News Cut: February 25, 2008 Archive

What's ours?

Posted at 8:08 AM on February 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (15 Comments)

What is it with our obsession with the "elusive Minnesota connection" news filter?

"Minnesota's Night to Shine" blares the Star Tribune from its doorstep position today. Inside, there was plenty of documentation of how people who knew natives Joel and Ethan Coen were considered "kind of creepy" by some people who knew them growing up.

The obsession with Diablo Cody as a Minnesotan is harder to understand, beyond the overreaching attempts to make the Oscars seem relevant to you, presuming that unless a "Minnesotan" is involved, you couldn't possibly be interested in -- let alone understand -- the event.

Perhaps tomorrow's headline will carry this bulletin: Diablo Cody is not from Minnesota. She moved here in 2003 to live with a guy she met on the Internet, wrote a little for City Pages, did some stripping, and then got the heck out of here. This has now earned her the distinction of being referred to as "former Twin Citian." People have spent more time here waiting for a connection out at the airport. And as anyone knows who has ever moved to Minnesota and tried to fit in among the natives, it takes more than a few years to be a Minnesotan.

For the record, MPR is just as guilty. Witness this collection of stories in the last few days:

Former residents score big at the Oscars
Juno wins indy Spirit top honor
Oscar nominees: are they really Minnesota's
And the winner is....

Meanwhile, down at the Chicago Tribune, Cody's hometown newspaper, the headline is: "'Old Men' the big winner," and "Coens take four statues." Why? Because that's the story and Chicagoans apparently are interested in the story. A mention of Cody does not mention her place of birth.

This is not a new phenomenon, of course. We claim Judy Garland as one of us. She -- then known as Frances Ethel Gumm -- left when she was 3 and not filled with memories of the Gopher State.

And, of course, we still treat Mary Tyler Moore as "one of us" because her fictional character on a fictional show about a fictional news station was set -- but not filmed -- in Minneapolis. We even put a statue up in the middle of our real downtown.

The newsies think you won't care about a story if it doesn't involve a Minnesotan. Are they right?

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On perfection

Posted at 9:26 AM on February 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)

Women, you're too hard on yourselves. So says psychologist Alice Doma, who's spent a couple of decades studying these things. "What's hard is to get women to accept what she says is obvious to men: Perfection is not attainable," she tells the Boston Globe.

Hmmm, perfection as a gender-specific goal?

John Gray, author of "Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus," doesn't think so. "We all seek it. It's why we have trouble delegating when we're overwhelmed and why we find ourselves overwhelmed in the first place. Gender aside, our to-do lists are just too long these days," he says.

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Raked over

Posted at 12:13 PM on February 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)

Can a dead-trees publication live in an online-only environment? The Rake is going to find out. It announced today it's stopping publication.

Said the announcement on its site:

The Rake will continue to publish online at www.rakemag.com, with its “Secrets of the Day” emails, event calendar, searchable restaurant database, and select blogs.

But since 15 of 16 employees are being let go, the publication of the magazine online is likely to be temporary.

Various blogs David Brauer at MinnPost reported last week that publisher Tom Bartel was trying to sell the Rake for $395,000.

One of the Rake's biggest online draws -- media critic Brian Lambert -- jumped ship to Minneapolis St. Paul magazine late last year.

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Photo op

Posted at 1:39 PM on February 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (8 Comments)

The blogs are all atwitter this afternoon over who sent a picture of Barack Obama to The Drudge Report. The Obama campaign blames the Clinton campaign for "fear mongering," and so far nobody has asked either camp if they really think Americans in general are so stupid as to believe that every person wearing a traditional Somali elder clothing represents... what... a terrorist? And as for Drudge, well, what do you expect from Drudge?

But maybe it's time for a new question in the next presidential debate: how stupid and gullible do you think we are?

Rather than create another "us vs. them" conspiracy, the best answer to the inquiring reporter is, "yeah, so?"

Update 3:12 p.m. Mon. - Here's a picture I found on Getty images from August 27, 2006. Note the same shirt, the same pants, the watch. I'm guessing - and it's only a guess -- that this was taken on the same day as the photograph that, apparently, is stirring fear from coast to coast.

Meanwhile, Talking Points Memo has update on Clinton conference call denying any role in the developing scandal. Still no sign of anyone asking "who cares?"

Update 3:28 p.m. - In other turban news, how did America miss this one?

And if only we had the Drudge Report to tell us about the day -- in 1975 -- that Mike Love of the Beach Boys announced his intention to join the Taliban.

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U.S. still a Christian country

Posted at 3:33 PM on February 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)

The U.S. is still a mostly Christian country.

The U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, released today, however, shows Protestants may soon be in the minority, according to the L.A. Times.

Barely 51% of Americans are Protestants, and among people between the ages of 18 and 29, just 43% identify with this branch of Christianity, according to the study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.

All the particulars are here.

In Minnesota (see chart), the percentage of evangelical Protestants is below the national average. The number of Catholics is above the national average.

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Ethics in the digital age

Posted at 6:19 PM on February 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (61 Comments)

There are various places online to get details of Monday night's forum on online ethics and standards, sponsored by the Society of Professional Journalists.

Metroblogging Twin Cities has the live blog here. They didn't like it. Note also the image of me, always the last picked for any team during gym class, winning the arm wrestling portion of the event with Chuck Olsen from The UpTake.

UpTake live blog here. A poster asks:

Here's another question, Why does MPR remove comments from their blogs when the comment is relevant to the post? I've heard this complaint from several people and I've seen it happen.

I need to amend what I said at the forum (hey, this is what it's all about, right?). I approve every comment unless it contains an uncivil diatribe in which case there's no such thing as relevance. I delete a lot of spam comments.

Some posters complain we weren't taking their questions. See? That's what they get for not reading News Cut, where there was a form to submit questions/comments. BTW, 100% of those surveyed on the UpTake site say the media is not honorable. But 14% rated the forum as "fantastic."

There were numerous Twitter conversations going on at the same time. Jon Gordon has been on my case to twitter. Twitter seems like digital spitballs to me. Jeff Jarvis has a different view here.

Update 7:02 a.m. Tue - Chuck Olsen has analysis on his blog and in the comments section below.

So it's settled, then.

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