[thelist] blockquote validation question

Greetings gang,

Small question about BLOCKQUOTE in XHTML Strict.

I've got a question for the semanticists here. (Is that a word? Yes it is!)

<blockquote>Whatever you're quoting</blockquote> is incorrect
<blockquote><p>Whatever you're quoting</p></blockquote> is correct.

The error the validator returns is: text is not allowed here; try wrapping
the text in a more descriptive container.

Why do we need a <p> tag within the <blockquote>?

Thanks.
-marc