Critical funding need for higher education
Since 1995, despite repeated requests to the Minnesota Legislature, the share of the state’s General Fund committed to higher education has fallen by 47%.
Opinion
MinnPost publishes Eric Black Ink, a column by Eric Black, and Community Voices, which features opinion pieces from a wide variety of authors and perspectives. (Submission Guidelines)
Except for the bad sidewalks, former Red’s Savoy building is perfect place for St. Paul’s Listening House day shelter
It’s rather a suitable irony that the Red’s property would become a home for Listening House, also an organization that has survived for decades despite seemingly all forces arrayed against it.
Post-pandemic non-profits and the struggle to innovate
Non-profits – even when they realize it’s an imperative – rarely do or are willing to innovate.
Being denied voting rights is a form of ‘civil death’
It is time for our state and our nation to reverse this long, shameful, discriminatory history by fully restoring the vote to former felons who have completed their sentences and are back in our communities.
How Biden’s lagging approval rating compares to other recent presidents ahead of a midterm election
Gallup data show President Biden’s approval rating is right in line with recent history.
Let’s tell the full story when it comes to the Southwest Light Rail route
Fundamentally, the root cause of today’s challenges to project construction is that Hennepin County skewed the route selection process to ensure that the light rail transit would travel through the Kenilworth corridor and not through the Uptown area, even though the latter had more dense population, a greater number of transit-dependent residents, and a greater number of jobs than Kenilworth.
The University of Minnesota needs to be the ‘North Star’ of college financing
Our current system of financing much of higher education with student loan debt lacks sufficient financial incentive to control costs. Making the university the guarantor of student loans would provide that incentive.
The latest takedown of the Electoral College is here
Columnist Eric Black recommends a YouTube video of U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin destroying the Electoral College.
Climate justice: Let’s not let white privilege be a barrier to solving the climate crisis
As a white person, I have the responsibility to examine my white privilege and understand how it intersects with our shared path forward on climate change.
Whale watching to weddings: Fictions make life fun
The true story of becoming an ordained minister in the span of 10 minutes.
Test your presidential election knowledge of the popular vs. electoral vote
Who was the only presidential candidate to win the national popular vote in three and exactly three consecutive presidential elections?
Someone needs to step up for St. Paul’s historic Walnut Street stairs
For well over a century, the small staircase connected people across St. Paul’s social and physical geography, attracting everyone from locals to tourists to joggers to Cathedral Hill’s fluctuating unhoused community.
Only Black parents can close Minnesota’s achievement gap
Black parents in Minnesota must become their children’s first teachers if they wish to close our growing achievement gap.
Minnesota protects big hospitals, not patients
Overall, 38 states and Washington, D.C. operate regulatory regimes, commonly called “certificate of need” programs. Defenders of the scheme claim it is necessary to maintain balance. But the COVID-19 pandemic shows the true score.
The fight to preserve Minneapolis’ Hiawatha Golf Course isn’t over despite recent park board vote
Advocates of the master plan called the MPRB’s Sept. 7 action the “final vote on Hiawatha.” Well, perhaps by the MPRB, but not the final vote on the project.
Backtracking on abortion ban stance as he sinks in polls, Scott Jensen remains a threat to reproductive rights in Minnesota
In a recent campaign ad, Republican gubernatorial candidate Scott Jensen props up a baby and calls out Gov. Tim Walz on “weaponizing the issue” of abortion.
Refusal of some Republicans to commit to accepting election results is troubling
Columnist Eric Black laments a Washington Post report showing only seven of 19 Republican nominees in closely watched statewide races committed to accepting the outcome if they lost.
There is no tooth fairy, and the PolyMet/Glencore mine will not save our climate
Over its 20-year mine plan, PolyMet would produce 15.8 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent pollution, more than 10 million tons from burning fossil fuels.
New York Times piece on democracy is spot on
Eric Black writes, “The experience of the Trump presidency and the number of ways he found to try to steal the office for four more years in 2020 make it vital that we candidly face the elements of the crazy, overly-complicated system of sort-of democracy under which we govern ourselves.”
Crime or not, trashing presidential records is a travesty
Trump’s careless conduct regarding presidential records infringes on the public’s ability to learn from its own history.
