The Star Tribune’s Tim Harlow reports, “A Metro Transit bus shrink-wrapped in hot pink is making the rounds this spring and attracting lots of attention, not surprisingly. But one Drive reader noticed it in St. Paul for another reason. The rolling billboard sponsored by Planned Parenthood is emblazoned with a giant image of an intrauterine device (IUD), a flexible, plastic T-shaped device that’s used to prevent pregnancy, and accompanied by the words ‘Birth Control, It’s What We Do.’ … The reader is not the only one to take issue with the advertisement. Metro Transit spokesman Howie Padilla said the agency has received a handful of complaints objecting to the ad.”
So you’re saying that new nine-passenger BrontoCruiser XXL isn’t looking so good? MPR says, “As the Memorial Day weekend draws closer, Minnesotans are looking at the highest gas prices they’ve seen in several years. The average price of a gallon of gas in Minnesota on Sunday was about $2.83 a gallon — about 10 cents higher than a week ago, according to the price-tracking website GasBuddy.com. At this time a year ago, the average price in Minnesota was about $2.29 a gallon. … Nationwide, the average price of regular-grade gasoline has jumped 10 cents a gallon over the past two weeks to $3. Industry analyst Trilby Lundberg of the Lundberg Survey said Sunday that the price has spiked 41 cents over the past three months.”
Windows provide a window into the HPC. The Pioneer Press’ Frederick Melo writes: “When it comes to historic preservation, there’s a chasm between the city council and the 12-member board that oversees the city’s historic districts, and it can be summed up in a word: windows. Time and again, the dozen volunteer members of the Heritage Preservation Commission — all of them appointed by the mayor — have taken a hard line against window replacements, even when they’ve run up against the city’s fire code or faced arguments about insulation, lead paint, security and energy efficiency.”
Now that there’s a 30 percent less chance of a blizzard next week. John Myers of the Forum News Service says, “If you’re hoping for a campsite at Gooseberry Falls State Park over Memorial Day weekend, you’re probably out of luck. Same for Jay Cooke, Split Rock, Tettegouche and most of the region’s other most popular state park campgrounds — they’re 100 percent booked for the three-day, unofficial opening of the summer camping season.”
Revenge hack. Says Paul Walsh in the Strib, “A New Mexico man accused of paying hackers to sabotage websites affiliated with his former employers and government agencies in Minnesota, including the state’s court system, has been sentenced to 15 years in prison. In one of the first cases of its kind in Minnesota, the sentence of John K. Gammell, of Las Cruces, last week in federal court in St. Paul includes five years’ supervised release and restitution that authorities were still trying to determine.”
He might consider a gubernatorial run in Missouri. Says the AP, “A North Dakota politician accused in a peeping incident at a college campus in 2006 announced Sunday he is dropping out of the race for secretary of state. Will Gardner’s withdrawal from the race came two days after the Fargo Forum reported on the 2006 incident in which he was accused of peeping through a window at a North Dakota State University women’s dormitory. … Gardner, who was 29 at the time, was arrested for allegedly peeping in a women’s dorm while working as a webmaster at the university’s libraries.”
No big surprise here. KSTP-TV says, “Education Minnesota, the state’s largest labor union with more than 80,000 members, formally endorsed U.S. Rep. Tim Walz’ campaign for governor Saturday night. … The 24-member board of the Education Minnesota Political Action Committee had set a three-fourths threshold to endorse in the governor’s race this year. On Saturday, Walz was the only candidate to meet that criterion; in fact, the vote was unanimous.”
Meanwhile, the Intercept has a story on our newest U.S. Senator and the Medicare-for-All bill: Says Zaid Jilani, “When Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., resigned from the Senate in January, Vermont Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders’s landmark single-payer health care legislation, the Medicare for All Act, lost a sponsor. The bill now has 16 sponsors — far from the 60 votes needed to overcome a Senate filibuster and the simple majority needed to pass legislation — so every senator’s support matters. The contenders in the Democratic primary for the Minnesota Senate seat are split on whether they’ll sponsor a single-payer bill if elected. … Tina Smith, the former Minnesota lieutenant governor who was appointed to replace Franken, is also running in the August primary ahead of the November special election. She has not yet co-sponsored the Sanders legislation, and is unsure she will do so in the future.”
IUD
Every guy who is sexually active with a woman who he would never chose to marry and support their children should be grateful for every woman who wants, can afford and has a clinic that will provide an IUD. It takes a man to cause an unplanned pregnancy.