I really enjoyed your article as I always do reading any thing that you write I grew up with the Trashels and the Randolphs many days at the Caddyshack at Northland CC club. Still see those guys around from time to time. He truly was a great athlete and one of the best ever to come out of this area!! I agreed with your summation of the goal for season this year. Lots of talent lots of media, lots of hype, but again
No prize for Motzko and the Gophers!!

Thanks for information about the Trachsel accident. Sad situation. Played softball with Jim Trachsel many years ago. Many good athletes in that family.

I am glad this got cleared up as well didn't want to believe it.

Great story John. I saw him play in that Aldrich tournament. Best highschool player I ever saw.

Well this just ducking sucks. Would like to know the sign of the writer because if they don’t match with Aquas then there would def be bias. Aquas are progressive thinkers and it seems to take a decade or so for family and friends to realize the validity of what we say to have truth, and then it’s their realization. But I was accused of being “weird” 10 years ago, but now it’s okay for you, and maybe the masses who have caught on too. So, most don’t get us … it’s kind of awful. And lonely because people’s brains seemed to be boxed in and ours are not. Also, love affection, but hard to give it to stupid people.

Screw the setlists we say! Stay Indecent all the way!

Awesome work New Salty Dog! Duluth loves you more than they ever loved Dylan! Keep up the good work!

Today is the anniversary of Hitler's death. It is also the anniversary of my parents' wedding. My father, Jimmy Mathews, was killed in action , U.S. Infantry, Normandy, France, June 12, 1944. I have other people in my family who were killed in various American wars including the Civil War. Now if black people want reparations, maybe they should look at all the union troops killed in the Civil War. And if you want to make things better for yourself quit hating and whining and give the good guys some credit. I've tried to be friends with black people throughout my life and find many are racist against me. So it takes both sides to make peace, I think. Read Luke 8:4-15 if you want to know what to do. Add that to this list of sayings!

You use schizophrenia in an analogy to show what is wrong in America, but I don't think we have a disease, that lets us off too easy. It is corruption, pure and simple. You need to take some personal responsibility, since you worked in education. I know all about education, because I was an army brat. I changed schools so many times growing up that I was able to have a bird's eye perspective as a child. I saw that I would get a much better education on my own without a messed up system getting in the way. What is happening now is that about 30 per cent of people in America who were unable to overcome and so be able to withstand our educational system are now being manipulated by a small power elite. This power elite is trying to maintain power by manipulating this vulnerable group who are unable to think for themselves. Democracy can't succeed without a well-educated citizenry.

Is Frances (Frankie) Murdoch still alive?

Life is confusing enough, we shouldn't have to also decide what sex we are! For instance, Little Richard spent his whole life going back and forth in his sexuality. He finally said, "It's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve." James Thurber wrote a book titled, "Is Sex Necessary?" So there is something to be said for making boundaries in our sexuality, school age kids should not have to reinvent the wheel (sexually) when they go through puberty, it is hard enough to get through without too many scars. So there should still be morals, boundaries against promiscuity and predatory sex to protect young people.

Quite a fascinating column! H. L. Mencken. J. Hunter Thompson and Tom Wolfe have nothing on you, because they used effete pyrotechnics, but you have been there, done that, so your words carry some weight.

Sorry, meant Hunter S. Thompson.

I've lived earlier in my life in the Chicago area, New Orleans, Oakland & here in Duluth for the last 2 years & would like to commend the Reader as an outstanding free weekly paper regarding your coverage of politics, the environment, & local culture.

I do want to share my dismay at some of Mr. Drabik's columns, however. My intelligence was badly insulted reading his June 22 piece regarding "border wars" by an erroneous "fact" he has shared in the past. He characterizes the 3 main baddies (in his eyes) in WW II as all being "Socialist," those being the USSR, the German Reich, & Italian Fascists under Mussolini. While I understand characterizing the old Soviet Union as being "socialist" since the original revolution was Left-inspired, and the authoritarian Leninists & Stalinists betrayed it. While it is true that the NASDAP (Nazi Party) included "Socialist" in its original name, it was never anything of the sort, it was hard right and racist-nationalist. The only "socialism" it evinced was whipping up hatred for "rich Jews" though it of course murdered millions of Socialists, poorer Jews, gay people, pacifists, and others on the Left. It protected and rewarded rich Gentiles by stealing wealthy (& poor) Jews' assets & redistributing them to Nazi supporters. It's equally absurd to call Mussolini a "socialist", he started out as an Anarchist bandido, but his government was also hard right, supported the anti-Red Catholic church, etc.

There is a moronic book from 2007 which shares Drabik's lack of understanding of the Left-Right spectrum of politics, called "Liberal Fascism." Basically it says that evil Dem. redistributors (FDR, etc.) are totalitarian butchers or bullies to Republicans. The "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, which had torch-carrying Nazis & Confederates did not feature calls for economic redistribution to the poor or kindness & respect to the poor or underdogs. I cannot say whether Mr. Drabik is shockingly ignorant, or deliberately misrepresenting facts, but he is not a member of what some of us call "the reality based community."

Otherwise, you have an excellent free paper, & I enjoy picking it up every week.

Mark Schneider,
Duluth

Do you still deliver to Hibbing?

I am sorry I said Tom Wolfe wrote effete pyrotechnics. The culture he came from was, but he was not. Maybe that is why he had to blast his way out of it.

You can usually grab a Reader at the Super One grocery store. The last time I was there the Reader Rack was located in the store exit area, after the checkout area, within the cart corral. In Chisholm, it has been available at the Freedom C-store. I don't recall if it was/is available at Holiday or Lucky Sevens.

President Biden is a mensch. You are saying he doesn't come out and go against the rich in this country? (He mumbles, you say.) But I have faith in him that his sympathies are with the working and middle class. However, in order to get his policies achieved, he knows he must work with the wealthy so he is smart not to sound off like a revolutionary.

You say Ted Turner became a prophet ... by saying, "Christianity is a religion for losers." How is that a prophet? It just sounds like he resents that there are some things his money can't buy. Maybe he's afraid that the Lord could cut his ego down to size.

You are full of beans. Biden is the best! Quit tearing him down. You sound like a Trump clone.