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FOR MORE THAN 50 YEARS, I have been given a rare privilege: a print – and now online-only – column showing up in readers' email boxes at least once a day.
That privilege has never belonged to me alone. It belongs to readers who decide, day after day, that the voice behind it is worth their time. Columns are not trophies. They are agreements—built on trust, renewed constantly, and lost quickly if a writer forgets who they serve.
This moment is about honoring that agreement.
I have spent most of my career writing from Duluth and northeastern Minnesota. That grounding matters. It shaped how I see institutions, how I understand power, and how I measure the distance between decisions made in boardrooms and their consequences in living rooms, locker rooms and hospital corridors. Place teaches perspective. It also teaches limits.
Over the past year, something unmistakable has changed.
The readership has exploded—steadily, measurably, and far beyond regional boundaries. Columns focused on professional sports, statewide politics, healthcare, and major Minnesota institutions have consistently drawn the largest audiences. They are read across the state, even nationally and internationally. They are shared widely. They prompt responses not just from readers, but from people inside the systems being examined.
The analytics are clear. But the numbers themselves are not the point. What matters is what they represent: readers looking for experience, context and plainspoken judgment at a time when clarity feels increasingly rare.
That carries responsibility.
At a certain stage in a career, a writer’s job changes. Early on, the task is to prove you belong. Later, it becomes about range—learning new subjects, new rhythms, new ways to listen. Eventually, if you are fortunate, the responsibility shifts again. The work is no longer about covering everything close at hand. It becomes about applying experience where it has the most value.
That is where this column now stands.
This column is evolving into a statewide platform—one focused on Minnesota as a whole, and on the forces that shape life here: power, money, sports, healthcare, politics and civic institutions. This is not an act of ambition. It is an act of alignment. The work has grown. The readership has grown. The stakes have grown. The column must grow with them.
This is not about ego. It is not about titles. It is not about abandoning place. It is about responsibility.
Duluth remains part of this story because Duluth is part of Minnesota’s story. It is not a boundary. It is a vantage point. Cities like Duluth often experience first—and most acutely—the downstream effects of decisions made elsewhere. That perspective does not disappear when the scope widens. It sharpens.
Some longtime readers may flinch at that framing. Change often brings discomfort, especially when it challenges familiar expectations. But this is not a retreat from anything that mattered before. It is a step forward, guided by reader behavior, professional reality, and a clear-eyed understanding of where this work is most effective.
While writing my latest book, Minnesota 2050—now at the printer and scheduled for release soon on Amazon—something else became clear. Immersing myself in the state’s future forced a broader lens. The book examines Minnesota’s institutions, pressures, opportunities and fault lines over the coming decades. It required stepping back from any single city or region and asking harder questions about where the state is headed, who benefits, who pays, and who decides.
That process clarified something important for me as a writer.
Long-form work has its place. It allows for depth, synthesis and patience. But the discipline of the column—the obligation to return regularly, to engage current realities honestly, and to speak directly to readers statewide—is where I am most effective right now. The analytics confirmed it. The reporting confirmed it. The clarity came naturally.
Minnesota is navigating a complicated stretch.
Healthcare systems are under strain, not just financially, but structurally and morally. Political trust is thin, eroded by polarization and a growing gap between rhetoric and outcomes. Professional sports—often dismissed as entertainment—remain one of the clearest mirrors we have, revealing who holds leverage, how public money is justified, and whose voices carry weight when billion-dollar decisions are made.
Large institutions increasingly shape daily life in ways that are rarely explained plainly or challenged honestly. They operate behind language designed to reassure rather than inform. Readers feel that disconnect, even if they can’t always name it.
They deserve a column that tries to name it.
This column will remain independent and accessible outside a paywall. That matters. In a state with no shortage of information, experienced commentary should not be restricted to subscribers alone. Independence allows this work to call things what they are—without institutional filters, without commercial hesitation, and without negotiating language to protect access.
Readers can decide whether they agree. My obligation is to be clear.
Independence does not mean recklessness. It does not mean contrarianism for its own sake. It means being able to follow the facts where they lead, even when the conclusions are uncomfortable. It means asking questions that do not fit neatly into partisan frames. It means respecting readers enough to tell them what I see, not what is convenient to say.
That approach has guided this column for decades. It will continue to do so—now with a wider field of view.
Readers should also expect more long-form columns moving forward. Some subjects cannot be handled responsibly in 800 words. Healthcare policy, statewide political realignments, institutional failures and successes, and the economics of major sports franchises require space. When the topic demands it, the column will slow down, dig deeper, and stay with the issue longer.
That is not a departure from the past. It is a return to first principles: say what matters, explain why it matters, and give readers enough information to think for themselves.
A long career teaches a writer when to hold steady—and when to move forward.
After five decades, I know what I can offer, and I know when the work is asking for more. I have never been more engaged professionally, more focused on the craft, or more committed to using experience responsibly. That fire does not come from novelty. It comes from understanding what is at stake—and how rarely it is addressed with honesty.
This column will continue to question power. It will examine money. It will treat readers as adults. It will avoid easy outrage and cheap certainty. It will not confuse noise for importance. It will make mistakes, correct them, and keep going.
Most of all, it will respect the reader’s time.
For everyone who has read these words over the years—whether for decades or for the first time—thank you for the trust. That trust is the foundation of everything that comes next. The work ahead is not about being louder. It is about being useful.
That has always been the job.
And it remains one I am honored to do.
