They seemed to know. The swallows began an arial ballet outside my living room window the moment I opened my laptop to mourn. Ten of them, maybe 15 acrobats, engaged in a celebration, perhaps. Maybe a tribute. It transported me back to my grandmother’s last day. I was wheeling her along in the sunshine outside of the hospital when a …
Let’s start with a basic fact. Democracy cannot exist without the rule of law. The concept that no one is above the law. And America cannot exist without democracy. Our founders bristled at the arbitrary dictates of a king an ocean away. Americans fought and died in World War II to ensure democracy and its hallmark, free elections, the peaceful …
I doubt many of us consider what Labor Day is about or think about what the labor movement did to build the middle class. It astonishes me that people who’ve unwittingly benefited from unions spend so much time demonizing them. Government statistics will tell you that a union worker’s family gets 10% to 15% higher wages, and they bring nonunion …
You’re holding in your hand something akin to a miracle in an increasingly authoritarian world, a reflection of incredible foresight on the parts of the Founding Fathers. They understood that democracy couldn’t exist if the voice of the governed was stifled. Free speech wasn’t an afterthought, it wasn’t the Second Amendment, it was the First. It’s enshrined in the U.S. …
I love gadgetry. I have remotes to run my remote controls. It’s not perfect, though. I discovered that my Apple TV remote volume control triggers my new Chinese-made CD player. And everyone’s worried about TikTok. Yes, they still make CD players. I mean, what was I going to do with all those CDs I bought to replace all those vinyl …
Ah, we meet again, as many of us have since 1991. Remember the ‘Sixties warning — don’t trust anyone over 30? What would they say about someone who’s been “opinionating” longer than that (and, in the process, inventing words)? I often have a mental lineup of topics I want to cover. Despite advice from some in the beginning that I …
One of the dirty little secrets about the American legal system is that might, that is money, often makes “right.” Those with the wherewithal can legally and financially exhaust others, effectively punish them with frivolous lawsuits. That seems to be the case with one of the unsung good guys in North Dakota, Jim Fuglie. Jim is a former reporter for …
“Of course, I’m just a wild-eyed liberal,” I said sarcastically during a conversation with a conservative friend one day. “No, you’re a moderate,” she said. “You just seem liberal in McIntosh County.” Perhaps so. On social issues, I think government ought to stay out of the bedroom, doctor’s offices and out of our personal lives in general. I don’t believe …
I love my country. Despite many missteps — slavery and Indian genocide being the two main stains on our record — America remains a bastion of freedom. But not necessarily common sense. This is a space I typically reserve for human-interest columns, the fun, foibles, idiosyncrasies and beauty of life. If you want my take on current events, that’s available …
My friend Jack McDonald received an award at the North Dakota Newspaper Association convention last Friday for his tireless legal defense of freedom of the press. Our freedom. Your freedom. We listened in the great ballroom, elbows on white tablecloths among the cake crumbs and carcasses of Chicken Cordon Bleu. In his speech, Jack pondered the “what if’s” in life. …
The Red Wing (Minn.) School District is losing a great teacher, someone I respect immensely — my brother. If you’re lucky, you get someone in your life who inspires you, teaches you to think for yourself, challenges you and helps steer you to a successful path. In Red Wing, Scott Bender is one of those guys, so respected, one graduating …
When I was a kid, Whitey, Gare Bare, Hawkeye and I would play football in the snowbanks beside my house. Because we had brain damage. Tackle football in subarctic temperatures didn’t help. The end result is my career choices came down to either column-writing or politics, but I still had too many healthy brain cells for the latter. You don’t …
In the end, I was thankful for what seemed like the thankless task of coaching a first-year women’s softball team in Jamestown, N.D., in 1985. Early on, I realized I had just one very good ballplayer, a third-baseman named Margo, who carried herself like Geena Davis in “A League of Our Own.” We had an OK shortstop, one outfielder who …
I sat under a partly sunny sky on Father’s Day contemplating fatherhood. I awoke to a text and Father’s Day greetings from Dylan who started it all for me nearly 25 years ago. He was on vacation in the Black Hills. India was still snoozing after a bachelorette party at Green Lake. She was pretty chipper when she went to …
My eyes fluttered awake to the early-morning coos of mourning doves and a halo of light from the window. “Oh, it’s Memorial Day,” I remembered from somewhere in my cavernous REM slumber. I creaked to the cold kitchen in a season in which it’s too warm to run the furnace and too cold for my bones. I was desperate for …
Those of us of a certain vintage grew up without fear of polio because Jonas Salk’s vaccine against that awful virus went into distribution in 1955, quickly eradicating the disease in America. But many of us grew up seeing and knowing polio victims, many of them irreparably crippled, some unable to walk, others with atrophied limbs. There was no great …
Hey friends, well, it’s been two months since I announced my cancer diagnosis on the eve of major surgery at Mayo Clinic. Since then, I’ve received a steady stream of cards, well-wishes, and prayers, and they’re working because I’m doing great. Thank you! I don’t plan to spend a lot of time in the future doing play-by-play on my recovery, …
You’re killing me. I’m not saying it’s intentional, but in the end, dead is dead. Many of you just don’t get it. After seven months and 220,000 dead Americans, nearly four times as many as we lost in Vietnam, I still hear people say they won’t wear a mask because they don’t care if they die. Well, I don’t care …
Well, it’s time for my annual post-Mother’s Day column. I don’t think I’ve ever managed to publish a column before Mother’s Day because, frankly, I’ve been flying by the seat of my pants so long my butt should have wings and a parachute. I suppose I deserve some credit. At least I’m writing this on Mother’s Day. In the interest …
I think I’ll have my morning coffee on the patio. But not this morning. It’s foggy, windy and 43 degrees — conditions I would have appreciated in February, but we lose our sense of perspective each spring, don’t we? Even on the Northern Plains we feel entitled to fair weather. Can you imagine how insufferable Floridians must be? On Monday, …
Hey folks, if you’re like me, a natural social-distancer, not much has changed except now I have an excuse. Well, OK, a few things have changed. I’ve had so much time on my hands I actually felt compelled to bake bread last week — beer bread, specifically. I’d still be in the kitchen, but I ran out of Grain Belt. …
You’re not helping. I know, you heard from a friend of a friend of a friend whose dad knows a guy, but let me tell you what reporting is like from the professional side of things. We can’t print it, or broadcast it, or blog it, if we can’t document it. Why? Because it would be irresponsible. After you’ve worked …
If you’re like me, you stock up on sale items. It’s good habit to have. So, even before the pandemic and social distancing, I’ve had a full pantry. The novelty of Schwann’s offerings, as good as they are, has worn off, and I wanted to make something hearty and healthy. So “Whatever is in the Pantry Vegetable Soup,” it is. …
You may remember the television series, “The Waltons,” a Depression-era slice of Americana based on Earl Hamner’s experiences in the Virginia hills. The series reflected one family’s good-natured resilience and resourcefulness in hard times. Every evening when the lights were turned off, the stillness was broken by voices saying good night. I imagine it in these times: “Good night, Grandpa.” …
I’m sitting in front of my computer trying to arrange a flight home from West Virginia University for India. As I write, West Virginia is the only state in the union without a documented case of the Coronavirus, still things feel a little safer out here in our prairie isolation. It feels a little like it did in the days …
I’d like to wish all my friends a Merry Christmas. Here’s a story I wrote in 2005. The clatter was tremendous. Decorative brass fireplace implements clanged off the brick hearth and a fine black cloud of soot billowed, and when it had cleared, there stood a man who looked just like the one in the Christmas cards — right down …
By now, video of the confrontation at the Lincoln Memorial has been examined more closely than the Zapruder Film, and the gaslighting of America is complete. You really didn’t see what you saw. Sen. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., in his ongoing inspirational battle against the First Amendment, encouraged lawsuits against the media for misinterpeting the video. “Those kids did nothing wrong,” …
The campaign for 2020 is in its infancy, but I’m close to eliminating one candidate — Elizabeth Warren. Not because she’s a Harvard professor or any of the inevitable pretense that comes with academia. It really comes down to inauthenticity. Her painfully awkward live streaming on New Year’s Eve was an attempt to ingratiate herself to “regular folk” by opening …
I’m going to type very slowly so you can keep up. Don’t get me wrong, I used to think North Dakotans were even more above average than residents of Lake Wobegone, blessed with sound cognitive abilities. According to some legislators, I was wrong, so I’ll try to keep this as monosyllabic as possible. Republicans in the North Dakota Legislature have …
I begin today in a self-reflective state of mind at the urging of Kevin Cramer, who took umbrage over criticisms of Precedent Trump’s un-Christianlike behavior at George H. W. Bush’s funeral. Trump didn’t sing, recite the Apostles’ Creed, or offer Michelle Obama even one piece of candy. Apparently, he was fearful of violating her nutritional guidelines. Since she left Washington, …
I’ve about had it with snowflakes and it’s barely December. I saw on Fox News that the #MeToo movement is trying to stamp out romance. What’s under assault is the revered seasonal classic, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” A Cleveland radio station took the song off the air under pressure from radicals in pink hats because it’s about a guy trying …
Far be it for me to complain, but I’m going to complain. Whatever happened to Thanksgiving tradition? There was a time when we remembered the reason for the season — Columbus discovering the Pilgrims. And it was more than an excuse to buy LED televisions the size of garage doors. We didn’t say, “Happy Holidays,” we said, “Happy Thanksgiving,” and …
Hey slackers, did you really think you were going to get away without a current events review before the semester ends? Oh, no — Jim Acosta is back, so you know the fake news spigot is going to be running wide open. Pull up a desk, kids, stow the cell phone, grab a No. 2 pencil, eyes straight ahead and …
Bob and I sat, our motorcycles idle, among a quiet group of veterans, waiting for stragglers. But no one came late. Most of us had been there early enough to stretch our legs. A few of us smoked. The veil of fog faded away from the black and green hues of the Black Hills. It looked like rain. Hell, it …
I’m writing this before the election, so I don’t know what happened, which, come to think of it, is pretty much the norm for me, anyway. If the Democrats won big nationally, as an avowed enemy of the people, I may be under the sheets, contentedly smoking a post-election cigarette. Any celebration will be short-lived, however. Even if Nancy Pelosi …
Heidi Heitkamp has had better weeks. She’s probably had better train wrecks. “Nobody told me there’d be days like these,” John Lennon sang. “Strange days, indeed.” Last week, her campaign, scrambling for momentum, included in a newspaper ad the names of 127 women purported to be sexual abuse victims. The ad called out Kevin Cramer for his insensitivity to the …
I don’t know if you’ve been following along but there’s this thing 58 percent of Americans do the first Tuesday of November. And no, it’s not check the mailbox for a welfare check as some might have you believe. It’s called it an election, although some people refer to them as train wrecks. The last election should have been sponsored …
SEPT. 27, 2018, WASHINGTON — Senate Judicial Committee Chairman Charles Grassley is seated. Brett Kavanaugh fastidiously adjusts the items on his desk. Cory Booker snaps a selfie. Jeff Flake nervously chews a Lifesaver. Lindsey Graham pages through the latest edition of Good Housekeeping. GRASSLEY: (whispers) “Where’s my gavel? Sen. Feinstein, did you swipe my gavel?” FEINSTEIN: (snores softly) “Huh, wah? …
I spent more time on my fantasy football picks than the Senate has on Brett Kavanaugh. No matter how it turns out, I’ll have another chance next year. But the Supreme Court is for keeps. If the 53-year-old nominee serves to the age of 90 like Oliver Wendall Holmes Jr. did, he’ll reign until 2055. Ruth Bader Ginsburg will be …
It isn’t often that you can vote against the Apocalypse. This November voters will be on the front lines to defend the state against the Armageddon that has befallen eight states and the District of Columbia — legalized recreational marijuana. I’ve witnessed the carnage with my own two bloodshot eyes in Colorado. Everyone is running around like Cheech and Chong …
I’ve been thinking about the poor sap who will have to document recent events in future history textbooks — assuming, of course, that U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos doesn’t strike history from the curriculum or make Speaking in Tongues the official language by then. The chapter may start something like this: “In 2016, Vladimir Putin managed to slip acid …
I don’t want to be an alarmist, but there will be rioting in the streets, the stock market will crash, and we will all be very poor if they decide to impeach Cara Mund. The current Miss America and former Miss North Dakota is embroiled in a catfight with ex-Fox News Queen Gretchen Carlson. Catfight? Isn’t that term sexist or …
The problem with democracy is when citizens start sticking their noses into the government’s business. No state is more under siege than ours. There are four measures on the November ballot placed there by malcontents. As if we can’t trust the Legislature to do what’s best for oil billionaires. That sort of thinking threatens to undermine our way of life. …
Hello class, it’s that time of year. The wheat harvest is on, the leaves will be turning soon, and NFL players are beginning to kneel. It’s time for the Tony Bender Back to School Super Brain Quiz. 1. Why won’t Kevin Cramer agree to more debates? A. Stall Ball always works out so well. B. How many ways can you …