Opinion


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  • Confusion will reign

    Randy Olson|May 7, 2020

    On Wednesday, May 6, Minnesota Department of Health officials quietly admitted an important point that major media has not picked up on. In their statewide media briefing, MDH officials quietly admitted that most new COVID cases this week are with people who don't speak English or have a hard time understanding English. (Their words) They are workers at meat processing plants, or they are family members of those workers. At one meat packing plant in Minnesota, 58 languages are spoken. That is a recipe for disaster in a global pandemic....

  • Lost our support

    Randy Olson|May 7, 2020

    This has been building up for the past three weeks, and this week it is official: this newspaper family has ended our support for Governor Tim Walz and his administration's approach to the COVID virus. In the Friday, May 8 media briefing, Walz and his officials spouted bizarre fear tactics regarding potential graduation ceremonies at high school football stadiums, mainly in rural Minnesota where graduating classes can be quite small. Example given by a journalist today: in schools such as Chokio-Alberta and Hancock, their graduating classes...

  • Opinion: we need a Farm Foreclosure Moratorium

    Apr 16, 2020

    Over the past month, Minnesota and our country overall have been focusing on two co-occurring crises: the COVID-19 public health emergency, and an economy on life support. Our state is taking the necessary steps to maintain public health by extending our "stay-at-home" order, and has taken significant steps to help small businesses by providing SBA loans and by expanding unemployment insurance to make sure frontline workers who contract COVID-19 on the job have access to workers' compensation. But a number of our rural colleagues in the farming...

  • Lockdowns: we are in a fight or flight moment

    Apr 9, 2020

    USA Today reported "Coronavirus response delayed despite health officials' private alarm" on April 7. Within all the rot in that article written to criticize and accuse federal authorities of mishandling the COVID-19 threat, you can read that a federal official acknowledged on February 27 that the outbreak was already significant and could not be "outrun". USA Today is critical of authorities for not responding quickly enough as USA Today sees it, for taking some time to think about what to do. But the federal government has served us well in...

  • (VIDEO) How can you not LOVE the power of this song

    Randy Olson|Apr 9, 2020

    This video (below) features the choir at East Norway Lake Lutheran church (and volunteer singers from the congregants) on sunrise worship service on Easter Sunday, April 4, 2010. This video clip is very special to me, as it includes the late Rose Aasen, who is seated in a chair on the far left of the choir (from the vantage point of the videocamera). Holding the music for her is her daughter-in-law Nancy, married to her son David. Rose was a very close friend of my late father. She was a...

  • Now more than ever in history

    Randy Olson|Mar 26, 2020

    Let this be a lesson for everyone that, in no clearer terms, personal responsibility can literally save our country!!! Be smart! Be well! Stay well! Do not be selfish and spread your germs to other people, especially senior citizens and other children and adults who have conditions that make them more vulnerable to the COVID-19 virus. Everyone has a responsibility to mitigate or stop the progression of COVID-19 through our society. We're not asking people to dodge bombs falling from the sky like what happened across Europe between 1939 and...

  • Take the journey

    Randy Olson|Mar 26, 2020

    Sometimes you just have to take the journey. Often, it requires a leap of faith. (VIDEO)...

  • Political correctness can kill

    Randy Olson|Mar 12, 2020

    Instead of re-saying what is said in this video...just watch the video. It's wild that so-called health experts are more worried about offending people than about actually stopping a global pandemic. Another thought: when you read the headline "CNN envisions how coronovirus can help Democrats win"...you know we are in trouble. (That panel of talking heads on CNN was just plain sick to have a discussion like that!) From Sean Davis on Twitter: "Corporate political media hate you, they hate the...

  • Opinion: stealing is wrong

    Feb 13, 2020

    Lately operating a business in Brooten has become challenging on multiple fronts. If I explained everything I'm thinking right now, I'd probably lose half of my subscribers because of how offended they would be. So let's just say I am gonna keep certain things to myself. As far as other events, well, I am certainly not going to be quiet about them. And what I have to say probably will offend a large portion of my readers. Oh, well. "If you can't stand for something, you'll fall for anything." It's been extremely difficult to run my newspaper op...

  • The clean up crew

    Randy Olson|Feb 6, 2020

    Three businesses in our area were severely harmed by many years of wrongdoing by the Brooten Commercial Club. They are Rooney's Bar of Sedan and the KaDe Shack and Marcia's Bar in Brooten. Some who will read this don't know the full story, but I am happy to tell you that the three businesses just mentioned are regaining strength and are recovering from what happened to them leading up to the end of 2018. Now that the clean up crew is doing their job, the struggle continues in finding out what happened and why. Those involved in this clean up...

  • Big government logic

    Randy Olson|Jan 30, 2020

    Big Government logic in 5 steps: Step 1. Create a law. Step 2. Realize the unintended consequences. Step 3. Spend taxpayer money to try and rectify it. Step 4. Realize problem hasn't been solved. Step 5. Spend more taxpayer money....

  • It amazes me

    Randy Olson|Jan 9, 2020

    It's amazing to watch and wonder what on earth is going through the minds of parents who drop their kids off at our elementary school, and immediately upon driving away on the boulevard by the school entrance - their eyes shoot down in reflexive fashion to their phones. There are days where I walk away in sheer horror as the ratio of parents who do this and who don't do this rises to near one-out-of-two. So your child or children are safe in the building, and somehow that makes it okay to drive away from the school with your eyes glued to your...

  • Tremendous!

    Randy Olson|Nov 14, 2019

    The Belgrade-Brooten-Elrosa community displayed terrific, outstanding support for the B-B-E Jaguars volleyball team! These posters were distributed around the towns the week of the state tournament. Posters printed by Murphey's Printing of Brooten. The business directory on this website includes a listing for Murphey's Printing. (Short link) https://bit.ly/2X69A7v....

  • Grandpa wisdom

    Randy Olson|Sep 12, 2019

    As spoken by Kelsey Michele Weimerskirch about her grandpa Dennis Weimerskirch at his funeral on September 7 in Belgrade: 1. Be kind to others; you never know what battle someone else is facing. 2. Work hard, enjoy your successes and be humble. 3. Being positive takes much less energy than being negative. 4. Always lend a helping hand, you'll never regret serving others. 5. Love your family with all that you have. I will never forget seeing Grandpa dancing in their kitchen with Grandma. He...

  • It takes an effort!

    May 23, 2019

    Posted online at 09:40 on the morning of Thursday, May 23, 2019. I will re-post this comment again in the coming days...but I have to laugh at some of the comments buzzing around the community to the idea that Bonanza Valley Days in Brooten will be either scaled back or not held at all in July. It is one thing to "miss" something or mistakenly be out of the loop. You're busy, you're not paying attention and you just flat out miss information that is freely flowing around. However, it takes extra effort to remain ignorant. You have to really...

  • It's happening: subscription prices to increase at the Voice

    Dec 20, 2018

    As of January 1, 2019, subscription prices will increase for the Bonanza Valley Voice. We have wrestled with this for over a year, and it almost took place this year on January 1. We are going with the most minimum of an increase that will continue to keep the newspapers coming each week: $2 for local subscribers and $4 for local "snow birds" as well as out-of-area subscribers. In 2018, the newspaper industry took a severe beating with large increases (30 to 50 percent) to newsprint costs....

  • Celebration across the newspaper industry

    Aug 30, 2018

    The day August 29, 2018 brought terrific news for the U.S. newspaper industry. The full effect of the news won't be known for a couple more months, but what we do know is something to be truly grateful for. A paper tariff added in January to Canadian paper used for news print will completely go away in the coming weeks. The tariff was pushed on behalf of a Wall Street hedge fund that owns North Pacific Paper Company (NORPAC) in Washington State. The result was a 40-plus percent increase in the...

  • Looking back to 1942

    Aug 16, 2018

    *Note: this post will have political overtones. Apologies in advance. This is marked as opinion. It pains the Bonanza Valley Voice to see the rapid pace at which members of modern U.S. society forget our past and the great sacrifices our forefathers endured to build America into the great nation we are today. To learn story after story of elder seniors whose families did "anything and everything" it took, every ounce of inner and outer mental and physical strength, to endure the endless...

  • Support the Arts!

    Cheryl Larson|Apr 12, 2018

    We all know there are thousands of reasons to support the arts. Here are five from Americans for the Arts research guru Randy Cohen that you can keep handy for important occasions, like cocktail parties or debates about funding for the arts. The arts are fundamental to our humanity. They ennoble and inspire us-fostering creativity, goodness, and beauty. The arts bring us joy, help us express our values, and build bridges between cultures. The arts are also a fundamental component of a healthy co...

  • Letter to the editor

    Oct 13, 2016

    As a native of Appleton that has lived there over 40 of my now 50 years. I want to see it prosper. I would love it if there would be a use for the prison that I worked at for over 8 years, as a correctional officer, sergeant, trainer, and spokesperson. As some of you know I have been active in politics, for several years now. I have witnessed a lot of political games, and a lot of political shenanigans over my years. Some of them have involved the Appleton prison. As I watched the hearing last spring at the capitol my heart was breaking as I...

  • Out-of-the-box ideas for Appleton prison

    Jul 21, 2016

    Letter to the editor, There was talk and promises about re-opening the Appleton Prison during the last legislative session. Failure was always blamed on other parties. Yes, some people were upset about expanding prison beds, but the heavier opposition that I heard about from lawmakers in St. Paul was the very questionable economics. The proposal to lease the PCF from CCA was estimated at between $6 and $8 million per year. This only accounts for the dollars paid to CCA, not the operations...