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ICE, Israel face much of same dilemma

When you think about recent events in the Middle East, it’s easier to understand what’s happening in Minnesota. There are significant parallels between the tactics of Hamas and pro-illegal immigrant agitators. Start with this. Both have no realistic way to achieve their objective through conventional means. Despite the brutality of the Oct. 7 massacre, Hamas couldn’t defeat Israel militarily. That’s the reason it had to rely on a surprise attack. In response, Israel decimated Hamas’s leadership. President Donald Trump ran on deporting illegal immigrants, and voters gave ...

GOP’s survival depends on Trump-pioneered coalition

Just how badly did Republicans do in two Texas special elections last weekend? Badly enough that Republicans nationwide have to learn some searing lessons. Although the GOP lost both races, one was for a U.S. House seat that’s been in Democrats’ hands for decades: Christian Menefee’s victory narrows the GOP’s congressional majority, but only because that safely blue seat had been vacant since Rep. Sylvester Turner died last March. The other contest, which yielded an upset, was for a Texas state senate seat that will be up for election again before the legislature ...

There’s value in having a college degree

The debate regarding the value of a college degree has resurfaced in the news recently. With tuition continuing to increase at universities and colleges across the country, many people have, as a political reporter described, “grown sour on one of the longtime key ingredients of the American dream.” A recent news poll was cited of 1,000 registered voters in which 33% said they believe college is “worth the cost” because a degree provides more opportunities for better-paying jobs. Sixty-three percent stated that they felt a college degree “was not worth the cost” due to ...

This past month has been quite a year

From Minneapolis to Venezuela to Greenland, a year’s worth of current events have unfolded in a matter of weeks. Here are a few things that feel as long as the first few weeks of January have felt: Every episode of “Stranger Things” in Season 4 and Season 5. “In Search of Lost Time” by Marcel Proust, the modernist French novel published in 1913 exploring themes of the human condition over the span of 486 chapters, more than 4,000 pages and 1.2 million words. “The Longest Most Meaningless Movie in the World,” a 1968 British underground film that runs 48 hours and is ...

‘Protest’ is word not to be abused, misused

Alex Pretti wasn’t killed while “protesting.” This is a common description of what he was doing on a Minneapolis street the fateful morning when a confrontation with federal immigration agents ended in his tragic shooting. But if Pretti had been a mere protester, he’d very likely be alive today. Now that we’ve seen videos of an earlier struggle with federal agents and learned more about the organized nature of the anti-ICE resistance, it’s become clear that the better word for Pretti was agitator, or perhaps even operative. A protester, as typically understood, is ...

Hold onto Ruthie’s in your hometown

All that remained of Ruthie’s Diner on Jan. 21 was charred, ice-encased rubble — the aftermath of firefighters’ desperate efforts to extinguish the blaze that ultimately consumed the modest eatery at Ligonier, Pennsylvania, which for more than 70 years had served locals and the travelers, anglers and hunters heading east along the Lincoln Highway Several locals pulled into the parking lot and simply stared, at a loss for words as they watched a community mainstay reduced to charred ruins, thin smoke still rising from the ashes. Ruthie’s was the kind of place where everyone ...