News Cut: April 3, 2009 Archive

Five at 8: 4/3/09

Posted at 7:58 AM on April 3, 2009 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)
Filed under: Life

** It's probably a sign of the times that with just a few days before the start of the baseball season, most of the stories in the New York Times baseball section are about two new baseball stadiums in the city. There are a couple of nifty Flash presentations about Citi Field (which my cubicle neighbor, Bleacher Bums' writer Chris Dall calls "TARP field.") and the new Yankee stadium. If everyone in your office has busted their NCAA bracket, consider a pool for when the Mets will dismantle the walls in the outfield after the players start grumbling. A 16' high wall deep in centerfield, which is 408 feet from the plate? That's not going to last long.

At this time of the year, the sight of green grass in baseball is all the hope many of us have to cling to. So consider these images of Boston's Fenway Park an intervention.

** Is this really where we want to take high school athletics? A high school version of March madness?

** When is it OK to make a kid cry? This question is getting a surprising amount of attention because of an anti-smoking commercial from Australia in which a kid is lost in a train station (when you smoke, you abandon your kids.)

On the Today show this morning, Matt Lauer gave the commercial's producer a tougher grilling than Dick Cheney ever got.

** I'm filling in for Jon Gordon next week on Future Tense and thinking that maybe we should tackle this question. If something is taxed in its physical form, should it be taxed in its digital form? Minnesota wants to tax digital downloads of music. Sounds easy enough, right? It's not as if we didn't see it coming. But how about a little consistency when it comes to buying stuff online? The other day I renewed my Norton Anti-virus program. Symantec charges Minnesota sales tax. I ordered some electrical wire the week before, no Minnesota sales tax.

** Hot dish has the power to unite a community, says the Worthington Dailiy Globe. This is a sweet little story of people all over the country, making Sue Suman's hot dish recipe, and sharing Worthington memories while sending good thoughts to Sue, who has been diagnosed with cancer.

What we're covering

The governors of North Dakota and Minnesota are announcing a plan for a permanent flood control solution for the Fargo-Moorhead area. MPR's Dan Gunderson is on the case. Stephanie Hemphill will take a look at the "second crest" of the Red River. Former MPR reporter Martin Kaste, now a star at National Public Radio, looks at changes in how the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency conducts workplace raids under the Obama administration. Most of the people netted in a recent raid in the Pacific Northwest were released. And NPR's Linton Weeks considers how pets are doing during this recession.

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The Iowa case

Posted at 10:34 AM on April 3, 2009 by Bob Collins (14 Comments)
Filed under: Crime and Justice

The Iowa Supreme Court has struck down a ban on gay marriage. Here's the full court opinion.

The "money quote":

Our responsibility, however, is to protect constitutional rights of individuals from legislative enactments that have denied those rights, even when the rights have not yet been broadly accepted, were at one time unimagined, or challenge a deeply ingrained practice or law viewed to be impervious to the passage of time. The framers of the Iowa Constitution knew, as did the drafters of the United States Constitution, that "times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress," and as our constitution "endures, persons in every generation can invoke its principles in their own search for greater freedom" and equality.

..and...

It is true the marriage statute does not expressly prohibit gay and lesbian persons from marrying; it does, however, require that if they marry, it must be to someone of the opposite sex. Viewed in the complete context of marriage, including intimacy, civil marriage with a person of the opposite sex is as unappealing to a gay or lesbian person as civil marriage with a person of the same sex is to a heterosexual. Thus, the right of a gay or lesbian person under the marriage statute to enter into a civil marriage only with a person of the opposite sex is no right at all. Under such a law, gay or lesbian individuals cannot simultaneously fulfill their deeply felt need for a committed personal relationship, as influenced by their sexual orientation, and gain the civil status and attendant benefits granted by the statute. Instead, a gay or lesbian person can only gain the same rights under the statute as a heterosexual person by negating the very trait that defines gay and lesbian people as a class--their sexual orientation.

There was no dissent.

You can learn more about the justices here.

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The day MLK died

Posted at 1:14 PM on April 3, 2009 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Icons

It was 41 years ago tomorrow that Martin Luther King Jr., was assassinated. Today, Life magazine is providing images of the assassination scene that have never been published.

Keep trying, the server is often not able to keep up with the demand.

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Imponderables: Why do some people escape poverty?

Posted at 2:52 PM on April 3, 2009 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)

Regular readers of News Cut probably have surmised that I like to ask questions that have no answers, in the hopes that the ensuing discussion can make it easier to at least begin to sort it out.

A new post on TED about a woman who escaped a Nairobi slum, and pursues dreams of becoming a doctor raises an old question: Why do some people escape the most unimaginable challenges and succeed and others don't? Is it just luck? Or something else?

Some comments attached to the video raise a more intriguing question: Does telling the story make us less inclined to solve the underlying problems of poverty?

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Where's?

Posted at 3:28 PM on April 3, 2009 by Bob Collins (5 Comments)
Filed under: Schools

Cody J. Baird, 13, an eighth grader from Jackson Middle School in Champlin, won the Minnesota geography bee today in St. Cloud. He moves on to the national competition in Washington, sponsored by National Geographic.

Here's some sample questions provided by the organizers.

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Earmarks deadline

Posted at 3:49 PM on April 3, 2009 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)
Filed under: Politics

Today is the deadline for members of Congress to post their 2010 "earmark" requests online. Under new House rules, members have to post their requests on their individual Web sites.

The Web sites, of course, are not standardized so it's not always easy to find a particular posting. But given a reasonable review of the Web sites, here's the ones that have been posted for the Minnesota delegation:

Rep. Tim Walz - Not found.
Rep. John Kline - Not found.
Rep. Erik Paulsen - Not found.
Rep. Betty McCollum - Not found
Rep. Keith Ellison - Not found
Rep. Michele Bachmann - Not found.
Colin Peterson - Includes flood protection for the Red River valley, barley research, ultra-light vehicles for the military.
Rep. James Oberstar - Not found

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