Please forgive some brief wistfulness over the old days here at MinnesotaBrown.com. On an Election Day like today, I once breathlessly live blogged northern Minnesota election from the closing of polls to the final results. I nurtured a network of courthouse moles across the region and sometimes was the first to call races on the Iron Range.
In more recent years, I’ve trimmed down my election night offerings. Partly for mental health, partly out of the futility of chasing clicks in a social media-dominated world. Tonight, I’ll make observations on X (@minnesotabrown) and save my deeper thoughts for columns that run in the Minnesota Star Tribune, Mesabi Tribune and Minnesota Reformer. It’s the “letter from an elderly relative” version of a live blog, for better or worse.
I still do a number of radio hits, including one this morning on WCCO Radio in the Twin Cities. I’ll be on KAXE Northern Community Radio tomorrow morning at 8:10 to break down local results.
And, thanks to my new role as contributing columnist at the Strib, I’ll be pitching in a few shorter pieces for their continuing election coverage. The first ran this morning, and I may have another tonight or tomorrow.
I drove through Grand Rapids last night. If you haven’t been there lately, the local DFL and GOP headquarters are across the street from one another. And, on the eve of this momentous election, both were closed up by 7:30 p.m. I offer a few thoughts on how local campaigning has changed and how that might inhibit accurate predictions about what might actually happen.
We’re all about to learn a lot about this country. I doubt we’ll all retain the same information, but history will record this day.
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