Mike Sweeney: With level playing field, future is bright for news

MIke Sweeney| Nov 21, 2009 at 12:13 AM

It has been almost two months since I became chairman of the new Star Tribune, and I'd like to share my impressions of our company, our newspaper and the evolution of the news industry. My colleagues have stressed the special obligation a news organization has to be open and transparent. If we ask you to have confidence in our reporting, we must let you know who we are and where we are going. To that end, although we are a privately held company, we will soon be sharing on our website the same information on our ownership, our board, our executives and our financial results that publicly held companies must provide.

Today we are a profitable company with a healthy balance sheet and the financial resources to fulfill our core mission of being Minnesota's most important news source. Following the financial restructuring completed in September, we are more efficient and more innovative. The combined readership of our print and online offerings has never been higher.

And we are continuing to innovate. StarTribune.com is by far the most popular Minnesota-based website, but we believe it can be much better. During 2010 we'll make a significant investment in the website, adding up-to-date architecture that will allow us to provide more robust information in a format that is simple to navigate. The printed version of our newspaper generates the majority of our revenue, and it won't be going away any time soon. We will print and deliver a great newspaper as long as our customers want it.

The quality of journalism at the Star Tribune has never been higher. Of the 270 people who work in our newsroom, 115 are reporters. And 100 community bloggers write for our website. In 2000, when technology was less helpful to journalists, we employed 126 reporters. No news organization in Minnesota comes close to matching our reporting resources and expertise.

In my 30 years in business, I have never seen a more exciting marketplace than today's news industry. Citizens are more interested in news than ever, and there are countless organizations willing to provide it. For-profit businesses and nonprofits are all vying for your attention. Large technology-driven companies like Google and Yahoo are competing with niche businesses like Politico and the Huffington Post. And the nonprofit world has responded with terrific sites like Minnesota's own e-democracy.org and MinnPost. Against this robust backdrop, our community is facing important public policy questions. One that particularly concerns us is whether the government should provide taxpayer dollars to subsidize news media companies. From the Star Tribune's perspective, the answer is a resounding "No!" We don't want or need taxpayer subsidies, and we see no reason for government to disrupt an already robust, innovative market.

Minnesota Public Radio disagrees. This past week MPR convened a group of hand-picked speakers from across the country to proclaim the future of news. The selected panelists seemed to agree that newspapers could not evolve and that market intervention was necessary. Information about how newspapers were evolving and how entrepreneurs were innovating was shrugged off. There was apparent consensus that public radio could fill a perceived void by grabbing public funding. We have numerous concerns about publicly funded news, but our primary question is how an organization funded by government can objectively report on government.

For example, MPR has successfully lobbied state government for years to secure millions in subsidies to help finance its nonprofit business expansions, most recently obtaining $2.65 million in Legacy Amendment funds over a two-year period. Apparently MPR will use some of those taxpayer funds to compete with private media companies. In a time of such scarce government resources, should public money be allocated to a healthy nonprofit so that it can compete more aggressively with private, for-profit businesses?

Today's media market is more robust than ever, and we welcome the challenges that lie ahead. At the Star Tribune, we will continue to evolve and invest in our future. As a community, we should reject the concept of taxpayer bailouts for failing media companies and eliminate tax subsidies that fund the expansion of nonprofits into functioning free markets. Let's start from a level playing field and let the best news media organizations survive and thrive.

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Jill Burcum: Northstar: Riding the rigid rail

Jill Burcum| Nov 21, 2009 at 11:51 PM

I could barely contain my excitement after getting a sneak preview last summer of the new Northstar Line now gliding into Minneapolis from the northwest suburbs. Stepping into the gleaming blue-and-yellow rail cars, I happily pictured myself settling in with a latte and a newspaper for a stress-free ride to work -- a stark contrast to my daily battle on the roads through congestion-plagued Hwys. 10 and 252.

But after taking Northstar to work on Monday -- couldn't resist riding on its first official day of operation -- I'm back behind the wheel of my dusty Volkswagen. And with rare exceptions, maybe snowy days that really snarl traffic, that's where I plan to stay. The reason? The state's sparkling, much-needed new rail line has an Achilles' heel barely mentioned during last week's inaugural festivities: its limited schedule.

By design, it serves commuters lucky enough to have an 8-to-5 schedule who never work late, but few others. If you're relying on Northstar to see the Holidazzle parade, for example, you're out of luck unless you go on a Saturday. On Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays, the last train out of Minneapolis leaves before the first light-filled float rolls down Nicollet Mall at 6:30 p.m. Planning to take in the Twins, see the Timberwolves or cheer on the Vikings? Some home games fit Northstar's regular schedule, but a fair number may not. Fortunately, Northstar can run additional special trains to serve sports fans or others attending big events, but only 30 times a year. The Twins alone have 81 home games in 2010.

Then there are commuters like me. My workday starts and ends later than most: 9 to 6. That's problematic on both ends. The last of the five morning trains into Minneapolis that I can catch leaves at 7:42 a.m. I had to be at the Coon Rapids station more than an hour before I normally back my car out of the garage.

Having the last of the five evening trains out at 6:10 p.m. also leaves zero wiggle room to deal with day's-end demands. I made the train Monday night, but rushed through a key interview so I could leave work early to catch the Hiawatha Line in time to get to Northstar's Target Field station by 6:10 p.m. I also had a backup ride ready.

To be fair, those who pushed long and hard to make the $317 million Big Lake-to-Minneapolis Northstar Line a reality always intended it to serve only as a "commuter rail,'' meaning a train that operates during peak times to ease rush-hour congestion. Doing so likely saved several hundred million dollars. Northstar's more limited service meant it didn't need costly new tracks built for exclusive use, unlike light-rail projects. Instead, it purchased the right to run at certain times on tracks owned by the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad.

My fear is that this tradeoff -- limited schedule for a lower price -- may jeopardize Northstar ridership, as well as the success of this line and other regional rail projects. Anoka County Commissioner Dan Erhart and other farsighted Northstar champions are positioning one of the nation's fastest-growing population corridors for a future in which energy prices are increasingly uncertain. While hard-core environmentalists hope skyrocketing gas prices cause us suburbanites to abandon our communities and pile into Warehouse District condos, that's simply not realistic. Better to start putting in transportation infrastructure like Northstar now vs. scrambling to do it 10 or 20 years down the road.

But if people aren't riding Northstar, it's hard to justify expensive investment in new rail projects or extending this one to St. Cloud. While transportation wonks may always have grasped the schedule limits of a commuter line, it is likely a surprise to many would-be riders. If they try the train once and it doesn't work, will they come back?

Erhart and other Northstar officials are well-aware of what's at stake. Expanding Northstar's schedule would be expensive and may not be possible until additional track is built between Coon Rapids and Interstate 694 in Fridley to ease a freight-rail bottleneck in the area. To their credit, officials are pushing hard to coordinate the Northstar runs with sports teams' schedules. They've also adjusted the regular schedule since last summer to allow crack-of-dawn commuters like Bob Bietz of Ramsey to ride the line. Bietz, who works at the airport, had called me last summer to complain that Northstar's preliminary schedule didn't accommodate early birds.

Erhart believes north suburban commuters understand that Northstar's opening is but a first step in bringing more transit options to the area. I hope he's right. Getting the Northern Lights Express passenger rail up and running from Duluth to Minneapolis, for example, will expand rail riders' options, he said. "In the long term we believe we'll have a system to serve the entire metro community ... in a very productive way. We're not building this for 2003 ... or 2009. We're building this system for 30, 40, 50 years into the future.''

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Lori Sturdevant: And, as always, obstacles in the transit path

LORI STURDEVANT| Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

During a couple of fits of frustration this year (he's had several) while attempting to mollify potential neighbors of the Central Corridor light-rail line, Peter Bell has pondered aloud the larger significance of its bumpy road to construction.

"Can we still build big things in this state?" the Metropolitan Council chairman asked. "If we had not already done so, could we build the interstate highway system today?"

Another time, he sighed: "Maybe the amount of checks and balances we have put into decisionmaking for infrastructure projects don't allow us to do big things anymore."

The most recent source of Bell's aggravation has been a dispute with the University of Minnesota. Corridor planners and university leaders have been oh-so-slow to come to an understanding about how best to keep vibration and electromagnetic interference from disrupting research in buildings on Washington Avenue, adjacent to the proposed rail line.

They're just about out of time if the project is going to stay on schedule and within budget. The $940 million project counts on receiving half of its funding from the federal government. Unless that money is in President Obama's 2010 budget, this railroad won't be running as scheduled in 2014. Obama's support likely hinges on securing a deal with the University of Minnesota early next month.

Word from last week's Central Corridor talks was encouraging. A new memorandum of understanding is finally in the works.

Far be it from this columnist to jinx a pending deal by rehashing points of prior dispute. (Besides, I'd have to turn this column over to my electrical-engineer husband to do the topic justice.) I'd rather root for the Central Corridor with Bell's bigger question in mind.

The next phase of light rail signifies more than a new way to get from downtown Minneapolis to downtown St. Paul. It's also about demonstrating that Minnesotans still have big ideas for building this state, and can pull them off without getting tripped up by parochial interests or what's-in-it-for-me thinking. (And no, I don't consider the University of Minnesota a parochial interest.)

The Central Corridor is one segment -- a crucial one -- of a big transit plan (see map on page OP1) that's inspired by a big idea. It's that the Twin Cities should shore up its 21st-century economy by offering its increasingly numerous, increasingly aged residents means of mobility that don't involve driving a car.

Many people believe that owning and operating a car will become more expensive as policies to rein in atmospheric carbon emissions take hold and/or fossil fuels become harder to find and produce.

Granted, many other people think such worries are a lot of hooey.

But even climate-change and peak-oil skeptics have likely noticed that more of their fellow Minnesotans are looking gray and saggy these days. The best demographic forecasts (see www.tccompass.org) say the number of Twin Cities residents older than 65 will double between now and 2030. The number of younger adults will stay about where it is now.

Further: The average older woman in Minnesota can expect to outlive her ability or desire to drive by 10 years. For the average man, it's six years, according to Dawn Simonson, executive director of the Metropolitan Area Agency on Aging.

Keeping those elders mobile for as long as possible is not just a matter of convenience. It's also a matter of economics. The same goes for the other nondrivers in the region, most of whom are productive, taxpaying members of society.

Maximizing Minnesota's human capital and per-person productivity is going to be vital to this state's prosperity. In fact, it already is. And maximizing mobility by providing a variety of travel modes serves that good end.

If the Central Corridor's construction does not start in 2010, the obstacles the line faces will grow taller. Delay means higher costs -- $35 million a year or more -- while government money gets tighter.

Political hazards lie ahead, too. Several Republican candidates for governor say they don't want the Central Corridor or any other tax-funded rail line to proceed. Auto-based transportation is their priority.

Meanwhile, the Hiawatha Line keeps beating its preconstruction ridership estimates. And last week the new Northstar Line started showing another part of the metro area what's possible with rail.

And, to his credit, Bell -- whose Met Council job is a part-time position -- was working way more than full time last week to show that, despite transit decisionmaking rules that almost invite impediments, Minnesota can still build something big.

Lori Sturdevant is a Star Tribune editorial writer and columnist. She is at lsturdevant@startribune.com.

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Katherine Kersten: At U, future teachers may be reeducated

KATHERINE KERSTEN| Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

Do you believe in the American dream -- the idea that in this country, hardworking people of every race, color and creed can get ahead on their own merits? If so, that belief may soon bar you from getting a license to teach in Minnesota public schools -- at least if you plan to get your teaching degree at the University of Minnesota's Twin Cities campus.

In a report compiled last summer, the Race, Culture, Class and Gender Task Group at the U's College of Education and Human Development recommended that aspiring teachers there must repudiate the notion of "the American Dream" in order to obtain the recommendation for licensure required by the Minnesota Board of Teaching. Instead, teacher candidates must embrace -- and be prepared to teach our state's kids -- the task force's own vision of America as an oppressive hellhole: racist, sexist and homophobic.

The task group is part of the Teacher Education Redesign Initiative, a multiyear project to change the way future teachers are trained at the U's flagship campus. The initiative is premised, in part, on the conviction that Minnesota teachers' lack of "cultural competence" contributes to the poor academic performance of the state's minority students. Last spring, it charged the task group with coming up with recommendations to change this. In January, planners will review the recommendations and decide how to proceed.

The report advocates making race, class and gender politics the "overarching framework" for all teaching courses at the U. It calls for evaluating future teachers in both coursework and practice teaching based on their willingness to fall into ideological lockstep.

The first step toward "cultural competence," says the task group, is for future teachers to recognize -- and confess -- their own bigotry. Anyone familiar with the reeducation camps of China's Cultural Revolution will recognize the modus operandi.

The task group recommends, for example, that prospective teachers be required to prepare an "autoethnography" report. They must describe their own prejudices and stereotypes, question their "cultural" motives for wishing to become teachers, and take a "cultural intelligence" assessment designed to ferret out their latent racism, classism and other "isms." They "earn points" for "demonstrating the ability to be self-critical."

The task group opens its report with a model for officially approved confessional statements: "As an Anglo teacher, I struggle to quiet voices from my own farm family, echoing as always from some unstated standard. ... How can we untangle our own deeply entrenched assumptions?"

The goal of these exercises, in the task group's words, is to ensure that "future teachers will be able to discuss their own histories and current thinking drawing on notions of white privilege, hegemonic masculinity, heteronormativity, and internalized oppression."

Future teachers must also recognize and denounce the fundamental injustices at the heart of American society, says the task group. From a historical perspective, they must "understand that ... many groups are typically not included" within America's "celebrated cultural identity," and that "such exclusion is frequently a result of dissimilarities in power and influence." In particular, aspiring teachers must be able "to explain how institutional racism works in schools."

After indoctrination of this kind, who wouldn't conclude that the American Dream of equality for all is a cruel hoax? But just to make sure, the task force recommends requiring "our future teachers" to "articulate a sophisticated and nuanced critical analysis" of this view of the American promise. In the process, they must incorporate the "myth of meritocracy in the United States," the "history of demands for assimilation to white, middle-class, Christian meanings and values, [and] history of white racism, with special focus on current colorblind ideology."

What if some aspiring teachers resist this effort at thought control and object to parroting back an ideological line as a condition of future employment? The task group has Orwellian plans for such rebels: The U, it says, must "develop clear steps and procedures for working with non-performing students, including a remediation plan."

And what if students' ideological purity is tainted once they begin to do practice teaching in the public schools? The task group frames the danger this way: "How can we be sure that teaching supervisors are themselves developed and equipped in cultural competence outcomes in order to supervise beginning teachers around issues of race, class, culture, and gender?"

Its answer? "Requir[e] training/workshop for all supervisors. Perhaps a training session disguised as a thank you/recognition ceremony/reception at the beginning of the year?"

When teacher training requires a "disguise," you know something sinister is going on.

Katherine Kersten is a Twin Cities writer and speaker. Reach her at kakersten@gmail.com.

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Garrison Keillor: Call me a romantic or what you will ...

GARRISON KEILLOR| Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

I was in Chicago with time on my hands and the sweet woman murmured to me -- you know how this goes -- "Would you like to see the Art Institute?" and I was thinking No No No God No, and I said, "Sure. Fine." "You wouldn't rather do something else?" she said. "No," I replied. That's the correct answer when a woman asks you about art.

What I'd rather do is watch a couple of welterweights whale on each other for 10 rounds or a lanky blonde dance as she peels off her long white gloves and unsnaps her garter, but it's 10 a.m. on a Tuesday, so into the citadel of art we go.

I've been here before. The sweet woman loves galleries and French impressionists and the sunny gardens of Pierre Bonnard. While looking at them, she is likely to say something about color and texture. But I am an American man and color and texture are not my strong suits. And so I staked out my aesthetic at the start. I said, "I see no reason to paint flowers. You can buy fresh flowers. Still lifes are only an exercise. And abstract expressionism is for the lobbies of big insurance companies. The true calling of an artist is to paint women and the greatest challenge is the naked female form. That's what separates the true artists from the wallpaper-hangers."

I said this in the room that houses some rather erotic Georgia O'Keeffe flowers and "American Gothic" with its squinty lady, and I spoke on behalf of American men everywhere. At the age of 67, I have stopped apologizing for looking at naked women. I don't stand directly in front of a nude and stare at her, lest I be taken for a pervert. I stand in front of the painting next to the nude and sneak sidelong glances, but nonetheless I am moved by her. Deeply.

A man gets to say what he likes. In Chicago, the city of the big shoulders, he does. In New York, where men have exquisite thin shoulders and glossy skin tone, they are more into texture. I glanced at a plaque on the gallery wall, something about "his work references as a multifaceted narrative structure that recontextualizes the ambiguity of alienation and aims at disrupting the viewer's habits of perception." Well, pardon me for living, but I am fond of my habits of perception. I stroll past the spatter art and angst-ridden photography and junk sculpture, and when I see a naked woman, my heart leaps up.

Rubens did big naked porky women who could lie on a man and smother him, and many artists have done pale, cold goddesses, but I want a sweet woman bathing or reclining on a couch, someone I'd like to know. She makes my heart sing.

She reminds me of beautiful naked moments from real life -- skinny-dipping in the Mississippi, intertwining underwater on Oahu, sitting in hot water in the big round iron tub on the deck in Utah, the sweet woman lowering herself gingerly into the water, slowly, slowly, as her delicate anatomical parts feel the heat rising -- and coming from fundamentalist people in a cold-weather state, nakedness means more to me than to, say, a Southern Unitarian.

We hiked around the Art Institute and didn't discuss texture. I saw a couple of nude women and other women who looked as if they were thinking about undressing, and then we went back to the hotel and sat in a steam room together and got recontextualized.

What does this have to do with health care and our enormous indebtedness to what used to be known as Red China before Republicans became reds? Everything.

Politics and policy mean more to those who love life itself. We want government to stave off lawlessness and war and chaos and economic misery so that we can wholeheartedly enjoy the pure goodness of life which, when you come right down to it -- and I come right down to it as often as possible -- is a naked woman lowering herself into hot water that you yourself are sitting in, waiting.

Garrison Keillor's column is distributed by Tribune Media Services.

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Nick Coleman: Won't you please help end recession?

NICK COLEMAN| Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

Thanksgiving Day is coming, and Mr. Turkey said: "It's very careful I must be, or I will lose my head."

That little ditty, still popular among today's vegan-leaning schoolchildren despite the gruesome fate on the chopping block, might serve as a warning to consumers as we head into a holiday shopping season that could help revive the economy.

Don't lose your head. You'll need it.

The traditional start of the Christmas spending orgy comes Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, and rarely, if ever, has so much been riding on the hopes that shoppers will throw aside their fears -- and their late-payment notices -- and shop until they drop or the recession stops. It's not likely to be that easy.

Black Friday, as it used to be called when it could be counted on to put retailers in the black for the year and when predawn shoppers trampled each other in angry scrums fighting for the last Tickle-Me-Elmo doll, may only be gray this time. According to the National Retail Federation, consumers expect to spend 3 percent less on shopping than they did last year, and two out of three American families say they are worried about the economy and plan to spend less, look for sales bargains, use coupons, make do with last year's decorations and hold the purse strings tight.

With unemployment high, jobs still being lost, credit hard to get and Americans skeptical that a recovery has begun, this could be the modern-era equivalent of all those Christmases your grandparents told you about, when their stockings were filled -- if they were full -- with oranges, a wooden top and a pack of chewing gum. All of this brings us to the patriotic consumer's dilemma: Shopping is good for the country's economy, but dangerous to your family's financial security. What are we supposed to do? Mary Jane LaVigne and Reverend Billy have the answer:

Nothing.

To be more precise, they say "buy nothing" on Black Friday. Buy nothing from the big-box stores and buy nothing from the corporate consumerism pushers. Instead, spend your money locally, spend it thoughtfully, and avoid spending it on cheap, trendy junk that clutters your closets after it breaks and might have been made in a sweatshop or an overseas factory where workers are paid poorly and treated worse.

And, most of all, ask yourself WWJB: What Would Jesus Buy?

That provocative question is the name of a documentary about Rev. Billy and his ministry that will be shown in the Twin Cities on Friday and Saturday, and which dares to challenge all the messages we get telling us to be good little consumers and do our part in fattening corporate bottom lines and bringing the economy to "recovery."

"It's not possible to consume our way to prosperity," says LaVigne, a White Bear Lake writer. "If that was going to happen, we would've done it by now."

LaVigne is one of a group of "Buy Local" enthusiasts sponsoring the film showings and appearances by "Rev. Billy," a subversive Jimmy Swaggart activist/street preacher who lampoons commercialism and questions our civic religion notions about buying things. A native of Rochester, Minn., "Rev. Billy" (real name Billy Talen) has preached in Times Square and has developed an entertaining "ministry" that, during the course of making his movie, got him tossed out of the Mall of America.

The serious side of his message: Buying locally is better (90 cents of every dollar stays in your town); consumerism is "a lie," and government help belongs on Main Street, not Wall Street. It's an argument that has made a lot of converts lately, and even the Wall Street Journal took note of Rev. Billy last spring.

"We asked Rev. Billy to come and bless our local retail stores and protect us from a Christmas season dominated by the big-box stores," LaVigne says. "We need to hear about how to live a good life. Rev. Billy is not sacrilegious; he is calling us to honor the real traditions of Jesus. After all, Jesus threw the money changers out of the Temple. The more thoughtful we are about what we choose to buy -- and where we choose to buy -- the more successful we will be at creating a better world."

So this holiday season, as you try to reconcile your patriotic urges with your anxieties about holiday spending, ponder the message of Rev. Billy: Buy Locally, or Buy Nothing. It might just save your head. And your wallet.

"What Would Jesus Buy?" will be shown at the Riverview Theater in Minneapolis (3800 42nd Av. S.) at 10:30 a.m. Friday (Rev. Billy calls it "Buy Nothing Day") and 10:30 a.m. Saturday. Rev. Billy will "preach" at the Saturday showing, as well as Saturday night at The House of Balls, 212 3rd Ave. N., and at a Sunday afternoon appearance at Macalester College in St. Paul. (For information, see www.revbilly.com.)

Nick Coleman is a senior fellow at the Eugene J. McCarthy Center for Public Policy & Civic Engagement at the College of St. Benedict/St. John's University. He can be reached at nickcoleman@gmail.com.

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Beverly Beckham: A patriarch, forever in shadow

BEVERLY BECKHAM| Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

His first son, George Quinn Curtin, born before the wedding, never lived on Windsor Street. He was a secret, given to a family in North Cambridge, and raised as Timothy George Keane. He was a Roman Catholic priest for years. His brothers never knew about him.

My father was one of those brothers. He was 76 years old and watching TV on a cold February night when he got a call from Keane. "I'm your brother," Keane told him.

Then my father told me.

We flew to Florida to meet Tim Keane and brought pictures of his mother and brothers, but not one of his father. We didn't have a picture. My grandfather had walked away from three little boys. My father and his brothers never forgave him. Whatever pictures there were ended up in a dust bin.

Keane met his mother only once. He was 27. They had lunch across from Boston Common. It was a hello and a goodbye.

It took him more than half a century to reach out to his family again. He was 79 when he finally tracked down and called my father.

They didn't become bosom buddies. Distance and too much unresolved history kept them apart. But when my father died, Keane flew up for the funeral. He was 85 and not in the best of health. But there he was in the receiving line introducing himself. "I'm Larry's brother," the words full of warmth and pride, this man we hardly knew, comfortable and comforting.

During those days, he said a few times that before he died he wanted only one thing: to see a picture of his father. To see what his father looked like.

I'd never met my grandfather or seen a picture. He could be standing in front of me, and I wouldn't know him. But I promised I'd help. How hard could it be to locate a single picture?

It's four years later, and I'm still looking.

Last week, I e-mailed some newfound pictures of my grandmother to her first-born son. He e-mailed back, "Thanks for the precious pictures -- no picture of my father yet."

Tim Keane was born as George Curtin in 1920. He is 89. I am running out of time.

My father told me just two things about his father: He remembered the time he sat beside him in a wagon pulled by a single horse. It was the wee hours of the morning, and his father was delivering milk, and there were no streetlights, and it was so dark you couldn't see the horse, he said. You could just hear his clip-petty-clop, clip-petty-clop. They pulled up to one house after another. And my father would get out and carry the bottles of milk, careful not to trip, and place them in a wooden box, then race back to the cart and to his father, the two of them sitting side by side as the day dawned.

He also told me about lying in bed with his two brothers on summer nights, listening to his father play the piano in the barroom across the street, all the strangers singing and having a good time. This was after his father left and took all the good times with him.

A single picture. There must be one somewhere.

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Readers Write for Sunday, Nov. 22

Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

BIG STONE II

Blocking it actually hurt environmentalists' cause

How ironic. By blocking the construction of the Big Stone II power plant, environmentalists have ensured that the vast wind potential of South Dakota will not be developed for the foreseeable future because the wind-power developers are unwilling to spend the money for the transmission lines that Big Stone II would have provided.

Environmentalists have a stranglehold on this country that limits progress in many areas.

ED NYGAARD, PRESCOTT, WIS.

BREAST CANCER EXAMS

Following guidelines could cost lives

As a three-time breast cancer survivor, I am incensed and appalled by the recommendations for cancer screenings ("A major shift on breast exams," Nov. 17). I especially disagree with the conclusion that breast self-examinations provide no value. I discovered the tumors in my breasts each time through self-examination, and at age 83, I'm alive to tell the tale.

The proponents of these guidelines speak of raising undue anxiety in women, but it seems they failed to consider the freedom from anxiety that occurs when mammograms show that no cancer is present.

One wonders about the accuracy of the data cited in the research and whether monetary considerations influenced their findings.

I hope that the previous guidelines, upheld by the Mayo Clinic and the Cancer Society, will supersede the unfortunate revisions.

EUNICE HAFEMEISTER, MINNEAPOLIS

•••

In the late 1800s, women in their late 20s and 30s were given hysterectomies for the purpose of "calming them down" from feminine mood swings. In the early 1900s, Sigmund Freud treated women for their anxiety, relabeling it sexual frustration. In the 1950s and 1960s, women were declared unfit for executive positions because the anxiety and disequilibrium of their monthly periods would cause them to make "emotional" decisions during "that time of the month."

And now, to spare us the anxiety of a false positive, we are told to forgo mammograms until we turn 50 and then have the procedure less frequently.

I was diagnosed by my yearly mammogram with breast cancer two years ago and successfully treated. Thank heaven no one was trying to save me from the anxiety of a false positive.

Women can handle anxiety. We do not have to be protected from ourselves.

BARBARA MRAZ, ST. PAUL

PRISONERS AT GITMO

Perhaps there's room at the Bush ranch?

Where shall we put the prisoners currently being held at Guantanamo Bay?

How about Crawford, Texas? The guy who started it all deserves to have them close by!

PAMELA HANSON, ARDEN HILLS

'DEADLY FALLS'

The real danger is underfunding

Regarding the series "Deadly Falls," no nursing home is perfect, but it should be noted that many nurses and nursing assistants are very kind and dedicated to their residents. When the state cuts funding or freezes funding increases to nursing homes, it is itself a form of abuse. It may not be the same as slapping a resident in the face, but its effects are just as bad!

My mom worked as nursing assistant when I was growing up, and she and her coworkers were always having to work short-staffed. I now work in a nursing home myself, and I've seen it where we have one nursing assistant for 30 residents. If the aide is in a room with a resident, how is it humanly possible to keep an eye out for the other 29 residents?

JERRY T. JOHNSON, BLOOMINGTON

•••

The series on nursing homes mischaracterizes the problem of falls. You hold that nursing homes are responsible when frail residents fall. But in many respects, this is a problem that cannot be prevented.

A close relative of mine is in a nursing home -- a very good one -- and is in this situation. She has a device fastened to her that sets off an alarm if she should try to get out of bed. The staff responds quickly, for sure. It is helpful and calm. The people are very respectful of the patients. They are also paid very little, but that does not diminish the tenderness of their care.

The real fault lies elsewhere -- in our medical system, which prolongs lives to the point where extreme frailty overtakes some people. They have simply lived longer than their bodies will sustain them. Their lives at this stage are like prisons -- totally dependent and lacking in dignity.

The lucky ones have dementia and don't know what trouble they're in. Many of the sentient ones find life insupportable and would choose a way out if they could.

P.T. CLARK, RICHFIELD

•••

A resident's fall in a nursing home is not necessarily a sign of negligence. It can also show that the resident was allowed to be as independent as possible vs. being restrained to prevent a fall.

Yes, there are occasions when staff are negligent, and these cases must be addressed by the nursing home. However, more sanctions will result in more paperwork for staff, which never ensures that the residents will receive better care. If each of us ask ourselves, "What kind of care would I want," I think that the majority of us would choose independence even though there is a risk of physical injury. The risks of restraint are increased osteoporosis and mental decline.

I trust that you will give equal time to telling the stories of the nursing home staff who work extra hours without pay to see that the residents receive good care. There are some wonderful love stories of staff and families out there. I know. I worked in long-term care for 14 years and followed the care of my mother, father and brother when they lived in a nursing home.

JOANN HOWITZ, FRIDLEY

'THE ANOINTED'

We did the anointing in last year's elections

Memo to Katherine Kersten ("The 'anointed' will 'fix' your health care," Nov. 15): President Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi weren't "anointed." They were elected.

PATRICK O'BRIEN, EDINA

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Steve Chapman: The descent of the GOP thought leader

Nov 21, 2009 at 11:31 PM

The 19th-century American writer Henry Adams said the descent of American presidents from George Washington to Ulysses S. Grant was enough to discredit the theory of evolution. The same could be said of the pantheon of conservative political heroes, which in the last half-century has gone from Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan to Sarah Palin. That refutation may be agreeable to Palin, who doesn't put much stock in Darwin anyway.

You can confirm all this by looking at what the three wrote. Goldwater, the 1964 Republican presidential nominee, made his reputation four years earlier with an eloquent and intellectually coherent volume, "The Conscience of a Conservative," which laid out a blueprint for the policies he favored.

Reagan likewise made the thinking person's case for conservatism. Between 1975 and 1979, after he had finished two terms as governor of California, he did some 1,000 radio commentaries, most of which he wrote himself. They were later collected in "Reagan, In His Own Hand," which provides the texts of his handwritten manuscripts and proves that, far from being the "amiable dunce" of liberal mythology, he thought hard and clearly about the issues of his time.

Palin? Her new memoir, "Going Rogue," fills up 413 pages, but it has less policy heft than a student council speech. Where Reagan dove into the murk of arms control and Goldwater fathomed federal farm programs, Palin skims over the surface of a puddle.

Amid all the tales of savoring the aromas at the state fair and having her wardrobe vetted by snotty campaign staffers, she sets aside space to lay out her vision of what it means to be a "Commonsense Conservative." It takes up all of 11 pages and leans heavily on prefabricated lines like "I am a conservative because I deal with the world as it is" and "If you want real job growth, cut capital gains taxes."

But the priorities of "Going Rogue" are striking poses and attitudes, not making actual arguments about the proper role of government. The book is meant to create an image, or maybe a brand -- folksy but shrewd, tough but feminine, noble but beset by weaklings and traitors, ever-smiling unless you awaken her inner "Mama Grizzly Bear" by scrutinizing her loved ones.

No one could be more pleased with her than she is with herself. Reading the book is like watching Palin preen in front of a mirror for hours on end, as she tirelessly compliments herself for courage, gumption, devotion to family and maverick independence.

Who needs policy? In her world -- and the world of legions of conservatives who revere her -- the persona is the policy. Palin is beloved because she's (supposedly) just like ordinary people, which (supposedly) gives her a profound understanding of their needs.

That attitude used to be associated with the left, which claimed to speak for the ordinary folks who get shafted by the system. Logic and evidence about policy, to many liberals, were less important than empathy and good intentions. Now it's conservatives who think we should be guided by our guts, not our brains.

Palin is the embodiment of this approach, never imagining that knowledge and reflection might be of more value than instinct. When Oprah asked if she had felt any doubts about her readiness to be vice president -- which requires the readiness to be president -- Palin replied breezily, "No, no -- I didn't blink. ... I felt quite confident in my abilities and my executive experience and I knew that this is an executive administrative job." (The audience tittered.)

Contrast that with Reagan, who after learning of his victory on Election Night 1980 told his supporters, "There's never been a more humbling moment in my life." Palin doesn't do humble.

You could almost forget that for well more than a year, Republicans have ridiculed Barack Obama as lighter than a souffle, an inexperienced upstart who owes everything to arrogant presumption and a carefully crafted image. But Obama wrote a 375-page book, "The Audacity of Hope," that shows a solid, and occasionally tedious, grasp of issues.

It is hard to imagine Palin (as opposed to a ghost writer) producing anything comparable. Almost as hard as it is to imagine that modern conservatives would expect it.

Leaders who can think? That's so 20th century.

Steve Chapman's column is distributed by Creators Syndicate.

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Time to hit a target

Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

TIME TO HIT A TARGET

U.S. must announce a carbon-reduction goal

Climate change was at the top of President Obama's agenda in China Tuesday, just three weeks before representatives from 192 countries meet in Copenhagen for a much-anticipated international climate conference. And he came tantalizingly close to saying what the rest of the world has been waiting years to hear: that next month the United States, the largest per capita emitter of greenhouse gases, will finally come to the table with a specific carbon-reduction target.

In a news conference after his meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao, Obama supported Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen's proposal for a far-reaching political agreement at Copenhagen -- one that "covers all of the issues in the negotiations, and one that has immediate operational effect." And the joint statement that Obama and Hu released indicated that a Copenhagen agreement, while not legally binding, should "include emission reduction targets of developed countries and nationally appropriate mitigation actions of developing countries."

The United States is the only developed country that has yet to announce a carbon target, even as developing economies such as Brazil have unveiled mitigation policies. China, meanwhile, has talked of a significant reduction in the carbon intensity of its industry, and Tuesday's joint statement indicates it might enshrine that in an international agreement -- a big step that probably depends on American movement.

Indeed, some kind of American target, even one that the full Senate has not yet endorsed, would ease negotiations on some huge issues, including how to verify countries' carbon reductions and how to help developing nations cope with climate change or get off of carbon-spewing development paths. As Obama indicated in Beijing, identifying or building the institutions necessary to do such things could begin immediately after Copenhagen -- if the parties can agree. Carbon reduction commitments that are contingent on the action of others might kick in. And big developing nations might put specific promises on the table or even agree to enter their commitments into an international legal framework. Obama could bring all of that home and claim that the United States got something in return for announcing a target -- something U.S. negotiators couldn't claim after the 1997 Kyoto negotiations.

Obama left himself wiggle room in Beijing, and American negotiators have been wary of getting ahead of the Senate. But that argument goes only so far. One reason for the Senate's delay is that Obama chose to focus on health-care reform before climate change, even though Copenhagen loomed. He should take the lead on climate now.

The House has endorsed a 17 percent reduction in carbon emissions from the 2005 level, and the Senate is considering a 20 percent cut. The administration is also moving forward with Environmental Protection Agency regulation that does not require congressional approval. Obama should be able to produce a number or a range of numbers that reflects the level of emissions reduction the United States can achieve.

WASHINGTON POST

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Letter of the Day: State has bigger priorities than a Vikings stadium

Nov 21, 2009 at 05:39 PM

DENNIS YELKIN, HOPKINS

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