Liberty & Prosperity Blog

Minneapolis is getting softer on crime by the day. I'm convinced of that after reading this Alpha News article . According to the article, "A north Minneapolis man now charged with murder in connection to a fatal shooting earlier this month should have been serving time in prison, court records show, but was instead free due to sentencing departures on two prior violent crime convictions." This time, the culprit isn't Mary Moriarty. The article continues, reporting "A witness later told police that the two men were arguing before Cole lifted a black bag wrapped around his hand and apparently shot Byrd. Cole then fled on foot but was located by police a short time later. Police also found a discarded drawstring bag on Washington Avenue with a gun inside and a hole in the bottom corner where the muzzle was pointed." That's bad anough but it gets worse: Cole was charged in September 2020 with second-degree attempted murder for seriously injuring a man in a ...

Which Came First? Input or Output? Facts or Narratives? by Ramblin’ Rose American linguist and educational researcher Stephen Krashen advocates some theories that are research based but also make a lot of sense. Let’s start with his theory related to input vs. output. Parents and other caregivers speak to babies/children before the children speak. They also use language at a comprehensible level. They speak using vocabulary and structures that children can understand and imitate in their own attempts at communication. The caregivers also tailor their language slightly above what the child can produce. According to Krashen, this is the Input Hypothesis with comprehensible input + 1 (i + 1). For caregivers that means naming food, clothing, and family before espousing political or economic opinions. The child receives beneficial input. Nor does a caregiver expect a child to speak automatically (output) without first hearing and processing words before attempting to imitate them and months...

I'm tired of hearing pundit after pundit talk about the supposed socialist takeover that the DSA Revolution is enacting. Since I refuse to believe that the U.S. is a nation of idiots, I choose to believe that nobody taught people the art of communicating. First, communicating is one thing. The art of communicating is quite different. The art of cummunicating starts with winning word wars. You win word wars before the first word is spoken. You win word wars through preparation and studying the underlying principles of the issue. For instance, if you want to defeat a Democrat Socialist of America, aka a member of the DSA, you start by studying socialism. Socialism doesn't create wealth. It redistributes wealth. That comes with an asterisk. It redistributes the serfs' wealth. It doesn't redistribute the oligarchs' wealth. I'm not certain but I think that's where the saying comes from that 'what's mine is their's and what's their's is their...

If there's anything that I love more than a ribeye from Thielen's in Little Falls made medium rare to medium, it's the sight of a full-fledged DFL Civil War . In most years, the DFL has polite fights before voting in lockstep. This feels different, with the DSA hoping to push establishment out of the picture. In this situation, State Sen. John Hoffman claimed that Congresswoman Angie Craig "sought his endorsement when he was still in the hospital recovering from a shooting." This has the makings of the start of a bar-room brawl. According to the Alpha News article, "Last week, DFL state Sen. John Hoffman spoke at a rally in support of Flanagan’s campaign for U.S. Senate. At that rally, Hoffman claimed that Craig sought his endorsement when he was still in the hospital recovering from a shooting." That certainly wasn't going to go without response from Craig's campaign. Here's how Craig responded: "Emphatically, what has been asserted is...

Back in mid-January, I asked if Minnesota was experiencing a populist uprising after reading about a group of mayors, led by Crosslake Mayor Jackson Purfeerst, wrote a letter to Gov. Walz and the legislature. Mostly, though, it was aimed at the DFL's Trifecta. This weekend, I wrote this article about Title IX MN's activism on behalf of changing the MSHSL's consatitution and bylaws to ban boys from participating in girl's sports. For conservatives, those are virtual uprisings. The question now is whether GOP politicians will take up these fights on behalf of their constituents. If GOP candidates take up these populist agendas, GOP turnout might be better than anticipated. Motivate populists to turn out by actually adopting their agenda and they'll turn out. If Republicans are smart for a change and actually listen to people with real problems, then follow the listening up with providing solutions, the sky's the limit. This lletter, signed by 261 mayors now, go...

When Mike Lindell proposed amnesty for illegal aliens , he set off a firestorm for the ages. The question quickly turned to why Lindell put the issue on his priority list in the first place. Congress, not governors, set immigration and naturalization policy.This issue isn't in the top 50 of issues for Minnesota's future. I just visited Lindell's campaign website platform page . Let's just say that he's cpompertitive with Sen. Klobuchar in talking in platitudes while saying nothing. For instance, on the subject of "Jobs and Minnesota's Economy," he wrote "Mike Lindell knows the economy runs on real people—Moms juggling schedules, business owners signing paychecks, professors shaping the next generation, urban church leaders holding communities together, young workers chasing a first big opportunity, and farmers betting everything on the next season. He built a national brand from a Minnesota factory floor, so when he sees bureaucracy slowing everyt...