Free Republic

t the time of this writing, COVID-19 is the leading cause of death in the United States. There is ample reason to hope that the vaccines now beginning to arrive will soon knock the coronavirus off that morbid perch. Nothing will bring back the loved ones we’ve lost to the pandemic, but at least we’ll be worrying about our old familiar foes — heart disease, for example, and cancer. And guns. Gun violence remains one of the more potent threats to U.S. public health. Firearms play a role in most of the murders committed in the United States each year,...

<p>Former Gov. Jesse Ventura would trim support from both Sen. Norm Coleman and Coleman's DFL challenger, Al Franken, if he were to enter the U.S. Senate race, a Survey USA poll has found.</p>

After three days of closed door meetings — so closed that the principals had to sign confidentiality agreements —Star Tribune management and labor just issued a joint statement about the discussions. There's not a ton new, though some previous themes were underlined and emphasized. Publisher and part-owner Chris Harte terms the paper's revenue decline "precipitous." Strib brand strong; online growing but not money-maker The good news, such as it is, is that the Strib still has a far-reaching brand — here, print declines are outweighed by online gains — but the company cannot monetize it. To put it in memo-speak,...

Those pesky conservative suburbanites and their market forces! They'll be the ruin of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, bellows Anonymous. Hugh Hewitt and Ed Morrissey have taken on the unattributed complaints of a self-described Star-Tribune ("Strib") veteran, who laments that his beloved paper is becoming a right-wing shill for, gasp, hiring a token conservative opinion columnist.: The Rake, a local alternative newspaper here in the Twin Cities, published an interesting cri de coeur from "one Strib veteran" about the direction of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. The anonymous attribution wears thin in the first line of the quote: As one Strib veteran tells the...

UM EL-NASSER, GAZA STRIP -- On the sandy hillside at the edge of this village, Palestinian children tumble and slide in the billowing dust beneath a camouflage-draped Israeli army post that guards three nearby Jewish settlements. "Every time our children play along that road, we worry," said Ali Abu Klaik, 50, who raised 14 children here and saw a 15th die. Once the Israelis "are all gone, God willing, this place will be better." From this battered town at the northern end of the Gaza Strip to a wind-blown refugee camp 24 miles away on the Egyptian border, the 1.3...

MINNEAPOLIS — Lots of newspapers lose lawsuits. But the $625,000 jury verdict against a small suburban newspaper has gotten the attention of media-watchers. The Chanhassen Villager was hauled into court over an editorial about an elected official — the sort of thing where newspapers usually have wide latitude. “This would probably bankrupt two-thirds of the newspapers in the state of Minnesota,” said Mark Anfinson, attorney for the chain of small papers sto which the Villager belongs and for many other smaller papers. Attorneys for the Villager aren’t claiming that the Villager itself is in jeopardy. Media attorney Paul Hannah, who...

WASHINGTON, D.C.--Carmen Bakken, 88, of Cambridge, Minn., proved her party loyalty this year when she got a stream of fundraising letters from the National College Republicans. She sent 91 checks totaling $42,985. Told of the extent of her donations, she said, "Oh, my goodness! I don't think I gave so much. I don't remember the name College Republicans. I thought what I gave to was a national Republican company." Similar accounts from other senior citizens in Minnesota and nationwide have put Eric Hoplin, the St. Olaf College graduate who chairs the College Republican National Committee, on the defensive about its...

It's the list of the 50 Worst Rock Songs Ever — and it surely must be authoritative, because it comes from Blender magazine! You know, BLENDER? So I'm not the only one who doesn't read it. Good. Anyway, Blender names the worst rock hit in human history. It's "We Built This City (on Rock 'n Roll)" by Starship. Good choice. To assert that one can build a city on rock 'n' roll is simply bad urban theory. It is safe to say that rock 'n' roll provides an insufficient means of providing the infrastructure necessary for a large urban environment....

For the past three years, no matter how monstrous the Palestinian attack on Israeli civilians, the Minneapolis Star Tribune has consistently refused to apply the word 'terrorism.' One of the paper's editors explained their 'evenhanded' position in February, 2002: "In the case of the term 'terrorist,' other words -- 'gunman,' 'separatist' and 'rebel,' for example -- may be more precise and less likely to be viewed as judgmental. We also take extra care to avoid the term 'terrorist' in articles about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict because of the emotional and heated nature of that dispute." Now, suddenly, the largest paper in...

day dream toy? Modern-day BB gun is no such thing Rebecca Thoman Published December 12, 2003 A boy's Christmas wish list that includes BB or pellet guns is a parent's worst nightmare. One look at contemporary pellet guns, named and modeled after their grown-up counterparts, the Uzi semiautomatic or the Magnum .44, should convince any parent that these "toys" are not what they used to be. Modern BB guns are nothing like the wooden-stock rifles of 1938, the kind yearned for by Ralphie in the holiday classic, "A Christmas Story." Eighty percent of BB guns on the market today attain...

<p>Courtney Dicmas showed up with her tenor sax on the streets of south Minneapolis on Sunday and took her place among the people and puppets that became the 29th May Day parade.</p> <p>For a mile they marched through stiff winds and cold, winding up at Powderhorn Park, where hundreds of spectators sat huddled under umbrellas and welcomed spring -- spring? -- to the Twin Cities through the good offices of the sponsoring In the Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre.</p>