A case study

I preface this post with these personal notes. I am a member of the board of directors of Minnesota’s Center of the American Experiment. Former Minnesota Education Commissioner Cheri Pierson Yecke is now a senior fellow of the Center; I became a fan of hers during her service as Education Commissioner and consider her a friend. This story involves Dr. Yecke and Minnesota’s dominant newspaper, the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Some of the information included here derives from Dr. Yecke.
Over the years the Star Tribune has published many of the columns that Rocket Man and I have submitted to the paper as op-ed columns. Our experience with the op-ed page has been uniformly pleasant, with the single exception of the vicious personal attack on us this summer by deputy editorial page editor Jim Boyd. This fall I was also the subject of critical comments by Star Tribune columnist Nick Coleman, who is one of the protagonists in this case study. I ask that you take into account all the cautionary notes above in considering the following.
We can start to connect the dots on some seemingly unrelated incidents.
First: Bowdlerization of conservative op-ed columns to protect liberals.
Consider the actions of our friends at the Star Tribune’s editorial page regarding columns submitted by Dr. Yecke. As Professor King Banaian of SCSU Scholars blog points out here and here, the editors seem to have developed the habit of weakening Dr. Yecke’s arguments so that liberals won

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