Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily midday digest of what local media outlets and Twitter-ers are gabbing about.
MN Greenlights Weak Weed Gummies, Buddy
Weed is good. That's the mindset we're slooooowly moving toward here in Minnesota. Starting tomorrow, adults 21 and up will be able to legally purchase edibles and drinks containing THC. "In some ways, we legalized cannabis," Steven Brown, CEO of Nothing But Hemp, tells the Star Tribune. Hell yes! Except, not quite. The new law allows for 5 milligrams of THC per serving, and 50 milligrams per package. That's enough to get you buzzy, but might be a disappointment for the garden variety weed dabbler. For reference, depending on the product, most sites selling THC and THC-derived cousins, Delta-8 and Delta-9, recommend that people start in the 15-40 mg range. But hey, this is something, right? There’s no restrictions on what kind of business can sell these products, either, so expect to see collaborations in coffee shops, brewpubs, restaurants, and bars. Smoke ‘em if you… er, chew 'em if ya got ‘em!
A Native Reckoning at the U of M
"The federal government’s hanging of 38 Dakota men from Mankato, Minn. gallows in December 1862 brought an end to the U.S.-Dakota war," begins a Thursday MPR story. "It also triggered a financial bonanza for the University of Minnesota." The so-called “Minnesota Windfall” from that stolen Dakota land raised nearly $580,000 for the university during its early days, a story that remained mostly hidden until recently, when it was uncovered by a pair of investigative reporters. Led by researchers with Towards Recognition and University-Tribal Healing Project—TRUTH—the U of M recently undertook a broad review its treatment of Native people going back to its 1851 founding. MPR reports that researchers are also looking into the return of human remains and funerary objects held by the university, as well as the legacy of a boarding school on the present-day U campus in Morris, Minnesota. Their findings will be published in a report this summer.
Minneapolis Cops Are Historically Bad at Solving Homicides
If one wanted to cast additional blame, the CBS News series "Crime Without Punishment" could be rebranded as “Cops Without Competency.” That’s the main takeaway from this recent investigative collab with WCCO, which found that the Minneapolis Police Department cleared just 38% of the homicides it attempted to solve in 2020. Nationally, that figure floats around 50%, though in the ‘60s rates pushed 90%. Each subsequent decade, cops got worse and worse at performing perhaps the central function of their jobs, especially when the victims were non-white. "You think if there was more community trust, they'd solve more?" Marsha Mayes, whose three-year-old son Terrell died by gunfire in north Minneapolis in 2011, told CBS. "Exactly. I got trust in some, not all… I miss my baby, my baby meant more to me than life.” MPD swears its clearance rate went up in 2021, but wouldn’t share numbers until they’re published with the FBI. Last fall, Minnesota Reformer found that MPD failed to solve almost 8 in 10 shootings; the department declined to explain itself.
Delta Offers Free Rebookings This Weekend, Because Your Flight is Going To Be Canceled Anyway
You think you’re flying somewhere this weekend? Ha, ha, ha! Airlines in America have really been struggling to function the past couple of weeks, due to the brutal hours required by a shrinking number of staff who receive shitty pay. Now, Delta is subtly “hinting” that you should reschedule your flight this weekend, as the airline is experiencing “operational problems.” And it won’t even charge you for saving its ass! Delta isn't alone in what CNN has dubbed the Summer of Travel Hell: According to Thrifty Traveler, American Airlines has already canceled more than 500 flights; United Airlines has scrapped more than 200. “They typically reserved [free change waivers] for storms, weather events,” Thrifty Traveler reporter Gunnar Olson told host Cathy Wurzer. “This is a very different kind of storm for them and one that they're not going to be able to ride out very easily.”
