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.
NSA boss says ‘everybody does it,’ Medicare boss issues the apology of the day, another lawsuit alleging priest abuse in the Twin Cities, ground is broken for a new Surly brewery, a reunion of Superstorm Sandy babies, and the death of the woman who never aged. Read more →
If you were around for the assassination of President Kennedy you may find conflicting feelings about the 50th anniversary.
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Apparently, we have a failure to agree on whether college graduates are as ready to go to work as they think they are.
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A couple of Twin Cities Millennials are getting some love on the Forbes website today for their Theater of Public Policy. Read more →
Profits don’t mean jobs, anymore. That’s the reality of the economy in the 21st century.
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Can the rural grocery even be saved or do people want to shop at the big stores? Plus: The endless debate ends, a broken promise on Obamacare, should LGBT renters be a protected class, the need for shopping takes a bite out of Christmas Eve, and a reward for a parent doing the best she can. Read more →
With the Fitzgerald and the Ordway within a stone’s throw, why does Saint Paul want to renovate the Palace Theatre? Mary has the answer. Also: Abortion laws fall, why it’s hard getting affordable health insurance in SE Minnesota, a plane crash in Princeton kills one, and new research says children who grow up in poverty have smaller brains.
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The law is an anti-abortion effort that has been tried in several states, usually with the same result: They’re ruled unconstitutional.
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Once again we in Minnesota have prematurely reached the stage of the football season where the only Super Bowl-related discussion still worth having is about the Super Bowl commercials. Read more →
Baseball is using the World Series to highlight some great causes. Read more →
We seeing the beginning of the exit of some familiar voices from NPR as the public radio organization cuts 10 percent of its staff because of financial tough times. Read more →
The call of the green in the Oil Patch, do your trust your teenage driver, the stuff people try to sneak onto planes, how 35,000 people comforted a dying man, and more proof that kids are alright. Read more →
As near as we’ve been able to tell, Daniel Alvarez, the onetime corporate lawyer who chucked it all to kayak from Minnesota to Key West, got there in March and decided to kayak back, has made it back to the Northwest Angle.
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It’s a fine line the Boston Red Sox have been walking in recent months with its emphasis on ‘Boston Strong,’ the rallying cry of the city in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing. Read more →
One of my favorite readers has submitted this obituary from the Rapid City Journal for our continuing series, ‘The Art of the Obit,’ which highlights those obituaries that break the cliche and chronicle the life of the deceased in a more human way. It doesn’t get more human, perhaps, than a young woman who drank herself to death. Read more →
Bob Collins