August 1, 2000 - The DFL's endorsed US Senate candidate - Jerry Janezich - has finally joined his major primary opponents in running ads. Janezich is starting with radio ads, weeks after three of his opponents began television advertising. One of them - Michael Ciresi - first started running T-V ads in February, and began another big television ad buy this week. In the latest in our series of Ad Watches, Minnesota Public Radio's Laura McCallum asks analyst Dean Alger to review the Janezich and Ciresi ads....
August 2, 2000 - Local officials from northeastern Minnesota sat down with Governor Ventura's staff today and shared ideas about how to grow the region's economy. It was the first time the Governor's cabinet has met outside St. Paul, and state officials say this trip was so successful, similar meetings around the state could become a regular feature of the Ventura Administration. Minnesota Public Radio's Stephanie Hemphill reports. { During the election campaign Jesse Ventura didn't know what I-triple R B stood for, and he stumbled on the Tonight show with Jay Leno when asked to describe taconite. But no more. Ventura and the heads of twenty-four state agencies learned about mining and a lot more on a two-day tour of the Iron Range. Yesterday they toured Minntac, the state's largest iron ore mine and taconite plant. Today they heard from local officials about efforts to diversity the Range economy.
August 2, 2000 - People are becoming increasingly addicted to the internet. They need to constantly check their email and need to be up-to-date on everything possible.
August 3, 2000 -
August 7, 2000 - Minnesota has never elected a woman to the United States Senate -- but that will change this year if Rebecca Yanisch has her way. The Minneapolis D-F-Ler is the only female major party candidate seeking to challenge incumbent Republican Rod Grams. Although she's never held elected office, Yanisch is counting on her experiences growing up in the Red River Valley and her time as Minneapolis' top development official to propel her through the D-F-L primary to a match-up with Grams in November. In the second in our series of candidate profiles, Minnesota Public Radio's Michael Khoo takes a look at Rebecca Yanisch.
August 9, 2000 - Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura has been selected to serve on a U-S Surgeon General's committee to eliminate the disparities in racial and ethnic health. While Minnesota is one of the healthiest states in the country, Ventura says there's a huge difference between the health care of white Minnesotans and people of color in the state. Minnesota Public Radio's Tom Scheck reports...
August 9, 2000 - The number of births to teenage girls in Minnesota has dropped 18-percent since 1991, giving Minnesota the fourth lowest teen birth rate in the country. However, while the number of babies born to teens of color has dropped too, it's still alarmingly higher than the rate for white teenagers. Nancy Nelson, Executive Director of the Minnesota Organization on Adolescent Pregnancy, Prevention and Parenting, says part of this trend is connected to economic status:
August 10, 2000 - The University of Minnesota's organ transplant team has published an article examining a new transplant procedure. Researchers at the U of M created a protocol allowing strangers to donate one of their two kidneys to a transplant patient. In the current issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers discuss the ethical and medical implications of such a procedure. Minnesota Public Radio's Tom Scheck reports...
August 10, 2000 - The child poverty rate in Minnesota has shot up by 85-percent since 1979, according to a new report from the National Center for Children in Poverty. That's 122-thousand more kids, despite an unprecedented economic boom throughout most of the nineties. Diane Benjamin is an advocate for children and the Executive Director of the Children's Defense Fund-Minnesota. She thinks that the Center's numbers exaggerate the problem:
August 14, 2000 - The lawyer who led Minnesota's successful lawsuit against big tobacco is tackling what some may see as an even bigger challenge - Minnesota's US Senate race. Mike Ciresi hopes to win a competitive four-way DFL Senate primary, and go on to beat Republican incumbent Rod Grams. Ciresi has money, a creative ad campaign, a good grasp of the issues and some big name support. But he's never run for office before, and must convince DFL primary voters that he's the best Democrat to take on Grams. In the third in our series of candidate profiles, Minnesota Public Radio's Laura McCallum looks at the career and campaign of Mike Ciresi...