One Bag at a time 4000 Show up!

FARGO, N.D. (FargoFloods.com) Volunteers at Oakport Township north of Moorhead, Minn. filling sandbags Monday, March 24, 2009, as residents prepared for record flooding from the Red River. Moorhead is across the river from Fargo, N.D. Town residents were evacuated by boat during the 1997 flood.

High school and college students were let out of class Monday to help with sandbagging as residents raced to hold off a threat of flooding from the rising Red River.

City officials in fargo planned to fill more than 1 million sandbags, but with more rain forecast they increased the quota to nearly 2 million sandbags — about 500,000 each day by the end of the week.

“We’re confident that we can get the bags delivered,” said Bruce Grubb, Fargo’s enterprise director. “Getting them made is a more daunting challenge.”

North Dakota State University canceled classes Monday and Fargo high schools also excused students to help.

River Dr  in Fargo

Put the Fargo Phantom in your favorites….

Find Help and Give Help in Fargo Flood effort here.

FARGO, N.D. (FargoPhantom.com)–Tuesday night at 7 PM the 9th Fargo Film Festival began to an almost
completely compact house. This year, there are four ice sculpted penguins in
front of the theatre. The weather has been cold enough to preserve these
sculptures, done by students from NDSU’s Department of Architecture and the
public is requested to respect the integrity of the art.

Penguins are appropriate, as the centerpiece of this year’s opening night
was the Film “Ice People,” an invited film directed by Anne Aghion of New York
City. The film was a documentary of an expedition to Antartica by two NDSU
Geoscience Professors, Doctors Alan Asworth and Adam Lewis, who wre
accompanied by two students and Aghion and her crew. As Margie Mailey, in
introducing the Festival and the film explained, she invited the film after
she found out that it is scheduled to open the San Francisco Film Festival.
She knew Dr. Ashworth, but not about the film, so the rest was easy. Continue reading →

FARGO, N.D. (FargoPhantom.com)–On Tuesday night, the NDSU Bison Men’s basketball won the Summit League tournament and thus qualified for the NCAA tournament.  This is indeed laudable, since this is the first year Bison were eligible for the tournament.  This has only been done once before (L:ong Beach State in 1970).  Even more impressive to me is that the Bison are primarily made up of home grown talent(North & South Dakota, Minnesota and Montana).  Our area is known, for a variety of reasons more for producing football and hockey players.

But of course I do not need to point out this is an impressive accomplishment: we’ve heard and read little else in the media in the last few days.  I looked to me like the front page headline in Thursday’s Forum were six inches high.  NDSU President Chapman was interviewed in Souix Falls just after final game.  The TV station that showed the game and conducted the interview said Chapman would explain why this win was so important to the University and the state.  All I heard him say was “this is a great win for the school and the state.”  He didn’t say why.

The next night, in the same time slot with an equal amount of coverage during and after the game as given the Bison, Robert Morris University won the Northeast Atlantic Athletic Conference and thus qualified for the NCAA tournament.  Only this will be their sixth appearance, so they must really be a well known school.  Unfortunately, I had never heard of the school academically or athletically.  I surmised they must be in New England somewhere. since they call themselves “the Colonials<” and the name of their conference puts them in the northeast somewhere. I know that Robert Morris was ne of the signatories of the Constitution, but I had no idea what town the school is in or what state it is in.  I wonder how many others are in the same situation.  I now know(and there is no town associated with the institution), but I’ll keep the information to myself.  Other “important” qualifiers are Sienna, Radford and Charleston.  Real academic and athletic powerhouses.

Now, I’m not trying to rain on anybody’s parade.  I’m just trying to bring a little perspective to the situation.  Certainly in would be nice to see the Bison advance even one round, but that’s not likely.  Let’s face it: the Oakland University team they beat on Tuesday resembled, to me, a disorganized, badly coached high school team.  The only reason they were in the game is that they were so much taller.  But they threw up more air balls than a bingo parlor, were fond of throwing the ball to nobody, and one of their seven footers even went up for what was presumably a dunk and slammed the ball off the side of the backboard.  To me, if this was representative of Summit  League basketball, I’m not impressed.

It actually bothers me to watch the time and effort followed by the expectations that people put into Bison Athletics.  I’ve heard TV sportscasters talk about the “signature” win over Wisconsin a couple of years ago.  Yeah, along with the signature 40 point loss to Kansas State the same season.  Does this mean that Grand Valley State’swin over Michigan State(admittedly in an exhibition game). Gardner Webb’s win over Kentucky and Hampton Institute’s win over North Carolina are all “signature” wins for significant programs?

The move to division one was, I think, driven by football.  But football is expensive.  I don’t think we have the fan or financial base to support a big time program, actually in either sport.  I’m not impressed by a near win and a win over a dispirited and disinterested Gopher team.  I might be if, after that game, the Bison had to play another Big Ten team the next week, and another the week after that.  But I think we saw last season what would have happened.  Many were surprised at the number of losses the Bison incurred last fall and I’ve heard people ask “what’s up with that.”  To me, the answer’s simple: for the first time, the Bison actually had to play a schedule of established division one programs.  No weeks off to play Concordia of St Paul and lick the wounds of the previous week.

It pains me even more to hear people interviewed on television talk about how they love tie Bison, wouldn’t miss a game, etc.  Love the bison, OK, but what about the University?  Even with our huge state surplus NDSU is still one of the worst funded research institutions in the country.  Of course, many don’t understand the level of competence in their fields of many of the faculty, or what a strong land grant school does for a state.  If you need some indications, look at our financial situation, which regardless of what you here is not good.  And we essentially feed the world.  We should have many communities like Apple Valley, Edina, Eden Prairie, al in the Twin City area.  But we don’t.  We don’t have the people with the education to make it happen, in my view.

NDSU’s mission is supposedly “Teaching, Research and Service.”  President Chapman used to think it was “Athletics, Education and Research” until the faculty reminded him otherwise.  Somehow, NDSU does a good job with its stated mission.  The opening night of the Fargo Film Festival showed a documentary about two NDSU geology professors and their trip to Antartica with two of their students.  They made an extremely important discovery on this particular trip, and the film gave an excellent description, I thought, of what drives driven researchers like these two professors.  Oh yes, somehow Dr. Chapman seemed to have missed that event, as well as the play “Mr Lincoln” held in Lincoln’s 200th birtday, as well as many other concerts, plays and other academic events at NDSU and elsewhere.

As impressive as I think NDSU’s faculty is,, this needs to be kept in perspective too.  The University of Minnesota is currently growing hearts, presumably for replacements.  I won’t go into the details, but that’s impressive.  I’m sure most of us have heard of the Collider that has been built in Europe to create sub=atomic collisions bewteen particles in an effort to understand the nature of matter(believe me, we’re still very much in the dark: in joke, pun intended).

We’ve got a fine little University here in Fargo.  Should be smaller, according to many faculty, many of whom think the increase in enrollment has actually hurt the overall quality of student.  We ought to support it, and support does not mean making a big deal of a mid-level athletic program.

Read More Reviews Here of 2009 Fargo Film Festival Reviews

FARGO, N.D. (FargoPhantom.com)– An afternoon at the Fargo Film Festival.  Wednesday afternoon I took in a segment of the afternoon offerings at the Fargo Film Festival.  I’m writing this to give an idea to give some idea of what the daytime offerings are like: there’s still a couple of days in which to take in these offerings.

The first film was a fifteen minute narrative short about a 15 year old high school student and his first date.  The movie was essentially a fifteen minute joke.  Continue reading →

NDSU Wins Over Oakland in Summit League Tournament NDSU Goes to NCAA March Madness

NDSU Basketball Wins over Oakland 66-64

FARGO, N.D. (FargoPhantom.com)– Ben Woodside’s medium jumper with 3 seconds left gave North Dakota State a 66-64 win over Oakland University Tuesday for the Summit League championship and a berth in the NCAA tournament.

No. 1 seed NDSU (26-6) trailed through much of the game – by 14 points in the first half – and needed a rally in the final five minutes to win.

A long field goal attempt by Oakland’s Johnathon Jones at the final horn bounced out.

Michael Tveidt led NDSU with 21 points. Woodside added 17.

Erik Kangas and Will Hudson each had 16 points for No. 3 seed Oakland (22-12). Jones added 15 and Keith Benson had 14.

Downtown fargo was still moving on Skis and we have the pictures to prove it.

FARGO, N.D. (FargoPhantom.com) — Here’s the March 10th Downtown Fargo Snow Pics & Pictures Brought to by our Snow Storm Team at the Fargo Phantom.

Fargo theatre was closed. Heavy snow driven by wind gusting to 40 mph brought parts of the upper Midwest to a halt Tuesday, closing courts, schools, businesses and two major highways i29 & i94.

The storm even shut down a popular hangout known for its trademark frozen desserts, the Moorhead Dairy Queen. “It must be bad. No one wants their Blizzard today,

Most businesses in the area did not open Tuesday or closed early, and even North Dakota State University shut down.”That really made a difference. NDSU usually doesn’t close,”

FARGO, N.D. (FargoPhantom.com)–On Tuesday night at Babbs Coffee Shop the College of Science andMathematics at NDSU held its fourth “Science Café.”

There will be a fifth in April. with hopes of a more regular schedule during the
2009-2010 academic year.  According to Dr. Kevin McCaul, the Dean of the
college, the meetings are held downtown to make them more informal and
more attractive to the general audience for which they are intended.
For this presentation, that strategy seem to have worked as nearly 100
were in attendance.  I’m not sure of the exact purpose of these
meetings, but they certainly expose the adademics of NDSU and the
College of Science and Mathematics in particular to the general
population.  I think this a good thing, and should have been done long
ago.

Tuesday night’s leader was Dr. Jim Coykendall, Professor and Chair of
the Mathematics Department.  Professor Coykendahl has an impressive
liist of accomplishments, including his bachelors degree from Caltech
and phD from Cornell.  He also held the James A. Meir junior
professorship, one of only two chaired professorships in the college.

Professor Coykendall’s discussion was about solving the Rubic’s cube,
and the presentation was certainly accessible to a general audience.
The discussion began with a little history of the Rubic’s cube and Jims
own experience with solving it.

With much participation from the audience, the astronomical number of
possibilities to attempt to solve the cube was demonstrated.  Then Jim
discussed ways to go about forming strategies to solve the cube without
trying all possibilities.  This led to a discussion, again with a lot
of audience participation, to the mathematical analysis of the
structure of permutations.  A permutation of a number of objects is
simply an arrangement of those objects.

Professor Coykendall is from Tennessee originally, and his easy going
hill country delivery was easy to listen to.  There were many questions
at the end, and all present seemed to enjoy themselves.

I think the Science Café’s an excellent opportunity to view NDSU’s
highly qualified faculty at work in a relaxed setting and can give us
some idea of what they do when they’re having fun.  I hope they
continue to be so successful.

For more Info on when the next meeting email:

kevin.mccaul@ndsu.edu

FARGO, N.D. (FargoPhantom.com)–It’s not just West Fargo School District officials who are grappling with the “emotional” issue about whether to build a second high school.

Parents, teachers and students who also are struggling with this decision weighed in Wednesday.

It was the second of six meetings district officials are hosting to gather input to shape what the district’s May bond referendum looks like.

While the district says they need another elementary, middle and high school – among the biggest projects – most of Wednesday’s conversations centered on the “big question”: Does the public support one high school or two?

“We need that answered first as far as putting together this puzzle as how we go out to the public for a bond issue,” said School Board President Tom Gentzkow. “That kind of gives us the direction as a body to move forward.”

“If it’s presented right … we might be able to get past that,” Althoff said. “Around here, we’re big Packer fans. I think (having two high schools) will be a hard sell for the community because we’re used to the small community. I would like to support two buildings, but not necessarily two schools. But I’m still open.”

Parent Lori Anderson said, “We like that hometown feeling, and we don’t want to lose that.”

Both parents and other community members looked Wednesday at how keeping students in one high school or adding a second could affect academics, athletics and attendance boundaries.

More athletic opportunities and smaller academic settings were among the pros the public listed for having two high schools. The cons included an inter-town rivalry, equity issues and athletic performance.

WASHINGTON — President Obama urged the nation on Tuesday to see the economic crisis as reason to raise its ambitions, calling for expensive new efforts to address energy, health care and education even as he warned that government bailouts have not come to an end.

In his first address to a joint session of Congress, Mr. Obama mixed an acknowledgment of the depth of the economic problems with a Reaganesque exhortation to American resilience. He offered an expansive agenda followed by a pledge to begin paring an ever-climbing budget deficit. Continue reading →

Lately the news, particularly the sports news, has been filled with news about Yankee baseball star Alex Rodriguez

and his history of steroid and performance enhancing drug use.  There is also an old saying that “those that don’t learn from history are destined to repeat it.”

What do these things have to do with each other?  A lot, I think.

No one denies that our country is in a deepening recession, perhaps the worst in our history.  There seems to me to be no indication of recovery.  Since I have always behaved myself fiscally, I am one of those that don’t like my mounting tax dollars going to bail out those that were, or are, fiscally irresponsible.  But if that’s what it takes, that’s what it takes.  But there is no indication that these bailouts will work.

So, what’s the connection?
Continue reading →

I think everyone knows our country is in trouble.

Most politicians and civic leaders alike agree that we desperately need to put differences aside and work hard to get us out of this mess.  Everybody, it seems, except Republican Congressmen and a certain far right talk show host I’ll mention later.

To set the record straight, I consider myself a-political.  Some strong conservatives call me a liberal, but when asked to define liberal, it seems to be anyone that disagrees with them.  Those more moderately conservative call me a conservative.  I think of myself in terms of a line from an old Kingston Trio Song, “… and I don’t like anybody very much.”

Cheered on by the far right, it seems to me that President Bush, while spouting much rhetoric about preserving freedom, proceeded to remove much of our freedom through the Patriot Act and Homeland Security.  I don’t really believe either of these is necessary, but that’s another issue.  It is true that you could at least be investigated if not arrested for bad-mouthing the President, had to be screened in order to hear him speak, without the opportunity to plead your own case, and that those citizens choosing to exercise several of their first amendment rights in his presence(petitioning the government for redress of grievences is one of these rights) had to do so out of his sight and, presumably, hearing.

What’s all this got to do with the present, when Bush is out of office?  Well, the other day I saw a full page ad in a local publication showing a large photo of talk show host Scott Hennen, with the quote “I hope Obama’s socialist policys are a disaster.

Mr Hennan, if you had said a similar thing about your hero Mr. Bush you could well have wound up in jail.  You would at least have been investigated.  I would point out that in Mr Obama’s town meeting in Indiana, people that disagreed with him were admitted without screening and allowed to question him.  If you have an issue with his polices, it seems that you can go ask him about them instead of being screened out.

One might question conservative talker Scott Hennen loyalties at this point.

Fear the Lutefisk

“there are no institutions of higher learning that have as part of their mission statements “entertain the local population by having athletic teams.”

By:The Norwegian Explorer

A recent local topic of discussion is the consideration of the North Dakota Legislature somehow requiring the football teams of NDSU and UND to play each other on an annual basis.  Even though I don’t care if the two institutions ever play each other again in anything, or for that matter even have football teams, or even athletic programs, I think that if the legislature considers such an act it would be right up there with when the Tennessee legislature decreed that the irrational number pi is, in fact 3.

First, according to ESPN, there are no institutions of higher learning that have as part of their mission statements “entertain the local population by having athletic teams.”  What would be the content of such legislation if one or both of the institutions decided to drop football a la Western Washington, or follow the lead of some of the finest research universities, e.g. University of Chicago, University of Rochester, Carnegie Mellon to name a few, and eliminate athletics altogether?

This, of course, is not likely to happen. But let’s suppose such legislation does become law.  In that case, we would have the situation where the legislature has interfered in the internal affairs of it’s flagship institutions, a clear violation of the academic freedom of both institutions and one or more of their academic departments(yes, the Athletic Department is an academic department).  This could besmirch the academic reputations of the schools to the level of affecting their ability to attract outside funding for their research.

OK, so you don’t care if the schools are any good or not.  Fine.  But when NDSU went to Division 1 athletics the case was made by President Chapman when speaking to the NDSU University Senate that the funding was coming entirely from outside donations, and was therefore none of the Senate’s business.  Well, if the football teams are funded primarily by private donations, what business is it of the legislature’s whom or if they play?  And some say the smoking ban violates their individual rights.

In summary, I have no dog in the fight of whether NDSU and UND play each other in anything.  But I think that if the legislature meddles in the situation, it would serve no-one and possibly harm all parties.

In our last installment, we discussed some positive signs in the race relations situation.

I have now graduated from college and am hanging around Raleigh, taking courses and working for the Raleigh Recreation Department in preparation for graduate school in the fall.  This was the summer of 1963, called by some the “long hot summer,” or by others, the summer the police turned around.

To set the time frame, this was the summer of the Greensboro lunch counter sit it, the Selma, Alabama march and other large acts of civil disobedience in which African Americans let it be known that they would no longer accept second class citizenship.  Many cities in the Southeastern United States  were  “integrated” thus, and Raleigh was no exception.  The only difference was that the leaders of both sides agreed to keep the press out of it, and the only coverage was short articles on the back page of the Raleigh News and Observer.
Continue reading →

The new president has made a pledge to spend money on infrastructure across the United States because he believes it is a way to strengthen the economy.

While the country is spending money to build/maintain roads and bridges, Caterpillar in North Dakota will reap the benefits of increased demand for their equipment.
Continue reading →

• What’s going on in Gaza…Same as usual just more intense.

Israel expanded its most lethal air offensive to date (some 300 air strikes since midday Saturday) against Gaza’s Hamas leaders yesterday. The successful attacks dolled out more damage than ever before, making rubble out of parts of the city. They are amassing what appears to be a large ground force attack as well
Continue reading →

In our last submission, I was attending a Southern institution of higher learning that was ahead of its time in that it did admit some African Americans, allowed them almost equal rights with their white(and asian and middle eastern counter-parts), even though all other surrounding schools were strictly segregated, as was the town of Raleigh, NC, where the college was located. Continue reading →

“We were really busy leading up to the storm,” Thompson United for the Homeless Director said. “Some days we can get all of them in, some days we can’t.”

Area shelters have similar ways of dealing with homeless who have to be turned away.

The New Life Center can house about 100 men and serves 180 or more meals each day.
Continue reading →

Citing the usual suspects…credit crisis and dwindling sales, Chrysler LLC on Wednesday said it would shut down all of its manufacturing operations from the end of this week for at least a month. Continue reading →

Lets Just Say Millers Spot on Here

10. Larry Craig

9. Ted Turner & Deepak Chopra

8. “The Pregnant Man” Thomas Beatie

7. Fischer Stevens “He Dumped Michelle Pfeiffer and he resembles a toad.”

6. Fidel Castro “Head Moran in Cuba”

5. Plaxico Burress Continue reading →