The Minnesota Department of Human Services is probing the Mayo Clinic for possible violations of civil- and human-rights laws by putting a higher priority on patients with commercial insurance.
The review, confirmed Thursday by DHS Commissioner Emily Piper, follows reports that Mayo will give preference to privately insured patients.
Piper's department is also evaluating its various contracts with the Mayo Clinic system, which reaches far beyond its Rochester home base. Those contracts served over 150,000 public program enrollees last year, including lab work and pharmacy services.
Piper's actions are in response to a video transcript leaked to the Star Tribune in which Mayo Clinic CEO Dr. John Noseworthy explains the policy to employees.
This possible violation of civil and human rights on Mayo's part reminded Bluestem Prairie of an earlier time when the Mayo Clinic worked to make America great. Beth Karon's article on the B'nai Israel Synagogue's website, History of our Congregation, provides a snapshot of discrimination in Rochester in the 1920s:
After years of their service, especially that of Mama Sternberg, Samuel Sternberg put together enough money to build the Northwestern Hotel, which served as a Jewish hostelry and kosher eating establishment. It also became a meeting place for intellectuals of that period – regardless of their religion – including doctors, students, and literary enthusiasts. In the 1920’s, Mayo started charging a $100.00 deposit to select groups of patients before they could be seen. Jews were among this select group (along with “Negroes and Greeks”). Since many were immigrants with meager funds, the congregation would help provide this fee when needed.
It was B’nai Israel Synagogue that contacted the B’nai Brith Anti-Defamation League about this discriminatory treatment. Because of the protests waged by the local and non-local Jewish communities, two things happened in 1927: First, Mayo withdrew the deposit requirement, and second, a denominational medical social service, which included a Jewish medical social worker, was established. Thus, B’nai Brith International began serving in Rochester. The overall care of the religious needs, visiting the sick, and disposition of the deceased still rested on the shoulders of the Rochester community of 25 families.
Elsewhere on the website, those who were discriminated against in terms of payment are described as “Jews, actors, and other indigent types.” In short, people with whom Bluestem might like to hang out. We also deeply appreciate the fact that people living in Greater Minnesota organizing to make greater Minnesota a better place didn't start in November 2016.
Photo: The Avalon Music building in Rochester, which Wikipedia (photo credit) tells us:
a historic three-story red brick building in Rochester, Minnesota. It opened in 1919 as the Northwestern Hotel. The Sam Sternberg family operated it as a kosher restaurant and hotel for Jewish travelers, including many visitors to the Mayo Clinic nearby.[2]
Perhaps Mayo Clinic might try to set a different date than 1926 for making America great again.
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Now he's trolling the governor--and his own constituents--in a letter to the editor of the Morris Sun Tribune, No need for water czar. Read the whole LTE in the Sun Tribune. One paragraph stands out for us:
Here's a word picture to explain a better approach. Traffic congestion in the metro areas took decades to streamline into the interstate systems we now enjoy and take for granted. The traffic congestion was not solved in two years by a "traffic czar" or traffic law proclaiming "let there be no congestion." It took decades of patience, careful planning and concerted efforts by the citizens to solve the problem. In the same way, appointing a "water czar," or hastily passing ill-crafted buffer laws proclaiming "let the water pollution be solved by 2018" is poorly conceived and will not accomplish constructive and lasting results.
What in the wild, wild world of sports is Backer talking about? Neither anecdotal experience nor traffic studies suggest that "[t]raffic congestion in the metro areas took decades to streamline into the interstate systems" in which we've managed "solve the problem" of congestion. Nor was the planning of the metro's interstate system a kumbaya moment in our state's history.
First, about that "solved" problem of congestion. Just last month, the American Transportation Research Institute (not a bunch of dirty hippies flogging Agenda 21, but the research wing of the American Trucking Associations) sent out a press release noting Twin Cities Home to Four of the Nation's Worst Truck Bottlenecks:
The American Transportation Research Institute today released its annual list highlighting the most congested bottlenecks for trucks in America, including four in Minnesota.
The 2017 Top Truck Bottleneck List assesses the level of truck-oriented congestion at 250 locations on the national highway system. The analysis, based on truck GPS data from 600,000+ heavy duty trucks uses several customized software applications and analysis methods, along with terabytes of data from trucking operations to produce a congestion impact ranking for each location. The data is associated with the FHWA-sponsored Freight Performance Measures (FPM) initiative. The locations detailed in this latest ATRI list represent the top 100 congested locations.
"Minnesota is home to 17 Fortune 500 companies, making it a major freight generator and player in the nation's economy," said Minnesota Trucking Association President John Hausladen. "ATRI's analysis allows us to target state and federal resources to keep trucks, and the economy, moving."
The four bottlenecks in Minnesota, all located in the Twin Cities, are:
No. 45 – I-35W at I-94
No. 55 – I-35W at I-494
No. 71 – I-35W at I-694
No. 88 – I-35E at I-94
"Trucks move 70% of the nation's goods, so knowing where our highway system is most congested can lead to better decisions about what highways and bridges need improvement," said American Trucking Associations President Chris Spear, "and it is our hope that ATRI's research will guide states toward improving these pain points in the supply chain so our industry can continue to safely and efficiently moving the nation's goods."
For access to the full report, including detailed information on each of the 100 top congested locations, click here.
It's not just industry flacks fretting about congestion in the Evil Metro. Last August, Pioneer Press staffer Marino Eccher reported Twin Cities road congestion hits record high and is expected to get worse, MnDOT says. Perhaps the problem was solved since then, thought that sort of kind of undercuts Backer's analogy, such as it is. Eccher writes:
It’s not just your brakelight-riddled imagination: Freeway congestion in and around Minneapolis and St. Paul was the worst on record last year, according to a new report from Minnesota Department of Transportation.
The agency’s annual report on freeway congestion said congestion was up from 21.1 percent in 2014 to 23.4 percent last year. That’s the highest number since the agency started collecting data in 1993.
Severe congestion, lasting longer than 2 hours, was at 7.6 percent, the highest it’s been in at least a decade, MnDOT said.
Congestion is measured as a percentage of the metro’s 758 freeway miles on which traffic is moving at less than 45 miles per hour. That’s the speed at which disruptions like crashes, stalls or overcapacity ramps can trigger widespread breakdowns in the flow of traffic, the agency said.
Unsurprisingly, I-35W, I-394 and the I-494/694 loop are the most snarled stretches, with the worst of it coming near the I-35W/I-94 interchange.
The agency said road design improvements, MnPASS express-lane expansion and active traffic management and information are all part of its effort to ease congestion — but warned that projected increases in travel, an improving economy and higher road construction costs are all expected to worsen the problem.
Given these results, Bluestem has to wonder why Backer (or the hapless GOP House staffer writer assigned to him) selected the process of freeway construction as the model for water quality efforts in rural Minnesota. If he think this is "solved" congestion in the metro, we'd hate to let our dog and chickens drink "clean" water determined by a similar process out here.
Not all neighborhoods had voice in building MN metro interstate
The section of I-94 between Minneapolis and Saint Paul was completed in 1968. In the Twin Cities, the construction of the highway was politically charged. The highway was built primarily through many working-class and African-American neighborhoods.[5][4] In Saint Paul, the routing of I-94 is set through and displaces the historic Rondo neighborhood, which prior to the highway construction was the largest African-American community in Saint Paul. By uprooting almost the entire neighborhood, the highway disrupted the vitality of the Saint Paul African American community.[3][2][4] This history influenced the July 2016 blockade of nearby I-35W* [I-94] by Black Lives Matter protesters, to whom the freeways are symbols of oppressive urban policy.[6]
One wonders whether Backer and staff ghostwriter would think Rondo lives mattered, if either indeed knew that the neighborhood had once existed. It wouldn't be the first time Backer made factual error about an urban population, given the invidious comparisons he's made between flood victims in Browns Valley and New Orleans or odd statements about urban transportation.
Irony sidenote: not surprisingly, Backer is a co-author ofHF0390, which increases penalties obstructing traffic to a highway or airport, a bill spawned by those freeway blockades.
Governor learned lessons; Backer spews old anti-Evil Metro talking points
Gov. Mark Dayton is making another push to clean up Minnesota’s waters — and says he’s learned lessons from his contentious battle two years ago to implement buffer strips along the state’s waterways.
In a speech Friday morning to the Minnesota Environmental Congress, the DFL governor said he’ll propose improving Minnesota’s water quality 25 percent by the year 2025.
But he’s not proposing specific tools to accomplish that reduction just yet. Instead, he says he’ll solicit citizen input around the state this summer and make proposals based on that input in 2018.
“One of the lessons I learned with the buffer legislation is that it was criticized as a top-down, one-size-fits-all mandate,” Dayton said Friday. “I have my own ideas. I can advance those next year. But I want to let this process unfold and get citizens themselves engaged and citizens themselves feeling their own investment in the outcome.” . . .
That lesson is quite a bit different from the one Backer draws from Dayton, and it's ironic that the Pioneer Press article appeared on the same day as Backer's letter.
But then, Backer's learned that he can get re-elected inventing whatever he wants about the Evil Metro, which hasn't just solved its traffic congestion problem, but is always out to get him as well.
*I-35W was blocked by a separate group, primarily white allies, the Pioneer Press reported, while I-94 had been blocked the Saturday night before the weekday action.
Photo: Could this be Backer dreaming about a buffer law repeal during the farmers' panel after lunch at the Water Summit in Morris, his twin brother, or just another guy who looks ? Whatever the cast, it's clear Backer's asleep at the wheel when it comes to talking about Evil Metro area congestion or about the current details of Governor Dayton's water quality plan. Read more about the questions about this photo in Republican guy who voted for Minnesota's buffer bill continues to grandstand against it
. (Photo submitted by a former Backer constituent).
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Duehring lost, and returned to the Washington DC area. He served on the Bush-Cheney Transition Team, Department Defense Transition Team following the 2000 election, and was appointed as the Air Force's Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs and Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Manpower and Reserve Affairs under the Bush Administration from 2001 through 2009.
Mr. Duehring is a 28-year Air Force veteran, having been commissioned in 1968 through Officer Training School. He is a decorated combat pilot, completing more than 800 missions during the Vietnam War as a forward air controller, including a tour as one of the Raven FACs in northern Laos. Mr. Duehring has flown more than a dozen types of aircraft, amassing more than 1,200 hours in the A-10 Thunderbolt II. He retired as a colonel in 1996. His final military assignment was U.S. Air Attaché to Indonesia.
Mr. Duehring has served on the Bush-Cheney Transition Team and the Department of Defense Transition Team. He was the Executive Director of the Patrick Henry Center for Individual Liberty, a non-profit educational and charitable foundation, and he was endorsed as the Republican candidate for the Minnesota 2nd Congressional District in 1998. Prior to his current assignment, Mr. Duehring served six years as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs. He performed the duties of acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs in the absence of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs, including an extended period during and following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. . . .
. . . While the war in Vietnam ebbed and flowed with alternating violence and boredom, there was a rumor of another war, somewhere else, where men flew long hours in propeller aircraft without markings into constant danger in a land where adventure reigned supreme, where common sense replaced the hated Rules of Engagement and where a man could finally test the limits of his abilities. These pilots were few in number and their call sign was Raven.
This is the wartime autobiography of one of the few pilots ever to fly under that now famous call sign. Craig Duehring lived and flew out of the guerilla headquarters at Long Tieng, Laos, in support of the iconic Hmong leader, Major General Vang Pao, for a longer tour of duty than any other Raven. During that time, he knew many of the most notable Ravens and participated in many tragic events of the day – including the famous “St. Valentine’s Day Massacre”.
This is the story of how one young man left the farm country of southern Minnesota and embarked on a career as an Air Force pilot during the height of the Vietnam War. Equally as important as the combat he experienced is his personal triumph over repeated obstacles and near disasters to achieve his dream that will be a source of inspiration for young readers everywhere. . .
Photo: Craig W. Duehring during a Pentagon press briefing, Sept. 14, 2001. Via Wikimedia Commons. Image was released by the United States Department of Defense with the ID 010914-D-9880W-047.
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That the poem "In Flanders Field" wasn't written by an American hearkens back to the World War that prompted Veterans Day as a national holiday for the United States. The Academy of American Poets notes in its listing for Canadian poet John McCrae:
In April 1915, McCrae was stationed in the trenches near Ypres, Belgium, in an area known as Flanders, during the bloody Second Battle of Ypres. In the midst of the tragic warfare, McCrae’s friend, twenty-two-year-old Lieutenant Alexis Helmer, was killed by artillery fire and buried in a makeshift grave. The following day, McCrae, after seeing the field of makeshift graves blooming with wild poppies, wrote his famous poem “In Flanders Field,” which would be the second to last poem he would ever write. It was published in England’s Punch magazine in December 1915 and was later included in the posthumous collection In Flanders Fields and Other Poems (G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1919).
Soon after writing “In Flanders Field,” McCrae was transferred to a hospital in France, where he was named the chief of medical services. Saddened and disillusioned by the war, McCrae found respite in writing letters and poetry, and wrote his final poem, “The Anxious Dead.”
In the summer of 1917, McCrae’s health took a turn, and he began suffering from severe asthma attacks and bronchitis. McCrae died of pneumonia and meningitis on January 28, 1918.
“In Flanders Field” became popular almost immediately upon its publication. It was translated into other languages and used on billboards advertising Victory Loan Bonds in Canada. The poppy soon became known as the flower of remembrance for the men and women in Britain, France, the United States, and Canada who have died in service of their country. Today, McCrae’s poem continues to be an important part of Remembrance Day celebrations in Canada and Europe, as well as Memorial Day and Veterans Day celebrations in the United States.
The United States Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Public Affairs tells this story:
McCrae's poem had a huge impact on two women, Anna E. Guerin of France and Georgia native Moina Michael. Both worked hard to initiate the sale of artificial poppies to help orphans and others left destitute by the war. By 1920, when Guerin, with the help of the American Legion, established the first poppy sale in the U.S., the flower was well known in the allied countries — America, Britain, France, Canada, Australia and New Zealand — as the "Flower of Remembrance." Proceeds from that first sale went to the American and French Children's League.
Guerin had troubles with the distribution of the poppies in early 1922 and sought out Michael for help. Michael had started a smaller-scaled Poppy Day during a YMCA conference she was attending in New York and wanted to use the poppies as a symbol of remembrance of the war. Guerin, called the "Poppy Lady of France" in her homeland, and Michael, later dubbed "The Poppy Princess" by the Georgia legislature, went to the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) for help.
The poppy was adopted as the official memorial flower of the VFW at its national convention in Seattle, Wash., in August 1922, following the first nationwide distribution of poppies ever conducted by any veterans organization.
In 1923, faced by a shortage of poppies from French manufacturers, the VFW relied on New York florists to make up the difference. This was a huge setback, however, and led to the idea by VFW officials to use unemployed and disabled veterans to produce the artificial flower. This concept was approved in late 1923 and the first poppy factory was built in Pittsburgh, Pa., in 1924. This provided a practical means of assistance to veterans and also ensured a steady, reliable source of poppies. Veterans at Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities and veterans homes help assemble the poppies, and each year the VFW distributes roughly 14 million worldwide.
It was around the same time the first poppy factory was built that the VFW registered the name "Buddy Poppy" with the U.S. Patent Office. The term "Buddy" was coined by the poppy makers as a tribute to their comrades who did not come home from the war or who were scarred and crippled for life.
The VFW celebrated the 75th anniversary of the Buddy Poppy as its official flower in 1997. While profits from its sales have helped countless veterans and their widows, widowers and orphans over the years, the poppy itself survives as a perpetual tribute to those who have given their lives for the nation's freedom.
It's Veterans Day--originally Armistice Day, as the VA history of the holiday notes. As a thank you to all veterans, Bluestem offers this reading of the poem, by Canadian poet and songwriter Leonard Cohen, who died yesterday.
Photo: Veterans, from Stars and Stripes.
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Jim NashMy great grandparents did this in 1905 when they arrived at Ellis Island from Norway. Norwegian citizens one day American citizens the next. Invested into the community, jobs, voters, the whole shebang.
"This" referenced The Draz's headnote:
And...most importantly, they pledged their loyalty to the United States of America and its citizens.
In fact, that flash citizenship process isn't quite how it happened.
Naturalization is the process by which an alien becomes an American citizen. It is a voluntary act; naturalization is not required. Of the foreign-born persons listed on the 1890 through 1930 censuses, 25 percent had not become naturalized or filed their "first papers. . . .
General Rule: The Two-Step Process
Congress passed the first law regulating naturalization in 1790 (1 Stat. 103). As a general rule, naturalization was a two-step process that took a minimum of 5 years.After residing in the United States for 2 years, an alien could file a "declaration of intent" (so-called "first papers") to become a citizen. After 3 additional years, the alien could "petition for naturalization." After the petition was granted, a certificate of citizenship was issued to the alien. These two steps did not have to take place in the same court. As a general rule, the "declaration of intent" generally contains more genealogically useful information than the "petition." The "declaration" may include the alien's month and year (or possibly the exact date) of immigration into the United States.
There were some exceptions: "derivative" citizenship granted to wives and minor children of naturalized men; an alien woman who married a U.S. citizen between 1790 to 1922 automatically became a citizen; 1824 to 1906, minor aliens who had lived in the United States 5 years before their 23rd birthday could file both their declarations and petitions at the same time; and exceptions granted to veterans that allow a person to shorten the residency period by as much as four years.
Throughout our nation's history, foreign-born men and women have come to the United States, taken the Oath of Allegiance to become naturalized citizens, and contributed greatly to their new communities and country. The Oath of Allegiance has led to American citizenship for more than 220 years.
Since the first naturalization law in 1790, applicants for naturalization have taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States. Five years later the Naturalization Act of 1795 required an applicant to declare an intention (commitment) to become a U.S. citizen before filing a Petition for Naturalization. In the declaration of intention the applicant would indicate his understanding that upon naturalization he would take an oath of allegiance to the United States and renounce (give up) any allegiance to a foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty. Applicants born with a hereditary title also had to renounce their title or order of nobility.
It's not something that happened just as one got off the boat, as Representative Nash jokes--with an instant transformation from being Norwegian to being an American.
One curious side note about the Minnesota state constitution: both Representative Nash's Norwegian citizen ancestors (arriving in 1905) and our editor's own grandhttps://www.mnhs.org/library/constitution/father Sorensen (1912) missed the chance for completely legal non-citizen voting.
From 1857 until 1896, the Minnesota state constitution allowed "White persons [male] of foreign birth, who shall have declared their intentions to become citizens, conformably to the laws of the United States upon the subject of naturalization" to exercise the right to vote before becoming citizens. This was in both the original Democratic and Republican versions of the document.
Photo: The Oscar II, upon which our editor's Danish grandfather reached America on May 1, 1912. It took him a few years to become a citizen.
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In 1996, Chmielewski became embroiled in the "phonegate" scandal. It was revealed that Chmielewski had given family members state long-distance access codes, allowing them to make phone calls at state expense. Chmielewski was ultimately defeated for re-election in 1996, after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor.
There is one thing the public can get its hands on from every Minnesota lawmaker: long-distance telephone bills. Remember those?
Back in 1993, the Legislature was stung by a scandal over the misuse of a toll-free number for legislators that was lent out to friends and relatives, who racked up an $85,000 phone bill on the House majority leader’s account.
“Phonegate” led to criminal charges, resignations and a law mandating that telephone records absolutely, unequivocally are public to anyone who asks for it. Marty said the law requires him, every month, to sign off on paperwork for bills totaling maybe four bucks.
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Update: Responding to an email from Bluestem Prairie, reporter Josie Gerezek called Bill Schulz about his statement, and the story now reads:
At the rally, Schulz said he lived in California during his time in the Navy, through the ’60s and early ’70s. In a later phone call, Schulz said he had actually served in the ’50s and ’60s. “I saw what happened when the movement for equality among blacks turned into something violent, with the Black Panthers in the San Francisco and Oakland area, and I saw those people out on the street and the crimes they were committing, the murders they were committing,” Schulz said. “Now, I see that coming again.”
Schulz said after his 13 years in the service, he visited Mississippi and Alabama.
“Martin Luther King and a number of other black leaders were holding the freedom parades, and I marched with them a few times,” Schulz said, adding he’d served with men who were black, white and Hispanic. “I have no problem with race.”
Schulz could not have seen "those people out on the street and the crimes they were committing, the murders they were committing" while serving in the Navy in California if he marched with King in Alabama and Mississippi after his service with the Navy ended. While the Panthers legally carried guns from their founding, no fatal shots were fired until late October 1967.
Either way, Schulz is trying to have it both ways--that he was both a participant in the great civil rights marches in 1965 and 1966 after leaving the Navy and a witness to '"those people out on the street and the crimes they were committing, the murders they were committing" while serving in the Navy in California.
If he meant to say that he marched with King, then didn't like the Panthers, he simply should have said that, without using his naval service to place himself as an eyewitness to a history he probably just watched on television.
Moreover: Bluestem has yet to meet a veteran who doesn't know when she or he served our country. Schulz is a regular guest columnist at the newspaper, so apparently their regular guest columnist's shifting life history matters. Black History? Not so much. [End update]
It is a fact universally acknowledged that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated in Memphis by James Earl Ray on April 4, 1968.
Rally organizer Bill Schulz, who Fergus Falls Police Chief Kile Bergren describes as a long-time supporter of law enforcement, said what motivated him were the targeted shootings of police officers like those in Dallas and Baton Rouge. The I-94 Black Lives Matter protests in the Twin Cities, too, were a call to action, he said.
“That is anarchy,” Schulz said of the protests, which took over major interstates resulting in nearly two dozen officers being injured. “It may be free speech, but it’s promoting anarchy.”
Schulz said it was time local police knew “the sentiments of the people” were with them.
Schulz said he lived in California during his time in the Navy, through the ’60s and the early ’70s. “I saw what happened when the movement for equality among blacks turned into something violent, with the Black Panthers in the San Francisco and Oakland area, and I saw those people out on the street and the crimes they were committing, the murders they were committing,” Schulz said. “Now, I see that coming again.”
Schulz said after his 13 years in the service, he visited Mississippi and Alabama.
“Martin Luther King and a number of other black leaders were holding the freedom parades, and I marched with them a few times,” Schulz said, adding he’d served with men who were black, white and Hispanic. “I have no problem with race.”
While Schulz may or may nor have a problem with race, he does appear to have a problem with timelines, given that King was no longer living when Schulz visited Mississippi and Alabama in the 1970s, after his 13 years in the service.
Shame on the Fergus Falls Journal for running this copy.
Here's the screenshot of the original copy online:
Photo:Civil rights leader Andrew Young (L) and others standing on balcony of the Lorraine Motel on April 4, 1968, pointing in direction of the shots after the assassination of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who is lying at their feet. Photo by Joseph Louw.
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Calling for the elimination of the IRS, the Department of Education, the Department of Energy, the Department of Commerce, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development didn't help Ted Cruz slowdown the relentless Donald Trump.
While meeting with potential voters at Beltrami Electric Cooperative, Hughes described his background as a U.S. Air Force veteran, his political stance as a constitutional conservative and outlined his plan to reduce the size of the federal government
"My No. 1 theme is to make the U.S. government smaller and send much of what's done at the federal level back to the states," said Hughes, a Karlstad resident.
To do so, Hughes said if elected to Congress, he would want to eliminate five of the 15 federal government departments including education, energy, commerce, labor and housing and urban development. Despite his ideas, though, Hughes said he isn't telling voters that he will get everything accomplished on Capitol Hill.
With roots in the 1880s, the DOL was created when President William Howard Taft signed the Organic Act of the Department of Labor on March 4, 1913, having been bullied into it. A DOL timeline notes:
After much opposition, President William Howard Taft signs the Organic Act creating the U.S. Department of Labor. Signed during Taft's last hours in office, it is followed shortly thereafter by President Woodrow Wilson's appointment of William B. Wilson (no relation) as the first secretary of labor.
Hughes will undo this Progressive Era betrayal and put the Bureau of Labor Statistics et. al back into state governments' hands, whether or not they want it.
"I feel I'm much more conservative than Hinson," Hughes said. "I want to eliminate entire departments, make government much smaller and taxes much lower, whereas she will talk about streamlining and making efficiencies."
Photo: Woodrow Wilson (left) and William Howard Taft (right) on the day the Organic Bill of the Department of Labor was signed and government balloon to proportions that mirrored Taft's awesome Progressive Era stache.
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Today is Memorial Day--which was Decoration Day until 1971, when it became a federal holiday. Decoration Day grew from dozens of local ceremonies immediately following the Civil War, including the moving story of African Americans in Charleston who worked to give fallen Union soldiers a proper burial and remembrance.
Seventy-two years after he gave his all off the coast of Normandy, France, on June 6, 1944, U.S. Navy Motor Machinist Mate 1st Class John Emanuel Anderson was laid to rest Saturday in his hometown of Willmar, surrounded by family, veterans, dignitaries and members of the community. Under a rainy sky they came together, not only to say goodbye, but to say thank you. It was a somber occasion but one that was also a celebration. . . .
Anderson’s remains were identified by DNA testing in 2015 and disinterred for reburial next to his parents in Willmar’s Fairview Cemetery.
The memorial service took place at Willmar’s War Memorial Auditorium, followed by the burial at Fairview Cemetery. The Willmar Brass Quintet provided the music and the playing of Taps, while the Minneapolis Navy Operational Support Center and Army Reserve/National Guard Honor Guard were on hand to perform the military honors, including acting as the pallbearers, folding the American flag and providing a gun salute.
Retired Brigadier General Dean Johnson of the United States Army National Guard gave the open and closing remarks and prayers at the service.
“You waited, wondered and questioned. Now he is finally home,” Johnson said.
After his death on D-Day Anderson had been buried as an unknown in the Normandy American Military Cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer, France. His family was told he was missing in action, lost at sea after his LCT-30 tank landing craft was hit by enemy fire. His parents and three sisters died never knowing what had happened to Anderson. It took years of research, letters, phone calls and hope for Anderson to be positively identified, a moment his family thought might never have come.
“The journey was long and arduous,” Franklin said, one of nine nieces and nephews of Anderson.
Helping along the way was Jon Lindstrand, curator of the U.S. Military Historical Collection, who worked tirelessly for four years on Anderson’s case.
“It means those who were lost will not be forgotten. John’s story offers hope. Hope that they will all come home,” Lindstrand said during the memorial service. . . .
About 1,000 people lined the street to honor the missing sailor during the procession home. A public memorial Saturday brought out hundreds to honor his life.
“After all this time, to know exactly where he’s at and to have him back here at home is just huge,” Lindstrand said.
John Emanuel Anderson was born in Willmar, Minnesota, on September 25, 1919, to Oscar and Anna Anderson. He was raised in Willmar and graduated from high school in 1937, after which he worked for his father as a painter and decorator,planning eventually to take over his father's business. Following the outbreak of W.W. II in 1941, John enlisted in the U.S. Navy. He trained throughout the U.S. as a Motor Machinist. After serving in North Africa, Sicily and Italy, John was sent to England to prepare for the Invasion of the European Mainland in January of 1944.
John was the couple's only son, the youngest of four children.
His return--and the generous public support by the regional center that's home to just under 20,000 people, none of whom now are related to the fallen sailor--is a reminder that many Americans still honor those who sacrificed for this nation. Rest in peace, John Anderson.
Photo: Citizens lined the streets to honor Anderson. Photo via WCCO news.
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Bluestem wasn't the only reading the news article.
Today's Fergus Falls Journal published a guest column by Underwood resident and Women’s Foundation of Minnesota vice-chairVictoria McWane-Creek, Coverage of Bigwood speech inaccurate. McWane-Creek, who attended the lecture, writes:
I was appalled at the coverage of Lt. Col. Rice’s lecture for the Bigwood event series. The print edition’s headline seemed sensational and the content regurgitated Rice’s perspective; reporting lacked attendee feedback, offered no alternative perspective, and provided no relevant context. I attended expecting to hear this accomplished woman’s incredible story. Instead, Rice delivered a treatise on how the Republican Party is for blacks, how there is no real racism, how middle class White people are the most discriminated against group, and the “real” civil rights history. To summarize, Rice does not personally experience racism and concludes that racism and institutional discrimination no longer exist.
Rice’s conclusion rests on the belief that the Constitution guaranteed equal opportunity for all. This is a distorted belief based on an assumption that the Constitution valued inclusion. Missing from Rice’s assessment, and the Journal article, was the intent that white, landed men only benefit from its protection and rights; ignoring the documented legacy of unequal application of laws where black, native, Japanese, Muslim, and gender non-conforming people are concerned (e.g. mass incarceration, education, health, wealth and income disparities, and death at the hands of authority etc.) Some laws sought to diminish non-whites access while others sought to privilege whiteness (see Alexander’s The New Jim Crow, Harris-Perry’s Sister Citizen, or Katznelson’s When Affirmative Action was White). . . .
Listening to Rice, I thought of The Invisible Gorilla. It investigated how attention, memory, and knowledge distort beliefs, they contended that “the distorted beliefs we hold…are not just wrong, but wrong in dangerous ways” (Chabris & Simons, 2010, p. 68). Distorted beliefs are automatic and do not require or welcome close examination. Mezirow wrote that distorted premises lead to viewing “reality in a way that arbitrarily limits what is included…or does not facilitate integration of experience” (1991, p. 118).
Racism and institutional discrimination are powerful socio-political constructs that society has yet to dismantle. Rice posits a dangerous notion that encourages a false sense of accomplishment — without supportive evidence. Considering that unarmed black people are more likely to be killed by those authorized to use deadly force, our education system often fails students of color, significantly higher black unemployment, drastically less black wealth, and that my family faces racial profiling whenever we relocate, not challenging this notion is dangerous. The structures that generate “barriers and disadvantages for some and privileges and advantages for others’’ remain (Burke, 2013, p. 840).
This article forwards the unchallenged notion that white privilege and discrimination no longer exist and intimates that society eliminated institutional impediments to opportunity. I expect journalists to apply their craft, provide context, and use multiple perspectives. Furthermore, I hope that subsequent coverage enlightens readers, provides necessary context, challenges assumptions, utilizes data, allows readers to connect authentically with the issues, and builds a more informed citizenry.
Underwood resident Victoria McWane-Creek is pursuing a doctorate of educational leadership at Concordia University and is a public conversations project practitioner.
An Underwood woman has been named vice chair for the Minneapolis-based Women’s Foundation of Minnesota.
Victoria McWane-Creek has dedicated her personal and professional life to lifting the voices of people left on the margins of society, including youth, people in poverty and survivors of sexual abuse, according to a news release.
She currently works as a Title III student success coach at Minnesota State Community and Technical College in Fergus Falls.
Along with her service to the Women’s Foundation of Minnesota, McWane-Creek currently serves on the Rural Minnesota Concentrated Employment Program Youth Advisory Council and the Women of Color and Native Women’s Leadership Council.
She is currently working on her doctor of education degree with Concordia University- Portland, and holds a master’s degree in instructional design and technology from the University of North Dakota and a bachelor’s degree from Eastern Oregon University.
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Usually when Bluestem posts about speakers who have their own tags on Right Wing Watch, those individuals are the guests of Tea Party groups and other such grassroots groups, but not so with Frances Rice.
Jacob Tellers reports in the Fergus Falls Journal article, Bigwood Lecture reflects on who is being treated unfairly, Rice's lecture was sponsored by the Fergus Area College Foundation and Otter Tail Power Company. Tellers reported that Rice believes that racism is no longer a problem for black Americans:
Racism is no longer a problem for African Americans, according to a speaker at the 24th annual Bigwood Lecture Wednesday evening at Legacy Hall on the campus of Minnesota State Community and Technical College.
Instead, it is white, working-class men who now bear most of the racism in today’s society, said Frances Presley Rice.
Having experienced true racism herself, Rice sympathizes with those who she says are now being treated unfairly, she said.
She grew up as an African American in an impoverished, single-parent family in the segregated South, but she says she didn’t let those circumstances hold herself back from achieving success.
“The level of success we achieve is in our own hands,” Rice said. . . .
She also addressed the history of race relations in the United States, saying that it is now often misunderstood and mischaracterized. Since the conclusion of the civil rights movement, her race has not held her back from achieving success, Rice said.
Rice contends that equality has been achieved and that the African American community needs to stop viewing themselves as victims.
While Rice said that President Barack Obama’s election was further proof that there are no longer barriers between race and success, she added that Obama and the Democrat Party have done much to sow racial discord.
According to the source in Fergus Falls who brought the story to our attention, Rice was also brought into the local high school:
Ms. Rice also spoke to the juniors and seniors at our high school today. I've heard from a teacher who reported that the kids said it was "horrible" and "super-political." I don't know if the foundation that brought her in to speak has some kind of agenda or if they just didn't do their research very well, but the teachers that we've heard from today were not impressed with the decision to bring her to the school.
Our source tells us that the headline in the print edition of the newspaper is "White men target of racism, speaker says."
Earlier this month, a "National Diversity Coalition for Trump" was formed by the GOP presidential frontrunner's lawyer Michael Cohen for the purpose of, in the words of one of the group's leaders, demonstrating to voters that Donald Trump is "not racist, misogynist, sexist or Islamophobic." Trump is reportedly scheduled to meet with this group today . . .
Also among the members of diversity coalition is Frances Rice of the National Black Republican Association, who absurdly claimed a few years ago that the GOP's infamous "Southern Strategy" was an effort by the Republican Party to get "fair-minded" non-racist voters in the South to stop supporting the racist Democratic Party.
"That strategy was designed to get the fair-minded people in the South to stop discriminating against blacks and to stop supporting a party that did not share their values," she said. "So those fair-minded ones who migrated to the Republican Party did so. They joined us, we did not join the racists."
Given the division that Trump has sown within the Republican Party, it's curious to see Rice and the National Black Republican Association (which does not appear to be an affiliate of the Republican National Committee) endorsed Trump.
The National Black Republican Association, a self-proclaimed “grassroots activist” organization committed to “returning African Americans to their Republican roots” (i.e., “the party of Lincoln”), released a statement Friday saying that it was “pleased to announce [its] endorsement of Donald J. Trump for President of the United States of America.”
The Florida-based organization, founded in 2005, says it supports Trump because he shares its values: “We, like Mr. Trump, are fiscally conservative, steadfastly pro-life and believers in a small government that fosters freedom for individuals and businesses, so they can grow and become prosperous.”
NBRA Chair Frances Rice detailed the group’s reasoning further, saying that over the last 60 years, Democrats have run black communities into the ground, turning them into “economic and social wastelands.” She writes in part:
We are deeply concerned about illegal immigration, a major cause of high black unemployment, especially among black youth.
Black Americans across America are beginning to wake up and see clearly the reality of what is happening in black neighborhoods. Democrats have run black communities for the past 60 years and the socialist policies of the Democrats have turned those communities into economic and social wastelands, witness Detroit, Baltimore and South Chicago.
We believe that Mr. Trump has demonstrated that he can push back against the mainstream media, end political correctness and free black communities from the destructive grip of socialist Democrats.
Trump, a prolific tweeter, who has gone on record saying “the blacks” love him, crowed about the endorsement on social media Friday . . .
The leader of the Sarasota-based National Black Republican Association is a minority within a minority. Not only is she black, she is also a Republican, a member of a party to which fewer than 10 percent of black voters in Florida belong. Her campaigns -- including one meant to foil the nomination of the first black presidential candidate, Barack Obama -- are best known for their shock value.
Her messages have brought condemnation from Democrats. But they have also sparked a backlash among many Republicans. . . .
When hearing that the chairman of the Republican Party of Florida, Jim Greer, had expressed disappointment in her magazine, The Black Republican, which Greer had secured party money to publish, Rice dismissed it with a wave of her hand.
The magazine featured a picture of Ku Klux Klan members burning a cross, with the caption "Every person in this photograph was a Democrat."
Article titles included "Democrats embrace their child molesters," and "Top 10 Democratic sex scandals in Congress," and "Democrats wage war on God." . . .
Supporters call Rice relentless, a black Republican willing to say things white Republicans cannot. Detractors say she is setting back the GOP's black outreach effort with her inflammatory campaigns.
"Obviously we weren't consulted before she decided to do any of this," said Tony Cooper, president of the Tampa Black Republican Club. "It's a fruitless debate and it may conjure up more ill will toward the party. We should be spending money on debating the Democrats on the issues."
Said Deon Long, president of Florida's Federation of Black Republican Clubs: "We thought those billboards were asinine."
Rice thinks of herself as an "iron butterfly" positioned to expose the "Democratic Party's racist past" in time to convince blacks to vote for John McCain. . . .
Like nearly everyone else originally part of the NBRA, Cadogan has since dropped out. The original board included eight members from around the country, and Rice's husband. In a matter of months, all the board members except Rice, her husband and Cadogan resigned. E-mails provided by one former board member detail that Rice's style had led to the resignations.
After Hurricane Katrina, for example, Rice insisted on sending out a press release praising President Bush's response to the disaster. The board balked because members thought Bush's response was imperfect at best, and those who died or lost their homes were disproportionately black.
Deberly Burstion-Donbraye, formerly a board member of the National Black Republican Association and director of the Republican Party's minority outreach effort in Ohio, said Rice's efforts seemed to lack common sense and ignore the variety of opinions within the Republican Party. She resigned, fearing her reputation was at stake. . . .
Read the entire article at the Sarasota Herald Tribune.
Like our tipster, we wonder just what background research the head of the local college foundation did to invite Rice--and why the paper seemed so incurious about Rice's claims that poor white folks bear the brunt of racism in American life.
We can only wonder whether the Fergus Falls College Foundation and Otter Tail Power Company would be interested in bringing in some of the black community leaders covered in Bring Me The News article, Groups lay out ideas to help fix 'unacceptable' racial disparities in MN. Apparently, Ms. Rice and her hosts missed this:
Photo: France Rice speaking in Fergus Falls, Briana Sanchez, via the Fergus Falls Journal.
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We hesitated to share theApril 1 announcements published in the Dairyland Peach and the Morrison County Record announcing an upcoming screening at the Little Falls Ballroom of Curtis Bowers' "Agenda 2: The Masters of Deceit."
The movie night, which includes a cash bar available for all beverages, as well as pizzas and pulled pork sandwiches for sale, is sponsored by the Central Minnesota Tea Party. We previewed Bower's first Central Minnesota Tea Party first Bowersfest back in the 2012 post, Their own private Idaho: Curtis Bowers to keynote July 12 Browerville Tea Party Rally.
Son of James Bowers, author of The Naked Truth: The Naked Communist - Revisited (an explication of the top 45 Goals of Communists section in W. Cleon Skousen's The Naked Communist), Curtis Bowers believes that Everything He Things is Wrong With America can be attributed to a long standing Communist agenda that's behind it all.
As he continued to travel, Bowers found that people were overwhelmed by the seeming myriad of issues they were facing. From the promotion of Islam to the propaganda of climate change, from the deceit of Common Core to the manufactured economic crisis, and from the manipulation of the Evangelical Church to the unsustainable debt burden, it seemed as if America had a hundred different enemies with a hundred different agendas, he said. But he knew from his research that wasn’t the case.
Bowers is out to expose the “Masters of Deceit and their attacks on our freedom,” he said.
Spoiler Alert: Masters of Deceit are commies
Students of American history will recognize "Agenda 2's" subtitle from the book of the same name by J. Edgar Hoover, whose paranoid style was to conflate gay men, civil rights and Vietnam-era peace activists and all radicals with the communist party.
In a recent ten-minute interview with end-times Christian talk radio host Jan Markell of Olive Tree Ministries, Bowers told Markell how everything from LGBTQ rights to Islamic terrorism is under the control of communists. According to Bowers, those dirty reds really don't care about "homosexuals" or radical Islam splinter groups, they just plot to take over the world.
The frame seems to have stepped straight out of one of Chip Berlet's explainers on conspiracy theories.
Here's an excerpt from the interview with Markell:
While this material may seem readily flaky to many readers, Bowers has a history of attracting the attention of some of Minnesota's hard right Republican leaders. Witness farmer and DFL supporter Alan Perish's 2012 letter to the editor of the Staples World:
This July 12, a Tea Party Rally was held in Browerville. Keynote speaker, Curtis Bowers is most notable for two things; writing a book that makes the U.S. sound like a failure and his own failure to be elected to a state legislature he was appointed to. He’s not the reason I’m writing this.
Also speaking at that meeting: Mary Franson, Paul Gazelka, Ron Kresha and Mark Anderson
Mark Anderson isn't seeking re-election, and we're curious whether the Tea Party and Bowers continues to be attractive to the other four.
Image: The communists behind everything. Or whatevas (above); Pinky and the Brain (below).
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Conservatives stymied on passing a balanced budget amendment to the United States Constitution have hit upon the notion of a convention of the states to amend the constitution, as provided in Article V. Some progressives have hit upon the idea of a convention to get money out of politics--a possibility dubbed by some as the "runaway convention."
On Monday night at the Chanhassen Rec Center, ALEC member and West Fargo Republican state legislator Kim Koppleman and a convention of the states volunteer activist from Alexandria will discuss "Article V, Balanced Budget, Amendment Initiative, Term Limits & Compact for America" at 7:00 p.m.
State Senator Kevin Lundberg (R-CO) and State Representative Kim Koppelman (R-ND) joined David to talk about a new movement among many conservatives involving Article V. Though Alexander Hamilton believed a national government was necessary, he explained in Federalist No. 85 that the role of Article V was to provide the states a check against Congress. With that in mind, is a second Constitutional Convention possible?
. . .There is a peculiar irony to the fact that a constitutional Convention of States is viewed so favorably by those conservatives who are convinced their side of the political fight does nothing but lose. Moreover, it is a risky approach to amending the Constitution beyond the existing process, which demands overwhelming consensus and years of tempering consideration. Convention proponents don’t seem to see much risk in this process.
Those who are not possessed of infinite faith in their powers of persuasion contend that the Convention of States cannot “run away” from the initial intentions of the conventioneers because some state legislatures will impose penalties on delegates who deviate from the approved agenda. In this way, convention backers claim, only the constitutional amendments conservatives favor – a Balanced Budget Amendment and term limits for federal officials – can be passed and, eventually, ratified. As of today, however, only three states have approved “delegate limitation” or “faithful delegate” acts. Just seven more states have proposed such acts. Further, of the over 30 states that have called for a convention, many did so in the 1980s when the political makeup of the Union was much different. Some of those states have since rescinded their support for a Convention of States, reducing the number of states supporting a convention to as few as 23. This should tell conservatives who support this item something about the nature of competing interests and the rapid pace at which popular sentiment can evolve. To induce more states to call for a convention, the scope of such a gathering would have to broaden substantially.
Contrary to popular belief, there are no rules for such a convention. Congress has tried on over 20 occasions to craft a uniform set of rules governing a convention process, but it has failed every time. The Congressional Research Service cannot definitively assert that a constitutional convention can have a limited focus, and its review of precedent seems to reinforce the notion that a sovereign convention of the people enjoys broad autonomy from state and federal legislatures. Despite frequent assertions that a “runaway” convention is simply not possible, there are no guarantees that conservative delegates can maintain total control over such a radical process. By design, a convention to reconsider the existing amendments, including those in the Bill of Rights, will have an expansive agenda. Conservatives might be surprised to learn that their liberal colleagues are fully empowered to litigate their own grievances with America’s governing charter. And everyone has a problem with the Constitution.
Bernie Sanders liberals are disgusted by the First Amendment’s freedoms as defined by the Supreme Court that overturned the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform laws. They introduced a new amendment to the Constitution in the Senate that would rewrite the First just last year. Democrats, in general, have for decades sought to limit the freedoms in the Second Amendment, and a recent series of judicial impediments to doing so render the amendment process the best vehicle for enacting far-reaching gun control laws. One ill-timed incident of gun violence amid a convention might foment the rise of a movement in support of such a measure. Libertarians would surely like to strengthen elements of the Fourth Amendment to prevent agencies like the National Security Agency, the Transportation Safety Administration, and the Defense Department from pursuing present methods of information collection and retention. Conservatives of the Levin school would not be happy with a narrow convention agenda that declines to repeal the 17th Amendment, allowing for the direct election of U.S. senators. Further, some hope to draft an amendment that would allow a three-fifths vote of Congress or state legislative bodies to overturn Supreme Court verdicts – eliminating another check on majoritarian governance the Founders, in their wisdom, imposed on posterity.
When the convention ever gets around to considering a Balanced Budget Amendment, media scrutiny of that provision would soon render it toxic. The center-left press would soon discover that America’s largest debt drivers are entitlements, but also sprawling executive branch agencies like the departments of energy, education, and transportation. Does anyone imagine that in today’s polarized age Democrats would sit on their hands while conservatives unilaterally threatened the government’s ability to fund those initiatives? In order to secure liberal support for a BBA, it might be subject to unforeseen revision.
Some convention supporters display unique faith in the tempering power of the ratification process. Any amendments sent to the states out of this convention must be ratified by three-fourths of the Union, therefore only the most popular provisions will be adopted. Amendments 16 through 18, however, granted substantial powers to the federal government and were broadly popular at the time of their ratification. Those who opposed prohibition bowed to popular pressure and agreed to a provision that would sunset the amendment if it was not ratified by three-fourths of the states within seven years of its passage by Congress. They were shocked when it was adopted by a sufficient number of states in just under 13 months. . . .
Well, perish the thought. No wonder the John Birch Society hates the idea.
In 2015, in Ignorance is Risk, a op-ed piece at US News and World Report, managing editor for opinion Robert Schlesinger wrote:
While such an assembly has never been called, the convention route is enjoying a period of vogue in some quarters. As many as 27 states (there’s some dispute regarding the precise number, having to do with whether these applications ever expire) have passed resolutions calling for a convention focused on a balanced budget amendment and those pro-convention forces targeted another baker’s dozen this year. Seven states failed to pass the amendments this year, according to David Biddulph, who cofounded the Balanced Budget Amendment Task Force. But that leaves six more states, including two – South Carolina and Wisconsin (which doesn't have a bill yet but is expected to get one later in the year) – that are completely GOP controlled, which is significant because the balanced budget amendment push comes predominantly from the right. (There are progressive pro-convention forces as well; four states have passed resolutions focused on overturning Citizens United.)
Skip whether a balanced budget amendment is a good idea (it’s not) and instead marvel at the convention idea being that rare uniter of Washington’s disparate partisans. “It’s not a bad idea, it’s a disastrous idea,” says liberal activist Fred Wertheimer of Democracy 21. Uber-conservative Utah Sen. Mike Lee sees “dangers” and “great risks.” The conservative blog Hot Air earlier this month ran a post proclaiming it “the right’s worst idea,” while liberal Bloomberg View columnist Jonathan Bernstein had a piece two days later headlined “The Worst Idea in American Politics.”
. . .And this would be the Super Bowl of lobbying. Imagine the fabulous amounts of money that would be spent trying to tweak the Constitution. Actually, imagine is exactly what you might have to do. Would there be lobbying disclosure rules? Would there be limits on what gifts or favors delegates could accept? We don’t know. . .
And how much traction has it gotten? Schlesinger continued:
Update, May 1, 2015: There's marginally more clarity on one issue than I had initially realized; starting this year, the House Judiciary Committee has kept a running tally of certified "memorials" (as the term of art appears to be) from states either requesting an Article V convention or repealing a previous request. As of this writing, Virginia Rep. Bob Goodlatte, the committee's chairman, has certified 15 memorials from 12 states; seven of these resolutions have focused on a balanced budget amendment, three have focused on a broader formula of fiscal restraint, limited government and term limits, three want a convention to fix the Citizens United decision, one wants to amend the Constitution to prevent Congress from passing bills that deal with more than one subject and one – from South Carolina – repeals the state's previous call for an Article V convention.
This brings somewhat more light to the matter – here Congress is again trying to assert some control over the process – but arguments remain. To wit, Friends of the Article V Convention, the group which brought this list to my attention, has counted an amazing 766 applications over the years – dating all the way back to a general call for an Article V convention in 1789 from New York, Virginia and Rhode Island and including resolutions that have since been repealed – covering topics ranging from nullification to polygamy to apportionment to abortion. This group is of the opinion that a convention is well past due and that Congress violates the Constitution by not calling one.
Assuming the tally is accurate we have some clarity through inaction; Congress thinks that for some reason or reasons – memorials having to be, say, contemporaneous or related to the same topic – the various applications don't meet the two-thirds threshold. Is Congress right? I certainly hope so. In any case, the bulk of my argument obtains: The Article V convention route is a murky and thus perilous course to which to commit the Constitution.
Both Rothman and Schlesinger mention the non-partisan Congressional Research Service look at the issue. Here it is:
The SW Metro Tea Party was founded by state representative Cindy Pugh and Mara Sou, who is the daughter of RPM judicial endorsement activist Bonn Clayton.
Tonight’s guest speaker was Kim Koppelman (Fred’s brother) North Dakota Representative. His presentation offered hope and a positive outlook for “Restoring America’s Greatness, One Patriot at a Time”. Quote: "We thought Washington was a cesspool, but when we got there, we found out it was a Jacuzzi.” He went into how Barrack Obama has usurped power since becoming president by trampling religious freedom and free speech.
If you appreciate Bluestem Prairie's original reporting and analysis, you can mail contributions (payable to Sally Jo Sorensen P.O. Box 108, Maynard MN 56260) or use the paypal button below:
Following the US-Dakota War of 1862, 38 Dakota warriors were executed the day after Christmas 1862 in Mankato, Minnesota. This remains the largest public execution on American soil in United States' history.
Hundreds of people gathered in the cold and the snow at Reconciliation Park Saturday morning, trying to heal.
Some of them traveled hundreds of miles on horseback. Others had spent the night running from Ft. Snelling. Many just wanted to take part in a ceremony honoring the execution of 38 Dakota warriors more than 150 years ago.
Continuing a decades-long tradition, Dakota, Lakota and other Native Americans traveled to Mankato to honor the 153rd anniversary of 38 men who were hanged at the end of the Dakota War of 1862. They also came to preach forgiveness for the U.S.'s persecution of Native Americans in the 19th century, and to move forward with their respective cultures. . . ..
A series of treaties restricted the living space of the Dakota people to an area that could no longer sustain their traditional hunting economy. Promised payments and other remittance to compensate for the concessions were slow to emerge, withheld all together, or syphoned off by unscrupulous traders and others, leaving the Dakota people with nothing to live on—many facing starvation heading toward the long Minnesota winter.
With the Dakota people buffeted by the increasingly dangerous poverty and by the overt racism expressed by many of the white settlers and traders in the region (one trader infamously quipped “Let them eat grass” when informed of the pending starvation), it should not have been surprising when conflicts arose between the two races. The spark that would ignite the war came August 17, 1862, when four young Dakota hunters killed five settlers. In the past, wrote Carol Chomsky in her 1990 article “The United States-Dakota War Trials: A Study in Military Injustice” published in the Stanford Law Review, the young men might have been turned over to the Americans, but the Dakota people were in no mood for ignoring their situation. Instead, a war council was held that evening and a decision was made to go to war, though not supported by all the Dakota leaders. Even the war leader, Taoyateduta, Little Crow, reluctantly endorsed the action.
“In the 37 days of fighting, 77 American soldiers, 29 citizen-soldiers, approximately 358 settlers and an estimated 29 Dakota soldiers had been killed,” Chomsky wrote.
The Minnesota State Historical Society's US-Dakota War of 1862 section, Aftermath, includes a higher death count, but cites Chomsky's study in Trials and Hangings as well as chronicling the suffering of the Dakota people following the war.
Bluestem recommends registering at JStor and reading the scholarly article, “The United States-Dakota War Trials: A Study in Military Injustice” that LeMay cites in the Indian Country Today article, as Chomsky has conducted an exhaustive review of the primary historical sources about the war and trials.
What follows is a list, modified from Marion Satterlee’s “A Detailed Account of the Massacre by the Dakota Indians of Minnesota in 1862,” published in 1923. The spellings and translations are as Satterlee recorded them. A photocopy of her list and the hand-written list from Abraham Lincoln of those to be executed is found on a page of Minnesota Historical Society’s U.S.-Dakota War website. The two additional names are Dakota men tried and executed shortly after this mass execution, not on Satterlee’s listing.
Another list, posted by Gloria Hazell-Derby in connection with the 2013 Dakota 38+2 Memorial Ride, lists family heads and family members of the 3,368 Dakota people held prisoner at Fort Snelling in Minnesota after the war and many later forced on a march from Minnesota to the Dakotas. More than one-quarter of those who surrendered would die by the end of 1863, either in the camps or on the force march that followed.
Tipi-hdo-niche, Forbids His Dwelling
Wyata-tonwan, His People
Taju-xa, Red Otter
Hinhan-shoon-koyag-mani, Walks Clothed in an Owl’s Tail
Maza-bomidu, Iron Blower
Wapa-duta, Scarlet Leaf
Wahena, translation unknown
Sna-mani, Tinkling Walker
Radapinyanke, Rattling Runner
Dowan niye, The Singer
Xunka ska, White Dog
Hepan, family name for a second son
Tunkan icha ta mani, Walks With His Grandfather
Ite duta, Scarlet Face
Amdacha, Broken to Pieces
Hepidan, family name for a third son
Marpiya te najin, Stands on a Cloud (Cut Nose)
Henry Milord (French mixed-blood)
Dan Little, Chaska dan, family name for a first son (this may be We-chank-wash-ta-don-pee, who had been pardoned and was mistakenly executed when he answered to a call for “Chaska,” reference to a first son; fabric artist Gwen Westerman did a quilt called “Caske’s Pardon” based on him. [Photo of the Westerman quilt at the top of this post].
Baptiste Campbell, (French mixed-blood)
Tate kage, Wind Maker
Hapinkpa, Tip of the Horn
Hypolite Auge (French mixed-blood)
Nape shuha, Does Not Flee
Wakan tanka, Great Spirit
Tunkan koyag I najin, Stands Clothed with His Grandfather
Maka te najin, Stands Upon Earth
Pazi kuta mani, Walks Prepared to Shoot
Tate hdo dan, Wind Comes Back
Waxicun na, Little Whiteman (this young white man, adopted by the Dakota at an early age and who was acquitted, was hanged, according to the Minnesota Historical Society U.S.-Dakota War website).
Aichaga, To Grow Upon
Ho tan inku, Voice Heard in Returning
Cetan hunka, The Parent Hawk
Had hin hda, To Make a Rattling Noise
Chanka hdo, Near the Woods
Oyate tonwan, The Coming People
Mehu we mea, He Comes for Me
Wakinyan na, Little Thunder
Wakanozanzan and Shakopee: These two chiefs who fled north after the war, were kidnapped from Canada in January 1864 and were tried and convicted in November that year and their executions were approved by President Andrew Johnson (after Lincoln’s assassination) and they were hanged November 11, 1865.
Wakantanka Taku Nitawa
We close with a clip from the movie, Dakota 38 + 2, of a montage of the names and consequences, set to variations on Wakantanka Taku Nitawa (Many and Great, O God, Are Your works), set to the tune Lac Qui Parle. The Dakota language lyrics and music were composed by Joseph Renville and published in the Dakota dowanpi kinhymn book in 1842.
As a consequence of the war and public policy about indigenous language (and the religion and culture that it sustained), only a few elders have Dakota as their first language, though the Dakota Wicohan in Morton and other programs work to help new generations to cherish the language.
Photo: "Caske's Pardon." Mixed media sculpture/quilt by Gwen Westerman, 2012. Purchased from the 2012 "Ded Unk'unpi - We Are Here" exhibit. Minnesota State Historical Society.
In her artist statement, she writes, "'Caskes Pardon' is a response to some of the discussions today about obtaining a federal pardon for Wicanhpi Wastedapi, also known as Caske. He helped protect Mrs. Sarah Wakefield, the doctor's wife, during the war but was charged with murder and condemned to die. His name was not on the list of those to be hanged. In the style of retablos, or devotional paintings, this piece incorporates the traditional star quilt with 38 + 2 blue glass beads and represents Caske's prayer for those who executed him in retaliation."
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Mike Huckabee said in an interview on John Gibson's Fox News Radioshow today that the United States shouldn't be taking in Syrian refugees because it is cold in Minnesota. . . .
The best thing about this statement is that it refutes itself. Minnesota is actually one of the most welcoming states in the country when it comes to refugees. In the 1980s, the Minneapolis–St. Paul area became the top destination in the US for Hmong refugees from Southeast Asia after the Vietnam War. And starting in the 1990s, Minnesota has been one of the leading destinations for Somali refugees as well. . . .
Those of us fortunate enough to have been born in Mankato, home of children's author Maud Hart Lovelace, know that there's nothing new in people from hot places coming to live in Minnesota and liking it.
Lovelace loosely fictionalized her own childhood in Mankato in the "Betsy, Tacy" books, transforming the lovely Minnesota River Valley town into "Deep Valley, Minnesota."
Take the residents of "Little Syria" in Lovelace's 1942 book, "Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill." The blog, 100 Books That Every Child Should Read Before Growing Up summarizes the book in a post:
Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill includes the added richness of a foreign culture set down in rural Minnesota. During a picnic, Betsy and her friends happen upon Naifi, a lively Syrian girl who is out herding her goat. With black braids, earrings, a long skirt and longer pantaloons, she could not be more exotic. Her lunch is a chunk of cheese and round flat bread, her grandfather smokes a narghile, her grandmother pounds lamb for kibbee, her father writes Arabic from right to left. She lives in Little Syria, a ramshackle community of unassimilated immigrants who fled their country because of religious persecution. Now in Minnesota, they encounter prejudice of a different kind. Betsy, Tacy, and Tib come to Naifi’s aid when she is set upon by a nasty mob of boys taunting her with “Dago! Dago!” Lovelace does not belabor this zenophobia, neither does she whitewash it.
Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill is the third book in the Besty-Tacy series and was originally published in 1942, but the story takes place in 1902. Betsy, Tacy, and Tib each turn 10 years old in the beginning of the book, and hitting the double digits is a big deal for the girls. . . .
While Besty, Tacy, and Tib dream up ways to make Tib queen, Betsy’s older sister, Julia, has plans to become Deep Valley’s summer queen on account of a song she sang at school. A signature drive to allow the residents of Deep Valley to choose the queen leads to Betsy, Tacy, and Tib going over the big hill to a neighborhood known as Little Syria for its large population of Syrian immigrants. The girls learn that the things they’d heard about the residents of Little Syria are not all true, and they discover a new culture and new friends. But their trip over the big hill causes the fight between Betsy and Julia to grow bigger than before, and they must think about whether crowning a queen is more important than their relationship.
Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill is the first book in the Betsy-Tacy series to have a plot that creates tension and lasts more than a few pages. At age 10, the girls are growing up, and of course, with growing girls there’s bound to be drama. Maud Hart Lovelace’s characters seem so real, and getting to watch them grow up and evolve over the course of the series makes them feel like friends. When I’m reading the Betsy-Tacy books, I feel like a kid again, and I lose myself in Betsy, Tacy, and Tib’s adventures. Lovelace keeps the story light, though she touches upon a heavy topic — discrimination. Young readers can learn a lot from Betsy, Tacy, and Tib’s willingness to stand up for the young Syrian girl they met on a trip up the Big Hill. Lovelace describes the Syrian immigrants’ desire for the American dream and their hopes for the younger generation, and she shows how taking the time to get to know someone and not brush them off because they are different can create long-lasting relationships.
Our Grandfather Sorensen went to Americanization School with a number of Lebanese fellows, promptly learning enough Arabic to haggle at Mocol's grocery (not exactly what the American Legion had in mind with the classes, but these things happen).
Whatever the details--and Lovelace's fictionalizing--people from the Middle East and other hot places came to Minnesota. They liked it and one of the Mocol family became a much-loved mayor of Mankato.
Image: An illustration from Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill.
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In Friday's Morning Take, we read about promotional activities for tomorrow's Governor's Pheasant Opener near Mankato. Lt. Governor Tina Smith
At 4:00pm, the Lt. Governor and the Nicollet Conservation Club will take a guided boat tour of Swan Lake, the largest prairie pothole marsh in the contiguous United States.
It's good to see the lake valued and we hope Smith enjoys the tour.
Back in the early 1970s, the shallow prairie lake was a candidate for becoming the cooling pond for a coal-fired power plant. In 2013, the New Ulm Journal reported in Swan Lake meeting draws a crowd:
A roomful of outdoors enthusiasts energetically told of their past and present experiences on Swan Lake at the Nicollet Conservation Club on Tuesday.
Hosted by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and Nicollet County Historical Society (NHS), the event about one of the largest prairie pothole lakes in the lower 48 states included a wide array of information and story telling by DNR and NHS officials as well as area sports enthusiasts.
Once twice the size it is now, Swan Lake was Minnesota's largest marsh-wetland ecosystem before it was drained for more farmland decades ago. . . .
Swan Lake's water level is more stable than many other area lakes and sloughs. It's well vegetated," said Stein Innvaer of the Nicollet DNR office. "Northern States Power (NSP) was going to build a coal-fired power plant on the lake once.
[David Vesall, assistant game and fish director] and other officials of the DNR met with the Governor's Task Force on Power Plant Siting to explain the department's position on designation of the Lake. Swan Lake is one of seven sites proposed for development by Northern States Power Co. of a 1,600-megawatt fossil burning power plant.
It's possible, then, that Nicollet County could have going through the turmoil facing Sherburne County, rather than the tour today, had the fool-hardy choice to turn a duck-factory into an industrial site gone forward.
Yesterday, Bluestem Prairie watched the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency's Clean Power Plan Stakeholder meeting online, listening to representatives from utilities, environmental organizations and state legislators discuss the plan to reduce carbon emissions--and possibly slow climate change.
One legislator tweeted:
At Clean Power Plan mtg I am reminded/remember: Team work makes the Dream Work! Mn leadership works = problem solving.
What will happen in Becker as the two coal-fired units are phased out? Two Republican lawmakers fretted about that, but others, including an owner of a construction company, pointed out that clean energy also creates jobs.
. . . In 2023, Sherco Unit 2 will be shut down. In 2026, Sherco Unit 1 will be shut down and subsequently, Sherco Unit 2 will be converted to natural gas that same year.
Sherco’s larger, newer Unit 3, which has more modern pollution controls, would continue burning coal.
Xcel Energy said they are committed to continue to provide high pressure steam to Liberty Paper in Becker.
Newberger says the shutting down of Units 1 & 2 will eliminate about 150 full-time jobs.
“Xcel has informed me that many of these job eliminations will be by attrition and retirement,” Newberger said. “The rest will be reassigned to other areas within Xcel.”
Newberger also said he was relieved at the news that the currently employed will be able to remain employed if they do not retire.
“I am also relieved that creating a new gas plant will ensure some form of property tax base for the City of Becker,” he said.
But his frustration over the situation is still palpable.
“However, the fact remains that these 150 jobs will not be replaced with new workers as they would be if the plant were to continue its normal operation,” he said. “That means 150 fewer good-paying job opportunities for families in our area. The economic impact will be a staggering blow to Central Minnesota.” . ..
We'll be hearing a lot about those 150 local jobs at Xcel Energy, which will slowly be phased out as the workers filling them retire or move on to other opportunities as we move toward the shutdowns in 2023 and 2026.
We have to wonder, however, that Becker and Sherburne County might have something to dangle for companies looking to locate in Greater Minnesota. Skilled workers, quality housing, access to a freeway (and Highway 10), along with proximity to St. Cloud, the western suburbs, as well as natural amenities like the Mississippi River, the Sherburne National Wildlife Refuge, Sand Dune State Forest: all of these are assets.
Change is difficult--but part of leadership is to direct resources to toward the opportunities offered by it, rather than to exhaust resources and emotion in a rear-guard action against it.
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Now that the dust and hard feelings have settled in the scrappy DFL primary in the special election to fill the seat left vacant by by the death of Representative David Dill, the Tower Timberjay revisits the "man camps" question.
As anyone who paid attention to the race knows, Bill Hansen’s suggestion that a copper-nickel boom would bring man camps to house workers, and that those camps would bring increased crime to the area, was widely derided as an attack on union construction workers and PolyMet.
That attack line was far-fetched from the beginning, and I see very little evidence in the poll returns to suggest it had much impact on voters. Hansen always had an uphill battle simply because of population and geography, and his campaign was well aware of it. . . .
Hansen’s claim that a copper-nickel boom (of the kind envisioned by Frank Ongaro of Mining Minnesota) would bring man camps is inarguably true, as was his prediction that such camps would bring social problems to the area.
Indeed, the suggestion would come as no surprise to anyone who took part in the planning efforts conducted by the East Range Readiness Committee back in the mid-2000s, since housing for workers and their impact on communities, was one of the major topics of discussion. It wasn’t Hansen raising those concerns at the time. It was then-Hoyt Lakes Mayor Marlene Pospeck, a copper-nickel mining supporter, who was calling the potential for man camps a “big concern,” according to a Minnesota Public Radio report from 2006.
The story continued: “Construction workers are often set up in makeshift trailer camps— places Pospeck says are known for rowdy behavior, frequent police calls, and an increased need for social services. It’s one thing to deal with one major construction project, but two or three or more could be a huge strain on the local communities.”
No one attacked Pospeck for disrespecting the Iron Range building trades for raising such obvious concerns. But then, it wasn’t the political season, when little things like facts and context are often tossed out the window. . .
. . .We can argue about how severe those problems might be, but anyone who suggests Hansen simply invented this concern, or was slamming local construction workers, should familiarize themselves with a little Iron Range history.
Helmberger looks back to the 1950s taconite boom and more in a column worth reading.
Photo: 1st mining camp near Mountain Iron 1893, via Mining Artifacts. Probably not what anybody meant during the primary, but it's a cool old picture.
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One of the more charming pieces of American discourse is the use of bogus quotations by the Founding Fathers. Need to make a point? There's probably a chap for that.
Just after the completion and signing of the Constitution, in reply to a woman’s question as to the type of government the founders had created, Benjamin Franklin said, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
“A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where 51 percent of the people may take away the rights of the other 49,” said Thomas Jefferson.
A republic is representative government ruled by fundamental rules of law, according to the United States Constitution. A republic recognizes the unalienable truth of Gods Laws and the rights of individuals.
In truth, Jefferson never said it. The Monticello website maintained by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation files Democracy is nothing more than mob rule... under spurious quotations:
Status: We currently have no evidence to confirm that Thomas Jefferson ever said or wrote, "Democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where 51% of the people may take away the rights of the other 49%" or any of its listed variations. We do not know the source of this statement's attribution to Thomas Jefferson.
Snopes and other debunking sites echo the curators at Tom's old home, but perhaps the most entertaining debunking is found at the ideologically-right site Conservapedia entry for Jefferson. In the "Fake Quotes" section:
Many false quotations have been attributed to Jefferson.[58]
Jefferson did NOT say, “A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine”.
Jefferson did write in 1787: "Societies exist under [...] governments of force: as is the case in all other monarchies and in most of the other republics. To have an idea of the curse of existence under these last, they must be seen. It is a government of wolves over sheep."[59]
Moe's argument hinges on a distinction between a democracy and a republic, yet Jefferson apparently did not hold the latter word in awe, but rather with a cautionary note by one who had seen governments of many sorts in operation.
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Our friends at Clean Up the River Environment (CURE) alerted Bluestem to a public hearing at 8:30 am on Thursday, August 27th, in Olivia regarding Duininck Inc.'s request for a variance to mine gravel less than 1000 ft from the Minnesota River in Renville County.
As the map shows, and CURE writes, the proposed pit is also near one of our favorite places to take friends visiting the Upper Minnesota River Valley:
Duininck Inc. controls a little less than 20 acres in the Sacred Heart South Township, and while they have ignored that particular parcel for years, they are now planning to reopen the gravel mine. Surrounding areas are Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program land vibrant with wildlife, and the historical Joseph R. Brown Wayside Park is only a half-mile away. The pit is also in the Minnesota River floodplain, and, according to locals in the area, floods frequently.
The Joseph R. Brown Wayside Park is home to the ruins of "Farther and Gay Castle," the Brown family mansion that was burned in the 1862 US-Dakota War. We love to tell the story of Indian agent and inventor Joseph Brown's role in renegotiating treaties (and those terms' impact on the run-up to war) and the courage and eloquence of his French and Dakota wife, Susan Frenier, whose Dakota name is Hinyajice-duta-win (Soft Scarlet Down), in securing the lives of her children and hired hands when they were captured in fleeing the fire.
Right now, it's a lovely and peaceful place, but given the way sound echoes in the valley, we're concerned about the proposed project. We'd rather be able to hear migrating wild swans each spring in the river bottoms than mining equipment.
According to Renville County Ordinance (Chapter Seven, Section 2.7), an Interim Use Permit for a new or expanded mining operation can only be granted if the property is at least 20 acres in size. As Duininck only owns or has a permanent easement on 16.98 acres, Duininck cannot reopen this gravel mine without receiving a variance from the County Board of Adjustment and Appeals. The meetings of the Renville County Board of Adjustment and Appeals are public, and interested persons can be heard during the meetings.
While the staff of the Board of Adjustment and Appeals have duly noted that the ordinance requiring that mining parcels be at least 20 acres was in place before Duininck bought the property, Duininck insists that they did not know about this provision. This sounds like a lack of due diligence and respect for the community where Duininck hopes to extract resources.
If you can join us at the meeting, please do. Even if you can’t, please share this news with friends and acquaintances in the area. It’s just not right that these decisions can be made with minimal citizen input.
Public Hearing Time and Location: Thursday, August 27th at 8:30 am Renville County Government Services Center 105 South 5th Street, Suites 312/313 Olivia, MN 56277
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Founded by State Representative Glenn Gruenhagen (R-Glencoe) and his ex-gay friend Kevin Petersen, the Pro Family Forum has compared Friday's U.S. Supreme Court ruling in favor of marriage equality to the infamous Dred Scott and Buck v. Bell decisions.
We will view any decision by the Supreme Court or any court the same way history views the Dred Scott and Buck v. Bell decisions. Our highest respect for the rule of law requires that we not respect an unjust law that directly conflicts with higher law. A decision purporting to redefine marriage flies in the face of the Constitution and is contrary to the natural created order. As people of faith we pledge obedience to our Creator when the State directly conflicts with higher law.
Dred Scott v. Sandford is a notorious case from 1857 in which the court ruled that African-American were not citizens and thus had no standing in the judicial system, while the federal government had no right to regulate slavery in its terririties. Buck v. Bell is a 1927 ruling that state laws on forced sterilization of people living with disabilities did not violate due process.
We're not sure how the brain trust behind Pro Family Forum imagines that the freedom to marry the person one loves is like slavery or forced sterilization, but there you go. The group also is pushing a petition by Iowa Congressman Steve King to "Rein in the Supreme Court.
The Pro-Family Forum, formerly the Pro-Marriage Amendment Forum, was founded by Gruenhagen and “former homosexual” Kevin Peterson (In 2013, Gruenhagen announced his “former homosexual” friend on the floor of the Minnesota House as that body was taking up marriage equality).
Photo: Glenn Gruenhagen, R-Glencoe, and Kevin Petersen on Speechless, a conservative cable access show.
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All of the statements, opinions, and views expressed on this site by Sally Jo Sorensen are solely her own, save when she attributes them to other sources.
The opinions, statements, and views of contributing writers are their own.
Sorensen, editor and proprietor of Bluestem Prairie, serves clients in the business and nonprofit sectors. While progressive in outlook, she does not caucus with any political party.
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