South Dakota
updated
9:06 a.m.
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If I'm reading the court record properly , the court slapped drunk driver Tessa Gould with a $516 fine ($136 suspended) and $220 in court costs, along with a month's revocation of drivers license, three months of DUI classes, and a year's probation. And what punishment did her boss dish out? Gould's arrest came two days before Noem won the Republican House nomination. She started working as H...
Madville Times - 7:09 a.m. - 4 clicks 
Yo, Barack, where's the green love? Unlike the South Dakota press, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch continues to give well-researched coverage to mounting concerns over the integrity of the Keystone pipeline . Reporter Phillip O'Connor finds that the Obama Administration is going softer on pipeline companies than the Bush Administration did: Pipeline safety officials first learned of problems w...
Madville Times - 5:01 a.m. - 3 clicks
Three down, one to go: according to the South Dakota Department of Environment and Natural Resources Environmental Events Database , Pump Station #23 on the TransCanada Keystone pipeline sprung a leak on August 10. This one was just a little squirt, five gallons of tar sands oil hitting the ground two miles west and two miles south of Freeman . The database lists the cause as "equipment failure....
Madville Times - 3:29 a.m. - 3 clicks
There's just a half-day left in the latest Madville Times poll: " What effect will Kristi Noem's criminal record have on her standing with South Dakota voters? " Vote now in the right sidebar! The poll stays open until breakfast time tomorrow, so tell your friends, and vote now! effect : Yes, I botched the spelling in the original poll. Effect is the noun, meaning a result or impact. ...
Madville Times - Wed 2:22 p.m. - 6 clicks
Prediction: by November 2, the criminal record of every South Dakotan will have appeared in the press. The Kristi Noem campaign must be in panic mode, trying to divert attention from Noem's habitual lawbreaking by publicizing Lars Herseth's speeding tickets (yes, Lars, who last ran for office in... what, the 1990s?) and SHS campaign chief of staff Tessa Gould's recent DUI. Oops. Maybe should hav...
Madville Times - Wed 8:48 a.m. - 8 clicks
From the court listings in today's Aberdeen American News: Jason Henry Lutz, 28, of 1108 N. Second St., DUI, first offense, fined $505 and sentenced to 60 days in jail with 58 days suspended; stop sign violation, charge dismissed. Mr. Lutz is a staff member in Sen. Thune's Aberdeen office. ...
Northern Valley Beacon - Wed 8:21 a.m. - 4 clicks
Wherein I blatantly repurpose Dakota War College's commentary : An arresting reminder from KELO-TV why Kristi Noem’s $48.50 fine for her blowing a stop sign is a light sentence indeed: A 25-year-old mother and a 21-year-old driver are dead after a car crash just east of White, South Dakota. It happened at about 7:30 Friday night. Jordan Hochstein, 21, of White was driving north on 479...
Madville Times - Wed 7:49 a.m. - 3 clicks
"So how do I persuade a computer?" That was the profound question asked by a skinny freshman in my English classroom eight years ago. His query was prompted by a new directive from Pierre: our ninth-graders would take their state-mandated writing test online. Rather than penciling essays for well-indoctrinated moonlighting English teachers to grade, the students would type their essays online, an...
Madville Times - Wed 6:20 a.m. - 5 clicks
The South Dakota Constitution Party continues its futile search for an activist judge to give it preferential treatment under South Dakota election law. The Constitution Party is asking the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn Judge Roberto Lange's decision that the Constitution Party failed to follow the legal requirements to place candidates on South Dakota's statewide ballot. The only ...
Madville Times - Tue 10:50 a.m. - 6 clicks
Gee, maybe I could get a Sunday gig after all.... A contemplative reader says he heard a good sermon at All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church in Sioux Falls last Sunday. The headliner: Ronald Knapp, minister emeritus of First Unitarian Church of Omaha , who told the congregants why he is an atheist. My correspondent forwards a 2007 PDF edition of Reverend (?) Knapp's sermon : If we can...
Madville Times - Tue 7:03 a.m. - 8 clicks
That didn't take long: You can view the full Wanted poster for speed demon Congressional candidate Kristi Noem on the South Dakota Democrats' newest website, Kristi Above the Law . The poster includes links to the oodles of bad press Noem has received for her six failures to appear in court and two arrest warrants , not to mention the $2100 in traffic fines she's paid. Print and share you...
Madville Times - Mon 8:43 a.m. - 6 clicks
Lake County just can't get a clean break on unemployment figures this summer. We managed to add 20 jobs in July. Alas, we saw 30 people enter the local labor force, meaning a net increase in unemployment of ten people. We now stand at 5.0%, up 0.1 percentage points from June. July roughed up everyone in the neighborhood: every county adjoining Lake also saw an uptick in unemployment: Brookings:...
Madville Times - Mon 7:06 a.m. - 7 clicks
I'm still not jumping up and down to wage casino wars with Iowa . Yet I note with interest a letter from State Senator Gene Abdallah , Republican from District 10, essentially endorsing the position of Democratic gubernatorial candidate and fellow State Senator Scott Heidepriem that South Dakota needs to address the Larchwood casino issue. Senator Abdallah's critique still relies too much on ...
Madville Times - Mon 6:46 a.m. - 10 clicks
Sunset burning through far clouds, windy August evening, where 230th turns to gravel north of Colman, South Dakota. ...
Madville Times - Sun 7:28 p.m. - 10 clicks
The latest Madville Times poll finds a majority of you gentle readers agreeing with me on the use of Peter Norbeck's "Valhalla" cabin in the Black Hills. I asked you " Should Game Fish and Parks open the Peter Norbeck/"Valhalla" cabin for rental to the general public? " The results: Yes: 88 (66%) No: 46 (34%) Norbeck's cabin is a remarkable public asset, built by a remarkable South Dakotan. N...
Madville Times - Sun 7:05 a.m. - 12 clicks
I think Pastor Boese is harder on the hypocrisy of Kristi Noem and her "values" supporters than I am: If this were Rep. Herseth all the “Patriot-Ayatollah Pastor-Priests of the Civil Religion” would be heating the tar and plucking the chickens…preaching sermons about the slippery slope of running stop signs=a form of abortion. However the shoe is on the other foot: it is Noem is running th...
Madville Times - Sun 5:41 a.m. - 15 clicks
So Kristi Noem does 94 on the Interstate . Well, at least we finally understand why her hair looks like that. Kristi could become the new Ole and Lena. I'm feeling a whole humor sub-genre coming on. (I will acknowledge, however, that there's a strong argument to be made that there's nothing funny about Noem's reckless, unapologetic endangerment of her fellow South Dakotans.) ...
Madville Times - Fri 5:09 p.m. - 11 clicks
Which set will you vote for? That's Noem on the left and Herseth Sandlin on the right. If you're really undecided this ought to help. If you're into reading leg language. I think. This photo gives me some pangs. It was shot by a Melini Mara on assignment with the Washington Post, and is part of the photo gallery from the Mama Grizzly-Palinesque story that is giv...
Northern Valley Beacon - Aug 23 - 5 clicks
The Dakota Day , which is among the few cerebral blog sites originating in South Dakota, has a series of articles about an Afghanistan veteran soldier who is home on leave. The soldier expresses his attitudes and thoughts on Facebook with some vicious derogation of the President and minorities, which The Dakota Day reproduces in a sanitized version . Follow up articles at The Dakota...
Northern Valley Beacon - Aug 13 - 2 clicks
Writer Lorraine Collins of Spearfish offers her perspective on recent developments at Black Hills State University and the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology regarding their new status in the NCAA. Her articles are published in the Black Hills Pioneer, and we thank her for allowing us to post them on Black Hills Monitor. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Not too long ago I was d...
Black Hills Monitor - Aug 4
Bob Mercer was about the first news person in South Dakota to note that Caterpillar, Inc., will have an engineering and design center up and running in Rapid City by October. This is probably some of the most important news for the state since the National Science Foundation selected the Homestake Goldmine for the Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory. The story is stil...
Northern Valley Beacon - Aug 4
Those of us in South Dakota who have attended any of the meetings with Keystone pipeline and PUC or State Department have heard promises of the rapid response of that company to any, as they say, very unlikely leaks. In the past few days, another Canadian pipeline company that has made the same kind of promises has a line that......
Dakota Today - Jul 29 - 4 clicks
STATES FAIL TO REPORT DISCIPLINED CAREGIVERS By Tracy Weber & Charles Ornstein - ProPublica , 19 July 2010 Hundreds of state agencies nationwide have never told the federal government about health professionals they disciplined, undermining a central database meant to weed out dangerous caregivers. The federal databas...
Black Hills Monitor - Jul 21
Recently, the Rapid City Journal blog "Mt. Blogmore" has been giving Shad Olson attention. Olson appears to me to be a wingnut right loon who warrants next to zero attention. His bit of notoriety resulted because he left KOTA-TV after appearing at a "TEA Party" meeting. Anyway, in the midst of the discussion, Bill Dithmer posted a journalistic code of......
Dakota Today - Jul 20
