Bob CollinsGeoff Fearns, 59, is no slouch when it comes to big money. He’s president of TriPacific Capital Advisors, with a half-billion dollars of real estate holdings. But when he needed to give up a seat, he was just another little person on a big airline. 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.
It was on this date in 1945 that Buchenwald, the Nazi concentration camp, was liberated by soldiers from the 6th Armored Division of the Third Army.
Edward R. Murrow faced the task of telling the story of Buchenwald with no tape recorded audio, no fancy production, just words. Read more →
Surely there’s a way to characterize Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons without suggesting that Hitler set a certain standard for depravity. Read more →
Bertram Boyum worked on a farm for 15 years but decided he wanted to do something different with his life. He started doing auctions at a church bazaar. That’s when an aunt told him a person could make a buck or two in the business. Read more →
Bottom line? If you’ve got a past you don’t want dredged up, get off the plane.
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Orin Doty, who died late last month, provides today’s quote worth remembering: ‘One person doing something is better than a thousand people doing nothing.’ Read more →
When is soon too soon in social media marketing that uses the worst day a man had as the foundation of a Twitter joke? Two brands are testing the question; one has already conceded defeat. Read more →
Minnesota’s 2014 teacher of the year isn’t interested in being the poster boy for people who oppose the last-in-first-out system of teacher layoffs, even though he’s gotten his layoff notice. Read more →
The mother and grandparents of a Montgomery, Minn., woman has been charged with falsely reporting her ‘missing,’ the Mankato Free Press reports. Read more →
The Supreme Court has held that asking someone for a urine sample is a search and, therefore, needs a warrant from a judge.
What happens if a person can’t or won’t provide a sample even with a warrant?
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Some NBA cities are getting all jazzed up for the excitement of the NBA playoffs.
And then there’s Minneapolis, where the local team has missed the playoffs for a 13th consecutive year. Read more →
It’s not at all surprising that emails obtained after a university fired a reporter revealed that an “ethical lapse” of not identifying herself to politicians who were embarrassed by her accurate reporting wasn’t really the sole reason she lost her job.
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United Airlines, the anti-leggings airline, isn’t above asking police to drag people off a plane if it wants to give the seat to someone else.
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There’s a fair chance the state government will shut down this spring and when/if it does, trust me, the bathrooms are the first to go. They’re always the first to go. Read more →
There are worse ways to start a Monday than being reminded that whistling is still a thing. Read more →