Bob CollinsIt’s only coincidence that on the same day I post about a high school kid giving the finger to a ref in high school soccer’s biggest game of the year, NPR has waded into the waters of the high school classroom and the kids who drop ‘f-bombs’ in class. Read more →
MPR News Reflections and observations on the news
By Bob Collins
Bob Collins retired from Minnesota Public Radio in 2019 after 12 years of writing NewsCut and pointing out to complainants that posts weren’t news stories. A son of Massachusetts, he was a news editor 1992-1998, created the MPR News regional website in 1999, invented the popular Select A Candidate, started several blogs, and every day lamented that his Minnesota Fantasy Legislature project never caught on.
Most morning shows on commercial radio should never be taken too seriously, but apparently an election in Grand Forks could be influenced by a satirical, if juvenile, bit by a local radio station’s shock jocks. Part of the problem, perhaps, is the gullibility of listeners. Read more →
Even Weiss’ reason for not being even a little afraid of the possibility of a terrorist is going to get a lot of urban cyclists around the country cheering. He already deals with everyday automobile drivers, he writes. Read more →
Washington County deputies never expected anything back from the attention they paid to Margo Alice Forrest, who never married, never had kids, lived alone and kept to herself, the Pioneer Press’ Mary Divine writes today. Read more →
Although a high-ranking politician in the United States calls our justice system ‘a joke’, you couldn’t tell it by Minnesota’s approach to drug users. Drug courts work by treating addiction as an illness and steering away from jail users who are willing to put in the time in a more productive way. Read more →
We’re not above poking fun at the state to the east but there’s nothing but love for Wisconsin this morning, which provides us with a needed reminder that decency is still in style. Read more →
It’s really the simple marriage proposals that are the most beautiful. Like Carlos Correa’s. Nothing fancy. Step One: Win the World Series with the Houston Astros. Step Two: Work out a plan with Ken Rosenthal of FoxSports to interview you on national TV. Step Three: Propose. Read more →
A Brainerd hospital is going to test whether it’s possible for a medical facility to treat only the “good” patients and avoid any sort of backlash with the policy. The chances are Essentia Health will succeed at St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Brainerd because it’s refusing to admit patients with little constituency: the severely mentally ill.
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The unusual collision of a radio network’s management and a radio network’s newsroom was heard nationwide on Wednesday when NPR CEO Jarl Mohn was grilled by one of his network’s reporters — Mary Louise Kelly — on why NPR fired its head of news only after the Washington Post blew the whistle on Michael Oreskes’ behavior 20 years ago at the New York Times, when he accosted two women in separate incidents.
It was an unusual, and likely uncomfortable, few minutes as Kelly interrogated her boss. It was unusual for the CEO of an organization to be willing to be grilled so publicly. Read more →
Papa John’s, the official pizza joint of the National Football League, reported this morning that same-store sales increased only 1 percent, while analysts expected it to increase 1.3 percent. Apparently, .3 percent is the toll that the NFL player protest is having on the company. Read more →
John Krenick, of St. Paul, has lost again, and so, too, has everyone trying to store old cars on their own property in violation of Minnesota law. Read more →
Who among us hasn’t thought, ‘my life would be complete if I only had half a bridge to call my own’? Here’s our chance. Read more →
A couple in Wisconsin faced every bride and groom’s nightmare.
Nick Eckes’ mother and grandmother were killed in a wrong-way crash on State 57 in Appleton while on their way to the wedding rehearsal and traditional rehearsal dinner. Read more →
A critics screening is due out in two weeks. Quenemoen isn’t sure he’s got that much time. Read more →
The apologists for sexual harassment were immediately out in force, questioning why NPR should suspend a person for something he did 20 years ago. Even questioning how a man could ‘slip his tongue’ into a woman’s mouth without a little bit of help. Disgusting, anyone? Read more →