Bob CollinsMy mother, now 92 years old, spends many of her days reading the letters sent her during World War II — love letters, I presume, since they’d only been married a few months when he headed to Europe. They are bundled and tied with ribbons, and when she finishes reading them, she starts at the Read more →
MPR News Reflections and observations on the news
As of this afternoon, Zack Danger Brown, the man who started a Kickstarter campaign to raise money by promising to make potato salad, owes $21,000. That’s the conclusion of the Tax Foundation. In its blog post today, the group considers the over $70,000 people have thrown at Brown so far: We will cap the amount Read more →
Noisey, the digital music channel, has made a stop in Minneapolis for the third installment (after Seattle and Denver) of its Made in America series. And although we did spend five minutes contemplating loitering outside Paisley Park like a stalker, there’s so much more to the area than “purfiying yourself in the waters of Lake Read more →
We have noted in this space for many years the silly tendency of TV reporter to want to stand in water to tell the story of a flood (a tendency, it’s worth noting, that seemed sparse in the recent floods in Minnesota). A Phoenix reporter took it to a new level with the recent haboob.
There’s nothing wrong with the world that a little more romping in mud can’t cure. Read more →
What comes to your mind when you read this description of articles of clothing, now banned at a Minneapolis bar? – Flat-billed hats – Large chains – Sleeveless under shirts – Long white T-shirts – Athletic apparel – Sports jerseys without collars – Excessively baggy clothing “You might as well say, ‘No black folks allowed,’” Read more →
Soccer is called “the beautiful game,” because “the game that rips your heart out, stomps on your gut, and leaves your country humiliated in the eyes of the sports world” just doesn’t have the same ring to it. Read more →
Let the word go forth, airline pilots: Captain Gerhard Brandner has raised the bar. His Frontier Airlines flight to Denver was diverted because of thunderstorms the other night and as he sat on the ground in Cheyenne, he decided to order some pizza for himself. He also ordered 49 more pizzas for all his passengers. Read more →
Kayden Elijah,2, and his kiddie delight is providing a collective lift for the rest of us, thanks to this video which has swept the InterTubes in the last day or so. He had to have a foot and leg amputated because he was born with an omphalocele, which leaves organs to grow outside the navel. Read more →
It’s hard to see how the Star Tribune will be a better newspaper without the experience that is about to walk out the door. Roughly a dozen-and-a-half staffers have taken voluntary buyouts and will be leaving the newspaper. The Newspaper Guild said the departing members have 586 years of newspaper experience. Many of them are Read more →
We are not challenged anywhere near enough by journalists to remember that there are more victims of this violence than the ones who die. There’s the person who has to look into the eyes of a dying kid, too. Read more →
As expected, NPR is ending its relationship with its ombudsman, Edward Schumacher-Matos. His contract expires at the end of the month and isn’t being renewed. His demise was nearly a foregone conclusion since his astonishing seven-part “investigation” into NPR’s series on the removal of Native American children from their homes in South Dakota, an investigation Read more →
Zack Danger Brown is getting a lot of hate for thinking of something everyone else wishes they’d thought of first.
Brown apparently understands that with Kickstarter, the money donation website, people will throw money at you if everyone else is too, no matter how stupid the campaign.
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Shifting the blame to the people is a time-honored tradition of a stagnant country. Read more →
Andrew Rector says his life has been ruined since he caught up on some sleep at a Yankees-Red Sox game in April.
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