Category Archives: Uncategorized

The prisoners are held without criminal charges. They work for a dollar a day or less, sometimes only for a candy bar. Some report being threatened with solitary confinement if they don’t report for “voluntary” work. It’s happening right here, in private U.S. prisons and in some county jails, according to a report in the New York Times: Continue reading →

Back in the day, before we were married, my husband and I went for long walks at night — the only free time we had in common, and also lovely and romantic. I always noticed footsteps behind us, anyone approaching and, in general, who was in the vicinity at all times. He didn’t. We talked about what shaped our different awareness / alertness / fear levels. Continue reading →

Remember that graduation speech meme that goes, “Shoot for the moon! Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.” It’s pretty gag-worthy, both for its appalling misstatement of astronomy and for the triteness of the metaphor. Turns out it’s also advice that most college students can’t afford to take. Instead of shooting for the moon (or the stars), they’re more likely to shoot for the biggest salary they can find, so they can pay the student loan debt.  Continue reading →

Minneapolis is celebrating passing the 400,000 resident mark — 400,938 according to this week’s reports. St. Paul is pushing on toward 300,000 — at 296,542, we have just a few thousand to go! That’s big growth for both cities from their 1980-90 low points, though both have a way to go to get back to the numbers of their 1970 glory days.   Continue reading →

Get thee to a cemetery — it’s Decoration Day again. Whether you observe the federal holiday on Monday or the traditional date (Sunday, May 31), this is the week to take flowers to cemeteries, brush the grass clippings or dust from grave markers, and talk about the dead as you poke plastic flowers into the rain-softened earth. Continue reading →

Remember Professor Shannon Gibney at MCTC? She’s been officially un-reprimanded! Continue reading →

UPDATED 5/23 — see below:

Race in the news this week: long story from Ta-Nehisi Coates in The Atlantic, and shorter story from Nekima Levy-Pounds in the Strib, taking on White Privilege: The Elephant in Minnesota’s Living Room. Coates, in a tour de force, makes a case for reparations —”Two hundred fifty years of slavery. Ninety years of Jim Crow. Sixty years of separate but equal. Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.” Continue reading →

Computers, wi fi, the internet — our schools are lagging far behind what they need in these tools for 21st century life and education. A series of articles from the Hechinger Report outline where we are falling short. Continue reading →

Guilty and charged, NPR’s devastating series on the criminal injustice system, describes the insanity of charging court fees to indigent defendants and then sending them to jail for failing to pay. Continue reading →

Jill Abramson, executive editor of the New York Times, was fired on May 9. Why? While neither Abramson nor publisher Arthur O. Sulzberger, Jr. gave much explanation, plenty of other people jumped in to offer explanations that centered on gender. Continue reading →