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This is 100 percent factual
Got an unpopular or atypical worldview you’d like to advance without actual evidence? Try this. Say something crazy. Then say: “This is 100 percent factual.” Watch how it works. “Our drinking water is full of nanobots that make men impotent. This is 100 percent factual.” OR “American women have been subjected to mind control by…
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The weekly social report
What the heck? Here’s a link to a story about a party written by a newspaper’s legislative correspondent. The Ranger Party, a celebrated annual tradition at the State Capitol, was Monday night. I didn’t mention it yesterday because when you write from a woodland bunker on the actual Iron Range, every night is a Ranger…
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Beavers on cable news!
One of the fun things about being a quaint rural person in a quaint rural place is seeing how big media covers stories occurring near you when something happens. For instance, the Bemidji State Beavers hockey team is in the Frozen Four of NCAA hockey. Even though they are not from a major city! Rather,…
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Water Wars
This Duluth News Tribune op/ed by Rolf Westgard details the most underrated issue northern Minnesota will face in the next century: our water. We’ve got it. The world needs it. This could be a problem. Read the full text. Related posts: No related posts.
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I’ve got the munchies just thinking about it
From today’s Hibbing Daily Tribune, under the headline “North Hibbing, high school used for film“: HIBBING — North Hibbing and Hibbing High School were recently used as settings for a film depicting how time is a “human conception.” And how, no matter how hard one tries, the past cannot be physically revisited. Or, can it?…
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Ay, Oh, let’s snow!
Here it goes again. A foot of snow possible through tomorrow. Related posts: No related posts.
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Punch that @&%$# kid in the &^%$^ face!
In Proctor, parents are up in arms over a move to bus children of all ages on the same routes. Concerns include safety and inappropriate language by older kids. As a rural kid, I spent two hours a day on the bus. And yes, I got hit on the head with a skateboard once and…
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News from the equinox
This is my weekly column for the Sunday, March 29, 2009 edition of the Hibbing Daily Tribune. A version of this piece will air on next week’s “Between You and Me,” Saturday morning on 91.7 KAXE. News from the equinox By Aaron J. Brown Last week we welcomed the spring equinox. Note that I did…
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Passing the buck
Marshall Helmberger’s Sunday editorial in the Timberjay papers (Ely, Cook, Orr and Tower) should make some waves in the state budget debate. He lays out a compelling argument against the stopgap methods the governor hopes to use to plug the state budget deficit. My only addition is that budget disasters like the one we have…
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Watching the water
Looks like things are in a holding pattern in Fargo. Kudos to everyone who worked so hard getting those sandbags up. The cold weather is slowing down the flooding, but this could be a long couple of weeks for our western friends. I have a counterpart writing an “underground” alternative voice for the Fargo area.…
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Don’t be demagogin’
Wanna see an editorial about the ongoing debate over booster seats in Minnesota that contains this phrase: Come on, this issue is open for debate. Don’t demagogue it. AND this phrase? While we do not doubt the sincerity of the sponsors of the bill to provide another layer of safety for children, we find it…
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Changes coming to Iron Range medical sector?
The St. Mary’s/Duluth Clinic health system is entering talks with officials at Fairview University Medical Center Mesabi over ways to collaborate on the Iron Range. This Mesabi Daily News story shows the perspective of health care officials in Virginia about the possibility. I kind of get a “Poland 1939” feel off the article, but maybe…
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What’s with the guy in the green shirt?
Last week I detailed my first-ever Twin Cities book tour and teased the fact that some finagling friends snuck (sneaked?) me onto the House floor for a photo. Forgive the self-indulgence but here it is, fresh from the mail: From left to right, House Majority Leader Tony Sertich (I served on his first campaign), me…
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State Park? Try again, chumps!
U.S. Steel has halted negotiations with the state to turn a large swath of its lands on Lake Vermilion into a new state park. They will now pursue private development of the land. Rich people win again. They’re like the Yankees. Related posts: No related posts.
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Essar remains focused on Range project, despite continued questions
The Duluth News Tribune joins in analyzing those cryptic comments from the chairman of the Essar Group in that Indian newspaper. The question is how Essar Steel can finance a project the size of their proposed Nashwauk mine and steel mill in this economy. The company remains insistent that they are building the project. I’ll…