News from Lake Woebegone

I am missing Minneapolis so much it hurts, and I don't know when I'll get back to visit. So to keep in touch, I read The City Pages online. This week had a bumper crop of interesting news (unusual anywhere for August!) Surprise! Heritage Park Is Not Hell on Earth is about the newest experiment in social engineering, in its later stages of construction on Minneapolis's near-north side. I posted a far more critical expose about it some months ago, so the (relatively) good news is welcome. Not so welcome is the evidence of the further slashing of income-equalising "quality of life" factors that made Minnesota so attractive to me in the first place, such as the closing of a truly exemplary care home and the aggressive rise of the fundamentalist-funded Teen Challenge. And then there is this very interesting story Will "Justifying Torture" be on the final exam? St. Thomas's new Law School hire. This concerns the appointment of Robert Delahunty, coauthor of the infamous "torture memo" to the faculty of a local law school in a college that has always been noted for its leadership in human rights advocacy. Where did it all go so wrong for "kinder and gentler" Minnesota?