May 10, 2004 - Up until last Friday, most Twins baseball games were only broadcast on the team-owned Victory Sports One, a channel available to very few cable TV subscribers across the state. But a new eight-year contract with Fox Sports Net will put games back onto the regional Fox sports channel, available to many more viewers. The deal effectively ends the ambitious Victory Sports experiment.
April 15, 2004 - Immigrants to the U.S. often arrive with a tremendous hope for a new life as well as a deep sense of loss for the one left behind. Those themes, plus culture clash and the resilience of youth, are at the center of the play "Snapshot Silhouette." A product of the Children's Theatre Company of Minneapolis, the play has for the past month been providing Twin Cities students a glimpse of what life is like for some of the region's newest immigrants. It is built around two twelve year old girls, one Somali and one African-American who, as circumstances have it, find themselves living together in the same Minnesota home.
April 5, 2004 - General Manager Terry Ryan gives an appraisal of The Minnesota Twins as they open 2004 Major League Baseball season with a home game against the Cleveland Indians. During the off-season, the Twins lost key players through free agency and traded others to cut payroll. Ryan says he doesn't think the roster changes will stop the Twins from winning a third straight division title.
December 26, 2003 - MPR’s David Molpus interviews Don Blyly about a peculiar Christmas Day surprise at his Minneapolis bookstore.
December 23, 2003 - Throughout the first part of December, Minnesota Public Radio has asked listeners to join in the spirit of the season by setting new lyrics to old holiday tunes. The entries were judged, and winners have been chosen. In the "Jingle Bells" category, open to young people, Michelle Boursier of Maple Grove, was the winner. Segment includes interview with Michelle and a clip from her entry, recorded by the singing group “Dare to Breathe."
December 22, 2003 - MPR’s David Molpus interviews a winner of Merry Happy Lyrics’ "Hark the Herald Angels Sing” category. The entry is by a cowboy poet who goes by the name of Wally Firesteel.
December 17, 2003 - Next month Governor Pawlenty is to decide whether to support the State Corrections Department in its call for new funds to expand Minnesota's prisons. Corrections officials say the state's capacity to accomodate a rising inmate population with current facilities is near an end. As Deputy Corrections Commissioner Dennis Benson put it in an interview with Minnesota Public Radio. "our backs are against the wall with only 85 vacant beds in the entire statewide system." That means states eight prisons are filled to 99 percent capacity.
November 28, 2003 - While President Bush made a surprise visit to U.S. troops in Iraq this week, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton chose to spend Thanksgiving with Army paratroopers in Afghanistan. The former First Lady warned Taliban rebels that they are "fighting a losing battle," and said she is very impressed by the determination of the new civilian government there. For a different perspective on how things are going in Afghanistan we turn to Greg Mortenson, who divides his time between visits to rural parts of Afghanistan and the U.S. He runs the Central Asia Institute, based in Bozeman, Montana. Mortenson, a native of Minnesota, says schools are the key to Afghanistan's revival. But security problems and economic issues inhibit the country's stability.
November 24, 2003 - The Medicare prescription drug legislation moved closer to passage in Congress today, as Senate supporters turned back attacks launched by opponents. The bill would make the most sweeping changes in Medicare since its creation in 1965 by providing a prescription drug benefit for the program's beneficiaries and giving insurance companies broad leeway to offer private coverage to 40 million elderly and disabled Americans. Susan Foote is the director of the division of Health Services Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. She says that, while the numbers are shifting as the bill moves closer to passage, the benefit would require significant contributions from individual Medicare recipients.
November 21, 2003 - An interview Jim Walsh, music critic for City Pages, about Prince’s career and selection as one of the 2004 inductees for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.