Another year has come and gone. In keeping with a recent tradition I now highlight some of my top Google Analytics posts from 2010. After the list I'll share a few favorites that never caught on.

MOST READ POSTS

1. About my friend Tom Anzelc -- I hate that this one came out on top but there's no denying that my friend Tom's court appearance to defend himself against false accusations in a civil protection order case was big news last summer and tops in the click stats. A Pawlenty-appointed judge dismissed the complaint outright as being without merit or credibility.
2. Oberstar, Cravaack and the future of Minnesota's Fightin' Eighth - (Parts 1 and 2) -- Taken together these two posts were the biggest traffic generators in the history of this blog, particularly in first-day hits. Chip Cravaack's meteoric rise and Jim Oberstar's Shakespearean fall drove a lot of traffic to this blog, one of few MN8-based sites with regular political commentary.
3. This Iron Range blogger is done apologizing for Iron Range cronyism --I broke publicly with my DFL party and honestly things haven't been the same for me since. I remain active in my local party unit, mostly for coordination of Tom Anzelc's campaigns and because I have friends there. But this was a flame thrower. Things were not this summer nor are they now "right" on the Iron Range. There are systemic problems in our politics, economic development and even our culture. I'm done pretending things are OK. They aren't. This post was well received by many. I'm sure others resented it, but only one, Rep. Loren Solberg, had the guts to say so. Solberg would go on to lose his race this November. I didn't expect that and he was among the least deserving of that fate.
4. Breaking: Janezich defeats Entenza -- More evidence that snark rules page views. This was a poor use of time that got on the list anyway. Yay, internet!
5. The Come Home Bob meta interview -- Last spring I hosted videos for the Iron Range Tourism "Come Home Bob" campaign, highlighting Range attractions in a good-natured, humorous effort to woe Bob Dylan back to his hometown of Hibbing. The campaign ended up being kind of strange as some people thought we were dead serious, and mean. Others thought we were kidding, but then wondered. I wrote the scripts but lost creative control at some point. I should have gone Orson Welles on this deal.
6. Come Home Bob campaign draws some wanna-Bobs -- Same deal here.
7. Parades, street dances and fireworks, oh my! -- I realized a couple years back that I'm in a unique position to share parades, street dances and other celebration information for the Iron Range's storied Fourth of July traditions, which swell our summer population for a few days each year.
8. A modern Iron Range take on Tuesday's election results -- Post election commentary as the gravity of Chip Cravaack's win and the erosion of DFL support in MN8 became clearer. Another single-day hit.
9. Thank you, Jim Oberstar -- A personal reflection on Oberstar after his loss. I have a special memory of Jim from when I was a kid that made a big difference in my life. I'll always remember him fondly and thank him for what he did for northern Minnesota during his years in Congress.
10. Tie - The new Duluth and the big problem for northern Minnesota AND Obligatory Randy Moss post, with fish -- One is a short link and commentary (with an interesting discussion that ensued) about economic change in northern Minnesota. The other is literally a picture of Randy Moss holding a fish that I posted before his short, controversial tenure with the Vikings this year. The fish post was made special though as the first link I ever got from TYWKIWDBI, a great general interest blog that must be seen to be believed.

LOST FAVORITES
You could never tell by the preceding list, but I actually tried to reduce my political blogging in 2010. How'd that go, champ? Greeeeat.

• The end is near and the prices are unbelievable -- a Twin Ports jeweler advertised a "Second Coming" sale during the Christmas season, celebrating the imminent return of the savior by offering half off all diamonds in stock.
• Mining vs. the environment: a debate not centered in reality -- My Hamlet-style position on nonferrous mining in northern Minnesota isn't making anyone happy. But I play the long game and this is not a simple story.
• Trainspotting on the Iron Range -- a photo post of some canisters on the Canadian National Line. Visual evidence of globalization and its influence on our unique, regional economy.
• The Floodwood student uprising of '72 -- a look back at an archived story from the Duluth News Tribune. This was notable because after posting this I learned my dad was there when it happened and I got a great story. Other readers also chimed in.
• Cravaack reaches across the crevasse -- Chip Cravaack just cold called me one day when he was nobody way back before he was even endorsed by the GOP. I like to think I could tell then that he'd be the most competitive Republican candidate in MN8 in a long time. I'm trying to arrange another interview with Cravaack to do a follow up now that he's a Congressman and I'm the chump doing the same old stuff.
• This is a post about carp -- I made an effort to become the official blog of Asian carp infiltration news with mixed results. Also see More carping and Carp Czar risks assassination by bullhead-sheviks. After a couple of these the lady stopped sending me press releases. And that's the important part of the story.
• At DFL convention the Range yells a mighty 'yalp!' -- My analysis of the state DFL convention in Duluth. Can anyone imagine a more retroactively irrelevant use of time and money? I mean, knowing what we know now. You can read my tone in this post and see me reach a sad conclusion of my own.
• The giant Mesabi places a bet -- Over at Minnesota Public Radio I wrote my first guest piece for their commentary page. 
• In praise of the Iron Range -- a slightly snarky post written in response to a conservative blogger's impassioned advocacy for the suburbs. Just good clean fun. 
• The Case of the Missing Medallion -- The Hibbing Winter Frolic committee gave me a trial as the author of the official "clues" for the 2010 medallion hunt, quite the local tradition. I took the approach of a Sam Spade/Guy Noir mystery story spoof. It was a hit. I'll be back in 2011, so stay tuned.
• Wanted: Young People -- My news analysis piece about the changing demographics of the Iron Range region and how it's affecting our politics, culture and economy. Probably the best actual work I did all year.
• State of Superior sees political unrest -- I predicted (accurately) some of the political changes and upsets that would befall the once solidly-Democratic Lake Superior Region, which I sometimes call the State of Superior in honor of its alt-history possibilities.
• Planes, trains and automobiles: the true story -- I detail my trip to Chicago, which isn't that special but is the only time I left the state this year (excepting Superior, WI, of course, which is really more of a stateless trade zone).
• What is clout worth? -- A standalone question about the loss of Range political clout and what it really means.
• A new legion for old stories and values -- My annual trip to the Sons of the Legion spaghetti feed got me thinking about the Iron Range's history and future.

I posted almost 400 times in 2010, less than 2009 but at a higher pace than my ill-conceived blog hiatus from late that year. I'll be revisiting my novel in 2011 and am still mapping out how to do a radio show/podcast without killing myself and/or alienating my loved ones, but I'll keep some fires going here as well.

Did I miss any of your favorites? What would you like to see in 2011? Thanks for reading MinnesotaBrown and best wishes for a happy new year!

This is a movie review, of sorts, which I don't normally do and don't plan to do all that often except when I feel like it.

Tuesday night for my birthday I decreed that we would see "True Grit," the Coen Brothers adaptation of the Charles Portis novel which also beget the 1969 John Wayne original classic of the same name. I lay it out that way because this is a case where calling the movie a "remake" doesn't do justice. For once, the powers of modern filmmaking and 21st sensibilities have been used to make something better, deeper and more meaningful, instead of just 3D, flashier and louder. This alone is the most impressive thing I can say about the new "True Grit."

Maybe my feelings are just related to nostalgia. The original 1969 "True Grit" with Wayne, Glen Cambell and Kim Darby was one of those movies I saw several times over at my grandpa and grandma's house in Keewatin when I was growing up in the '80s and '90s. They had cable. We didn't. So the biweekly trip to their house was not only where I downloaded my family's culture but also pop culture and classical education, such as was available from cable television in the '80s and '90s. Also those high school years, sitting in the living room with my grandpa, dad and uncles watching up to three westerns in a row on a Sunday afternoon was the last time I ever remember feeling relaxed enough to do something like that. Around that time, anyway. So that's my baggage going into all this.

Then again, maybe I just like the film work of the Coen Brothers, which is stylishly straightforward. I constantly hear from fellow Minnesotans, especially the working class folks I see at the community college, how much the movie "Fargo" and its over-the-top dialect rankles them. But they don't like the sound of their own voices and that is so Minnesotan, and also why I love the Coen Brothers. The Coens' catalog is exceptional but their most recent work with "No Country for Old Men" and "True Grit" is evidence of a shift from odd films that are great toward films that are just regular great.

Unlike the original, this version of "True Grit" is, like the novel, based solidly upon the character of Mattie, played by Hailee Steinfeld, a 14-year-old girl from the Wild West of Arkansas seeking revenge for the killing of her father. Mattie hires a grizzled U.S. Marshall and is joined by a Texas Ranger also working a bounty on the same man. Mattie makes this story work and Steinfeld makes this movie work. The '69 version with Kim Darby in this role always left me wondering what was up with her. At the actress's age of 20 I wondered whether her character's ineptness was just due to the ineptness show by all women in those dated westerns or if it was because the character was younger than she appeared. In this version the opposite effect occurs to great benefit. At 14, Steinfeld's Mattie is a girl, a ferociously intelligent and strong-willed girl. Her naivety shows at times, but overall she is the most principled, driven person on the screen at all times. She might be the best female character I've ever seen in a western. I can't think of a better one as I sit here now.

Jeff Bridges in the role of Rooster Cogburn is also exceptional in the way he makes the hard-drinking, stubborn, old, fat U.S. Marshall a little more nuanced than Wayne did, who was really just playing himself. Bridges's Cogburn is less iconic and forgivable, more the experienced lawman with a roguish background who drinks when he finds whiskey and becomes fairly awful. That is, except when he takes an interest as he does at the end of this story. Ultimately it is Cogburn's begrudging need of human respect and admiration breaks him out of his rough spells, and Mattie provides any time he shows what drew her to him, his reputation of "true grit." But it doesn't take a MFA to figure out that Mattie's the one with true grit.

Matt Damon is great as the Texas Ranger who joins the pair in the hunt for the killer of Mattie's father, providing a great comic and literary foil for Bridges and Steinfeld. I also like the bad guys in this movie, definitely bad but not in the "black hat" ways of the old days. These are desperate, complicated men who are only shades more evil than a lot of the respectable people in town. Some are clearly mentally ill.

I don't want to discard the 1969 "True Grit" because both that movie and this one are generally good and indicative of their times. I consider this to be a superior movie, however, and the tonic for what ails anyone longing for classic storytelling.

Reuban Saltzman from the Structure Tech Home Inspection Blog has a great post today on the MinnPost "Blog Cabin" about how to prevent or address ice dams.

If you don't know what an ice dam is you were just like me before I moved into my first 1920s-built home on the Iron Range. They are collections of ice that form on roofs that cause rapid freezing and thawing inside the structure, usually prompting some sort of frustrating water damage in attics and ceilings. You sometimes don't notice the damage until you see a growing rust-colored stain forming on your ceiling. By then you have few options to stop the damage.

So then you're going to a call some company you've heard of because your buddy's dad did some roofing for them, so you figure, hey, how bad could it be? And they say it'll be $50 an hour for ice dam removal and you're like, hey, that sounds a little high but what are you going to do, am I right? So these two guys show up and put up their ladder, see, and then go eat their lunch in their truck and you're like, hey, that's a little annoying but I guess a guy gets to eat lunch, whatever. So they crawl up on the roof and poke at the ice dam with their sticks and, after a little over an hour and 15 minutes, plus lunch in the truck, they come down and, boom, done. Fine. A little over an hour, no more than $100, right?

So the bill comes and it's $250 and I call up the guy and I'm like, hey? And he's like, oh  yeah that was $50 an hour per guy. And I'm like hey, you didn't say that. What are you paying these guys? And he's all like, whatever. And then a few years later we built a four bedroom house in the woods and guess who we didn't call for carpentry or roofing. Guess. Just guess. That's right. Customer service, yo. Think about it.

Anyway, ice dams. They happen.

I heard from a new blogger in Chisago County, Minnesota, running a site called Fiefdom Politics. She seems to focus on local and regional issues in the southern part of Minnesota's 8th Congressional District. I can't promise I'll do this every time I hear from someone but there are so few blogs focusing on northern Minnesota and non-metro issues that I like to mention new ones when I can.

I'm biased, but it's important for people outside the population centers of this country to get involved on the internet and demand attention for issues important to our communities. So much of the internet is similar people of similar opinions and lifestyles talking to each other. Whether it's a good liberal blog like Bluestem Prairie or a conservative one like Small City Mayor, a Range-based creative outlet like Mesabi Misadventures or a niche blog like my friend C.O.'s Alaska-based What's in the Shop, it's important that people know that there's a world outside of the 494/694 box where life is different, some would say better. OK, I would say better. But that's just me.

I had another conversation about the Iron Range yesterday. I have these talks from time to time. Along with a few working historians, a few journalists and no shortage of political leaders, I'm one of the people who get the call when someone wants the story -- the real deal -- about the Iron Range region of northern Minnesota.

So here's the question. How much of the future of a place like the Iron Range is set in providence by our mining economy and how much can be changed by the people who live here? This is a proxy fight for fate vs. free will.

This upcoming year I aim to revisit my novel, a great challenge that somehow seems easier than answering this question.

The Duluth News Tribune released its annual list of the top 10 northern Minnesota news stories for 2010. I don't argue with the top story, the Republican gains and defeat of Jim Oberstar in Minnesota's Eighth District. That was easy, though. The editorial decisions made after that are dubious, in my opinion. I wasn't going to say anything about the bear story making the list, until I saw that the bear story placed ahead of a bar fire. Only some of these stories seem fixed to the time and place of northern Minnesota in 2010. And DNT, you'd be doing yourself some favors up north if you mentioned something outside the Twin Ports.

This is my annual "top words of the year" column for the Dec. 26, 2010 edition of the Hibbing Daily Tribune. Thanks for reading and supporting my work in 2010! On to a new year of stories and possibilities. 

Top words of 2010: Spillcam is not what you think
By Aaron J. Brown

When I opened the list of top words and phrases released each year by the word watchdogs at Global Language Monitor I thought maybe, just maybe, we finally had a happy year. In recent years the top words have been refugee, incivility, bailout and tsunami. Other years have seen words like change, hybrid and sustainability – but that’s no comfort, only implying that such things are necessary. The top word for 2010 was “Spillcam.”

“Ha ha,” I thought! Dick van Dyke falling over the ottoman. Shaky YouTube video of kids falling off their skateboards or fat guys falling off their boats. These are spills on cam! Did I miss this trend? This idea is hilarious and so much happier and friendlier than the 2-3 ongoing wars.

Yeah, well, Spillcam refers to the round-the-clock footage of the foul, black BP oil spill belching underwater toxins into the Gulf of Mexico last summer. As we know the issue was resolved (RESOLVED!) and all the media stopped covering it, mostly out of fatigue, even though the oil is going to be there for decades. For months we had to watch guys like Sam Champion from Good Morning America pick up “tar balls” and wave them around incredulously. I have to wonder if Global Language Monitor didn’t select “tar ball” because its loyal readers would have jumped off an eight-story stack of reference books if they had.

So, we get Spillcam as the top word and that’s fine, considering that GLM’s top phrase for 2010 was “Anger and Rage.” Tar balls, anger and rage. This makes me wonder if we can sustain the current level of indignation for long. You know, it’s fair to say that in historical context America is still a young country. Are the last 10 years just some collective toddler temper tantrum on our part? China went through its share of turmoil in 1,000 years and now they seem to be doing well. Hu Jintao, China’s leader, is the top name of 2010, by the way, as his nation asserts its diplomatic, monetary and economic strength.

Returning to the top words for a moment, the #2-5 words for 2010 were, in order, vevuzela, the narrative, “refudiate,” and “Guido and Guidette.”

You might have to do some checking to know what a vevuzela does. These would be the loud, horn-like, noisemaking devices used during the 2010 World Cup Football (you know, soccer) tournament in South Africa. They were very loud. It was a big deal in some places!

“The narrative” refers to the new way of thinking about politics, public relations and advertising. We no longer vote for (or buy) specific policies, platforms or products, rather we accept “narratives.” For instance, some believe our national narrative is that we are a religious, predominantly Christian nation that believed in strict adherence to the exact words of the Constitution. Others believe that we are a unique nation eschewing national religion, adapting to cultural change, and accepting civil law and social responsibility. (The answer, of course, is BOTH! We’ve been bat crazy since 1776!)

Refudiate is the handiwork of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who combined the words refute and repudiate in a tweet about something or other and everyone starting yapping. Some say Sarah Palin represents the true American spirit, like a PTA mom with an SUV and a rifle on her wall. Others say she represents a threat to intellectual growth and social progress in this country. (The answer, again, is BOTH! And isn’t that interesting!)

The last of the top five words were Guido and Guidette, referring to the Italian-Americans who have made New Jersey such a fascinatingly vapid study of our nation’s woes in “Jersey Shore.” Times used to be that Guido was just a name for someone who probably worked hard for a living. I’ll continue hoping that the next year brings some better words.

Aaron J. Brown is a writer and community college instructor from the Iron Range. Read more at MinnesotaBrown.com or his book “Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range.”

Merry Christmas from MinnesotaBrown.com! I'll be on a special prerecorded Christmas morning edition of "Between You and Me" on 91.7 KAXE. The show will cover many different aspects of Christmas, along with some appropriate tunes.

My essay will explore the movie "It's a Wonderful Life." It's dubbed a holiday classic though I'll be talking about how its quality as a film has more to do with the dark side of the human experience than the Christmas schmaltz many assume. On the biggest American holiday of the year many people are sad, not happy. And yet life goes on and, indeed, still promises hope.

The show runs from 10 a.m. to noon Saturday on 91.7 FM in northern Minnesota or streaming online all over the world at www.kaxe.org. I know it's Christmas morning, but maybe you're in the car somewhere, right? My essays are archived at the website and syndicated on PRX for public radio stations.

A year old now but still worth a play. Iron Ranger uses accordion to reinterpret classic Christmas song. Also, bar fight.

In honor of Christmas I'm sharing some bonus content this week. Here's an essay I wrote for KAXE a couple weeks ago. The topic for the show that week was "Christmas Trees."

Inside the Christmas tree
By Aaron J. Brown

HOST INTRO: It’s Between You and Me on KAXE. Today, with the holiday season upon us, we’re talking about Christmas trees. Our contributor Aaron Brown O-PINES about Christmas trees.
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Christmas reminds us that we survived another year and still have some semblance of a family and a haphazard network of friends. We made it. As bad is it might be, we might make it another year. Maybe. In honor of this melancholy truth we cut down trees and put them in our houses. Look at this, we say. Sometimes we buy fake trees. Look at that. Same deal.

My memories of Christmas trees are as unique as what is likely my own mild form of mental illness. For most of my childhood we cut a tree from the swamp out behind our house. As a kid I believed that Christmas trees made our ornaments – the wooden soldiers, angels, penguins and reindeer – come to life. The dark recesses of the branches were like some kind of yuletide ghetto, the sort of ghetto where it was not so bad, on account of the holidays. Santa and the shiny angel jockeyed for control of the all-important star near the top of the tree. The lesser ornaments, the expressionless clothespin kid on the skis, the icicle I made in kindergarten, would work for a foothold in their respective organizations. Politics and drama played out nightly under the C7 bulbs, lighting the cold streets of my tree world.

In another reverie I brought a notebook with me to my grandma and grandpa’s house for Christmas Eve and set up station beneath their enormous holiday fir. I used the long down time between the strange, Midwestern mid-afternoon meal we ate to the 7 o’clock sharp present-opening time to document the proceedings. Naturally, as a kid, I didn’t have much first hand information, only what could be observed. Adults determined the timeline. Adults already knew what was in the packages. Adults controlled my access to the pile of loot. So I’d record the size of the presents with my name on them, comparing them with the relative size and shape of my sisters’ presents. I’d observe the tree, always gigantic at my grandma’s house, and note minute differences in the ornament locations.

I’d further speculate in short, staccato dispatches about the activity of the authority figures in the home – what’s grandma doing, is anyone checking their watch yet? I guess you could call these primitive tweets in the years just before the rise of the internet. What was I looking for? Well, how many cans of barley pop were on the table? Had pie been served? Had everyone arrived? Had certain people left? How loud was it? How hot was it? Each of these factors influenced the opening of presents, in my four to five years of conscious memory and self awareness. I’d detail these observations on sheets of paper that I would then roll up like scrolls and tuck into the arms of a stuffed animal. These records, to my knowledge, are lost to history.

It’d be better to end this with a heartfelt message about how I learned that Christmas is really about giving and that the symbolism of our family gathered around the tree is what matters most of all. That’s true, I guess, but I didn’t learn that until much later when I realized how much work goes into putting up a tree and providing for a family. I no longer think about confining a box of shiftless ornaments to the tenement branches, watching the angels play the angles on the mean streets of pine tar alley. Or at least not literally. We always do put up a tree, though. The kids love it and it reminds us that we’re still here.

HOST OUTRO: Aaron Brown is a writer and community college instructor from the Iron Range. Read more at his blog MinnesotaBrown.com.

Sometimes the remake is better than the original. Merry (blue) Christmas!

Here's a couple developments in Iron Range mining projects. Unless something blows up this is my last newsy post for a while. Holiday features and good times on the way.

• Duluth Metals has acquired Franconia Minerals, consolidating two proposed nonferrous underground copper mining initiatives. This will simplify permitting and capitalization. We spent plenty of time discussing another company, PolyMet, and their proposed nonferrous mining operation last week.
• And Magnetation has inked a contract to sell its salvaged concentrate from old iron ore dumps in Itasca County to a Mexican steelmaker. NAFTA, you are a strange mistress.

Minnesota has retained its 8 Congressional seats after the release of today's U.S. Census numbers. It was literally the last state "on the bubble" for losing a seat, just narrowly edging out Missouri. Minnesota gained population but not at the national average rate. Texas is the big winner, gaining four (!) seats, mostly in Hispanic areas. That's a short term gain for the GOP and a long term prospect for Democrats (or a new party someday).

The Minnesota winners in all this are, in no particular order:

• the people of northeastern Minnesota who will get to keep some form of a contiguous, (mostly) non agricultural 8th District. 
• GOPer Michelle Bachmann, whose 6th District was most likely to get carved up into something difficult for her to keep.
• DFLer Tim Walz, who was going to get a tougher 1st District if we had gone down to 7 seats.

It's nice to see the upper midwest holding its own in the national westward and southward population shift. I'm betting this is the last census where this is the case.

There's a total lunar eclipse tonight to go along with the gorgeous but haunting yellow moon I saw over the treeline on the northwestern horizon this early morning. I was out on the country road by our house in northern Minnesota waiting for the bus with my kindergartner who was seeing his first yellow moon. I didn't have the camera with so I went online and found the closest thing I could for the picture here. (My NY Existence, from a post about yellow things).

The lunar eclipse will be at 1:41 a.m. CST Tuesday, I am told, which means I'll have to DVR it. Doesn't the moon know it's a school night?

A lunar eclipse on the winter solstice. Seems important somehow, even though it happens fairly often. Just like life. Ah.

John Lundy of the Duluth News Tribune had Sunday's front page profile of incoming U.S. Rep-elect Chip Cravaack (R-MN8). Cravaack is an impressive political candidate who caught fire at the right time and managed to avoid almost all negatives during a first-time run against an 18-term incumbent. He's known as a good neighbor down in his hometown of Lindstrom, snow blowing other driveways to be nice (though I imagine a jet pilot in early retirement would do things like that).

DFLers will have an interesting chess game to play in countering Cravaack in 2012. I would describe the MN8 race as a tossup almost any way you shake it. A strong DFL candidate would tilt it lean-Dem, a weak one would tilt it lean-GOP.

The nature of Congressional races today is such that serious candidates will have to staff and raise funds in 2011, probably starting within just a few months. This is depressing and deeply uninteresting to independents who want to see what Cravaack does first. But DFLers would be wise to start vetting a spectrum of candidates for a contested primary and all the various political scenarios 2012 might offer.

I honestly have no idea who will run or win the DFL nomination. It appears to me that some of the top tier candidates are considering other opportunities (such as the opportunity to not have to raise $3 million and go to D.C.), which could leave a very open DFL endorsement and/or primary field. Anyone have suggestions?

This is my weekly column for the Sunday, Dec. 19, 2010 edition of the Hibbing Daily Tribune. A version of this was broadcast as my weekly contribution to yesterday's "Between You and Me" on 91.7 KAXE.

To boldly go where we’ve been before
By Aaron J. Brown

In science fiction, such as Star Trek and Star Wars, travelers accelerate past the speed of light watching stars streak by. The space ships and we viewers never seem to hit the stars, even though that’d be statistically likely. The captain just pushes a button and we all end up in a new world.

As a kid I used to watch the snowflakes pass through the high beams of the family station wagon on our way home from Christmas Eve at grandma’s and imagine them as stars, too. We left one universe and entered another, a 100 degree swing from the white hot fusion of the family gathering to the frozen plastic interior of our Cutlass Cruiser. From there we entered the calm warmth of our home just in time for Santa to somehow sneak down the tiny exhaust pipe of the gas furnace in our trailer house.

Christmas in America seldom means crossing into an unknown frontier. Instead, we tread along old roads to places we’ve been before. Only a few times in an average American life do we change our Christmas venue. Once a generation? Once a marriage? Anyway, not often. The children grow up knowing a place and the memories pile on as they will. Like the life of a star, whose fate is determined by its mass and proximity to other stars, each of us holds our own memories of the holiday, some good and some bad: Yes, influenced by our families but not consciously.

This is the season where many of us plan to journey somewhere – for Christmas, for the New Year, perhaps to escape Christmas and the New Year. This is among the most important trips of the year, the one that affects relationships with people we purport to care about, often truthfully.

We take this journey from a new life, a new normal, our first apartments and college dorm rooms, with our new children, still with that new people smell, to somewhere old in our known world. We always brag that our ancestors were so brave in crossing oceans, moving from Ishpeming to Eveleth, or building that house from tamarack logs. Indeed, they were. But sometimes it also takes bravery to again march into the places we know. Even if the circumstances of your life are roughly the same, and that’s no guarantee, who the heck knows what ills befell your relatives this year?

Uncle Joe has been having problems with his business. Aunt Jane was seen on the arm of a man who is not her husband. Cousin Sam stabbed that guy with a meat thermometer. The guy was 98 degrees. Cousin Sam is out on bail. This is one family, just one corner of your extended family, which no doubt also includes people who also disapprove of your life choices. The wine flows freely, and the truth, and the cheese, which also means there will be gas, and not the kind selling for $3 a gallon.

All of this is well known before you load up the children, and/or the presents, and/or your own self-doubts, pile into the car for a destination where you played as a child, or at minimum a newer place with people from your childhood. And you will go. You will.

The journey across a wind and snow swept highway to such a place might as well be interstellar. Those snowflakes might as well be titanic balls of burning gas, each signifying a distance that seems insurmountable.
Your minivan speeds along, however, with the speed of the Starship Enterprise, the Millennium Falcon, or at least at the speed of life, which is fast. Too fast. Certainly too fast to miss this.

Aaron J. Brown is a writer and community college instructor from the Iron Range. Read more at his blog MinnesotaBrown.com or in his book “Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range.”

"Between You and Me" on 91.7 KAXE this Saturday morning features calls, music and commentary about travel for the holidays. Many of us will be on the roads, rails or in the air this upcoming week. Host Heidi Holtan will be listening to your stories and sharing some great music on the last Saturday before Christmas.

My commentary will again tap into the spirit of childhood and life, with the blend of humor and wistfulness that (just barely) paid for my iPad last year. A longer version is slated to run in the Sunday paper as my weekly column, so wait here if audio is not your thing.

Tune in from 10 a.m. to noon on 91.7 FM in northern Minnesota or streaming live all over the world at www.kaxe.org. "Between You and Me" and my essays are syndicated through PRX.

Incoming Rep.-elect Chip Cravaack (R-MN8) has been assigned to the House Transportation and Infrastructure committee, the same one chaired by his 2010 opponent, longtime Rep. Jim Oberstar (D-MN8). House members generally serve on one committee, so this is a pretty sweet assignment for a freshman. Oberstar served there for his 36 years in Congress, succeeding his former boss and transportation chair Rep. John Blatnik, another Iron Ranger who held the seat for more than 20 years prior to Oberstar.

Cravaack campaigned against Oberstar at least partly on the grounds that he allocated too much "pork" in federal spending. How many months before Cravaack's office releases a press releasing hailing an important transportation committee allocation for a northern Minnesota project? I say nine months, just like a baby. And that baby's full Christian name will be Political Reality McGee.

The Iron Range Resources board approved the $4 million land swap loan to the PolyMet mining company Thursday afternoon. This was expected as the nonferrous mining project proposed by PolyMet for the eastern Iron Range is politically popular as a job creation plan. It's a complicated deal, though, one that puts the Iron Range public sector in the ownership mix of this private mining project.

Let's view a parade of "first lines" (we used to call them ledes) from media coverage of this proceding:

John Myers - Duluth News Tribune:

The Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board approved a loan Thursday of up to $4 million to PolyMet Mining Co., but environmental groups are questioning whether the loan was legal.

Bob Kelleher - Minnesota Public Radio:

Eveleth, Minn. — A state agency could become part owner of a controversial copper-nickel mine proposed in northern Minnesota.

The state's Iron Range Resources agency has approved a loan package that gives it an opportunity to purchase PolyMet stock.

Bill Hanna - Mesabi Daily News (subscription only):

EVELETH — The Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board approved a can’t-lose $4 million loan to PolyMet Mining Inc. at its Thursday afternoon meeting.

Tell me, which of these three writers sounds most like someone with a gambling problem?

Anyway, that's how it is doing politics on the Iron Range. I imagine it's like how it is in some countries where one quickly learns to ignore the state run media, relying instead on what the hungry children begging at the market have heard from the wealthy men whose shoes they shine. 

If the script is similar to previous projects, PolyMet will continue making progress on its permits and financing. If reality has its way, and it usually does, something about the project will change -- its size, its scope, its approach, certainly its number of jobs created. That's a guess, mind you, not yet a fact. The reason I bring this up is that IF this happens the people of the Iron Range will have no recourse. Our leaders will say they have a "fiduciary responsibility" to do whatever the company says in order to recover this "can't lose" investment. And we'll do what we're told. Be happy with what you've got. Don't ask how the money could be better spent, or what it could have done for our cities and schools facing crippling budget cuts over the next biennium.

Or do ask. Yes, I think that's what I'll do.

Remember, jobs are important but we can't "buy" enough jobs to fix our problems. Since 1982 the Range region has lost at least 10,000 jobs, 40 percent of its population and 50 percent of its school enrollment. We on the Iron Range need to use our public resources to create a self-sustaining economy and preserve a quality of life attractive to current and future residents. We should do this because those are two things the private sector will not do on its own. The private sector WILL mine things if its profitable and that's just fine with me, if not some of my friends.

Google is delaying its decision about which community it will choose to pilot its high speed Google Fiber. Duluth, Minnesota, is considered a strong candidate among the thousands of communities that applied. An MPR report explores Duluth's chances. Google said it will announce its decision in early 2011.

PolyMet, the company proposing new nonferrous mineral mining on the East Range in northern Minnesota, is back in the news. PolyMet is asking Iron Range Resources for a $4 million loan as the project approaches the end of a very long permitting process. I expect they'll get the loan.

This is an interesting development partly because to my knowledge this is the first time Polymet has sought public financing of any kind having privately bankrolled the siting, permitting and engineering that has occurred so far. This was, to my thinking, one thing that separated Polymet from other developers hoping to mine or otherwise do business on the Range.

Then again, I'm not surprised that Polymet would use a resource that's available. Here's a quote from Steve Kuchera's story in the Duluth News Tribune:

“It will help to create jobs and diversify and expand the economy,” PolyMet Vice President of Public Affairs LaTisha Gietzen said of the loan. “Is it critical for the project? No.”

Let's read between the lines there. We noticed you guys were giving out money and so... I don't mean to infer ulterior motives on PolyMet's part. Like I said, why the heck wouldn't they take a stab at some low interest capital? Rather, I suggest some larger issues.

We have a central problem facing Iron Range Resources specifically and Range economic development efforts generally. We've established a precedent where a company or group promising a sufficient number of jobs can get access to many millions of dollars without a tremendous amount of accountability attached to the loan or grant agreements. Hell, the loans are usually forgiven. It can be argued that with the region in such dire need for jobs we can't afford NOT to expend money this way, but with companies like Essar, Magnetation, and now Polymet leaning more toward this kind of financing we could be going down a bad road.

It used to be that mines were the simplest form of capitalism that existed (separating out the environmental side of the equation, which is much more complicated). They operate where there are minerals and do so as long as it is profitable. To mire that rather uncomplicated process down in public financing, which is complicated even if you support a robust role for government, is creating an environment more like England's mining practices (subsidized lead mining, Thatcher, the '80s, the dad from Billy Elliot chopping up the dead mom's piano... etc.) than what had been working fairly well here.


In fact, to stretch this concept even farther, perhaps to its limits, what we're seeing happen on the Iron Range is a sort of privatized "nationalization" of the mines. New mining is rare so companies use public desire for jobs to bankroll all the risk with taxpayer dollars while reaping the profits the usual way. Yes, jobs are created, but no firm commitment to how many or for how long is promised (nor can it be promised).

Anyway, I liked Polymet better when it wasn't seeking public money. That's my libertarian streak for the week.

Every place has its morose story of woe and heartache, its cyclonic sucking vortex of public and private outrage. For the Iron Range that story is the troubles facing pensioners from the former National Steel plant in Keewatin. A few hundred miners caught between owners of the plant, now run as Keewatin Taconite by U.S. Steel, were cut off from their promised pension, paid pennies on the dollar by the federal Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation. I'd go into more detail, but it is an endless Russian drama of bile and sadness. You have no idea.

Today outgoing Congressman Jim Oberstar's office released news of an upcoming report on the status of these pensions, leading some involved to believe that some good news might await the retirees in early 2011. Oberstar's office has been on this issue for years. Today's release was quick to point out that this is one area where the constituent files will be shared with incoming Rep.-elect Chip Cravaack to ensure that the fires applied to the feet of the PBGC will continue burning. The endless point work by Oberstar's staff on this deserves recognition.

This story serves mostly as a reminder of some of the problems many future retirees will face in coming decades, myself included, as pension plans are roughed up in corporate mergers and public sector decline.

Thanks to all those who participated in my "Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range" signed book promotion for the holidays. We had takers from Las Vegas, southern California, suburban Washington, D.C., and, of course, Cook. A few more are in process. Thanks to everyone!

You can still order the book online in time for Christmas at the above Amazon link. Signed copies are available at the Village Bookstore in Grand Rapids and Howard Street Booksellers in Hibbing. You'll find copies at most Minnesota Barnes and Noble locations as well.

I so appreciate the group of people who take the time to read this blog and my other writing. You validate the terrible time management choices I make to keep this blog going. There will be more to talk about in 2011, so stay tuned.

This evening at 5:30 the House of Representatives is slated to offer its tribute to departing U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar (D-MN8), the outgoing House Transportation and Infrastructure Chair. Check out C-SPAN.

There might be a lot of dispute about Oberstar's politics but his legacy in Congress for the latter 20th century into this 21st is well worth noting today. From my take Oberstar offered something unique and important to this generation of our region, something that a rotating churn of populists (what awaits us) will never deliver. He offered a stable view of the region, became a political touchstone, and won funding for infrastructure that, while within the bounds of criticism, did propel the district's economy during a challenging period.

Oberstar is among the last of a generation of Congressional representatives who, instead of flying home on weekends and containing votes and business to Tuesdays-Thursdays, took the views of his constituents with him and spent the session living and working with members of both parties. The shared common goal was keeping the American experiment going strong in accordance with the needs of its people.

Critics might rightly say that this approach separates a representative from the people he or she represents, turning them over to a tainted world of Washington largess. On the other hand, others have suggested that the practice of flying home to constantly raise money, surrounded by the most partisan, extreme people you can imagine, has differently depraved our system. The ideal, in this case, probably rests between these two approaches.

But Jim Oberstar has offered his service and paid his political price. Today I salute him and thank him for 36 years of work on behalf of northern Minnesota.

This is my weekly column for the Sunday, Dec. 12, 2010 edition of the Hibbing Daily Tribune.

Light unto the holiday night
By Aaron J. Brown

The other night we did something many northern Minnesota families do this time of year. Despite the availability of electricity and light bulbs in our own home we trekked the 110 miles to downtown Duluth to see Bentleyville, the holiday light display that you’ve seen on the local news or on the Facebook profiles of your tangential friends.

These pictures fail to articulate one important observation: BENTLEYVILLE CAN BE SEEN FROM SPACE. It utterly changes the landscape of the Duluth harbor as you crack the rampart of Miller Hill’s retail district. Want directions? Drive toward the light. You will see it.

Residents of larger cities probably find such an attraction quant, another example of small market Midwestern yokelism. There are bigger displays in this country, and the Twin Cities papers feature a whole listing of large displays. But this display is pretty big, “the largest in the Upper Midwest,” and notable because of the way it has captured the imagination of people in our region. What started in 2001 as a private residential display outside Esko, Bentleyville has grown.  In 2008 the attraction moved into downtown Duluth’s Bayfront Park. Its huge team of volunteers continue to support original proprietor Nathan Bentley’s not-for-profit mission of giving food, toys and spreading holiday cheer to those in need.

It must also be mentioned that Bentleyville is indeed located in Duluth and takes place during December, two of the coldest cities and months, respectively, known to the Lower 48. We tried to prepare the boys for the cold blast they would experience, but trying to affix snow pants to the 3-year-olds in the van we realized we were up against a monumental wall of cold.

It’s always the wind that gets you, the kind that freezes your eyeballs. We made it around the tour of lights with Henry hugging all the large cartoon animals he could, some twice. I almost made a joke about killing one and hunkering down inside like Luke did in Star Wars, but I refrained. Until now!

It’s been interesting to watch Christmas light displays change so much in the last 20 years. When I was a kid I recall touring around with my aunts to see houses with what were then considered to be elaborate light schemes. In recent years it seems like somehow there are both more and less Christmas light displays. You see more giant inflatable decorations on every other street, the poofy Santas from big box stores that blow over in the wind. But, if memory serves, there are fewer large displays, the kind you’d pile the kids in to go see. It could be that the displays cost more now, or that people are deferring to a few of the largest displays. It could also be that residents are just trending older, the kids are gone, and fewer people have the ability, energy or desire to troll around the roof with a staple gun.

I used to decorate our house with Christmas lights. It was a tradition I started when I surprised my wife by lighting up the outside tree when she was at work one night, the first year we lived at our house in town. But we’ve since moved out to the country and had three kids. The fixture on my little light-up penguin barely works now, too jostled with time and cold, and I have no idea how many replacement bulbs I’d need to buy.

Too many. While it might not be practical to turn our rural home into a beacon in the December night, we did learn something from the lights we saw at Bentleyville. As we drove home in the dark van up the long highway back home, Doug literally cursed the darkness.

“Go away, dark,” he repeated for more miles than we would have liked.

The one thing you can say about the blinking, multi-colored, over-the-top spectacle of Bentleyville is that it sure lights up the night. Humans live for light. More light is better than less.

Aaron J. Brown is a writer and community college instructor from the Iron Range. Read more at his blog MinnesotaBrown.com or in his book “Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range.”

Here's exclusive Fox Sports video of the Metrodome collapsing from the inside.





Minnesotans seem torn on whether this will ultimately send the Vikings into a new stadium or to Los Angeles for a boatload of money and a new name. Then again, they could go the Lakers route and just keep the Minnesota-specific name for no good reason. L.A. Vikings, what the hell. Why not? The real vikings would have gotten to L.A. eventually, were it not for their gradual adoption of modern religious values and the introduction of farming. With those things waning what the hell. What the hell, indeed.

Or maybe the Vikings will stay. Right? Yes, this is possible. 

As you can see the snow that came pouring into the Dome was that dang powder snow common to blizzards. You can't build snowmen, it doesn't stay in place when you plow it, it's freezing cold and always finds its way around scarves and hoods.

The roof of the Metrodome collapsed last night under the estimated 17-20 inches of snow that fell in yesterday's near-record Minnesota blizzard. Fortunately today's Vikings football game had already been rescheduled for Monday (and now probably some other time, possibly some other place). It bears mentioning that the officials' decision to postpone the game was very wise, despite the cost, inconvenience and consternation caused. The sort of disaster that might have occurred had the roof collapsed with a stadium full of fans is troubling to consider.

It seems the roof hasn't entirely given way. One witness in the MPR story described the dome as a "big bowl of sugar." There's a press conference today at 10 a.m. where the damage will be described in better detail.

I won't say it's been a slow week on the Iron Range. It really hasn't. But I've not been able to write the things I normally would what with classes winding down at the college. Meantime, take a listen to "Between You and Me" on 91.7 KAXE this Saturday morning from 10 a.m. to noon. This week's topic is "Christmas trees" and I'll have a peppy little number about my strange, probably inappropriate tree memories from childhood.

"Between You and Me" features callers, music and produced elements like my commentary and that of others. It airs every Saturday morning and can be heard on 91.7 FM in northern Minnesota or streaming live all over the world at www.kaxe.org. Shows and my essays are syndicated on PRX.

My friend Jason Scorich wrote a history column for the Hometown Focus about the time Johnny Cash played the Iron Range (Eveleth, specifically) in 1958. This is worth a read.

Scorich juxtaposes Cash with the Range's own Bob Dylan. Then Robert Zimmerman, Dylan lived in Hibbing at the time of the Cash show and was, at that time, dismissive of the hard driving country gospel singer from Tennessee. The two later became colleagues and collaborators.

I would argue, as much as I love Bob Dylan, that Johnny Cash's music more deftly describes the pathos of the Iron Range: rhythmic, rough around the edges, traditional and yet warped into something rebellious. Yes, the Iron Range was then and may yet remain Johnny Cash country.

It bears mentioning every time I find myself in complete and total agreement with a Bill Hanna editorial in the Mesabi Daily News. The Iron Range Resources agency needs reform, a refocusing on quantifiable results, and increased transparency.

Iron Range Resources is a difficult agency to explain to outsiders, many of whom think it's just a regional pot of money for entrenched political interests. At it's worst that's what it can become. At its best it is a most unique and forward-thinking organization for diversifying the economy of a mining region that won World War II, built modern America and continues to greatly influence the state economy as a whole.

The people of the Range are ready to work. Are our leaders willing to lead?

Salon.com details four ways that America could collapse in the next 15 years. Good news: most of the ways are fairly bloodless. Bad news: this is a thing.

This isn't so much news as it is the gradual realization of the haphazard Iron Range economic development planning surrounding the Mesaba Energy Project, a coal gasification power plant proposed 10 years ago by the ethereal Excelsior Energy of Minnetonka. The U.S. Department of Energy recently removed the plant from its listing of so-called "clean coal" projects. This is only significant as a metaphor, for this project will never really die -- not until we stop asking if it's dead. It will die the Willie Loman death, the sad economic development project death owed by any number of other fanciful plans depicted in cursory computer generated art. Pay attention!

My literary references would be far more amusing if the project hadn't burned through millions of dollars of taxpayer and Iron Range dollars with no practical hope of ever delivering real jobs or clean energy. Peter Passi has the story in today's Duluth News Tribune. Charlotte Neigh of the Citizens Against the Mesaba Project (CAMP) was on KAXE this morning. Finance and Commerce offers its take on the project's woes, which company officials blame on "the regulatory environment." Regulations are only a tiny slice of the project's problem; cost, technological hurdles and lackluster private investment in this kind of power generation are the real problems. They wanted the government to build them a power plant, underwrite all the risk, so they could cash in (and yes, jobs, jobs, jobs). It's not working.

There are more stories to come. I've written about this project so very much that I'll leave it at that. Get mad and learn from the mistakes made. We've got but one more serious chance to reform and refocus Iron Range economic development planning before we are reduced to flower baskets and the occasional billboard on the highway up to Lake Vermilion.

The Wall Street Journal poses the question "Should Bob Dylan retire?" The Duluth native and Hibbing-raised musician is a favorite here as I help coordinate Dylan Days in Hibbing and have long been a fan of the man's songwriting and songs, particularly his 1965-1975 catalog.

This is not the first time we'll be asking such questions, once answered solely by a person's choice and whether they could still earn a living in their chosen vocation. (And the story is worth a click, if only to see the photo series of other aging stars). No, now it's about the idea of Dylan retiring more than whether or not the man has shot his vocal chords from years of touring. If Bob Dylan can age so too can the generation that has claimed him as their mascot. If petulant youngsters of my generation can push Bob Dylan to the exit, then they can push you to the exit, too, mature person who does not like to be called grandpa or grandma.

This started with the hair dye ads. It will not end well.

This is my weekly column for the Sunday, Dec. 5, 2010 edition of the Hibbing Daily Tribune.

The return of winter’s empire
By Aaron J. Brown

All things change.

In reading history all things change with regularity only because we have the advantage of looking back at vast amounts of time condensed into tiny paragraphs. For instance, the Middle Ages happened. It was OK. There’s more to the story, of course, particularly if you spent the 37 years of your natural life running grog across Gaul before being killed in the Crusades. But there’s not enough time to think about all that. Too much grog.

In truth a human being might live an entire life, a long, full, frustrating life without ever really seeing any change, only the same, or undercurrents that mean nothing in practicality. For instance, most people in the Middle Ages toiled in workaday jobs until death. That is very different today. Now we have computers. And our deaths are much more elaborate if only because they involved billions of dollars of collective medical care. But the beginning and end are the same. History continues to move slower than we would like here in the now.

History is kind to empires, because empires provide the sort of grab bars – the kind you put next to your bath tub when you are of a certain age – for a person to understand history. The Great Northern Railway called its primary train the “Empire Builder,” and for good reason. The United States was built on the commodities hauled on these rails, to and from places like the Iron Range, St. Paul and Chicago. The buildings and institutions we know in Hibbing, for instance, were built on the steady cadence of railroad cars now mothballed at a museum in Duluth.

I’ve had empire on my mind lately. As a history fan I’ve been gobbling up information about the Roman and British empires, facts long forgotten from my college history classes. It all seems more apt these days as we live in the waning prime of what will be called the American empire. Naturally, the American empire is not over, and will never be over, ever, at least as far as we’re concerned, the rabble of our historical period. Everything is fine. Just fine. No problems. It’s all good, as they say. Keep eating chicken and watching TV. Don’t stop doing what you’re doing, because that is the only thing keeping you from rioting, and I am for that. So is your government.

But we shouldn’t feel sad about the changes. Indeed, moping is a waste of time. As evidence I present the weather.

Last spring the melting snow and ice of winter reminded me of an empire receding from the landscape of a continent. Empires seldom end abruptly, rather decades, maybe even a century of decline precede the deed, always leaving behind remnants, cities and culture. Rome is still Rome. England is still England. Greece is still the word. These empires didn’t explode, they melted. But melted ice still leaves behind warped highways and scarred stone. Leave your dock in the lake and watch the empire of winter crush its bones and scatter them to the weeds in the spring.

These days we watch a new winter empire build its roads and coliseums, slowing travel and stopping rivers. I can sense the self-assurance of a cold that now tempers the snow man standing sentry over my back yard. As northern Minnesotans we know that winter’s prime still lies ahead. We also know that this winter will fall to spring as it did before. All empires are temporary, but significant, just like the people who populate them and make them work.

We tend to remember winters not individual snowflakes. But I think if it was possible, if we took the time to know the snowflakes, we’d find them much more interesting and important. They make empires possible.

Aaron J. Brown is an Iron Range writer and community college instructor. Read more at his blog MinnesotaBrown.com or in his book “Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range.”

Almost forgot to mention this week's edition of "Between You and Me" Saturday morning on 91.7 KAXE. The show's topic is "bath vs. shower." Which is your preference? I'll be chiming in with an attempt at being clever and guest host DJ the DJ will be taking stories from you and others in, around, and in the spirit of northern Minnesota. Wild stuff could occur. Wild.

Tune in from 10 to noon Saturday on 91.7 FM or streaming online at www.kaxe.org.

In recent years I've advocated high speed internet infrastructure as one possible way to diversify the Iron Range economy and move us past the local dependence on natural resource industries to provide jobs. My reasoning, in truth, sounds more like faith than fact. I have faith that with high speed, world class communication capabilities, and good marketing(!), we can convince people who have the option of living and working anywhere that northern Minnesota and the region in and around the Iron Range is a great place to live, with lakes, trees, interesting towns and good schools.

But this is only part of the fight yet to come. The technology, the intricacies of which would baffle most folks, including myself, is something that can be contained, encouraged, and grown through a combination of federal or state initiative and private industry investment and profit. That's the part that we can possibly predict. The next part, however, is how we use the capability. This is something totally unknown.

There are two main problems with the rural/Iron Range high speed internet conundrum: usage and access.

On access, social class, education and income again enter the equation as they always do through history. People who have more education and a reasonable income (lower middle class or better) are very likely to thrive with new technology and internet access. Low income people with less education are less likely to use or benefit from such technology. They can and will, but not right away. This is a growing problem on the Iron Range and in most other places in the Rust Belt. Mashable recently highlighted a Pew Research study showing how income disparity influenced internet usage.

On usage, same problem. If an area isn't already an internet haven, it will go through a predictable, moderately ugly phase in transition. The Boston Review has an interesting story on what has happened in poverty-stricken areas that invested in "telecenters" as a solution to their economic ills. In truth, such places attract low income men who seek entertainment and adult content. Oops. That's not the goal, is it? The truth is that internet access is only useful as an economic tool if it is combined with education and a society open to new kids of businesses that use the internet. The emphasis, as will be the case here for decades, should be how living in northern Minnesota is interesting, attractive, and unlike any of the typical options in American urban, suburban life.

In this issue, as is seen in Iron Range history, we must again play for generational goals, not immediate results. We must create a system by which the children of people who live here succeed, benefit, grow businesses and accomplish human goals.

(h/t Andrew Sullivan)

In the Blogging Bible it is clear that a blogger must never belabor a topic for risk of alienating his or her readers. Nonetheless, there's even more to this LTD Jewelry "Second Coming" sale TV ad that I've now written about three times. Steve Kuchera of the Duluth News Tribune has now interviewed Larry Falter, the jeweler in the ad, along with others in the Twin Ports about reaction to the ad, which offers half-price diamonds in honor of Christ's imminent return to sort the souls of the righteous and wicked.

Money line, from local minister Michael Gatlin:

“For me, from a theological prospective, I don’t find it helpful at all,” he said.

That's pretty polite. Meantime, the jeweler has "a ready answer" for anyone who asks why he just doesn't give the jewelry away in honor of the Second Coming:

“I have ethical obligations to people I owe money to,” he said. “If I couldn’t discharge those ethical responsibilities, I wouldn’t be giving a very good witness. I don’t want to profit at someone else’s expense.”

Well played. The hits on the ad's YouTube video have gone from a couple hundred to more than 5,000 in just 24 hours. Let's all run up our stats, people. This is win-win across the board.

The Consumerist, a consumer rights blog of some national note, has picked up on the Twin Ports based LTD Jewelry's "Second Coming" 50 percent off jewelry sale ad. We've been talking about this all week. Countdown to Good Morning America? I say Saturday morning.

The Star Tribune had a nice interview and video of Jim Oberstar's last day at his Congressional Office in Washington, D.C., from Tuesday. Check it out. 

It occurs to me that Oberstar's defeat remains so surprising that I haven't known what to write about it or what comes next for Democrats in MN-08. In truth the whole "State of Superior" (MN-08, WI-07, MI-01) now faces a remarkably similar Republican-leaning political climate, though to be fair Minnesota's Fightin' Eighth is now more influenced by the conservative exurban southern part of the district, not the Lake Superior watershed which remains fairly Democratic by comparison.

I haven't heard a single serious sniff from a DFL challenger to incoming Rep.-elect Chip Cravaack yet. We'll be exploring that universe very deeply in 2011. Meantime I get the sense that people are taking a wait-and-see approach to Cravaack. This district promises nothing but excitement for political junkies over the next two or three cycles, if not longer. Republicans better hope that new, young, conservative-leaning independents don't sour on GOP political promises. Democrats better hope that Duluth grows and holds its progressive core. A big boost like Google Fiber would help. Democrats will need new voters to compete long term.

Three years. That's what they say represents the life of a traditional trade paperback book, such as my book "Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range." This means that as 2011 approaches we are entering the last of the prime years of "Overburden," the book I wrote for the lost generation of Iron Rangers tooling around this unique place. The book won a Northeastern Minnesota Book Award in 2009.

Anne Swenson of the Ely Echo just this week offered another kind review of "Overburden," along with the recent one from Mark Munger of Cloquet River Press. Swenson writes:

Whether you're a newcomer to the Range or have lived here most or all of your life, this is a book which will suggest answers to your questions about the history, politics and people of the Iron Range.

The book was featured by a couple book clubs in the Lake Vermilion area this past month, and I just booked an address to the Mesabi Unitarian Universalist congregation in January. These events mean the book is entering its twilight years with gusto, which is encouraging as I enter the next phase in MinnesotaBrown, Inc., including a more challenging writing and creative schedule.

In honor of all this I'll be offering a special promotion through Christmas. From now until Dec. 9 I'll be offering a personalized or otherwise signed copy of "Overburden" by mail for the Iron Ranger, former Ranger or Range-curious person on your Christmas list. (Or yourself; treat yourself to this deal, America).  The cost will be the normal cover price plus tax totaling $18.06 with shipping included in the USA (we'll negotiate if you reside elsewhere). Send me an e-mail or private Tweet with your information and I'll give you the address to send the check. When I receive the check (before Thursday, Dec. 9) I'll mail the signed book with optional personalized message to you by Dec. 15. I'll be personally packing and shipping these from the Hibbing Post Office. The envelopes will come from my personal office supply drawer in the home office where I wrote "Overburden" in rural Itasca County. Isn't that something? Who knows, maybe one of my children will spill something on your purchase (efforts will be made to avoid this, but anything is possible!)