Bob Collins
It wasn’t injured; it was curious. You know how owls are. 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.
There are angels who walk among us, an assertion I think MPR reporter John Enger proved yesterday in his story about John and Cindy Ness, the Bemidji couple who could’ve ignored the plight of babies who are born addicted to opioids. Read more →
Surely there can be little doubt by now that using a cellphone while driving isn’t safe no matter how much we try to convince ourselves we’re different.
The brain has a hard time doing two things at once and this was true even when cellphones were just phones. Read more →
It’s in Hunk of Beef, manufactured by Evanger’s Dog Food and sold in Washington, California, Minnesota, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, Maryland, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida. Read more →
The main trouble with bad stories with happy endings is they quite often become happy stories with bad endings. Such is the story today of Jeff Bauman, whom you may remember from the Boston Marathon bombing.
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This guy, who retired at 55 and is letting us know he’s doing great while we’re hunkered down in our cubicle farms. Read more →
Here’s a little guy secret from the Northland:
There isn’t a guy alive around here who doesn’t want to drive a Zamboni.
That’s why Cole Schusted is a lucky guy. Read more →
Stocks go up and stocks go down but the long-term trend has always been in an upward direction. So some public officials think there’s long-term money to be made. Read more →
The host of the Splendid Table is the latest pioneer of public radio locally to exit the stage. Read more →
The convergence of sports and politics is usually an ugly scene and now that President Donald Trump is prepared to exercise the office’s traditional — and incredibly tired — welcoming of a sports team, it’s going to get uglier. Read more →
Twenty-two people crossed from Noyes, Minn., last weekend alone. Another 10 crossed over last week.
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If an Associated Press story today is any indication, some voters in rural Wisconsin are getting tired of hearing about immigration and walls on the border of Mexico.
In his last days, James Wiitamak doesn’t want much. Just a letter from you.
He’s in the VA hospital in St. Cloud and wants so much to hear from people that he took out an ad in the local newspaper.
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It’s been awhile since we’ve had a good screed against Baby Boomers so today Canada’s Maclean’s magazine takes care of that with an essay by ‘former diplomat and social entrepreneur’ Scott Gilmore, who writes that it’s the one group that people should feel OK to revile. Read more →