News Net Survey says that Gov. Scott Walker could have presidential potential

Since sifting through dull newspapers, hyperbolic blogs, and overflowing RSS feeds for meaningful news can be an arduous process, News Net catches and compiles both the amusing and the significant reports that were overlooked over the workweek. Here are some things to think about as the weekend begins.

• A recent phone survey by Public Policy Polling found that Gov. Scott Walker’s favorability among Republican voters was 55 percent positive and 11 percent negative, giving him a spread of 44. That score pushes him ahead of the other major players for the party’s 2012 nomination, like Sarah Palin (40), Mike Huckabee (42), and Newt Gingrich (19), the lat of whom Stephen Colbert called a “Cabbage Patch Adult.” There’s still a ways to go, but: President Scott Walker. Think about that shit for a minute.

• Madison city officials have unlocked the secret to getting more entertainment venues downtown: alcohol. The city’s Alcohol License And Review Committee gave the thumbs-up to a plan allowing seven new entertainment venue licenses, with each one being allowed to rake in no more than 65 percent of its revenue from alcohol sales. Also businesses with exceptional circumstances licenses can now blast their booze peddling from 25 to 50 percent. For those keeping track at home, that means like 6000 percent more alcohol downtown now. Woo! Oh, and some more shows, probably.

• Blue Cheddar reports that grumpy old state Sen. Glenn Grothman got a mighty love squeeze put on him as he exited the M&I Bank on Main Street downtown this past Tuesday. The one-man hugging machine did not know the senator, according to the police report, but simply hugged him because “[he] loved him” and the suit Grothman was wearing reminded him of the one he wore when he worked in insurance. Sir Hugs-a-lot also claimed to be a “peace walker” who trekked from Las Vegas, and he inquired into the officer’s knowledge of Snoop Dogg.

• If zombies are looking for some good brains to eat, why would they be lurching toward the Capitol? Hey-o! But seriously, folks, the living dead may lack the vital gray matter to compose an opinion on Wisconsin’s current collective bargaining rights battle, but that’s not going to stop them from marching up State Street and carrying clever signs. If you want to join the undead horde of 733 who’ve already registered their RSVPs on the event’s Facebook group page, get your tattered rags, face paint, and blood capsules, and be in front of Urban Outfitters at 1 p.m. on April 2.

• Finally, here’s an adorable representation of the turmoil at the Capitol, rendered in Peeps just in time for the approaching Easter holiday.