Monday, July 21, 2025

Box Score of the Week

Boston Red Sox at Washington Nationals - May 30, 1913.


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Sunday, July 20, 2025

The NARN Closer's playlist - 7/20/2025



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I know something's 'bout to break if we don't bend......

Mercy's sake, this will be a busy broadcast day. And since I can't invoke a third hour, I'll have to settle for the normal two hours allotted. As usual, my radio show The Closer will get started at 1:00 PM Central Time. 


In the first hour I'll discuss some of the biggest news stories from the state of Minnesota. The trial of Sen. Nicole Mitchell (DFL-Woodbury) wrapped up Friday as she was found guilty on two counts of felony burglary. Also, Dr. Scott Jensen looks become to GOP nominee for MN governor in 2026 like he was in 2022.


Then in second hour I'll weigh in on CBS deciding to axe Stephen Colbert's Late Show. Between that and NPR & PBS being defunded, the progs are not doing well.



So please call (651) 289-4488 if you'd like to weigh in on any of the topics we plan on addressing.

 
You can listen live in the Twin Cities at AM 1280 or, if you're near downtown Minneapolis/West Metro area, 107.5 FM on your radio dial. In and out of the Minneapolis-St Paul area you can listen to the program on the Internet by clicking this link, or check us out via iheart radio as well as Amazon Alexa (just say "Alexa, play The Patriot Minneapolis"). If you're unable to tune in live, please check out my podcast page for the latest show post.

And if you're so inclined, follow along on Twitter at #NARNShow or "Like" our Facebook page, where we also conduct a "Live Stream" of the broadcast.

Until then.....


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Friday, July 18, 2025

The progs are *still* not alright

Dang, I haven't seen Democrats this angry since the 19th century when they had their slaves taken away. 


There are a couple of big sources of their heightened angst on Friday, one being a mercy killing of perhaps the most unentertaining of late night entertainment TV. 


TV’s ongoing problems with late night have come for Stephen Colbert, with CBS announcing Thursday that it plans to end his “Late Show” after the next TV season, citing a “financial decision.”

The maneuver — which ends years of original late-night programming at CBS that started when the network lured David Letterman from NBC in 1993 — comes as the economics of wee-hours TV have begun to accelerate, with media companies growing wary of the high price tags involved in producing the shows while the young viewers they try to attract watch more of them via digital video.


Let's face it: we're loooooong removed from the days of late night programs being appointment television. But hey, for this exercise, let's pretend we're still operating under the successful model revolutionized by the likes of Johnny Carson and David Letterman. Americans likely wouldn't believe it's worth it to stay up late to watch demagogic leftist politicians or disgraced government bureaucrats on what is supposed to be a comedy show. 


Despite that, you still have prominent prog U.S. senators insisting that something more sinister may be at the root of Late Show going away.



 



Look, if Colbert were simply being swapped out for a different host, there might be a tiny seed of truth to the speculations put forth by Sens. Schiff for brains and Fauxcahontas Warren. But the fact of the matter is the entire franchise is going away. If it were still a viable business model, why would the network nuke the show altogether, especially since network TV as a whole is already facing a very uncertain future? 


But if this week weren't already dreary enough for progs, their favorite taxpayer subsidized propaganda arm (i.e. National Public Radio) will no longer be sucking on the government teet. 


The GOP-controlled Congress canceled $9 billion in federal spending for foreign aid and public broadcasting, following through on President Trump’s efforts to defund the programs and overcoming some resistance among Republican lawmakers.

The House passed the Trump administration’s plan, 216-213 early Friday. Two Republicans voted no with the Democrats: Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Mike Turner of Ohio. The Senate had passed it in the early hours of Thursday morning, 51-48, also largely along party lines, with Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska joining Democrats in opposition.


There's been clamoring for years to defund NPR, PBS, etc. And whenever that subject was broached, you had public broadcasting's staunchest defenders say something along the line of Federal funding being so small that yanking it wouldn't make much of a difference. But now that the proverbial gravy train has been halted, the progs are pivoting to their go-to shrieks of "PEOPLE WILL DIEEEEEEE!!!!!" 


Ironically, claims of NPR being essential to providing life-saving information (like during the Kerr County, TX flooding) was superseded by their own self interests.  





Uri Berliner, who was an NPR employee for 2+ decades before being suspended (he eventually resigned) for calling out the company's blatant leftwing bias last year, flat out claimed the organization did this to themselves. 


Once fairly evenly divided between liberals, moderates, and conservatives, NPR’s news audience shifted sharply to the left. And by 2023, liberals outnumbered conservatives more than six to one. True to the tote bag cliché, NPR became an accessory for Whole Foods shoppers. Which is sad, because in another era, NPR, and public radio more broadly, developed some of the most creative and entertaining programming anywhere, from Car Talk to This American Life, Planet Money, Radiolab and A Prairie Home Companion.

Thanks in part to this ideological transformation, NPR botched major stories—and damaged its bond with the American people.

To name a couple of prominent examples: It repeatedly insisted that the lab leak theory of Covid had been debunked and it refused to cover Hunter Biden’s laptop. NPR’s reporting on the most contentious issues of the day—climate change, youth gender medicine, and the war in Gaza—leaned on moralizing and emotional certitude more than on rigorous factual analysis.

Embracing the mantras of the Great Awokening, NPR became a caricature of itself with headlines like these:

  • Microfeminism: The Next Big Thing in Fighting the Patriarchy
  • Which Skin Color Emoji Should You Use? The Answer Can Be More Complex than You Think
  • Black Women’s Groups Find Health and Healing on Hikes, But Sometimes Racism, Too
  • Bringing Diversity to Maine’s Nearly All-White Lobster Fleet
  • Diet Culture Can Hurt Kids. This Author Advises Parents to Reclaim the Word ‘Fat’
  • These Drag Artists Know How to Turn Climate Activism into a Joyful Blowout

Inside NPR, rules on the use of language reflected the direction and mindset of the organization. We were told to avoid the term biological sex, warned not to say illegal immigrant (a hurtful label). A racial punctuation hierarchy was imposed; black would be uppercase, white lowercase. NPR adopted the phrase “gender affirming care” to describe childhood medical interventions that can mean sterilization and the surgical removal of genitals. These were not merely style choices. They were tribal signals, ideological markers.

NPR could have addressed these failings. I wrote my essay because I hoped the network might rediscover the values on which its success had been built. NPR could have regained some equilibrium, reclaimed a smidgen of independence, by copping to this reality even a little. It could have taken some visible steps back to the journalism gold standard of neutral impartiality. And it could have done all this prior to Trump’s reelection, so it wouldn’t look like NPR was caving to pressure from his administration.

But NPR did none of these things.


And then there's NPR CEO Katherine Maher, who decries such things as that pesky First Amendment and abject truth as getting in the way of things they like to do. 





Imagine being the beneficiary of American citizens' hard earned money and then decrying perhaps the most valuable civil liberty they possess. There's no amount of spin that is going to convince me that this was not the absolute correct decision. 


One final thought: There's a lot of sorrow being expressed over public media jobs potentially being lost and how that will adversely affect many employees and their families. So people who support the defunding of public media are being lectured that there's a real human element to which we should be sympathetic. But when then presidential candidate Joe Biden touted environmental initiatives which would inevitably lead to job losses in the fossil fuel industries? 





I guess not all employment losses are created equal. 


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Thursday, July 17, 2025

We've seen this movie before

In 2014, Minnesota Republicans nominated Jeff Johnson to oppose vulnerable incumbent Gov. Mark Dayton in an election cycle favorable to the GOP nationwide. And while Republicans did indeed fare well across the country, Minnesota was once again immune to that success with Johnson losing by about 5.5%. So it made no sense to run Johnson again in 2018 when the environment was unfavorable to Republicans nationwide, given it was the first midterm during the administration of an unpopular GOP President in Donald Trump. Sure enough, Johnson was soundly defeated by first time DFL gubernatorial candidate Tim Walz, who prevailed by more than 11 points. 

In 2022, the MNGOP nominated Dr. Scott Jensen to oppose vulnerable incumbent Gov. Walz in an election cycle that was once favorable to the GOP but later impacted by the July 2022 SCOTUS decision overturning Roe v. Wade. And while Republicans took back the majority in the U.S. House, Minnesota was once again immune to any GOP success with Jensen losing by about 7.5%. Of all the statewide races in Minnesota that year (i.e. Governor, Atty General, Sec. of State and Auditor), Jensen garnered the least amount of votes. Given all that (in addition to 2026 likely being a difficult year for Republicans due to it being the second midterm in Trump's presidency), Jensen would most assuredly recognize it's a fool's errand to run for MN governor again, right? Right?? RIGHT?!?!?!?

Today, Dr. Scott Jensen officially announced his candidacy for Governor of Minnesota, pledging to restore the values, safety, and opportunity that once made Minnesota a national model for prosperity and fairness.

“Minnesotans want their state back,” said Jensen. “We remember the days when our communities were safe, our schools were strong, and our leaders put people—not politics—first. That’s the Minnesota we’re going to fight to bring back.”


As I write this, Kendall Qualls is the only other big name vying for the GOP nomination for MN governor. And despite the fact Jensen was well funded in his 2022 gubernatorial run and had built up a solid national profile, Qualls proved very formidable at the endorsing convention that year. Ultimately Jensen was endorsed but it was clear we hadn't heard the last of Qualls. That's not to say that Qualls has some magic elixir to overcome a bad environment for Republicans this next cycle, but I would submit to you that a Jensen candidacy in '26 would be D.O.A. Which means there's a nonzero chance MNGOP delegates will once again give him the nod. 


I guess we're going to do that same thing over and over again, yet expect a different result. 


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Wednesday, July 16, 2025

What now, progs?

It was barely more than a month into President Donald Trump's second term when he and Vice President JD Vance had the high profile spat with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the Oval Office. 

In the aftermath, many progs and anti-Trump Republicans shouted from the hilltops how they stand with Ukraine. This wasn't necessarily done out of any principled stance as much as it was their instinct to advocate for whatever Trump appears to oppose. That's axiomatic. In fact, I still see a lotta the "I Stand with Ukraine" ribbons on their social media profile pics. 

With all that said, I'd be curious to know how many of those sentiments are still being proudly displayed by the Trump haters given recent developments. 

Trump announced Monday that, under a new arrangement, NATO would buy American weapons and pass them on to Kyiv, amounting to billions of dollars in new matériel. Trump said new Patriot batteries could reach Ukraine in days.

Trump also announced his intention to impose new tariffs if there is no cease-fire within the next 50 days, although the details are vague, and he’s made these kinds of threats before.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick later said the U.S. could choose to impose either additional tariffs on Russia itself, or sanctions on countries that do business with Russia. The direct tariffs would have minimal effect, but the so-called secondary sanctions could have real bite.

In Monday’s remarks, the president sounded like a man exasperated that he’s put one good offer after another on the table for months, only to watch Putin turn his nose up at every potential deal, and had repeated seemingly constructive phone calls with Putin followed up immediately by Russian barrages against Ukrainian cities.


Soooo.......Trump stands with Ukraine???? He now has the chance to do the funniest thing ever by adding that graphic to his Truth Social profile pic. 


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Tuesday, July 15, 2025

Inauspicious beginning for Nicole Mitchell (UPDATE: Mitchell *will* take the stand)

After multiple delays, the burglary trial for Minnesota State Sen. Nicole Mitchell (DFL-Woodbury) began this week.


Here is an excerpt of Becker County Attorney Brian McDonald's damning opening statement: 


 



On day two. jurors were able to view law enforcement's bodycam footage from that fateful early morning. 





If you listen to Mitchell's own words upon her arrest and while she was being detained, it contradicts the initial public statement she made after being released on bail. 





In that statement, Mitchell spins a yarn as if she's merely checking on a sickly relative (in this case, her stepmother Carol) and that her showing up in the wee hours of the morning startled her stepmom. Just a simple misunderstanding, right? Well, I gotta tell ya that I too would be "startled" if someone attempted to enter my home through a basement window with the use of a crowbar while dressed in all black. Add to that Mitchell saying she arrived at the home to retrieve some of her late father's belongings. So if she denies being there to steal something, was she planning on waking up Carol upon gathering what she sought? 

I'm gonna go out on a short sturdy limb and suggest that Mitchell's attorneys are strongly encouraging her to not take the stand in her own defense (UPDATE: Mitchell will indeed take the stand on Thursday). 

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Monday, July 14, 2025

Box Score of the Week

It's All-Star week! 


Let's check out the 2007 MLB All-Star Game from then AT&T Park (now Oracle Park) in San Francisco. 


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Seattle's Ichiro Suzuki hits the first (and thus far only) inside-the-park home run in MLB All-Star Game history.


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