BROWN HQ (May 30, 2007) -- Read this New York Times article,
consider the ongoing debate
about the proposed coal gasification plant in northern Minnesota,
and then ponder these ads and
another ad that features a happy jogging piece of coal. Mix the three
and you've got a preview of my Sunday column. I'd leave Big Coal alone
if Big Coal left me alone.
BROWN HQ (May 28, 2007) -- First, a reminder: Tune to
CBS (Ch. 3 in northern Minnesota) at 7 p.m. CST on Monday, June 4 to
see the premiere of "Creature Comforts," a unique show featuring real
interviews with people animated to animals. I was one of several
interviewers around the country who interviewed people for the program.
Heidi Holtan
and
I were the Minnesota delegation. Four of my people ended up as
principle characters and so did four of hers. 
BROWN HQ (May 27, 2007) -- Another glance at the
Democratic side of the presidential field has caused me to pause. As
some (probably not many) know, I threw my hat in with John Edwards a
few months ago. My support has been tepid because of the early drumming
of this election cycle and my reluctance to fully immerse myself in
presidential politics. In retrospect, despite the whole flap over his
haircut, I think Edwards still has a good shot at winning the
nomination despite the polls. An Iowa win followed by a New Hampshire
win could be enough to stop Clinton and Obama, despite their early
fundraising success. Clinton's support is wide but not deep. People
like Obama (I'm reading "Audacity of Hope" right now and I like him,
too), but know that he'll get another shot at this. I saw Bill
Richardson on "Meet the Press" this morning and, though his performance
had some flaws, he was really solid on Iraq. He could still sneak up on
the crowd, but more likely I see him as an ideal running mate for the
more likely winner, John Edwards. So, I'm calling Edwards-Richardson
for our ticket this year. Probably wrong, but there it is.
What is “quality time?” The term implies that any other
time is “shoddy, poorly-constructed time,” but what is it really? Most
of us
don’t get enough, we are told. We’re supposed to have it with people we
like.
The average American family enjoys less and less quality time together,
according to plausible statistics that I just made up.
It must be a pretty big problem because everyone is talking about this missing quality time. Things are so different now than they were in the good old days, when families spent entire days together playing games, singing songs and hoping that no one would get polio. Things sure have changed. We’ve got vaccines and most kids have too much to eat. But we’ve also got a quality time problem.
I know this because I saw on the news the other day that Hasbro, one of the biggest board game producers in the world, is making “express” versions of its games. Monopoly, Scrabble and Sorry take too long for the time-deprived family. So these new express versions promise a game span of just 20 minutes. That’s less than a sitcom with all the commercials Tivo’ed out.
It doesn’t take much more than half an hour of watching the morning news shows to see a segment on overscheduled kids. Some kids own day planners thicker than their thighs. Their parents must hose off the minivan to keep it from bursting into flames of overuse. Those same parents work longer hours and the most common family activity is the silent viewing of reality entertainment programs that are neither real nor especially entertaining. I don’t know that 20-minute Monopoly will solve that problem, but it shows the market pressure.
Incidentally, the express games rely heavily on dice. Instead of the methodical property acquisition we all remember from Monopoly, the dice determine your holdings in one fell swoop. Metaphorically, this makes the game player less like a self-made tycoon and more like the spoiled child of a recently deceased billionaire. No word on whether parachute clauses are part of the new rules. I’m betting that game makers also avoid the subject of estate taxes.
If board games become “Board Games Express!” then perhaps other time consuming aspects of family life can join in. Will we next see “Marriage Express?” Here’s how it could work:
WIFE: You bury yourself in you work. I don’t know you anymore.
HUSBAND: To the dice! (Dice shake, then roll) A-ha! We have learned to cherish each other again!
WIFE: I stopped loving you a long time ago.
HUSBAND: Back to the dice!
I imagine it would work the same for children:
KID: Daddy, why did mommy leave? Will you leave?
DAD: To the dice! (Dice shake, then roll) A-ha! We went to the zoo! You understand the complexities of adult relationships!
KID: I’m sad.
DAD: You roll this time.
I don’t mean to knock these new board games. They simply respond to a changing world. But before you get hung up on the term “quality time,” ask yourself if there is such a thing as quality time or just the good use of regular time.
I just rolled the dice. They agree with me.
More columns
BROWN HQ (May 26, 2007) -- My Saturday essay on KAXE's
"Between You and Me" is about cabins. Sometimes you pick the topic and
sometimes the topic picks you. Tune in live on 91.7 KAXE in northern
Minnesota or online.HOST INTRO: We’re talking about cabins today. KAXE contributor Aaron Brown doesn’t own a cabin and probably never will. He explains.
If you live on a beach, a surfing vacation seems like a waste of money. If you live in the mountains, why fight the ski hill crowds of Aspen? And so, since I live in a rural township in northern Minnesota, why would I want a cabin? Heck, a well heeled real estate buyer might consider my house to be a cabin. After all, it doesn’t have a conservatory or a billiards room and it’s impossible to house both a housekeeper and houseguest simultaneously.
I’ve spent most of my life in northern Minnesota, so I’m well aware of the significance of cabins. If you live on a lake as we do, people first ask, “how many people on your lake?” before asking, “how many of them are year-round?” The cabin people come and go during the warm months and, though they are not here year-round, many of them have been coming here for generations.
When people from outside the area come to their cabin, they are coming for an experience they’ve already created in their mind. For some, it’s about the fishing. Others expect relaxation in the quiet wilderness. In any event, what you expect might not always be what you get. Thus northern Minnesota will always face conflict between the expectations of our summer residents and the needs of our year-round residents. I noticed this when I lived in Iowa for a year. When I told people where I was from, invariable someone would say, “Whoo, that’s God’s Country up there. That’s somethin’ special.”
Of course, it is special. I love where I live. My family goes back generations here. Our towns and townships are full of unique characters worthy of literature. The culture is parochial but not pretentious. It is safe and the people here value hard work and compassion over money and status. And yes, there are pretty trees and lakes but, for me, that’s just a bonus.
You’ve probably noticed plenty of chain restaurants and home improvement stores open in the last five years, but we still struggle to start up local small businesses or create jobs that can support a family. Real estate prices and the resulting property tax levies are not in synch with the average incomes of our counties. Much of this can be attributed to the divide between our summer tourism and year-round economic struggles. We need our summer residents but this is no easy union.
I’m blessed that I don’t need a cabin to experience lakes and wilderness. Most people in northern Minnesota have neither a cabin nor regular access to a lake on their property. In fact, a majority of the people in our local counties work jobs that barely pay the bills. Whether you’re year-round or seasonal, that’s something to think about. I love Northern Minnesota because it’s real, not a fantasy.HOST OUTRO: Aaron Brown is a columnist for
the Hibbing
Daily Tribune, an instructor at Hibbing Community College and frequent
contributor to KAXE.
BROWN HQ (May 24,
2007) -- Actually, Dylan Days started yesterday, but I was laid up with
the aforementioned bad applesauce (see below). Tonight I'll be emceeing
the annual literary night with featured author/poet Barton Sutter and
the winners of the Dylan Days creative writing contest (7 p.m. at the
Hibbing Community College Theatre). Tomorrow we have the creative
writing workshop with Sutter at the Hibbing High School library (9-11
a.m.). Also Friday will be an encore of Wednesday's movie "Gotta Serve
Somebody" at 5 p.m. at the HCC Theatre. Then, at 7 p.m. Friday, the
annual Dylan Days singer/songwriter contest begins, with the winner
receiving an acoustic guitar and the chance to open for Maria Muldaur
at our Saturday show. Saturday is the big day, with the 7 p.m. Maria
Muldaur show at the Hibbing High School auditorium and events all day
long. Check out www.dylandays.com.
BROWN HQ (May 21, 2007) -- Midnight tonight is the
deadline for the Minnesota State Legislature to adjourn. Most of the
major spending bills have not been finished (except for the ones that
were passed and vetoed in the last few weeks). It's too early to
declare winners and losers for this session, but speaking for myself I
think this session showed just how very important the governor's office
is in this process.When this session started, I often heard "Two beats
one every time" in reference to the House, Senate and Governor. With
strong DFL majorities in the House and Senate and a Republican governor
that just barely hung onto office in November, the conventional wisdom
was that the DFL would write the agenda. On that front, Gov. Pawlenty
greatly exceeded expectations. I strongly disagree with this guy's
approach to government, but he is a gifted politician. On the good
side, this budget will be better than the previous Republican budgets
and the legislature will finish on time (unlike the Republican years),
but this was at best a draw for my DFL friends. The ideological
differences between the DFL and Republicans are even greater today, and
the compromises that will be made today probably reflect the lesser
elements of the opposing spending and taxing philosophies of the two
parties. Now the DFL has to develop a strategy to keep the House
through two more elections to get the genuine tax reform they want.
That won't be easy. Even if John McCain picks Pawlenty as his VP
candidate, we'll be fighting these tax battles all the way to the next
governor, which -- if we don't figure out Teflon Timmy -- could end up
being four additional years of this mushy legislation. DFLers: Do not
nominate Mark Dayton in 2010. He's a nice man, but we need an
A-gamer. (This is my essay
for KAXE's Saturday, May 19, morning call-in show "Between You and Me"
and my Sunday, May 20, 2007 column for the Hibbing Daily Tribune. I've been trying to write unique material
for both venues, but with the hospital deal, finals, graduation and
Dylan Days this week, well, it just wasn't going to happen. Please
forgive me, anonoymous internet reader).When I was a kid,
grandpa
pinned a silver sheriff’s badge to my shirt the moment I arrived for a
visit.
It was one of those great kid moments. At the end of a long autumn day
of
playing in the leaves it was time to go home, but the sheriff’s badge
was
nowhere to be found. I never did find the badge, but I still remember
how meticulously
my whole family combed the leaf-filled yard looking for it. Though I
didn’t
realize it then, that memory was worth more than the badge.
When we lose
things, it’s not
the absent things that upset us; it’s what the things mean. For a 24
hour
period after our son was born, I lost the memory card with all the
digital
pictures. I had backed them up on our computer, but there’s something
about
losing the original record of your first son’s birth that makes people
treat
you a little bit more like Hitler than they otherwise would. I found
the card
under our computer desk, but the scare was real.
My wife Christina
told me
about an essay she wrote for school when she was 12 entitled “The
Island of
Lost Things.” Gnomes would take your things to this island and try to
use them.
If the item had no use they would toss it back to the regular world
where you
might find them later, thus explaining why you sometimes found lost
items but
not always. That makes as much sense as any other theory.
Lost and found is
much more
than things. You can lose hope and find it again. We thought our
terrier Molly
Dog was gone when she fled into the rural wilderness near our home, but
we
found her and realized how important she was to us, despite her barking
and
inappropriate grooming habits. We lose loved ones, but find memories
and ways
to move on. And every loss – each dog, flash drive, watch, relative,
friend,
lover and shoe – is necessary for us to find who we are. Losing is
lousy, but
finding is what it’s all about.
There will be
more geraniums
and I will take better care of them in the future.
BROWN HQ (May 18, 2007) -- Today is graduation day at
Hibbing Community College. I'll be there doing my faculty thing. The
most senior faculty member always caries the mace. As the most junior
faculty member, I carry the rusty old chains. It's not easy but when
the faculty from a rival community college come riding up they know
not to mess with me. BROWN HQ (May 16, 2007) -- Haven't been posting much
lately, surely to
the disappointment of the average 147 readers I get each day (actual
statistic! It goes up when I blog about anything from pop culture and
the search engines pick me up, so, Paris Hilton!) Here's a Wednesday
sampler:
BROWN HQ (May 14, 2007) -- Today, a private equity firm
called Cerberus announced they would purchase Chrysler Motors from its
parent company DaimlerChrysler. Some are nervous because now the
struggling car company must answer to owners who, instead of being
established car makers focused on the bottom line, are bankers and
investors who probably drive cars ... and are focused on the bottom
line.(This is my Sunday,
May 13, 2007 column for the Hibbing Daily Tribune).Diligent readers sent me a copy of the original declaration of Mothers Day by Julia Ward Howe from 1870. The holiday began as a solemn occasion for mothers to remember their sons and husbands lost in the Civil War and bring about peace.
Howe stated: “We women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs. From the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own. It says "Disarm, Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.
“Blood does not wipe our dishonor nor violence indicate possession. As men have often forsaken the plow and the anvil at the summons of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel. Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.”
Somewhere between 1870 and last Thursday the whole Mothers Day thing went from world peace to ice cream cakes. Personally, I blame Nixon. (Though Michael Keller, Chief Brand Officer of Dairy Queen, surely bears some responsibility).
I will say this about motherhood, not that I’m an expert. It really doesn’t matter whether you embrace feminism, are deeply rooted in traditional family values or tie your kids to the camper hitch while you make a cigarette run: moms make it all happen.
I have a lot of people to thank today, all of whom answer to the name mom (something that becomes more confusing with each passing year). First, there’s mom. My mom has done day care for years, so saying she’s good with kids is a bit like saying an Olympic track star is good at jogging. She’s so good she went pro. She sewed the entire outfit I wore to my first day of school. She also hand decorated my 11th birthday cake with penguins molded out of frosting (before penguins were cool, might I add). Now she keeps my son plied with toy trains and books that make education seem as fun as sugar cubes and chocolate milk.
Then, there are the grandmas. They’ve always been important in my life, but especially now when they can effectively compare the childhood behavior of their kids, grandkids and great-grandkids to produce something close to scientific evidence of how kids think. For a rookie dad, that’s been helpful.
Then there’s the mom that I wake up to every day but that I don’t call mom because that’d be creepy. My wife Christina has given birth once, which I couldn’t do even if I had the parts, and now she’s expecting twins this summer. Since a “singleton” pregnancy (a word I’ve learned just recently) is challenging enough you might imagine how fun a twin pregnancy has been for her. Aches and pains aside, I could only endure a day or two of the “hey, mama” comments she receives from well-meaning friends and colleagues before I committed some variation of a felony. It might not get much easier when the twins are here, but what she’s survived so far is well worth an ice cream cake and national day of recognition.
Mothers Day may not be what it was in 1870.
There may be
some bewailing going on out there, but on the balance I expect a lot
more ice
cream cakes and home-cooked meals … ideally made by someone other than
the
mom(s). Thanks to all the moms that keep the world going.
BROWN HQ (May 11, 2007) -- It's nighttime now (can't you
tell by the husky narration going through your mind). The state House
will soon receive the smoking ban bill from the Senate. The Senate
version passed
almost 2-1 with the only strong opposition coming from our local
DFL senators, especially Sen. David Tomassoni. In the House, it's
biggest opposition will also come from my Iron Range DFL colleagues.
The ban will pass anyway, Gov. Pawlenty will sign it and all the rest
of the state will remember about the Iron Rangers in 2007 will be loud,
unsubstantiated arguments against a law that
two-thirds of the state's residents want. These Range guys are good
guys, friends of mine, but this is not good policy or politics.BROWN HQ (May 10, 2007) -- Well, it was bound to happen
eventually. I have received e-mail intended for the former CNN anchor
who shares my name. Andy from Arkansas writes:BROWN HQ (May 10, 2007) -- If you didn't know, I'm
co-chair and
spokesman for Dylan Days. I'll
be announcing the winners of the Dylan Days Creative Writing Contest
today I hope. Also, our media campaign is off the ground on the radio
and in newspapers across northern Minnesota right now. This two week
period is the busiest time of year for me as Dylan Days, final papers
and spring fever collide to create ... a perfect storm.BROWN HQ (May 8, 2007) -- Gov. Pawlenty is rejecting a
Range delegation-backed bill that would restore funds ($30 million
plus) to the Iron Range Resources agency and undo the practice of
appointing citizen members to the board. Also in the bill is a
requirement that would essentially allow the board binding oversight
over spending by the commissioner. Currently the board is, by statute,
filled with sitting legislators who represent the Iron Range and three
citizen members appointed by the Governor, Speaker of the House and
Senate Majority Leader. The board votes on recommendations, but the
Iron Range Resources commissioner (a governor appointee) makes the
final decision on board policy and spending. Iron Range Resources
(formerly the IRRRB and IRRRA before the official state logo maker ran
out of R's) is the state agency dedicated to the economic revival of
the Iron Range using money from a unique taconite production tax.
Traditionally dominated by DFLers, it has been the source of much drama
under the past 20 years of non-DFL governors.BROWN HQ (May 6, 2007) -- Yesterday's Hibbing Community
College Foundation Scholarship 5K Run/Walk was both a success and
failure. I achieved my goal of an approximate 25 minute speed, running
in at about 25:09. I finished in the top half of the men in the race.
This is not an especially fast time for a runner but it's not bad for
me. After the race I looked around at all the people who had tried
hard. Of all the men and women who tried hard, I was by far the fattest
one there. I take pride in that. It allows me to say, "Just think how
fast I'd be if I didn't eat a rare steak and mashed potatoes every
week." The answer: "faster than you, chump." But steak is soooo tasty
and people who know me know I'm not going to kick the potato habit
without hospitalization. Frankly, I'll keep straddling this line until
a doctor tells me to stop. I remain slightly overweight and slightly
fast. Not a bad combo, relatively speaking. (This is my Sunday,
May 6, 2007 Hibbing Daily Tribune column)In case you missed the news last week, astronomers located a planet in another solar system that might be able to support life. Now they need to do more research to determine if humans (or wookies*) can survive there.
According to an AP science story, the planet might feature temperatures that could support liquid water, though this is not yet known. Additional factors could eventually deem the planet uninhabitable, but this is still an historic finding. No heavenly body discovered outside our solar system has ever shown this much promise as a life supporting planet. Fittingly, astronomers have bestowed upon this planet a truly inspirational name: “581c.” (This just narrowly beat my preferred name, “AwesomeRock.”)
Whenever I hear about other planets like this my first thought is: “How long before we humans ruin this NEW planet? Will we destroy it right away, or poke away at it for three millennia? It’s all about colonization. Look around Earth now. Oops: Greenland’s about to melt and we just can’t seem to figure out the Middle East. It’s kind of like when your house has a mold issue. Oh, man, that mold is everywhere. It’d take 30 grand to fix, or maybe we just paint it and buy something new.**
We’re a long way – literally – from colonizing this planet; it’s 120 trillion miles away. But we should all consider some rules for the new planet should our great-grandchildren (x 100) move there in the future.
1) If you must kill the wild mugothorps*** be sure to use ALL of the mugothorp, not just their solid gold tusks and clean burning lamp oil.
2) This time, let’s all take it easy on throwing old stoves and tires in the woods. If you didn’t want the stoves and old tires anymore you shouldn’t have brought them over on the 30 year space flight.
3) Kids eat free.
4) Conflict should be settled the way it is in cheaply-produced 1980s teen movies: on the dirt bike track, skateboard ramp, dangerous ski hill or outdoor basketball court. Synthesized public domain rock music in the background would add to the entertainment value.
5) Interplanetary colonization would be a perfect time to drop the Electoral College. Just sayin.’
6) The red dwarf sun that heats this planet would appear 20 times larger than our moon in the sky, according to estimates by scientists. Also, the planet doesn’t appear to rotate, according to reports, so half the planet is plunged in eternal darkness. So, the term “Sunny Side Up” would be a geopolitical hate slogan on the new planet and should not be used.
7) Life may already exist on 581c. So, we should all agree now that if we encounter this new life no one should mention what we did to our last planet. “Oh, yeah, well, my last planet and I decided to just be friends. Our goals, uh, weren’t, like, compatible. Hey, is that a virgin coal field? Awesome!”
Maybe it turns out that this planet isn’t as habitable as we would hope. Maybe we are stuck with just this one planet. But we should set some ground rules early. We tried the whole “willy-nilly” thing with this planet and now we must endure stern lectures from Diane Sawyer about how badly we’re handling it. This time is going to be different, I can feel it.
* George Lucas spells this “Star Wars” fictional species name as “Wookkies” to ensure copyright protection. I reject this spelling. Hear me, Lucas. I defy you.
** This is wrong. Talk to a professional about responsible mold mitigation.
*** This is contingent on the discovery of
mugathorps on
the new planet. Scientists remain mum on the subject.
More columns
BROWN HQ (May 5,
2007) -- This essay appeared on the Saturday, May 5, 2007 edition of
"Between You and Me" with Heidi Holtan on 91.7 KAXE.
HOST INTRO: Our topic today is houseguests. Have you been one? Have you had one? KAXE contributor Aaron Brown recalls life in his in-laws’ basement.
For five months, I lived with my wife and newborn son in the basement of her parent’s house. To be fair, it was a finished basement with a TV, shower and many, many decorative plates, so it’s not like we were fighting off spiders the size of wedding cakes or feeding coal into an old timey furnace down there. It was actually pretty nice, almost as homey as the house we would later occupy just down the road. Our old house in town had sold long before we finished building the new house so everyone knew that this was just a temporary situation. You know, like Vietnam.
The first few weeks were the honeymoon. My in-laws stocked copious amounts of food in the pantry that they insisted we eat. So I ate. I ate bags of Baked Cheetoes, which were healthier than regular Cheetoes so you could eat twice as many. The fridge bulged with Diet Coke and yogurt that tasted like Boston cream pie. I didn’t even know they made that flavor! They cooked us lasagna and meatloaf and every week they fried fish from the lake we could see out our guest room window.
The honeymoon ended after a week or two when I put a banana peel in the garbage. Banana peels, you see, create a faint smell after a couple days. This is bad when you take out the garbage once a week – as I later learned was custom among residents of the Itasca countryside. So banana peels go into a special sealed can on the counter. I laughed and called it the banana crypt, a name that stuck. But then I got a really dirty look when, days later, another misdirected peel stunk up the kitchen. I begrudgingly stuffed my fresh yellow peels into the can of spongy brown ones each subsequent morning.
And it was not easy on my hosts either. An Internet junkie, I tied up their only phone line for hours each day as I attempted to teach online classes and read political blogs from the basement. Accessing the Internet through the lines in our rural township was like eating a dinner roll through a drinking straw. And every 30 minutes my mother- or father-in-law would pick up the receiver upstairs and curse the hiss of the modem.
Then, in the middle of our houseguest stint, our son Henry was born and came home from the hospital to our basement bungalow. All summer, the screams of a hungry baby and the smells of dirty diapers filled the house. All grandparents love their grandkids, but mostly because they get to love them and send them home. Eventually, after about six or seven assurances of “just two more weeks” our contractors finished our current house and we moved in. In a way, my in-laws would be justified in saying that we never left. We just built a shack next door and pop our heads in to borrow the lawnmower and sniff at what’s for dinner that night. But one thing’s for certain. I know where the banana peels go.
HOST OUTRO: Aaron J.
Brown is a columnist for the Hibbing
Daily Tribune, instructor at Hibbing Community College and frequent
contributor
to KAXE.
BROWN HQ (May 3, 2007) -- Like the presumed dead movie
villain that pops his eyes open right before the credits role,
Excelsior Energy is still alive. And just in time for the summer movie
season! Read
today's story from the Pioneer Press. Apparently, the start-up
company run by an unholy confederacy of lobbyists is talking to the
state commerce department about compromises it can make to win PUC
support this summer. You might recall the recent recommendation by a
pair of judges that the PUC deny the power purchase agreement on the
grounds that this project isn't innovative (as promised), it isn't
sequestering carbon (as promised) and might cause major rate increases
for power customers all over the state (this was never promised, but
it's still crappy). The commerce department says it wants the project
to succeed and that there might be some wiggle room in Excelsior's
plans that could win them approval.BROWN HQ (May 3, 2007) -- I'm grading papers today about
10 miles from the spot where, Pawlenty willing, they'll be making steel
for the first time on the Iron Range. Gov. Tim Pawlenty vetoed the
bonding bill that includes crucial infrastructure for the proposed
Minnesota Steel plant. However, a new bonding bill that will be sent
the governor's way still might include the $30 million for the project.
This $30 million is only a fraction of the $1.6 billion that a private
company has put up to build the thing, so I'm much more willing to
encourage major taxpayer investment than I have been on other "home
run" projects that have less chance of financial success. This is
crunch time. Come on, T-Paw. Sign this sucker and we'll name a suburb
after you some day.BROWN HQ (May 2, 2007) -- Busy day today, but I did come
across this
blog posting at politicalwire.com. What item would our current
Democratic and Republican presidential candidates bring with them if
stranded on a desert island? The answers yield a troubling finding:
most of the candidates classify their wives as "items." Best answer:
Sam Brownback (tarp). Worst answer: Chris Dodd (coffee with cream and
sugar). Tom Tancredo said "boat," but probably only so he could do
immigration patrols around the island's perimeter. Besides, that's kind
of like saying "time machine." Most honest answer: Bill Richardson
(blackberry and cigar). BROWN HQ (May 1, 2007) -- This Saturday, May 5, I'll be
"running" in the HCC Scholarship 5K put on by the Hibbing Community
College Foundation. One of the unique aspects of this race is the
student challenge. If a student challenges a faculty member who is
signed up for the race they run for free. If they beat the teacher they
get a free t-shirt. If the teacher wins, the student fails all their
courses. Ha! I kid. Losing students will not fail, except in their
emotional development. There are five or six faculty members running
the race. I am the only one who has not run a marathon in the last
year. Or ever, for that matter. Thus, I fear students may see me as an
easy mark. I've been training by running with a large, cumbersome
weight this week. Alas, this large, cumbersome weight is technically my
body. This could get ugly. I think I can do this under 25 minutes, but
that just ain't a major league number. Take it easy, students. Anyway,
it's all for a good cause, raising money for scholarships. You could
say that students win either way. But of course, the way I'd prefer is
for them to win a scholarship and lose this race.BROWN HQ (April 30, 2007) -- Sen. Barack Obama leads in
a national
poll of Democratic primary voters, with a slight two-point
advantage over Sen. Hillary Clinton, 32 percent to 30. Former Sen. John
Edwards is third with 17 percent. Everyone else barely shows up at all
in polling data. This is the first major national poll that doesn't
show Hillary in first place. I am supporting Edwards but I sure like
Obama, too. People have criticized his lack of experience, much the
same way they criticized Edwards lack of experience four years ago when
he was the VP candidate. My attitude is changing on all that. The
president is no longer a single office, but simply the head of a large
organization that runs the executive branch. It's easy to see in the
headlines what happens when a president surrounds himself or herself
with the wrong people. What's more important than experience is
philosophy and leadership. I think Obama matches up well with Clinton
and Edwards on those qualities. He's a strong public speaker, which is
a lost art among modern politicians, and frankly I like that he hasn't
been in Washington long enough to make too many promises or compromises
yet. I'm still with Edwards -- he's my guy on economic issues and he's
vetted. If he wins Iowa he will win the nomination. But if Clinton or
Obama win Iowa, Edwards is cooked. A baby conceived today will be born
in a world where we know if my prediction is correct. Get cracking, Mr.
and Mrs. America!