career. He gave up a two-out double to Zack Cozart before Joey Votto, who was hitting .386 with six homers, hit a harmless bouncer to second to end the game.

SLOWED DOWN

The Brewers also escaped without giving up a run despite allowing Hamilton, the Reds’ speedy leadoff man, to reach base twice.

Hamilton was 9 of 9 on stolen base attempts coming into the day before Martin Maldonado became the first catcher to throw him out. Maldonado nailed Hamilton at second in the sixth with the game tied at 2.

“Lohse did a great job varying his times to the plate. He was very, very quick to the plate. Maldonado can throw well so I was hoping we would get an off-speed pitch there,” Price said.

TRAINER’S ROOM

Reds: Price said he was looking for consistency from Bailey. The right-hander, Price said, was fine physically, but needed to build his endurance back up.

“I think he managed the game better,” Price said. “I don’t think he had as good of stuff as far as sheer velocity, but I think this is kind of the road we’re going to travel until he’s 100 percent.”

Brewers: Maldonado will play every day until he needs a day off, manager Ron Roenicke said. Maldonado is replacing Jonathan Lucroy, who is expected to spend at least a month on the disabled list with a fractured big left toe. … Rodriguez appeared to be fine after the reliever tweaked his right wrist on a play at the plate that allowed the go-ahead run to score off his wild pitch the previous night. The Reds won 2-1.

UP NEXT

Reds: Mike Leake (0-1) gets the start against the Cubs with Cincinnati opening a six-game homestand. Leake is 4-0 with a 2.45 ERA in his last six starts against Chicago.

Brewers: Matt Garza (1-2) opens a three-game set against the St. Louis Cardinals. Opponents are hitting .300 (21 for 70) against the right-hander this season.

MADISON (AP) – The deadly bird flu virus has been detected in a 90,000 turkey flock in Barron County.

The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection says that is the sixth report of bird flu in the state in 10 days. Nearly 1.3 million birds are affected.

Spokeswoman Raechelle Cline says initial tests show it’s an H5 virus, but results are still pending to confirm whether it’s the same H5N2 virus that has struck commercial poultry farms across the Midwest.

There are four confirmed, and two unconfirmed, cases of the H5N2 virus in Wisconsin.

There are two outbreaks in Barron and Jefferson counties, and one each in Chippewa and Juneau counties.

WASHINGTON (AP) – Think Jaws meets a kangaroo, with maybe a touch of cute kitten, and you’ve got the aptly named pocket shark – the newest and rarest species found off the U.S. coast.

Surprised scientists found a tiny, young version of the extraordinarily rare shark that was fished out of the deep Gulf of Mexico in 2010 with lots of other creatures in a government research trip. The dead specimen spent more than three years in a giant freezer waiting to be identified.

It turned out to be only the second of its species ever seen. The first pocket shark was found 36 years in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Peru and it’s been sitting in a Russian museum since.

This pocket shark was a male, maybe a few weeks old, about 5.5 inches long. Strangely, this type of shark has two pockets next to its front fins; their purpose is not known. It’s not quite like a kangaroo, which uses its pouch to carry young, but few species have pockets this large – about 4 percent of the shark’s body.

“It’s cute,” said Tulane University biologist Michael Doosey, who co-authored a study in a zoological journal identifying the shark. “It almost looks like a little whale.”

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fisheries biologist Mark Grace has spent more than 30 years going through bags upon bags of fish to identify them. It took him more than three years to get to near the end of the freezer, when he plopped a bag on the table and let it thaw.

“I wasn’t really sure what it was,” Grace said. “That pocket over on the pectoral fin, I had never seen anything like that on a shark.”

It’s a small miracle that he was not thrown away. A couple of times, the lab with the freezer lost power.

Once identified, the shark was shipped to New York and France for high-tech examinations that wouldn’t puncture the specimen.

The shark also has unusual belly patches not seen in most sharks. The only other pocket shark was a female adult about 17 inches long; it is believed that adult females may be larger than males.

But the truly strange thing about this species strange is its twin pockets. While no one knows what they are for, based on the Russian specimen Grace and Doosey speculated that they may secrete some kind of glowing fluid or pheromones.

The Gulf specimen has umbilical scars, showing he’s probably a few weeks old, Grace said. Because of that they think he was born in the Gulf. He was captured in February 2010 by the ship Pisces about 190 miles off the Louisiana coast.

“There’s others” out there, Grace said. “We just haven’t caught them yet.”

NEW YORK (AP) – Fifteen years after peaking during the dot-com boom, the Nasdaq composite has reached a new all-time high.

But this isn’t the Nasdaq of Pets.com and Webvan, when companies were valued on “cash burn rates” and “eyeballs.”

This Nasdaq, while still focused on technology companies, is a little more diversified than it was back then. And while the index, which tracks 2,500-plus stocks, has been steadily climbing since 2011, its ascent isn’t the crazed surge that preceded its last record close.

As the tech-mania took hold, investors pushed up the prices of all kinds of internet-related stocks. Some were never profitable and disappeared. Others, like Priceline.com and Amazon, have survived and prospered.

Now the index has clawed back. It has ridden a six-year bull market for stocks to close at 5,056.06 on Thursday, surpassing its previous record closing high of 5,048.62, reached on March 10, 2000.

The index ended the day up 20 points, or 0.4 percent, and has climbed 7 percent this year, by far the best performance among major U.S. stock indexes.

The headline number aside, the Nasdaq today is very different from the index and the overall market at the height of the technology boom, says Karyn Cavanaugh, a senior market strategist at Voya Investment Management. Investors have much more measured expectations of companies’ future earnings compared with the frenzied dot-com years.

During the boom “everybody was buying stocks, the cafeteria people were talking about their stocks,” said Cavanaugh, adding that now, “I don’t feel there’s the same frothiness. If it’s a party, it’s one of the most subdued ones I’ve ever been to.”

There’s another caveat to consider. Taking the effect of inflation into account, the index would have to reach 6,908 to match its highs from 15 years ago.

Here’s a closer look at the Nasdaq then and now:

THE DRIVERS:

– Now

The Nasdaq’s current rise has been driven by technology and health care. In a slow-growth world, investors favor industries where earnings will be better than average. Tech stocks are poised to benefit as companies increase their spending on equipment and software to cut costs and improve productivity. Health care stocks have been climbing as investors bet that biotechnology companies will discover the next blockbuster drug.

Together, tech and health account for almost two thirds of the Nasdaq’s market value.

One stock in particular holds sway over the Nasdaq: Apple. Its market value has surged to more than $750 billion from $22.5 billion in March 2000. The company accounts for 10 percent of the Nasdaq’s value.

Powered by tech and health care, the Nasdaq has climbed 22 percent over the past year, a more tempered rise than the 109 percent surge in the year before its last peak in 2000.

– Then

The Nasdaq had a much heavier tech-focus in 2000. At their peak, tech stocks made up 65 percent of the index compared with 43 percent today. Telecommunication companies were also a big component, accounting for 12 percent of the index’s market value versus 0.8 percent now.

The biggest stock in the index was Microsoft with a market valuation of $525 billion. Apple had yet to release the iPod, iPhone or the iPad.

HOW EXPENSIVE ARE STOCKS?

– Now

The price-earnings ratio of the Nasdaq, a measure of how much investors are willing to pay for every dollar of earnings the companies in the index generate, is 21.

– Then

When the Nasdaq was at its highest, its price-earnings ratio reached 194.

BROADER STOCK MARKET:

– Now

Both the Standard & Poor’s 500 index and the Dow Jones industrial average are trading close to record highs from last month, The stock market is being underpinned by solid company earnings and optimism that the economy will continue to strengthen gradually.

-Then

The S&P 500 was also surging in 2000, rising with the internet bubble. The S&P 500 peaked at its then-record close of 1,527.35, on March 24, 2000. The Dow closed at a record of 11,722.98 on Jan. 14, 2000.

NASDAQ HEAVYWEIGHTS:

– Now

Apple is the titan and Microsoft is a distant second with a market value of $356 billion. Google, Amazon and Facebook round out the top five. The top 20, however, also includes Starbucks, pharmacy benefits manager Express Scripts and retailer Costco.

-Then

When the Nasdaq reached its record in 2000, Microsoft was the biggest company in the index. Cisco, Intel, Oracle and Sun Microsystems completed the top five. The biggest 20 companies in the index were in technology or telecommunications.

THE ECONOMY:

– Now

The U.S. economy is slowly recovering from the financial crisis and Great Recession. Even with a slowdown in growth to 2.2 percent in the final quarter of last year, many economists forecast an expansion above 3 percent in 2015. Hiring is picking up and the unemployment rate, now at 5.5 percent, is falling. Economists expect steady, if not spectacular growth.

The Federal Reserve is still trying to bolster growth. Interest rates are close to zero, and while many economists expect that Fed policy makers will start raising rates later this year, the pace of increases is likely to be steady.

-Then

Optimism over the economy was high. The Federal government had recorded its largest budget surplus in nearly 50 years in 1998. At the end of 1999, the U.S. economy grew at a rate of 7.1 percent, and the unemployment rate stood at 4 percent. The first chapter of the Economic Report of the President, published in February of 2000, was entitled “Sustaining a Record-Breaking Expansion.”

The Fed’s benchmark interest rate was at 6 percent, close to its highest in almost a decade.

CORPORATE EARNINGS:

– Now

Company earnings have been rising steadily since the Great Recession and are at record levels. But there are signs that, after six years of growth, they may be starting to stagnate. Earnings per share for the average S&P 500 company are forecast to end 2015 little changed from a year earlier, according to S&P Capital IQ.

-Then

Company earnings surged in 2000. The average S&P 500 company increased its earnings per share by almost 12 percent. The hangover came a year later though, when earnings slumped by 19 percent.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – A Republican state senator is circulating a proposal designed to help make a marijuana byproduct available to treat people with seizures a year after it was legalized but still not accessible.

The Legislature last year passed a bill allowing the use of cannabidiol oil, but no one has been able to legally access it because of various state and federal law hurdles.

Sen. Van Wanggaard of Racine on Thursday asked for support of his measure that would eliminate the requirement that people have a prescription for the oil in order to use it. Under his proposal, people could not be prosecuted simply for possessing the oil.

Seven-year-old Lydia Schaeffer died a month after the bill was signed, never able to access the oil to help treat her severe seizures.

WASHINGTON (AP) – A second ice cream company has shut down production this week after health officials found listeria in a sample of its frozen treats.

Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams of Ohio recalled its frozen products following a similar action by Texas-based Blue Bell Creameries Monday. Blue Bell’s ice cream was linked to 10 listeria illnesses in four states and three deaths.

It wasn’t immediately clear if the recalls are connected. Listeria isn’t commonly found in ice cream, since the bacteria can’t grow at freezing temperatures.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said there are no known illnesses linked to Jeni’s products.

Jeni’s said it is recalling all ice creams, frozen yogurts, sorbets, and ice cream sandwiches and closing retail stores until its products are “ensured to be 100 percent safe.”

(SBG) –  “I came to Pakistan to help my government and I came when most Americans wouldn’t.”

It was one of the last messages Warren Weinstein’s family would receive: a plea for rescue by the U.S. government. Instead, it turns out, it was by U.S. hands, he was killed.

“It is a cruel and bitter truth that in the fog of war, generally and our fight against terrorists specifically, mistakes, sometimes deadly mistakes, can occur,” said President Barack Obama.

In this case, a strike in Pakistan, possibly by drone, targeting al Qaeda leaders. U.S. forces were apparently unaware that 73-year-old Weinstein, an aid worker taken hostage in 2011 and Italian National Giovanni Lo Porto, were at that same location.

“I know that there is nothing that i can ever say or do to ease their heartache,” President Obama said.

How could there be such a mistake? The White House says there were hundreds of hours of surveillance on the compound. But hostages are valuable commodities to the terror groups, and often well hidden.

“As President Obama indicated, this is not a time for excuses, the president says an independent review is underway and i think that’s entirely appropriate, we need all the facts,” said House of Representatives speaker John Boehner.

Further, in the attack and a separate one, two other Americans–Ahmed Farouq who’d become an al Qaeda leader, and well known Adam Gadahn who was a chief spokesman for the group, were also killed. Regarding their deaths, at least one U.S. Senator today said, “they got what they deserved.”

As for the families of Dr. Weinstein and Lo Porto, the White House says they will be compensated for their losses, though, no word on how much that may be.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Google is trying to shake up the wireless phone industry with a low-priced service designed to pressure major carriers into making it more affordable for people to get online and use Google’s services.

The service, called “Project Fi,” debuted Wednesday, about two months after Google revealed its plans to expand its ever-growing empire into providing wireless connections for smartphones.

Google Inc. is selling the basic phone service for $20 a month and will only charge customers for the amount of cellular data that they use each month, instead of a flat rate. Each gigabyte of data will cost $10 a month. That means a customer could sign up for a plan offering three gigabytes of data and get $20 back if only one gigabyte was used in a month.

Most wireless phone carriers allow their customers to roll over unused data into another month of service without refunding any money.

Project Wi-Fi initially will only be sold to a narrow audience that owns the Nexus 6, a smartphone that Motorola Mobility made with Google’s help.

Google’s pricing setup makes Project Fi less expensive than most of the comparable plans offering by the four biggest wireless phone carriers — Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint. The monthly prices for a single line of smartphone service with up to one gigabyte of cellular data at those carriers range from $45 to $50 compared to $30 from Google, before subtracting any potential credits for unused data.

The major carriers, though, offer a variety of family plans that could still be better deals than Project Fi. Those bundled plans allow several phone lines to share a pool of cellular data.

Besides trying to bring down the prices of wireless phone plans, Google is promising subscribers that their Nexus 6 model will automatically connect with the fastest network available.

Rather than building its own network, Google is leasing space on cellular towers built by Sprint and T-Mobile, which are hoping the deals will boost their profits without costing them too many customers tempted to defect to Project Fi. Google is promising Project Fi will automatically switch over to an available Wi-Fi network if that is running at a higher speed than the cellular alternatives.

“As mobile devices continually improve how you connect to people and information, it’s important that wireless connectivity and communication keep pace and be fast everywhere, easy to use, and accessible to everyone,” Nick Fox, the Google executive overseeing Project Fi, wrote in Wednesday blog post.

T-Mobile CEO John Legere, whose company already has been cutting its prices and rolling out new options, said it was a “no-brainer” to work with Google on Project Fi.

“Anything that shakes up the industry status quo is a good thing — for both US wireless customers and T-Mobile,” Legere wrote in a blog post.

Google has an incentive to promote cheaper and faster wireless service because it operates some of the world’s most popular online services, including its search engine, maps, Gmail and YouTube video site. The Mountain View, California, company believes most people will visit those services more frequently if they are enticed to stay online for longer periods, giving Google more opportunities to show the digital ads that generate most of its revenue.

Similar motives prompted Google to begin building high-speed, hard-wired networks capable of navigating the Internet at speeds up to 100 times faster than existing broadband services. Although Google is only selling its broadband service in a handful of U.S. cities so far, AT&T and Comcast are now offering options with comparable speeds in a few communities.

NEW YORK (AP) – Comcast is abandoning its $45.2 billion purchase of Time Warner Cable, according to media reports.

Bloomberg News and The New York Times both said Thursday that the cable company is planning to drop the bid after pushback from regulators. They both cited unidentified people with knowledge of the matter.

Comcast may make an announcement as soon as Friday, Bloomberg said.

Comcast and Time Warner Cable declined to comment.

Combining the No. 1 and No. 2 U.S. cable companies would put nearly 30 percent of TV and about 55 percent of broadband subscribers under one roof. That would give the resulting behemoth unprecedented power over what Americans watch and download.

That has had competitors, consumer groups, and Senators lining up to oppose the deal.

“This is one of those deals where the opponents of the merger have been one of the most vocal I can remember,” said S&P Capital IQ Tuna Amobi.

One concern, for example, is that the company could undermine the streaming video industry by requiring onerous payments from new online-only video providers for connecting to its network. Dish, the satellite TV company behind the new Web video service Sling TV, and Netflix are opposed to the deal.

Another charge is that Comcast hasn’t stuck to conditions imposed on it when it bought NBCUniversal. The company says it has, except for one circumstance when the FCC found it wasn’t promoting a stand-alone Internet service. Comcast says it fixed that.

Pushback against the merger has picked up in the last couple weeks.

Al Franken, D-Minn., along with five other Democratic senators and Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, this week urged the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice to block the merger, saying it would lead to higher prices and fewer choices.

Recent media reports suggested that regulators aren’t going to approve it. On Friday, Bloomberg, citing unidentified people, said Department of Justice staff attorneys were leaning against the deal. The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday said, also citing unidentified people, said that FCC staff recommended that the merger review go to a hearing under an administrative law judge, although no final decision had been made.

The FCC would send the deal to a judge if it didn’t believe it serves the public interest. The company has the right to present its case to the judge. But a trial could take months and even then a decision could be appealed to the FCC.

“It’s a dead end for Comcast,” said Rob McDowell, a former FCC commissioner.

The Justice Department declined to comment. The FCC declined to comment and spokesman Neil Grace said the review is ongoing.

Comcast spokeswoman Sena Fitzmaurice confirmed that company executives met Wednesday with Justice Department and FCC officials. But she would not comment on what occurred during the meetings or what other conversations the company is having with regulators.

If the Comcast-Time Warner Cable deal falls through, a transaction with Charter Communications Inc. aimed to smoothing the way for regulatory approval also falls apart. Charter’s bid for Bright House Networks, which it announced in March, could also be killed.

Many analysts expect that Charter, which lost out on its bid for Time Warner Cable to Comcast, to resurrect its effort if Comcast is rebuffed.

“Other cable deals that don’t involve Comcast might be allowed to go through,” McDowell said. There “seems to be an antipathy towards Comcast at the FCC” because the agency thinks Comcast didn’t stick to the conditions of the NBCUniversal merger, he said.

A combined Charter and Time Warner Cable would have 15 million video customers and 16.5 million Internet customers. That’s still smaller than Comcast alone, which has 22.4 million video subscribers and 22 million Internet customers.

Comcast wanted Time Warner Cable to bulk up on subscribers as it deals with old rivals Dish, DirecTV and Verizon’s FiOS, as well as newer, cheaper online competitors like Netflix. The company had also said the deal would help it cut costs, including for programming – the shows and movies it pipes to subscribers.

But Comcast may have to look overseas for future acquisitions.

“Washington’s concern here is excessive control of broadband in the hands of a single company,” wrote analyst Craig Moffett in a client email. “For all intents and purposes, their M&A ambitions would be on ice in the U.S.”

Burger House 41 in Green Bay has some delicious burgers. We take a look at some of the most popular.

CHATTANOOGA, TN (WTVC-TV) – An animal shelter in Tennessee is caring for three puppies found in a sealed cardboard box outside a Goodwill donation site.

A good samaritan says she went to this goodwill donation site in Chattanooga and saw a box outside that was moving. The box was labeled “stuffed animals.”

She looked inside and found the three young pups barely alive.

Chelsea Fogal from the McKamey Animal Center said, “I think these guys really lucked out that someone, a good samaritan, came along and found them. I think the outcome could have been a lot worse.”

The puppies were malnourished and had to be treated for worms.

Once they are healthy they will be put up for adoption.

The animal shelter is offering a $200 reward for any information leading to the suspect who left the puppies behind.

OSHKOSH – A city man was charged Thursday with first-degree reckless homicide for a heroin overdose death.

Patrick Brown, 33, will make an initial appearance in Winnebago County court today.

Police say a 31-year-old Redgranite man died in February on W. 10th Ave. Autopsy results confirmed the cause of death as heroin toxicity.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – The Wisconsin Supreme Court has upheld the drunken driving conviction in a case where Justice David Prosser withdrew after he or his staff apparently contacted the state crime lab for information.

The court ruled 6-0 on Thursday with Prosser not participating.

The case involved Michael Griep, who was convicted of third offense drunken driving in 2007.

Griep challenged his conviction, arguing that his right to confront a witness was violated because a crime lab supervisor testified about a co-worker’s determination that his blood alcohol level was above the legal limit.

The Supreme Court determined the testimony was allowed under exceptions to the law. It upheld a state appeals court ruling which also agreed with the conviction.