Bob Collins
Demographics aside, surely there must still be a place on the radio for his work. 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.
Jimmy Breslin, perhaps the most famous of the New York tabloid columnists, died on Sunday. He was 88. A legend. The nation’s newspapers don’t do legends anymore. Read more →
A group of students at the University of Minnesota Duluth could’ve spent spring break doing what so many other college students do — partying. They had bigger goals. They wanted to learn more about the history of civil rights in America. Read more →
It happened to the Pleasant Run Panther Bots, who had just won the competition near Indianapolis, the Indianapolis Star reports. Two on the team are African American, three are Latino. After they won, students and parents reportedly told them to ‘Go back to Mexico.’ Read more →
Perhaps the best time to have a funeral is while we’re still alive. Read more →
Because it’s Friday, that’s why. Read more →
Using Google today? The cops may be watching. Read more →
Exhale, Clinton, Minn., — population 433 — your cafe survives. Read more →
Twenty-five years ago today, I showed up at Minnesota Public Radio for my first job interview. I knew nothing, really, about Minnesota other than Hubert Humphrey, Gene McCarthy, Walter Mondale, Garrison Keillor, and a meatpacker strike that killed a classmate who was covering it for ABC News. I wasn’t sure if the fact that I Read more →
StoryCorps’ Friday morning episode today provides some great advice: If you want results, dress like a leprechaun. Read more →
These are tough times in the nation’s breadbasket. Commodity prices are down, and when a wildfire swept through sections of Kansas a little over a week ago, it devastated entire farm communities and killed livestock.
So a Minnesota woman is sending hay. Read more →
The obvious question: Who owns the current record for the largest game of Twister? It depends on how you calculate it. Read more →
A family of color in Delano is moving out after being targeted with racial epithets on their home. Read more →
The old-timers who served in World War II tended not to talk about what they did. Too bad, because it deprived families from a fuller picture of their lives. Read more →
It is a given problem in small-town America that the best and the brighest get out as soon as they can. They head for the city to make their future while their hometowns — rural America — decline. The role of college professors, J.D. Vance, author of Hillbilly Elegy, notes in an op-ed in the Read more →