Commentary
America’s public schools seldom bring rich and poor together — and MLK would disapprove
More than five decades after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., many carry on his legacy through the struggle for racially integrated schools. Yet as King put it in a 1968 speech, the deeper struggle was “for genuine equality, which means economic equality.” Justice in education would demand not just racially integrated schools, but […]
Daily Reformer: Klobuchar’s trouble on the home front
Good afternoon! Happy early voting day! Read Aaron Booth’s Minnesota presidential primary primer, filled with recent polling and data-rich maps. It should give you a decent idea of the state’s current political profile, especially on the DFL side, which is where all the primary action is. A side note: Aaron is a sharp but entirely […]
The answer to refugee-baiting? Minnesotanness.
I often joke that my graduate studies in anthropology became a life skill when I moved to Minnesota. The classic tools of the discipline — where one is traught to observe, analyze, and come to conclusions about often “exotic” other cultures — prepared me well for Life Among the Minnesotans. Some aspects of Minnesotanness will […]
Daily Reformer: Biden’s Irish grief & Gazelka lets his hair down
Good morning! Exclusive on the Reformer: Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka gave an interview in November to Andrew Wommack, a televangelist with very conservative politics who makes all sorts of faith healing claims, including that his child rose from the dead cuz prayer. Anyway, Gazelka, who comes across as an avuncular, gentle soul around the […]
Daily Reformer: Klobuchar takes credit for Minnesota civic activism
Good morning! New this morning: In an unsurprising hit to the presidential campaign of Sen. Amy Klobuchar, TakeAction Minnesota has endorsed Sen. Bernie Sanders for president. The lefty grassroots groups boasts 50,000 members — a strong army of volunteers for Sanders campaign here. The Dems debated with less than 3 weeks until Iowa. No one […]
Price transparency alone won’t keep health care costs down
Surveys consistently show that affordability of healthcare is a top issue that Americans want their elected officials to address. The United States spends twice as much per capita on health care as other developed nations — $10,586 compared with the $5,086 OECD average. It’s a tremendous burden on federal and state budgets, businesses and public […]
Daily Reformer: Who will be the next Senate minority leader?
“You think they're going to take down one of their own when they have this reapportionment coming?”
Welcome to the Minnesota Reformer
Our family visited the Minnesota History Center last weekend, and I was struck by the simple power of an exhibit showing a tiny prairie homestead from the 1870s. It’s a dark, earthen hovel with little more than a bedroll and a stove. A video projection shows the harsh weather out the “window,” first rain and […]
Vice President Walter Mondale: Protect the Boundary Waters
This sacred place is now under attack like never before. Donald Trump and his administration have launched an all-out assault by fast-tracking a risky sulfide-ore copper mining project proposed by Chilean conglomerate Antofagasta.