Stopped at the border!

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A dangerous foreign infiltrator was stopped at the border by federal agents who combined information and forces from multiple federal and state agencies, reports AP. Work by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agriculture specialists in International Falls and Detroit helped find a small yet destructive beetle stowing away in a shipment from China. The agency says this week the khapra beetle was found in a rail container carrying tile. News with attitude, mostly from MN but with occasional forays abroad.News Day summarizes, links to, and comments on reports from news media around the world, with particular attention to Minnesota news. Continue Reading

The Ax-Man cometh / SPPS stumbling out of the starting gate / Charter schools / Somali teens / Iran protests

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The Ax-Man cometh Gov. Tim Pawlenty will announce unallotment targets – or something like that – at 2 p.m. on Tuesday, according to the PiPress. This isn’t the actual unallotment, but rather an announcement of his plan. In theory, he’s still open to hearing other voices, but given T-Paw’s record on listening to people who disagree with him on budget issues, that’s not likely to move him off target. The likely targets? Local government, health care, higher ed, and fancy footwork with funding shifts for K-12 education. Continue Reading

Debunking health care myths

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Over at MinnPost, Susan Perry is writing about the U.S. health care system all week, sharing findings from an article in the Annals of Surgery. She recommends reading the whole article, but since it appears to be member-only and I’m not a surgeon, I’ll just read her daily summaries. Day one: lots of stats debunking the myth that we have the best health care system in the world. News with attitude, mostly from MN but with occasional forays abroad.News Day summarizes, links to, and comments on reports from news media around the world, with particular attention to Minnesota news. Continue Reading

Iran elections

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Protests continue, with BBC reporting seven protesters killed and a crackdown on media, including foreign media. For a good analysis, check out Juan Cole. Also worth noting: local prof William Beeman offers an interesting take in MinnPost, but the article also warns:
Foreign journalists typically focus on Iran’s upper classes and connect with those who tweet, blog and frequent Facebook. But that is not by any means a cross section of the Iranian electorate. It leaves out Ahmadinejad’s base: the poor and the rural residents who are less connected with the world and less inclined to talk with strangers. Continue Reading

More on missing Somali boys

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Over at MPR, Laura Yuen has a riveting story from a Somali activist who says that she, and the head of her mosque, tried to stop two young men from leaving for Somalia. She saw the teens at a travel agency, and “something clicked in her mind.” She got copies of the boys’ passports from the travel agent to deliver to the boys’ parents with a warning message. “That’s our culture, traditionally, in Somalia: If any adult sees you doing something wrong, that adult will act as your parent and will try to stop to inform your parent,” Ali said. The mosque’s director, Omar Hurre, confirmed that he notified the parents about their sons’ travel plans. Continue Reading

Charter schools: For better and for worse

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Doug Belden in the PiPress reports on a new national study of charter schools that shows that 17 percent of charters perform better than public schools, 37 percent perform worse, and 47 percent deliver about the same quality of education as public schools. Both nationally and in Minnesota, charter school students who are enrolled for at least three years show better outcomes. In Minnesota, black students at charter schools showed greater improvement in reading than their public school counterparts. Overall, however, the specific report on Minnesota found that “The typical student in a Minnesota charter school learns significantly less than their virtual counterparts in their feeder pool in reading and significantly less in mathematics.” The multi-year national study by Stanford’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) focused on 16 states, and covered more than 70 percent of all U.S. students attending charter schools. Continue Reading

The Ax-Man cometh

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Gov. Tim Pawlenty will announce unallotment targets – or something like that – at 2 p.m. on Tuesday, according to the PiPress. This isn’t the actual unallotment, but rather an announcement of his plan. In theory, he’s still open to hearing other voices, but given T-Paw’s record on listening to people who disagree with him on budget issues, that’s not likely to move him off target. The likely targets? Local government, health care, higher ed, and fancy footwork with funding shifts for K-12 education. Continue Reading

Unemployment up, crime down / Play it again / Iran elections / more

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Crime falling with economy The common wisdom is that crime rises during economic recessions, but the common wisdom is wrong, reports Eric Ostermeier at the University of Minnesota. Comparing crime rates and unemployment figures every April for ten years shows no correlation between crime rates and unemployment. In fact, “the crime rate of 4.3 incidents per 1,000 residents in April 2009 is the lowest April crime rate in Minneapolis this decade. After peaking at a rate of 6.0 incidents per 1,000 residents in April 2006, the crime rate has fallen in each of the subsequent three years – to a rate of 5.7 in April 2007, 5.2 in April 2008, and 4.3 in April 2009. ” • MN Job Watch Layoffs at U of M, Strib settlement with drivers, fake furloughs• Play it again — RIAA? Continue Reading

MN economy’s “gruesome bookends” / IRV or RCV – now legal in MN / Iran elections today / more

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MN economy’s “gruesome bookends” Steve Perry writes in MinnPost that Minnesota’s dwindling unemployment insurance fund and tax revenues tied increasingly to the business cycle offer two troubling “bookends” of evidence that the state’s fiscal troubles will continue far into the future. On the UI front, Minnesota has less than two months of reserves, with a year considered healthy, and is expected to join the ranks of states borrowing from the feds to pay unemployment benefits, and running up a debt that will further complicate future budgets. MORE• IRV is in MN Supreme Court allows instant run-off voting• You can’t get there from here Freeway closings in metro area this weekend• Minneapolis Police Department layoffs Stimulus? Not enough• World/National Headlines U.S wealth, Peru protests, Aung San Suu Kyi, Iran elections• War Reports Pakistan
MN economy’s “gruesome bookends” Steve Perry writes in MinnPost that Minnesota’s dwindling unemployment insurance fund and tax revenues tied increasingly to the business cycle offer two troubling “bookends” of evidence that the state’s fiscal troubles will continue far into the future. On the UI front, Minnesota has less than two months of reserves, with a year considered healthy, and is expected to join the ranks of states borrowing from the feds to pay unemployment benefits, and running up a debt that will further complicate future budgets. Continue Reading

Target Center strike

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Workers on the Target Center green roof went on strike this morning (June 11), over what they call unfair labor practices. According to their press release:
Since April, these workers along with Roofers and Waterproofers Union Local 96 have been demanding that Stock Roofing end unsafe and exploitive conditions on Target Center’s publicly funded green roof project. Workers have made sworn statements saying that Stock has forced them to work on Target Center’s roof without proper safety harnessing and other protective gear. The workers are also being shorted up to $20 per hour in violation of prevailing wage rules for publicly funded projects. The Star Tribune reports: “Stock representatives have countered that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has visited the site and deemed it safe, and that roofers and landscapers are paid per their jobs.” Continue Reading