Bob Collins
Many people in Boston apparently haven’t had enough snow yet. What’s wrong with them? 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.
The efforts of Pioneer Press reporter Mara Gottfried to help find the family of a homeless vet who froze to death in a St. Paul park is the type of story to make you want to call that relative with whom you’ve lost touch. Read more →
But yesterday’s announcement is type that sends shivers down the spine of working stiffs. The good times only last so long, and any of us can be next. Read more →
When Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson and pilot Roger Peterson died in the February 1959 plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa while enroute to Fargo, the Civil Aeronautics Board ruled the cause was pilot error and weather. Another pilot, L.J. Coon is getting some attention in the news today, telling the Read more →
Not every love story can have a happy ending.
Rebekah Gregory, 27, and Pete DiMartino, 30, were married 10 months ago. Read more →
The day might yet come when we tire of KARE 11 storyteller Boyd Huppert’s tales of the friendship of 90-year-old Erling Kindem and 4-year-old Emmett Rychner.
Let the record show: That day is not today. Read more →
A Los Angeles-area high school girls basketball team has been disqualified from a postseason tournament because it wore uniforms to call attention to breast cancer research.
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The most interesting statistic in this year’s concealed carry report: There was not a single case of a gun permitted under the carry law being used for self-defense. Read more →
Professional athletes may make plenty of money, but how much would you take to live without your child? Read more →
A house on Colfax Avenue in Minneapolis that had seen its better days is gone now. The 122-year-old ‘Orth House’ has been demolished despite attempts by some preservationists to save it.
But the Facebook war surrounding it goes on, providing a bit of lesson on how legions can get carried away in social network battles. Read more →
The Forbes list of the world’s richest people leads us to wonder: Is Minnesota ever going to have a billionaire not named MacMillan, Carlson, Hubbard or Taylor? Read more →
An Iowa man has ‘one upped’ the story of the Detroit man who walked 21 miles a day to get to his job.
Steve Simoff’s daily journey is 35 miles along I-35. Read more →
Google set up a zip wire in the Amazon rainforest to capture new 360-degree images of the trees from root to tip.
The results are stunning: A ‘street view’ look inside the jungle.
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The Three Stooges made comedy by poking fun at Hitler. Is ISIS/ISIL off limits?
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Another anti-war group has given up. Read more →