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The COVID solution is sitting unused

Brown County Public Health has taken to issuing a weekly report of new COVID-19 cases and deaths in the county, instead of a daily report. It’s too busy dealing with new cases to put the reports together. When they have come out lately, the reports are not encouraging. On Monday BCPH reported Brown County has cracked the 4,000 COVID cases mark. With 137 new cases recorded last week, Brown County is at 4,009. Two more deaths last week brought the death toll to 47 since the pandemic began. The COVID patients are filling the local hospital, which has staff members spending a lot of ...

‘Inflation tax’ prediction proving true

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., has been stalwart in his concerns over inflation and Democrats’ desire to spend trillions to fund new social programs: “An overheating economy has imposed a costly ‘inflation tax’ on every middle- and working-class American. At $28.7 trillion and growing, the nation’s debt has reached record levels,” Manchin wrote in a commentary published in the Wall Street Journal. “Over the past 18 months, we’ve spent more than $5 trillion responding to the coronavirus pandemic. Now Democratic congressional leaders propose to pass the largest single ...

Thumbs Up/Down

Tribute to George THUMBS UP: George Glotzbach was enthusiastic about a lot of things in New Ulm — he was a big fan of Wanda Gag, of old tyme music and of the city’s German heritage. It was his heritage, after all. He was especially enthusiastic about the old Middle School building. His father, Linus, was the Works Progress Administration (WPA) administrator in the area, and he was instrumental in getting funding for the addition to the building that is now the State Street Theater, and for the murals that adorn the walls in the theater. So it is fitting that the State Street ...

Lesser of two evils

The Food and Drug Administration has given its authorization to an electronic cigarette, the Vuse Solo, saying that the tobacco-flavored product can help adult smokers reduce their exposure to the harmful chemicals in regular cigarettes. It is far from a full-fledged endorsement of electronic cigarettes as safe. The FDA stressed they are neither safe nor “FDA approved,” and that people who don’t smoke shouldn’t use them. So, the FDA is just saying that for smokers, the e-cigarette is better than firing up a regular, tobacco-burning cigarette. It is the lesser of two evils, ...

City should pick a way to fund EDC head and stick to it

New Ulm’s Economic Development Corporation has been without a director for a couple of years now, and it it asking the city again for help to hire one. NUEDC at one time had Brian Tohal as its director, funded by subsidies from the City of New Ulm and the Public Utilities Commission. But three years ago the city council decided it would be better off if it hired its own ED director. The city ended its subsidies for the NUEDC position and hired an assistant city manager/ED director. Audra Shaneman took the job two years ago, but this year the city council decided the money it was ...

Platitudes won’t stop mass shootings

Saturday night’s mass shooting at the Seventh Street Truck Park bar in St. Paul was a hellish scene, according to police and survivors. An argument in the bar escalated, and two of the arguers pulled guns to settle it. In the crossfire, one woman was killed and 14 people were injured. Officials decried the violence, saying it was unacceptable, that it must never be allowed to happen again — the same kind of platitudes that get pulled out after each mass shooting. But it happens again, and again. It is going to keep happening, until we get serious about keeping guns out of the ...