Bob Collins
Mayor Betsy Hodges gave voice to the unspoken but hinted assertion that’s been percolating a bit on social media since the demonstrations started at Minneapolis’ 4th precinct police headquarters the other night. 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.
Next week, NewsCut will observe its eighth birthday and I can’t think of a worse week for defining who we are as a people by the news we make.
So here. Take a break from it. Read more →
As impressed as we are with the intelligence of pigeons, we are equally as impressed that in the world of academia, someone wondered whether they could help detect cancer. Read more →
It probably seemed like a good idea at the time for a first-year teacher in Utah who was trying to teach kids why people are lured into terrorism. Read more →
For people who don’t have cable TV, or who want to watch baseball games online even if they do, few rules were as frustrating as Major League Baseball’s blackout of local teams.
Fans could drop $120 for MLB’s streaming package, but if you tried to watch the Twins anywhere near the Twin Cities, the games were black out. It was a nod to Fox, which owns the local TV rights to half of MLB’s teams. It was a great deal if you followed out-of-market teams, but not so much if you were like most fans. Read more →
There is no place in America where people are safe from the racists among us. Read more →
What does it mean to defend the right to free speech on a college campus? The question has been analyzed for several years, mostly surrounding the choice of speakers — as was the case this month at the University of Minnesota — but rarely does it involve a truck. Read more →
Jeff Bradley used to be somebody, he says. He was a sportswriter. He covered the Yankees for the Newark Star Ledger. He wrote for ESPN the Magazine. He’s had his work featured in Sports Illustrated
But when he was laid off, he became more like the rest of of the somebodies in America who can’t find work even as they’re told the economy is zipping right along and unemployment is low.
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Prince has canceled his appearance at a concert in Europe, but Bob Dylan went ahead with his in Italy last night after he got another dozen armed guards assigned to the security force, International Business Times reports. Read more →
P.F. Sloan, who died on Sunday, penned one of the most famous protest songs in history. Then he disappeared. Read more →
Today’s Star Tribune letter to the editor relays the horror of being the subject of a news feature in today’s social media environment.
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There is value, of course, to the social media of participants, who now have the freedom to raise voices previously muzzled.
But it has not yet eclipsed — not nearly so — the value of a courageous storyteller.
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If you haven’t seen this video in your Facebook feed, you will.
‘In the Now,’ the Russia Today weekly program, says it doesn’t know who the man was who stood in the middle of Paris with a sign that asked, ‘Do you trust me?’ Read more →
Despite a rejection of a Student Association resolution calling for a campus-wide moment of recognition on 9/11, the University of Minnesota today said it intends to honor victims of the attacks each year.
The U of M news release today responded to news reports about the Student Association’s vote, which came after MSA representative and Director of Diversity and Inclusion David Algadi said it might inflame anti-Muslim sentiment. But it reaffirmed a statement from the Minnesota Student Association which said the resolution was voted down because of uncertainty about the logistics of a campus-wide moment of recognition. Read more →
We acknowledge up front that we’re just guessing, but we can’t imagine anything that could enrage terrorists more than the beauty a civilized mind can provide in response. Read more →