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Proposed new rail regulations common sense

U.S. Sens. Sherrod Brown, D-Cleveland, and J.D. Vance, R-Cincinnati, are cosponsors of an important piece of legislation that would impose both new regulations for the railroad industry and financial consequences for breaking them. The Railway Safety Act of 2023 may have been inspired by a disaster in East Palestine, but the changes could help keep people across the country safer. Among the necessary changes included in the act are requirements that all rail carriers with trains carrying hazardous materials — even those that do not fall under existing regulations for high-hazard ...

Support for Ukraine more challenging

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine did not catch the West’s intelligence agencies unaware. But no one in Washington or Europe anticipated the scale at which they would need to provide Kyiv with arms and munitions. ... The most pressing need in Ukraine is the supply of 155mm howitzer shells, which in recent months have become the main munition holding Russia at bay. The United States has supplied more than 1 million to Ukraine since the war’s outset, according to the Pentagon. Ukrainian artillery units have been firing them at a rate of roughly 3,000 daily — perhaps one-third the number ...

Thumbs Up/Down

Bus trip tripped up THUMBS DOWN: A special bus trip to the Minnesota State Capitol to lobby legislators on the crisis in nursing homes had to be canceled for Monday. It is Sovreignty Day at the Capitol, and all legislators will be in a mandatory joint session of the House and Senate so leaders of the 11 Native American nations in Minnesota can raise awareness of their issues. We are sure their needs are many and pressing, but so are the needs of the nursing home industry in the state. Nursing homes are unable to pay enough to keep nursing staff because the state ties nursing home ...

Biden undermining democracy

He seems to have abandoned “Jim Crow 2.0,” but that was the extent of the nuance in President Biden’s political remarks Sunday in Selma, Ala. He was there to commemorate the anniversary of “Bloody Sunday,” the 1965 brutality against a civil-rights march at the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Calling for the freedom to vote, marchers were met by clubs and tear gas. “The right to vote and to have your vote counted is the threshold of democracy and liberty,” Mr. Biden said. “With it, anything is possible. Without it — without that right, nothing is possible. And this fundamental ...

Nitrate from farming a continuing problem

For decades the main approaches to reducing nitrates that have increasingly endangered Minnesota’s drinking water have been to do testing, strictly regulate municipal wastewater systems and ask farmers to do voluntary best practices. It hasn’t worked and there’s little reason to believe it will have a significant impact in the future. State studies show that more than 70% of nitrate pollution comes from farming. Intensive corn and soybean farming and using manure for fertilizer is a big contributor. Yet the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and other agencies have little to ...

Beussman served New Ulm with care, commitment

Robert Beussman wore many hats during the years he lived in New Ulm, and most of them were excellent preparation for the final one he donned — mayor of New Ulm. Beussman, who died Monday at the age of 77, was born in Springfield, but adapted so thoroughly to New Ulm that it is hard to think of him as anything but a native. He served in the military, then made his career as a teacher. An excellent musician. He lent his trumpet playing talents to local groups, especially to the Concord Singers, which he led for a time, and to the Bockfest Boys. All of this helped prepare him for his ...