Iowa State Fair to let public vote on Michael Jackson butter sculpture

The following article appeared in the Des Moines Register on July 8, 2009

The Michael Jackson dairy debate continues: The Iowa State Fair today announced that it will let the public vote on whether the recently deceased King of Pop will be part of its 2009 array of butter sculptures, alongside the iconic butter cow.
"The Iowa State Fair appreciates the input of hundreds of people who have voiced their opinions, both positive and negative, on the issue of including Michael Jackson as a companion element in the 2009 moonwalk butter sculpture," the fair said in a statement.

"The ongoing discussion has created a lot of, well, 'churn,' " Gary Slater, the fair's manager and chief executive, added in his own statement.

OMG. Butter humor?

Lori Chappell, the fair's marketing director, said, "A lot of people are pretty passionate about the fair." While this year likely marks the height of fair butter sculpture controversy, she said, there was a minor flap over the role of religion in 1999 when former sculptor Duffy Lyon chose to carve "The Last Supper" for her 40th year at work in the refrigerated display case in the Agricultural Building.

The 2009 butter sculpture will celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon mission and Neil Armstrong's walk on the lunar surface on July 20, 1969. The sculpture will include an astronaut, an American flag, the surface of the moon and, depending on the public vote, Michael Jackson in recognition of his "moonwalk" dance step.

OMG again. Using the 'moonwalk' to create a tie in?

The online poll will be conducted at http://www.iowastatefair.org/ from July 9 through 3 p.m. July 16. Final results will be released July 17.

Each user will be allowed to vote only once and to that end will submit an e-mail address and ZIP code. The poll, however, will not be restricted to Iowa ZIP codes.

View local newscast video of this story "here". Besides searching for the poll at the state fair site KCCI has the poll up on their home page.

Please take the time to vote this thing down. The Michael Jackson love fest really needs to end. Yeah, sure he made music that people enjoyed. (Myself included) But enough already, so many people are capatalizing off of his death it makes me ill. I can only imagine that one year from now there could be another memorial concert to honor him again.

Much more respect has been given to other recent celebrity deaths. May they rest in peace.

KoKo Taylor 80
Ed McMahon 86
Farrah Fawcett 62
Billy Mays 50
Gayle Storm 87
David Carradine 72
Huey Long 105
Karl Malden 97 (Karl died? When was this reported?)