Editorial

Gretchen Kaye Carlson Kost (1974-2017)

February 1st, 2017

My little sister, Gretchen Kaye Carlson Kost, died Monday, January 30, 2017. A dearly cherished daughter and sibling, wife and mother, cousin and conspirator, she was a friend first, a friend often, and a friend always.

She was also a displayer of dimples, which as a kid she often labored to hide, scowling in photographs when not in the mood or of the inclination to be told what to do, which was pretty much always. But when the grownups were smart enough not to push, that smile was…

Our opinion: What sells, and what that says about us

January 25th, 2017

Music instructor Kris Kitko was recently in the Kirkwood Mall in Bismarck. She saw a

T-shirt in a store, looked again. On the T-shirt, it said “GRAB AMERICA BY THE PUSSY.”

“Kirkwood Mall is often the site for children’s performances,” said Ms. Kitko, “These shirts were in a front aisle and are easy to see as you just walk in.”

Kris filmed the T-shirt display. “One of the reasons I zoomed in so many times was to let people walk by behind me so that I didn't film them. Do…

Put down the device and mobilize

January 11th, 2017

There’s more than one way to agitate the internet, but as of lately the biggest agitator involves Trumplethinskin’s twitter account--ok I apologize.Name calling is probably the wrong way to start the first editorial of the year but it may have made you laugh or motivated you to write us an angry letter. Good. We like to see the passion in your eyes.

Yes, Trump lacks the eloquence of nearly all of his predecessor’s--that’s obvious. It scares the bejeezus out of me, too, but on the…

Happy Holidays

December 21st, 2016

Time flies. It was 20 years ago December 26 that the High Plains Reader changed ownership. The two-plus year old bi-weekly in Grand Forks evolved into what you know

HPR to be today, two decades later.

We owe a debt of gratitude to Founders Ian Swanson, Peter Ryan, Len Schmid, Mark Boswell and Jim Johnson. For the record, it was the Flood of ’97 that dislocated the Reader to Fargo.

Many discounted the possibility that HPR would survive even its first few years. We did, however.

Just think…

A little more conversation

December 14th, 2016

We can sit and post and kvetch about the commercialization of the holidays until we are blue in the face, but personally, the thing that I appreciate the most is holiday baking -- especially making springerle with my grandma. Springerle are a traditional German Christmas cookie, often made with wooden forms--some of ours are over 100 years old and happen to be family heirlooms. Each cookie is a relief print and an individual edible work of art.

The serious baking begins once she brings…

North Dakota Nasty

December 7th, 2016

Dapper by Allison Buecksler

We have a huge public relations problem here in the Peace Garden State. While the world was watching the DAPL pipeline controversy, ND failed abysmally in influencing the narrative telling people about us. What they see casts us in anything but a positive light. We need to acknowledge this.

The movie Fargo gave us an example of how far good PR and branding can go. The film – and subsequently the TV series – put Fargo on the map. Who’d have ever thought that DAPL, NoDAPL, and…

With all due respect

November 30th, 2016

By Tom Bixby

tom@hpr1.com

“Cass County Sheriff Paul Laney and Mandan Police Chief Jason Ziegler called pipeline protesters Liz George and Kana Newell over to their table,” wrote HPR reporter C.S. Hagen, “while they were eating at the Chinese restaurant Rice Bowl,” in Mandan.

The two women were leaving the restaurant. The sheriff and the chief didn’t have to call them over.

What followed was not a conversation. Laney lectured George and Newell, and when they didn’t agree with…

After Election Day, a wave of hate crimes against minorities

November 23rd, 2016

By Tom Bixby

tom@hpr1.com

Since the election, attacks on minorities have increased. By frequency: Muslims and people who look like they might be from the Middle East; LGBT people, especially transgender; African Americans; Jews; anyone who looks foreign and dresses distinctly. That’s nationwide; here in North Dakota, Native Americans are also at risk.

The abuse includes shouted insults, death threats, and physical attacks; and in schools, chanting “build the wall” and worse; racist…

Give them the same chance your family had, Commissioner

November 16th, 2016

City Commissioner Dave Piepkorn’s great-great-grandfather, Friedrich Franz Gottlieb Piepkorn (1808-1897), left Revahl, Prussia, now Rewal, Poland, between 1863 and 1870, and lived in Waltham, Mower County, Minnesota.

Why? Like most Prussians, Franz was stuck in the situation he was born into, and told what to do. Most farmers were tied to large estates and virtually owned by great landowners. They performed forced labor. The royal bureaucracy and landowners controlled everything, from…

No morning after pill

November 9th, 2016

Despite what many feared, the sun rose again Wednesday. And it will again, daily.

The shockwaves of a Trump presidential victory reverberated around the world. Many people fell into a state of despondency, a pall cast over their world. Others were jubilant, a victory in hand for Americans who had simply had it with big government’s dysfunction.

At this early point, there really is no prognosticating exactly what it will mean to American policy and the body politic with a Republican…