Video: Wolf puppies from the Wildlife Science Center

Filed under: Environment

For a rare look at two-week-old wolf puppies, visit our text-rich photo gallery of a wolf litter born April 27 at the Wildlife Science Center in Forest Lake.

It's extremely uncommon to see wolf pups this young. Generally, they don't leave the den for months. If you weren't lucky enough to see them today, here are two videos:

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Posted by Jeff Shaw at May 9, 2008 1:00 PM | Comments (0)

 

Motorist kills dog, sues owner

Filed under: Animal Rights

Well, if you didn't love America before, here's one more reason to gloat about our lawsuit loving nation.

After crashing into and killing Fester, a 13-pound miniature pinscher that ran into the road in Cloquet, a small town outside of Duluth, Jeffery Ely has decided to sue the dog's owner. Fester snuck out without a leash when its owner was trying to let the family’s other dogs inside.

Ely is requesting $1,100 for damages to repair his 1997 Honda Civic and to account for the time he had to take of from his two jobs to get the car repaired and court fees.

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Posted by Beth Walton at May 9, 2008 11:05 AM | Comments (0)

 

Now where is that pesky convention again?

Filed under: Media

Apparently, everyone needs a little geography lesson now and then, even the fact checkers at the USA Today.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform recently surveyed hospitals in seven U.S. cities. “Lawmakers looked into hospitals' ability to deal with a sudden influx of victims in the five cities considered at highest risk for terrorist attack and in the two cities hosting this summer's political conventions…Denver and Minneapolis,” the newspaper reported.

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Posted by Beth Walton at May 9, 2008 10:34 AM | Comments (0)

 

Breakfast of Champions 5/9: Up the wolves

Filed under: Breakfast of Champions

From the department of "late notice, but you don't want to miss this," comes an incredibly rare chance to see baby wolves. This afternoon, you can see 12- to 14-day-old wolf pups.

Today, Friday, May 9, the pups will meet the public at an event from 3:30-5:30 pm at the Wildlife Science Center in Forest Lake. It's $5 for adults and $4 for children, which is plenty cheap, and all the money goes to help support educational programs at the WSC. Later that evening, the pups will move to the center's flagship educational facility in Ely.

The International Wolf Center staff will care for the young gray wolves, who will join eight-year-old arctic wolves Malik and Shadow and four-year-old great plains wolves Maya and Grizzer, at the Ely interpretive facility.

There's going to be a party when the wolf comes home. I'll be there with a camera, and you should be, too. Suggested listening:

DAILY DISH: WHAT'S NEW AROUND THE SITE

Filling your punk rock quotient was a Triple Rock show that featured Kitten Forever. Erin Roof reviewed; Tony Nelson photographed four of the six bands.

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Posted by Jeff Shaw at May 9, 2008 5:03 AM | Comments (0)

 

VP Klobuchar Watch: Amy makes list of potential Obama running mates

Filed under: VP Pawlenty Watch

Will Senator Amy Klobuchar become our nation's next vice president? It's hard to keep track of all the many factors at play--OK, it isn't, there's only one factor at play. But the VP Pawlenty Meter (TM) gimmick is working well so we decided to franchise it out.

Tim Pawlenty isn't the only Minnesotan with a chance to land on a presidential ticket this year. The influential Democratic site TPM Cafe recently named Senator Klobuchar on a list of potential VP candidates for Obama:

In any case, he should pick a woman and any other woman will raise the question "why not Hillary."

My guess. He goes with Clinton or with Governors Sebelius (KS) or Napolitano (AZ) or Senators McCaskill (MO) or Klobuchar (MN).

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Posted by Kevin Hoffman at May 8, 2008 2:13 PM | Comments (4)

 

Pothole of the day: A triumph for the ages

Filed under: potholes

Tired of reading about the Strib's financial tribulations? Sorry about that. Ready for some frivolity flecked with good news? You know we've got you.

You may remember Foucault's Pothole on North 17th St. and Washington. Hold that memory in your heart, because that's all it is now.

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Posted by Jeff Shaw at May 8, 2008 10:51 AM | Comments (0)

 

Breakfast of Champions 5/8: Reasoned Dialogue in the Polis

Filed under: Breakfast of Champions

Often during meeting at City Pages Global HQ, we talk about how we'd like to get more comments on the blogs. Discussion is fun! It's the lifeblood of the polis! It exemplifies Aristotle's maxim of rational actors reasoning together!

Except it's the Internet. We always forget that part.

We're getting more comments on the blogs lately, which is great. Bring 'em on, especially the critical ones. Constructive criticism is healthy and necessary, and vicious criticism is often hilarious. Take, for example, the latest comment on an old Ron Paul post:

---
Name: ART DEKKO

ANYONE WITH BRAINS (UN-WASHED BY THE MEDIA) STILL INTACT....HAVING HEARD OF
RON PAUL....MUST CERTAINLY VOTE FOR HIM.

IMAGINE....GETTING ALL THOSE VOTES THUS FAR, WITH A TOTAL NEW YORK MEDIA
BLACKOUT.
YOU BOYS ARE SCARED SHITLESS.

RON PAUL GETS MY FAMILIES VOTES IN NOVEMBER."
---

Nothing says sanity like caps lock. He gets points for the name, though. Unless it's not a pun, but his actual name, in which case I award his parents the points.

I don't mean to pick on this particular commenter, or even the swarm of Paulbot commentators whose name is (and numbers are) legion. I say this in all sincerity -- we appreciate every reader, including those that give us a hard time. Besides, that whole thread is made of 100% pure weapons-grade comment win, and whenever I'm having a bad day, I go back and read it. It is like mirth in pixel form. If the threads start picking up, I'd love to start a "Comment of the Day" or "Comment of the Week" feature.

Okay, back to work. Those brains aren't going to wash themselves.

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Posted by Jeff Shaw at May 8, 2008 8:12 AM | Comments (9)

 

Smoking Bans: Good Ol' Fashioned, Good-Intentioned Folly

Filed under: Law

Yesterday’s Strib contained an interesting little diddy via the AP pertaining to smoking bans in bars and restaurant. The story’s crux—a recently Massachussettes study suggests the smoking ban disuades teens from becoming smokers—bolsters the idea that smoking bans have largely succeeded in promoting health.

Both supporters and opponents of the ban point to various studies backing their respective positions. (Anti-ban contrarians embrace this one linking bans to an increase in drunk driving deaths.) No matter your position vis-à-vis The Ban, it seems the greatest-good/utilitarian argument is the only rhetorical tool on the proverbial toolbelt.

That in mind, we decided to examine the philosophical underpinnings of The Ban... and pick them apart. Why? Because apparently we are contrarians.

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Posted by Matt Snyders at May 8, 2008 6:24 AM | Comments (12)

 

What we learned about the Strib's financial misfortunes today UPDATE x4

Filed under: Media

We're on Strib Bankruptcy Watch Day 3, and the caffeine is giving me and the story a second wind. Business really picked up yesterday with the publication of Jeff Shaw's web-exclusive news story revealing that the Strib's debt was trading below 60 cents on the dollar. Ouch.

As MinnPost's David Brauer describes it:

After Shaw's story broke, Strib parent Avista Capital Partners finally handed one of their reporters some inside dope; Neal St. Anthony disclosed that Avista was "forced" to write off $75 million of their $100 million investment. St. Anthony amplified Shaw's info, noting that $96 million in subordinated debt trades for 10 cents on the dollar. Citing cost cuts and unspecified revenue-producing investments, an Avista memo states, "We view 2008 as the year to prove a recovery is possible." So far, so bad.

You can read the Strib story about it here. You can read the New York Post's story about it here.

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Posted by Kevin Hoffman at May 7, 2008 4:22 PM | Comments (4)

 

Breakfast of Champions 5/7: Storm clouds

Filed under: Breakfast of Champions

News, like spring, is busting out all over. Also like spring, this can lead to turbulent patterns, like the thunderstorm yesterday or fresh information about the Star Tribune's woes popping up.

Enough with the extended metaphors. Let's get to the news. First, the expanded web content packages for two of our stories:

Buried Treasure: the feature about mining in northeastern Minnesota, the Reporter's Notebook post, the first slideshow and the second slideshow.

The Campus Con Man: Andy Mannix's news story, his update and the slideshow of party images.

Strib Watch: Star Tribune news continues to break. We started here in the morning with a Q+A about the Strib's financial status, citing Dun & Bradstreet reports. This gave way to an afternoon Web-only feature about how low the Strib's debt is trading.

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Posted by Jeff Shaw at May 7, 2008 5:54 AM | Comments (0)

 

Is the Star Tribune censoring criticism on its website?

Filed under: Media

It's been a crazy week at the Strib, what with the announcement in the New York Post on Sunday that Minneapolis's daily paper of record was on the verge of bankruptcy. Although the Strib denied that rumor, it did acknowledge that it had brought in the Blackstone Group to help manage its debt-load.

Now comes word, via the comments section, that the Strib may be extending its P.R. campaign into censoring reader comments on its website.

Several readers allege they left comments on the original article that were deleted because the point of view was negative toward the Star Tribune.

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Posted by Kevin Hoffman at May 6, 2008 6:16 PM | Comments (4)

 

Reporter's Notebook: Buried Treasure

Filed under: Economy

If you just can't get enough of the Iron Range, read on for these two web-only nuggets. First: more history! Also, a detailed accounting of the cutting-edge science behind refining sulfide metals. Without further ado:

(Photo of the Rust Hull Mahoning mine, the largest open pit iron mine in the world. For a sense of scale, see the truck on the right side of the picture? And those two grey rectangles a little to the left of it? Those little grey dots are 12-passenger vans.)

It is said there are two histories of the Iron Range—one of the companies and the other of the workers. In the early days, the miners were European immigrants who came to the Range by the thousands. As Marvin Lamppa relates in his seminal history of the region, Minnesota’s Iron Country: Rich Ore, Rich Lives, “Their purposes for coming were clear. ‘You can get rich in America.’ ‘There’s work for everybody in America.’ ‘The streets are paved with gold in America.’”

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Posted by Jonathan Kaminsky at May 6, 2008 6:15 PM | Comments (1)

 

Expanded web content: Campus con man not done with Minneapolis yet

Filed under: City Pages

By Andy Mannix

Daniel Gonzalez, the subject of our news story and photo slideshow this week, is out on work release. He's still incarcerated by Hennepin County, but he is allowed to leave to go to work.

Apparently he has Internet access.

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Posted by Jeff Shaw at May 6, 2008 2:40 PM | Comments (0)

 

Katherine Kersten manipulates quote in column on Grand Theft Auto IV

Filed under: Media

Letter writer Joshua Nichols points out some selective editing by Strib conservative lightning rod Katherine Kersten in her recent column on Grand Theft Auto IV.

In the column, Kersten writes:

"[T]eenage boys of America," wrote one reviewer, "... you can still kill and maim and plunder and screw until your heart is full," but now "the violence is no longer cartoonish." Thanks to GTA IV's new realism, when G-stringed strippers grind the main character's lap, the player's controller vibrates in response.

But if you run the phrase "can still kill and maim and plunder and screw" through a Google search, you'll find the source material, this Slate column. As you'll see from reading the full quote in context, Kersten used some selective editing to remove portions that were inconvenient to her conservative orthodoxy.

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Posted by Kevin Hoffman at May 6, 2008 1:30 PM | Comments (1)

 

NY Post: Blackstone Group to Strib's Rescue?

Filed under: Media

The writer at the newspaper who started the Star Tribune bankruptcy rumor has a followup article in today's edition.

Although the update first seems to back off the bankruptcy claim, implying that the Blackstone Group is here to save the day, by the end of the story we're back in Chapter 11.

Most intriguing is this bit of inside gossip at the end:

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Posted by Kevin Hoffman at May 6, 2008 9:27 AM | Comments (0)