Twin Cities Daily Planet (https://www.tcdailyplanet.net/category/uncategorized/page/34/)
Each year, a small group of immigrants makes its way into Saint Paul from a foreign and misunderstood land. They may come for love, jobs, the promise of more house for the money. Willing to face great adversity, they pack their belongings and take a giant leap of faith across the mighty Mississippi.
It was as a skeptic that I showed up at the Radisson Plaza last weekend to listen to Barney Frank give a talk about financial reform sponsored by the Caux Round Table.
But I left impressed by the Representative’s calm, fact-based, credible presentation as well as by his optimism about enacting real change. Continue Reading
With the U.S. Postal Service sporting billion-dollar deficits, leading to a hiring freeze and officials threatening to end Saturday deliveries, among other budget-cutting moves, our local letter-carriers are carrying a little heavier burden than usual. But things could be worse. Forty years ago this spring, life at the post office was so bad that the mailmen stopped delivering the mail. In 1970, when U.S. median household income was around $9,000, the pay for letter carriers started out at $6,100, and after 21 years of hefting the mail, they could hope to see that raised to $8,400. They were also expected to pay more than three quarters of the cost of their health insurance premiums. It required an act of Congress to raise their pay, and Congress acted about as quickly then as it does now. Continue Reading
Sculpture of Casey the gorilla at Como Zoo
Photo © Patricia Bour-Schilla
Saint Paul’s iconic Como Zoo has long been a charming, peaceful place to enjoy creatures great and small. Continue Reading
On the day of the explosion
Shadows pointed towards the pithead:
In the sun the slagheap slept.
Down the lane came men in pitboots
Coughing oath-edged talk and pipe-smoke,
Shouldering off the freshened silence…
Continue Reading
The following is an excerpted conclusion of Martin Luther King’s prophetic — and sadly, prescient — address at The Riverside Church in New York City on the evening of April 4, 1967.
Last Sunday evening’s 60 Minutes on CBS had a long and very useful segment about the why’s of the Wall Street collapse, and why the Big Dogs on the Street haven’t learned their lessons. It is very worth your while to watch the segment in its entirety. Continue Reading
