Near Two Harbors, 34 structures burned and Highway 61 closed; in Crow Wing County, a 1,600-acre fire sparked evacuations

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Nobody picked up on my request in yesterday's 5x8 for a little introspection in the wake of the Zimmerman trial's conclusion. Specifically, President Obama's question asking "if we’re doing all we can to widen the circle of compassion and understanding in our own communities.” It's probably too early for introspection. At some point, the focus of the national dialogue has to expand to larger questions.

Today probably isn't going to be that day.

, who made an important point. “Nobody knew exactly what happened,” she said.

"Anybody would think anybody walking down the road, stopping and turning and looking -- if that's exactly what happened -- is suspicious," she said.

"I think all of us thought race did not play a role," the juror said . "We never had that discussion."

"I don’t know if the jury, which included no African Americans, consciously or unconsciously bought into this racist way of thinking — there’s really no other word. But it hardly matters, because police and prosecutors initially did," Eugene Robinson writes in the 

"It does mean, though, that the public knows young black males commit a disproportionate amount of crime," he writes. "In New York City, blacks make up a quarter of the population, yet they represent 78 percent of all shooting suspects — almost all of them young men. We know them from the nightly news."

Yesterday, the Star Tribune editorialized a celebration of due process in the case.

"Due process? What due process?" commentator Jay Larson of St. Bonifacius 

But it's a bigger story than just the case of what happened in Florida. MPR's Annie Baxter raised it in her story this morning about 

Remember that Cheerios ad that General Mills started running a couple of months ago that featured a biracial family? 

 on the online commercial because of all of the racist comments.

Adults saw a white woman and a black man. Kids, it turns out, saw a Cheerios ad.

When electric motors replace kerosene-guzzling jet engines -- it's only a matter of time -- Chip Yates is going to be a big reason why. Yates set a speed record (200 mph) in an electric plane last summer, just days after he got his pilot's license. Now he's going to try to break it again -- 250 mph, preferably without almost blowing himself up this time.

 and his other quest recently: to be the first pilot to fly non-stop to Europe in an electric plane.

I interviewed Yates on a talk show I hosted at the air show in Oshkosh last summer, shortly after his record-setting flight.

Gunnar Boettcher's video of the "Frankenstein rabbit" in Mankato set the Internet on fire, but now it's created a dilemma: Should he try to capture it and maybe have an expert figure out what caused his obvious problems or just let it be?

"I'm going back and forth," he tells the 

. "I've been reading a lot of articles, trying to see what I could do."

He's leaning toward letting it mind its own business, to the outcry of some people on the Internet.

Between the Emerald Ash Borer, buckthorn, garlic mustard, zebra mussels, and gypsy moths, the fight against invasive species feels like shoveling sand against the tide. Now, we've got one more to worry about: bamboo.

The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources says Japanese knotweed is spreading from Maine to Minnesota and as far south as Louisiana, according to the 

You can't burn the stuff. If you cut it down, it grows back even faster.

How it got here is a familiar story. Japanese knotweed was imported to the U.S. from Asia in the 1800s. People always seem to want wherever they are to be somewhere else.

 What is the attraction of fantasy sports? 

It's the fourth most popular sport in the U.S.

 That's 13 percent of Americans playing it, NPR says.

Jack Handey is the envy of every comedy writer in America

, the New York Times says. Handey is a real person, Al Franken insists.

 You may recall a couple of weeks ago when meteorologists speculated the hottest temperature ever recorded on earth -- 134 in Death Valley -- might be broken in a 2013 heat wave. 

‘The Newsroom,’ Season 2, Ep. 1: HBO journodrama jumps the snark

 Baseball's All Star Game will be played tonight in New York. Mets' pitcher Matt Harvey will start the game for the National League.

The man with no memory: Navy vet wakes up, speaks only Swedish

Is two hours of screen time a day a reasonable limit for children? How about for you?

Second hour: A Pew report Report looks at how digital tools affect student writing. Plus: The life of a public defender.

 (12-1 pm): "Where does President Obama go from here?" Panelists are E. J. Dionne, Ron Brownstein and Andrew Revkin.

 - Neighborhood watch members react to Zimmerman verdict | California prison system under scrutiny | Florida's stand your ground law & race relations.

- A new novel from Minneapolis-based Coffee House Press blends elements of a spy thriller, a romance, history, philosophy and environmental concerns. The New York Times raved about "Submergence " by author J.M. Ledgard. The national publishing houses reportedly passed over the book, but it's exactly the material Coffee House seeks. MPR's Euan Kerr will have the story.

NewsCut

Bob Collins

Author

A question of race. Or not. What kids know that adults don't. The electric Lindbergh.  Tales of the Frankenstein rabbit. And the new bamboo menace in the Northland.

5 x 8: Racism never came up in Zimmerman jury deliberations

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