I'm a huge fan of historian and author Howard Zinn. His is the only autograph I keep. Thank you for covering his passing. His writing represented a clear-eyed, radical perspective that transcended the official story lines of the establishment. It has guided my thinking on a lot of subjects.

My only question for this paper: How is it that this world renowned leftist whose books were runaway bestsellers based on word of mouth had to wait to die to make it in the Star Tribune, while conservative writers without that kind of people power backing their work -- Clifford D. May and George Will, for example -- have gotten seemingly endless space in the op-ed section of the Star Tribune?

PAUL ROZYCKI, MINNEAPOLIS