News Cut: January 18, 2008 Archive

An energy tale of two states

Posted at 7:46 AM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)

"There's oil in them thar plains!" North Dakota has almost 4,000 oil wells, pumping about 129,000 barrels of oil a day. Oil prospectors in the state are reaping the benefits of $90-a-barrel prices. But is the state getting its fair share?

ABC's Nightline is going to take a look at that question tonight. The state takes in around $19 million a month, according to the Associated Press. That's a pretty small fraction of the money being made pulling oil out of the state's oil patch.

A few years ago, MPR's Dan Gunderson profiled the Upper Midwest's best-kept energy secret.

Western North Dakota has large oil reserves. By some estimates, it has more oil than the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. A federal government geologist estimated a formation called the Bakken shale holds 400 billion barrels of oil.

Meanwhile, across the border -- Minnesota -- the talk is all about new energy, not old. Gov. Pawlenty this week proposed a statewide energy plan to make it easier for clean energy projects to move forward. It was a plan notable for the fact DFLers didn't immediately criticize it.

And some legislators are trying to attract a big wind-energy company to move to Minnesota.

When it comes to the generation of wind energy, Minnesota is among the big states, trailing only Texas and California in wind-generated energy, according to figures released on Thursday.

No matter what sort of energy is used -- in this case to generate electricity -- something has to get it from point A to point B. And Minnesota can claim leadership in that area, too. According to Mr. Gunderson, new technology has been developed here that will make those giant power lines more efficient.

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When politics meets advertising

Posted at 11:10 AM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

Given American Apparel's history of provocative advertising, it's hard to tell for sure whether the ad in the New York Times last month was meant to alter the course of political debate on immigration, and create a rallying cry...

... or whether it actually was an exploitation of immigrants to sell more product.

It's not as if the company is above such things...

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Noose news

Posted at 11:38 AM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (6 Comments)

Another noose incident in Minnesota.

This time it's in Chatfield, where two students have been "disciplined" for hanging a black doll over a stage railing by a noose. The Winona Daily News quoted a parental source claiming the two were suspended for two days. Some in the school say that's not punishment enough.

The paper carries a quote by the school's principal that suggest that the students involved are more stupid than racist.

Principal Randy Paulson said that a poster supporting a white supremacist group was found previously on the locker of one of the students responsible for hanging the doll.

Despite these two acts, along with reports the same student had previously used racial slurs toward (Parent Tammi) Stoos’ daughter and other minority students, Chatfield School District officials said they would not necessarily call what the students did a hate crime, although the students were disciplined under their racial harassment policy.

“I think what happened here is that we had a couple of students that did this incident without a lot of thought, and not realizing that this would be a racial act,” Paulson said.

Blink. Blink. A student who has used racial slurs and had a white supremacist poster on his locker didn't realize hanging a black doll in a noose would be a racial act?

The fallout from the incident would suggest that depending on what school you attend in Minnesota, you may risk more by having a photograph on Facebook of you holding a Dixie cup off school property than hanging a black doll by a noose in the school.

It would appear that the golf community -- not exactly known for its firm stand against racism -- takes things more seriously. Golfweek Magazine sacked its editor today for putting a noose on the cover.

Meanwhile, in Jena, Louisiana on Monday, a nationalist noose-carrying group is planning a protest against Martin Luther King Day. One fairly wonders what kind of behavior the participants exhibited when they were in high school.

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A solution in search of a problem

Posted at 1:05 PM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)

The space program, at least in its infancy, changed the technology of America in ways we couldn't have imagined.

Still, it's hard to imagine what the future benefit will be of this. The University of Tokyo is teaming up with a paper airplane group to build a paper airplane, which will be launched from the International Space Station, to prove that it can float to earth without burning up.

As we've seen too tragically, the speed of spacecraft re-entering earth's atmosphere creates intense -- and dangerous -- heat.

But slowing the rate of return of an object from space to prove that it can withstand re-entry without heat protection has already been proven, with the Burt Rutan-designed Spaceship One, which changed into the equivalent of a fluttering leaf to re-enter the atmosphere.

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Herschel's secret

Posted at 2:43 PM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

Former Minnesota Viking Herschel Walker reveals in a new book that he suffers from multiple personality disorder.

According to the Atlanta Constitution today...

Multiple personality disorder, or dissociative identity disorder (DID), as it is more commonly referred to today, is a rare mental condition in which one person has two or more distinct personalities, according to the Merck Manual of Medical Information.

The personalities may or may not be aware of each other and a particular personality may not have access to all of the individual's memories. The switch from one personality to another can be very disorienting and the active personality may have memory lapses or feel that he or she has lost track of time. Persons suffering from this disorder may refer to themselves in the plural or in the third person.

Victims of DID have usually experienced a severe, traumatic shock of some kind and most report being abused as children. Treatment for this illness involves integrating the various personalities into one and usually requires psychotherapy that may continue for years, according to Merck.

"That's all news to me. All I know is whatever personality he had when he had the football was the one I liked," said former Georgia coach Vince Dooley, showing a remarkable inability to grasp the concept, even by football standards.

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Election results by the roadside

Posted at 2:56 PM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)

Digital billboards have been a bit of a controversy in these parts since a few of them sprouted in Minnetonka, St. Paul, and along I-494 near Mendota Heights.

Opponents have expressed concern that the rotating ad images would distract drivers.

It was only a matter of time, however, before the operators figured you could do more with them than just runs ads. You could run... news, or -- in the case of South Carolina -- election returns.

Will that increase the odds of an accident? Perhaps not. The South Carolina Department of Transportation analyzed the accident rate near the billboards and found out that the rate went down when the billboards went up.

The election results idea didn't start in South Carolina. Last week, the digital billboards in Michigan carried primary results. And caucus results in Iowa were also "broadcast" on the electronic signs.

A call is out to Clear Channel Outdoors in Minnesota to see if the idea will be tried here.

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Minnesota vs. Wisconsin: cold-weather tips

Posted at 4:05 PM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (6 Comments)

There are cold weather tips and there are cold weather tips.

In Minnesota, for example, the sort of advice we get at this time of the year is pretty standard fare: dress warm, drink fluids, and don't trust the ice.

It's not like Wisconsin, where cold-weather advice seems to begin and end with the booze.

"The expert advice for Packers fans looking to brave the near-zero cold at Lambeau Field on Sunday is the same a parent would give to a young adult heading out for a night on the town: Ease up on the booze and keep your clothes on," says the story in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Alcohol gives that flushed sensation, a "feeling that you're warm, when you're really not," said James Gast, a family practitioner in the Bellin Health Family Medical Center in Ashwaubenon, the heart of Packers country.

What are the odds anybody will heed the warning?

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Militant vs. insurgent

Posted at 6:25 PM on January 18, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

Insurgent	Militant

The language of war is a precarious area. Quite often there's significant meaning in the terms being used. For example, in Afghanistan, the U.S. is fighting militants. But in Iraq, the U.S. is fighting insurgents.

On Monday, according to the Associated Press, militants were in the news:

Militants stormed Kabul's most popular luxury hotel Monday, killing at least six people as they hunted down Westerners who cowered in a gym — a coordinated assault that could signal a new era of brazen Taliban attacks.

Similar language was used in a report from National Public Radio.

Meanwhile, in Iraq this week, according to the New York Times, it was insurgents who rigged a house to kill Americans.

From the alleyway outside a day later, there was little sign that this was the house where the bomb exploded Wednesday, during an offensive to clear Sunni insurgents from the northern Diyala River valley, 60 miles north of Baghdad.

Is there a difference? Radio Free Europe muddies the definitions with a headline story last January, Afghanistan: Are Militants Copying Iraqi Insurgents' Suicide Tactics?.

The White House, meanwhile, released a fact sheet last week, referring to Shia militants.

But in a speech in the Rose Garden before leaving for the Middle East, President Bush used several terms, except militants.

"First was a surge of additional troops into Iraq, with a new mission to protect the Iraqi people from terrorists, insurgents and illegal militias; second was a surge of operations that began in June once the troops were in place, with new offenses across the country to drive the terrorists and militias out of their strongholds; and third was a surge of provincial reconstruction teams, was a civilian surge, which deployed across Iraq to ensure the military progress was quickly followed up with real improvements in the daily lives of the Iraqi citizens."

In 2005, a BBC listener pressed Helen Boaden, the director of BBC news on the use of insurgents. She responded:

This term was decided upon because it describes people who are "rising in active revolt".
It is the best word to use in situations of rebellion or conquest when there is no free-standing government.

That was then -- when the BBC implied there's no free-standing government in Iraq -- and this is now. And now, the BBC is using both words in stories coming out of Iraq.

Color me confused. So I submitted the question to AP editor David Minthorn, who is the person who writes and maintains the organization's style guide. He responded:

Insurgent refers to people and groups actively battling the government or coalition forces. Militant usually refers to members of armed militias, which have a variety of agendas. The Kabul hotel attack is believed to have been carried out by Islamic militants, possibility surrogates of the Taliban insurgency.

Possibly, but the terms are often used when we don't know who's responsible for a particular incident. BTW, I submitted the same question to National Public Radio's ombudsman earlier this week. But she did not respond. She was answering other questions, like "What is an ombudsman." That I can answer. It's the person who can explain when and why a news organization uses one carefully chosen word over another.

(Photo credits: Getty Images)

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