When Minnesota parents send their children off to school, they expect them to have qualified teachers. In fact, state law clearly says that teachers must have state-issued licenses to teach certain subject areas or grade levels. Despite those rules, hundreds of state instructors do their jobs withou...

Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton recently gave the state just what the doctor ordered. Seeking to curb rocketing costs in the state budget’s fastest growing category, he ordered HMOs that provide state health care plans to go through a competitive bid process as well as enact rules that would ensure mor...

Run out of beer on a Sunday and what do some Duluthians do? They jump into their cars and motor across a bridge to a liquor store in Superior for more, hoping the few they’ve had weren’t a few too many. That potentially tragic scenario is an unfortunate reality that plays out more regularly than...

After a decade of debate, the Vikings stadium proposal will likely be decided — or mostly decided — this legislative session. It’s a debate that needs resolution. Sen. Julie Rosen, R-Fairmont, has taken the lead on the plan and is to officially introduce it to lawmakers. The Vikings’ lease a...

The first thing to praise about House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s budget plan, unveiled Tuesday, is that it exists. The Wisconsin Republican has produced a plan to deal with the debt, which is more than his Democratic colleagues or President Obama can say....

Former Minnesota House Speaker Steve Sviggum recently announced that he would resign his position as teacher and legislative fellow at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey School of public Affairs....

After a decade of debate, the Vikings stadium proposal will likely be decided — or mostly decided — this legislative session. It's a debate that needs resolution. Sen. Julie Rosen, R-Fairmont, has taken the lead on the plan and is to officially introduce it to lawmakers. The Vikings' lease at th...

On Monday, the Obama administration achieved one of the president’s principal goals in Libya: withdrawing U.S. warplanes from the fight against Moammar Gadhafi. In his speech last week explaining his decision to support an air campaign, President Obama said that after leading initial strikes, U.S....

Across much of Minnesota, emergency management officials and homeowners are breathing small sighs of relief. For now, it appears that dire predictions of record-setting floods won’t become reality.  Of course, Minnesota isn’t out of the woods yet. Once our current cold snap breaks and recen...

Technically, the litigants in the case scheduled for argument before the Supreme Court on Tuesday are Wal-Mart Stores and some 1 million current and former female employees who allege in a class action that they have been discriminated against. But all eyes will be on the justices themselves. Will t...