Last Word

Boys (and Girls) Who Cried “HOAX!” Meet the Covid-19 Wolf

September 25th, 2020


“The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their proper name.” - Confucius

“On March 26, 2020, the people of the United States desperately needed a leader (for the Covid-19 Pandemic). Instead they got Donald Trump and Sean Hannity.” – Brian Stelter, HOAX: Donald Trump, FOX News, and the Dangerous Distortion of Truth, 2020

“Too many of us Democrats bought into the right-wing notion that government is synonymous with failure. At a time when Americans are being…

Read more...


The Birth(erism) of Trump’s Nation of Cowards

September 15th, 2020

“(Kafka’s) world knows no physical or moral order…We, the readers, are reliving our bad dreams…punishment is over all the characters, but the crime remains mysteriously hidden…” - William Hubben

“The specter of color is apparent even when it goes unmentioned, and it is all too often the unseen force that influences public policy as well as private relationships. There is nothing more remarkable than the ingenuity that the various demarcations of the color line reflect. If only…

Read more...


The Milwaukee Bucks and “Big Bucks” Put Racism in the “Penalty Box.”

September 7th, 2020

“The vast majority of African-Americans who lived in this land in the first 246 years of what is now the United States lived under the terror of people who had absolute power over their bodies and their very breath, subject to people who faced no sanction for any atrocity they could conjure.” - Isabel Wilkerson, Caste: The Origins of our Discontents, 2020

“The NFL is the most conservative, Republican and nationalistic of major sports leagues, despite (a)socialist profit-sharing…

Read more...


Endgame for John Wayne/Rambo/Trump, “Reality” TV and “Virtual” History

August 31st, 2020

“I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me.” – Ralph Elison, Invisible Man, 1951

“Although the (1965) Voting Rights Act was sponsored by a…pro-civil-rights president who was…a Southern Democrat, most Southern Democrats opposed it. However, (LBJ) could count on strong support from Republicans: In the House, 82% of Republicans voted yes, compared to 78% of Democrats; in the Senate, 94% of Republicans voted yes, compared to 73% of Democrats. But things…

Read more...


History vs. Propaganda; Pundits vs. Investigative Journalism

August 24th, 2020

“History, like payback, is a bitch.” - Chicago Dog

“History as a discipline began as a confrontation with war propaganda. In the first history book, The Peloponnesian Wars, Thucydides was careful to make a distinction between leaders’ accounts of their actions and the real reasons for their decisions. In our time, as rising inequality elevates political fiction, investigative journalism becomes the more precious.” - Timothy Snyder, The Road to Unfreedom, 2018

“If we…

Read more...


A Liberal Cause That Some Conservatives Are Finally Fighting For:  Fairness

August 19th, 2020

“The problem for white, liberal males in positions of responsibility in the 1960s (and later), whether at universities, banks, law offices, small businesses and corporations, or legislatures was that the intellectual arteries of their colleagues were clogged by racism, a racism driven by fears, phobias, and long-standing ignorance and prejudice.” - Charles M. Barber, Judge Aaron Jaffe: Reforming Illinois, Bloomington, IN: Author House, 2016

“…if history is any guide, a change in…

Read more...


Dueling Billionaires; And the Rest of Us

August 13th, 2020

“The essence of Russia’s foreign policy is strategic relativism: Russia cannot become stronger, so it must make others weaker. The simplest way to make others weaker is to make them more like Russia.” - Timothy Snyder, The Road to Unfreedom: Russia – Europe – America, 2018

“Democracies die when people cease to believe that voting matters. The question is not whether elections are held, but whether they are free and fair. If so, democracy produces a sense of time, an…

Read more...


Celebrating “Good Trouble” Revolution

August 5th, 2020

“Men are born, and always remain, free and equal in their rights. Civil distinctions, therefore, can be founded only on public utility.”-Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen,National Assembly, Paris, 27August 1789

“(James) Baldwin wanted (Attorney General Robert) Kennedy to see (May 24, 1963) what was at the root of all of our troubles; that, for the most part, human beings refused to live honestly with themselves and were all too willing to hide behind the idols of…

Read more...


Trump and Barr “Dominate” The Streets of Ignorance

August 2nd, 2020

“…optimism (assumed) we were living in a ‘new world order’ and a ‘new economy’ that would ‘grow’…bringing a prosperity of which every new increment would be ‘unprecedented’…The ‘developed nations’ had given to the ‘free market’ the status of a god, and were sacrificing to it their farmers, farmlands and rural communities, their forests, wetlands, and prairies, their ecosystems and watersheds. They had accepted universal pollution and global warming as normal…

Read more...


Fearing Fear Is Foolish…Fearing Science is Suicide.

July 24th, 2020

“The time will…come when we will not…remember…September 11 without remembering also the unquestioning technological and economic optimism that ended on that day…The dominant politicians, corporate officers, and investors who believed this…did not acknowledge that the prosperity was limited to a tiny percentage of the world’s people, and to an ever smaller number of people even in the U.S.; that it was founded upon the oppressive labor of poor people all over the world; and that its…

Read more...


Tracker Pixel for Entry Blackbird Tracker Pixel for Entry Bismarck Tracker Pixel for Entry FPL Tracker Pixel for Entry artfest2 Tracker Pixel for Entry artfest1 Tracker Pixel for Entry Hjemkomst

Recently in:

By Bryce Vincent Haugen There are three Fargo Park Board seats up for election June 9. Park Board President Vicki Dawson and long-time member Dr. Joe Deutsch announced their reelection bids, but board member Aaron Hill is vacating…

By Michael M. Miller Francie M. Berg, native of Hettinger, N.D., edited an impressive book, “Ethnic Heritage in North Dakota,” published in 1983. She grew up on a ranch near Miles City, Montana. Her son, Richard Berg, is…

Thursday, April 23, 7 p.m.Fargodome, 1800 University Dr. N, FargoHeralded as "The Nicest Man in Stand-Up" by The Atlantic, Nate Bargatze is also one of the top-grossing comedians, breaking both streaming and attendance records. Now…

By Sabrina Hornung In the last week of March, we heard about an AI education droid visiting the White House as the first lady made a pitch to replace teachers with androids. In an interview with conservative commentator Benny…

By Ed RaymondAre we learning from chimps or are they learning from us?Here we are, involved in a number of wars in a dozen Middle East countries, and researchers in Uganda’s Kibale National Park have discovered that a large…

By Rick Gionrickgion@gmail.com Holiday wine shopping shouldn’t have to be complicated. But unfortunately it can cause unneeded anxiety due to an overabundance of choices. Don’t fret my friends, we once again have you covered…

By Rick Gion A brand new food event called the "ONE BITE Challenge" will launch in downtown Fargo on May 23. Rocky Schneider, executive director of the Downtown Community Partnership told us more. HPR: Hi Rocky. Thank you for…

By John ShowalterAs hip-hop started to make its way into the national spotlight in the late 1980s and early 1990s, it was largely split into two camps, “East Coast” and “West Coast”. Not content to be left out of a…

By Greg Carlson Leagues more entertaining than its logline and/or trailer might initially suggest, Renny Harlin’s “Deep Water” smartly avoids taking itself too seriously by fully embracing its delightfully trashy pedigree as…

Friday, May 8 - Sunday, May 10, 2-8 p.m.Brewhalla, 1702 1st Ave. N., FargoAmarok Tattoo is working with our pals at Drekker Brewing/Brewhalla to celebrate ink and everything odd and a little macabre. See some of the best in the…

Saturday, January 31, 6:30-9 p.m.Transfiguration Fitness, 764 34th St. N., Unit P, FargoAn enchanting evening celebrating movement and creativity in a staff-student showcase. This is a family-friendly event showcasing pole, aerial…

By Annie Prafckeannieprafcke@gmail.com AUSTIN, Texas – As a Chinese-American, connecting to my culture through food is essential, and no dish brings me back to my mother’s kitchen quite like hotdish. Yes, you heard me right –…

By Sabrina Hornungsabrina@hpr1.comNew Jamestown Brewery Serves up Local FlavorThere’s something delicious brewing out here on the prairie and it just so happens to be the newest brewery west of the Red River and east of the…

By Ellie Liverani In November 2025, the FDA initiated the removal of the “black box” warning from Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). The “black box” warning is a FAD safety warning for healthcare providers and patients…

January 31, 11 a.m. - 6 p.m.Viking Ship Park, 202 1st Ave. N., Moorhead2026 marks 10 years of frosty fun! Enjoy sauna sessions with Log the Sauna, try Snowga (yoga in the snow), take a guided snowshoe nature hike, listen to live…

By Jim Fuglie Okay, here I go again, warning (whining? complaining?) about another threat to the North Dakota badlands. Sorry. Please put up with me for a few hundred more words. Now, some folks I don’t think want to put a…