Get out from under the spell, Sandra

August 21, 2015

I have not written anything new for some time, to the satisfaction of many, no doubt, and the disappointment of, I hope, a few. There are excuses I could offer — and plausible ones, at that — but the truth is that I haven’t found much of interest in the local news, anyway. That is, until Brandon […]

by Steve Timmer

On comments: Welcome, David Schultz

June 19, 2015

A few days ago, Hamline professor David Schultz published his first commentary here: Whatever happened to the liberal Democrats? You should read it if you haven’t. Read it again if you have. There were comments to David’s piece, uniformly positive, and remarking how he would spiff the place up. I got emails from readers, too, to […]

by Steve Timmer

The trouble with family courts

June 3, 2015

Have you ever had someone come and ask your opinion about something, or to help him or her solve a problem, and then when you do, he or she turns on you and claims you’re wrong, and it’s all your fault? Mediating a tiff between your kids is a particularly good way to wind up in this situation; sometimes they […]

by Steve Timmer

Michelle’s pitch for martyrdom

May 1, 2015

You might learn something, or not

by Steve Timmer

Four persons of interest

April 29, 2015

I don’t know about the rest of you, my friends, but I have been absolutely riveted by Michael Brodkorb’s efforts to get to the bottom of the disappearance of Samantha and Gianna Rucki, missing now for two years. Interest in the case was revived by the Strib’s Brandon Stahl’s recent article about the disappearance of the […]

by Steve Timmer

Did you bring your toothbrush, Mr. Nathan?

April 29, 2015

If you read Brandon Stahl’s story in the Strib a week ago about the two missing teenage girls from Lakeville, and attorney Michelle MacDonald’s representation of the mother of the girls, or the story here remarking about the eerie equanimity with which the mother, Sandra Grazzini-Rucki, and her attorney bear the continued disappearance of the […]

by Steve Timmer

Do you know where the girls are, Michelle?

April 24, 2015

Just about the time you think the case of attorney Michelle MacDonald couldn’t get any stranger, you are proven wrong. MacDonald, the Republican candidate for the Minnesota Supreme Court in the election last November, is in the news again in a Strib story running under the hed “Lakeville sisters still missing two years after parents’ […]

by Steve Timmer

The Cycle of Corporate Abuse

April 4, 2015

On mining’s toxic relationship with the Iron Range.

by Jennifer Tuder

Mourning opportunities lost IV

November 28, 2014

This series is turning into a regular thing. Even I’m getting tired of the graphic. There was a commentary in the Strib this morning (Friday, November 28th) about another failure that should be attributed to the DFL-controlled Legislature in 2013-14: stable and adequate transportation funding. It’s a commentary by Adam Platt, the executive editor of Twin […]

by Steve Timmer

Mourning opportunities lost III

November 21, 2014

I. In the first two installments of the story (here and here), I discussed the systemic political failure of the DFL-controlled Legislature to pass electioneering and disclosure legislation. Another such failure was not passing the Quie judicial retention election plan and putting it on the ballot for voters. Presently, judges run for re-election, against an opponent, if […]

by Steve Timmer

Waiting for Dario, question 5

August 25, 2014

The gasoline tax

by Steve Timmer

Blurry language of Jeff Johnson

August 24, 2014

Out of focus language blurs what Johnson is about and he’s looking for a leading role

by Jeff Wilfahrt