Transitions

I don't often go to Mass twice on Sunday, but we did yesterday. We went to our normal (but not for long) 10 a.m. Mass at St. Rose for the farewell Mass of our parochial vicar, Fr. Jim, who will be taking over at a parish in Watertown that has been doing without a pastor for six months. We then went to Corpus Christi at 6 for the final Mass of Fr. Fitz, who is retiring.

The new pastor arrives today. His name is Fr. Marc and he arrives from Pax Christi in Eden Prairie. He's a young man, half the age of Fr. Fitz, and he now has the task of being pastor at the two parishes in Roseville, St. Rose and Corpus Christi. He comes highly recommended and we're grateful to have him, because sending a younger priest to St. Rose and Corpus Christi is a vote of confidence from the Archdiocese.

We have a shortage of priests in the Archdiocese. Until about 10 years ago, it was rare for one priest to be pastor of multiple parishes. We are members at St. Rose and have been for about 3 1/2 years now. We like St. Rose more than our previous parish, St. John the Baptist. We've never lived in Roseville but we've felt at home there. St. Rose is a suburban parish with an aging population, in keeping with Roseville generally. You see a lot of gray hair in the pews there and many of the members of the parish have been there for 40 or even 50 years. Corpus Christi is also in Roseville, but its history goes back to the St. Paul campus of the University of Minnesota. It's a significantly smaller parish and it is an oasis of calm just a half mile south of the madness of Rosedale. The congregation at Corpus Christi is perhaps a bit younger, but still aging.

People come to Roseville to shop and to dine, but you don't hear much about the city itself. It's easy to get on an expressway and never take a look at anything beyond the mall. Still, Roseville remains a good place to live and, like some of the other first-ring suburbs, may be ready for a renaissance. We're eager to find out.

Never is a long damned time

Back in 2016, when the presidential election was well underway, I actively hated Donald Trump. I found his ad hominem rhetoric appalling, suspected his long history of dealmaking to be a marker of an empty political philosophy, and I assumed the sophisticated Democratic Party apparat would peel him like a banana in the general election.

We're two years on. I'm still no fan of his rhetorical style, but everything else I thought about Trump has turned out to be wrong. As far as his rhetorical style goes, what I've subsequently figured out is this -- he's wasn't talking to me, at least not directly, in 2016. Trump has delivered things conservatives have desired for a long time, especially tax reform. He also appointed a worthy successor to Antonin Scalia and is now filling the federal bench with principled men and women who will be in a position to correct the myriad abuses of the Obama years. And, most of all, he's been working to drain the swamp in Washington, DC. Even though he's made a few deals here and there that make me wonder, his overall record is that of a consistent, principled conservative.

It's easy to find conservatives with a podium who remain Never Trumpers. I don't get it, frankly. Yes, Trump is a lout from the outer boroughs and his tastes are less than tasteful. I get why Democrats hate him -- he's a traitor to his class (Wharton grads aren't supposed to get dirty) and he's been busy tearing their playhouse down, because he understands what frauds they are. But what's become obvious over the first year of his administration is that most Never Trumpers are frauds, too -- they are not really concerned with politics and principles -- instead, their primary commitment seems to be getting along with the in-crowd that Donald Trump is systematically routing. And in opposing Trump, they've been as shrill as the Democrats.

It is difficult to see past your own cultural markers, especially the ones you've chosen for yourself. I am a graduate of a liberal arts college that sends out a lot of liberals into the world. Most of my college friends don't see the world the way I do. Because we have social media, I get to see what my college friends are thinking, and what's become clear is they aren't thinking. They've become frightened and reactionary, because change is coming. To an extent I remain sympathetic -- they don't want to give up a worldview that has shaped most of the choices they have made throughout their adult lives. If you've become part of the hive, it's no good when the queen bee is struck down. Still, change always comes, for good or ill. I don't have to embrace Trump personally or emulate his rhetorical style or persona. But if he's doing good work, it's incumbent upon me to acknowledge that. And he is.

Apple Scruffs

Our story this morning is not about the George Harrison song, which paid tribute to the folks who used to hang around Savile Row and Abbey Road in the late days of Beatlemania. We're talking about a totally different Apple Nothing scruffy about this news:

Apple Inc. said it would pay a one-time tax of $38 billion on its overseas cash holdings and ramp up spending in the U.S., as it seeks to emphasize its contributions to the American economy after years of taking criticism for outsourcing manufacturing to China.

The world’s most valuable publicly traded company laid out its plans Wednesday in a statement that was full of big-dollar figures, though it said that much of the money reflected Apple’s current pace of spending.

Apple said it would invest $30 billion in capital spending in the U.S. over five years that would create more than 20,000 jobs. The total includes a new campus, which initially will house technical support for customers, and $10 billion toward data centers across the country. It also will expand from $1 billion to $5 billion a fund it established last year for investing in advanced manufacturing in the U.S.

Would that have happened if the tax reform package that Trump championed had been killed? We don't know for sure, but it's a reasonable surmise. More from the Wall Street Journal:

Apple’s $38 billion tax commitment is the largest such sum announced in response to the major overhaul of the U.S. tax code that President Donald Trump signed into law late last year. That law included an incentive for U.S. companies to bring home offshore holdings, with companies required to pay a one-time tax of 15.5% on overseas profits held in cash and other liquid assets.

15.5% is far less than the 34% or 35% that the government would ostensibly had collected under Obama, but it's far more than nothing, which is what the government actually received when Apple and other companies kept their money overseas. There's more:

U.S. companies have long pushed for such a change to enable them to repatriate overseas cash without what they considered an excessive tax hit. Apple on Wednesday cited the tax changes as the reason for its $38 billion payment. It didn’t say how much of its $252.3 billion in overseas cash holdings it plans to bring home, though it will be the vast majority, Chief Executive Tim Cook told ABC News in an interview.

All told, Apple said it would directly contribute $350 billion to the U.S. economy over the next five years, with the bulk—about $55 billion this year, for example—coming from ongoing spending on parts and services from U.S. suppliers. That number also includes the federal tax payment and capital spending.

Back in the late 1960s, the Apple Scruffs hung out at the gates, always hopeful of getting the attention and favor of the Fab Four:

Can we get some?

We've now lifted the gates and money is coming in, from Apple and a variety of other companies. You'll see more stories of this sort in the coming weeks and months.

Dilemma

I don't write about my day job much here, because my world of work has little to do with blogging. At one point I was a copywriter by job title, but now I manage a team of copywriters. It's a familiar pattern in corporate life -- your expertise in one area leads you to career advancement, but the job responsibilities at your next stop preclude you from doing what actually advanced your career.

I am in the midst of hiring someone for my team. We had a tremendous response for the position and the applications came in so quickly that we turned the ad off so we could evaluate the candidates we'd received. One of the candidates who applied for a job on the team was my predecessor. He had left to work for a competitor, but the competitor has hit the skids lately and he was laid off, so he needs a job. For obvious reasons, I can't tell you how we're handling the situation, but it's a scenario they don't tell you about in business school.

OPEC may not matter any more

Some of my friends first got their drivers licenses in 1979, although I didn't get mine until later on. If you're old enough to remember 1979, you might remember seeing this:

Get it while you could

OPEC per se didn't cause this line -- it was mostly unrest in Iran -- but it did cause gas lines in 1973:

Good luck with that

These days, the chances you'll see a gas line are just about nil. And if the events chronicled in the Wall Street Journal are any indication, you aren't likely to see one again any time soon:

OPEC is worried that its plan to drain a global oil glut—and thereby raise crude prices—isn’t working.

A long-planned meeting in St. Petersburg, Russia, on Monday to discuss the oil market with big producers outside the cartel has turned into a critical gathering. Over the weekend, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries said, its ministers have held a series of “intensive consultations” about the challenges for an output-cutting deal the 14-nation cartel struck last year with Russia and other big producers.

The agreement was supposed to take almost 1.8 million barrels of crude oil off the global market and drain an oversupply that has weighed prices down for three years and sent a shock through the economies of oil-producing economies. But prices have remained stubbornly low as the glut persists. Brent, the international benchmark, fell 2.5%, to $48.06 on Friday because of doubts about OPEC’s ability to turn around the market.

If you want to know why, ask the frackers:

Another reason to expect little action on Monday is that OPEC is still weighing how to deal with U.S. producers, which remain largely outside of the cartel’s control.

Shale drillers—which work on shorter-term projects than traditional oil producers—took advantage quickly when oil prices briefly rose last year after the OPEC deal, sending more crude into global supply. They also have learned to drill at lower prices, and U.S. production has maintained its upward swing even as prices have been depressed this year.

As recently as last year, we were told fracking couldn't be profitable if oil was less than $65 a gallon. Oil production in the U.S. continues to grow, even at $48.06. Much of that production is fracking, as the domestic oil industry demonstrates its ability to adapt.

The implications are enormous. The geopolitical implications of the Middle East have been a huge part of life for all of us for nearly half a century. And $48/gallon oil cramps Vladimir Putin's style. Not ten years ago we were told we were reaching Peak Oil. I haven't heard much of that theory lately.

OPEC soldiers on, confident its machinations will make a difference later in the year. OPEC honcho Mohammad Barkindo says so:

Mr. Barkindo said Monday’s meeting could result in recommendations for OPEC and its allies to consider in the future. He said overall compliance with the deal since January had been “excellent.”

“The rebalancing process may be going at a slower pace than we earlier projected but it’s on course. It’s bound to accelerate in the second half,” he said.

Or the frackers will gobble up the market share. Place your bets.

Not what John Fogerty had in mind

Would he indict Woody? John Choi answers the question:

The chaos that some counter-protesters brought into the Minnesota Capitol in March during a rally in support of President Donald Trump included smoke bombs, Mace in people’s faces and fireworks, prosecutors said Friday as they announced charges against eight people.

Among those charged was Linwood “Woody” Kaine, a son of U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, who was Hillary Clinton’s running mate in 2016. The 24-year-old Minneapolis man is accused of fleeing police on foot and concealing his identity in a public place, both misdemeanors, and obstructing legal process, a gross misdemeanor.

While Choi is a member in good standing in the local DFL power structure, he hasn't let that allegiance affect him in this instance:

Investigators used additional eyewitness interviews, social media postings and cellphone videos to identify suspects and connect their actions to criminal conduct, said Ramsey County Attorney John Choi.

“When people seek to prevent others who are peacefully assembled from making their voices heard, it threatens the very foundation of our democracy,” Choi said Friday.

In the end, I wouldn't be surprised if Kaine doesn't go to jail for long, but it's important to start holding people who do such things to account. And several of Kaine's partners in rioting are looking at felonies, and they should be.

The pundit of the moment

I read widely, but in trying to understand our current moment, I continue to go back to Victor Davis Hanson. His latest piece sums up much of my current thinking. A taste:

Which should properly be more exasperating: Trump’s over-the-top rhetoric that accompanies a possibly revolutionary and realized conservative agenda, or McCain and Romney’s sober and judicious failures at pushing a mostly Bush-like agenda? By not fighting back in take-no-prisoner terms, both Republican candidates failed, ensuring eight years of Obama — years that in my view have done far more damage to the country than anything envisioned by Trump’s first administration.

Even conservatives sometimes seem more bothered by Trump’s raw uncouthness in service to a conservative agenda than they were by Obama’s sautéed orneriness in advancing progressive hope and change. Years of the Cairo Speech, the apology tours, the Iran deal, the Iraq pullout, Obamacare, record debt and low growth — editorialized by chronic attacks on Fox News, along with “you didn’t build that,” “punish our enemies,” and “I won” putdowns from Obama — never prompted calls for the 25th Amendment like those in some anti-Trump tweets. Is the difference predicated on class, accent, education, tone, appearance, tastes, comportment, or the idea that a shared Beltway culture trumps diverse politics? If a polished and now-president Marco Rubio had the same agendas as Trump, but avoided his rhetoric and bluster, would anti-Trump conservatives be pro-Rubio? And would Rubio’s personality and cunning have ensured his election and confidence in steamrolling such an agenda through the Congress?

Some questions are more rhetorical than others. And, more importantly, this:

In sum, it is far more difficult in 2017 to enact conservative change than it was 40 years ago — not necessarily because the message is less popular, but because government is far more deeply embedded in our lives, the Left is far more sophisticated in its political efforts to advance a message that otherwise has no real record of providing prosperity and security, and the Right had avoided the bare-knuckles brawling of the Left and instead grown accustomed to losing in a dignified fashion.

I'm a liberal arts guy and often find that "tone, appearance, tastes and comportment" weigh heavily, too heavily, in how I view the world. I also know this much -- fighting is unpleasant and it hurts. Losing in a dignified fashion is often the easier path. A fight is required, but a lot of people don't have the stomach for it. Perhaps I'm one of them. You can't really argue the counterfactual, but I believe had Marco Rubio been the GOP standard-bearer in 2016, Hillary Clinton would be president today. It's why I preferred Ted Cruz to Rubio, but I also suspect Clinton would have defeated Cruz as well.

1000 Words

It's Bernie Sanders, listening to Trump's kinda State of the Union address last night with evident discomfort:

Not happy, Bob

I didn't watch the speech, but I've looked at the transcript. From what I understand, Trump did not deviate much from the speech as written. To a certain extent, it mirrors much of what we've heard from his predecessors. A few of the proposals caught my eye, including this one:

I have ordered the Department of Homeland Security to create an office to serve American Victims. The office is called VOICE --- Victims Of Immigration Crime Engagement. We are providing a voice to those who have been ignored by our media, and silenced by special interests.

It's a useless office, but it's an effective shiv. There were more than a few of those in the speech. Another:

Remember when you were told that you could keep your doctor, and keep your plan?
We now know that all of those promises have been broken.

And another:

 My job is not to represent the world. My job is to represent the United States of America. 

If Trump wants to accomplish anything, he needs to remind the country why he won the election. On that score, here's Victor Davis Hanson:

Urban elites seldom experience the full and often negative consequences of their own ideologies. And identifying people first by race, tribe or gender — by their allegiance to their appearance rather than to the content of their characters — has rarely led anywhere but to tribalism and eventual sectarian violence.

The result was that when Trump, the outsider without political experience, appeared as a hammer, rural America apparently was more than happy to throw him into the glass of the bicoastal establishment, without worrying too much about the shards that scattered.

Trump was at the podium last night because he is the tribune of people who don't have the luxury of throwing out 1000 words to express their concerns. It may not end well, but it's still important to understand why he, and not Hillary Clinton, is now Leader of the Free World.

Inevitable

You don't need a cashier to know which way the wind blows:

Fast food giant Wendy’s plans to install self-ordering kiosks in about one out of six of the burger chain’s franchises nationwide by the end of this year.

A typical location would get three kiosks for about $15,000, The Columbus Dispatch reported. David Trimm, Wendy’s chief information officer, estimates that payback on those machines would come in less than two years thanks to labor savings and increased sales.

The kiosks have two purposes according to Trimm: appeasing younger customers by given them an ordering experience they prefer and reducing labor costs.

I don't know whether younger customers need appeasement, but I do know reducing labor costs is always a popular idea for businesses.

Automation in food service is not a new thing. I never ate at one, but the Horn and Hardart Automat was once a fixture of urban dining on the East Coast:

Help you at the Automat

Essentially, the Automat turned a commissary-type kitchen into a giant vending machine. Fast fooders like Wendy's actually killed the Automat concept, so we're coming full circle. Just as H&H needed workers to prepare the food, a Wendy's with a kiosk will still have plenty of people in the back of the house, at least initially, but increasingly machines will be automating that part as well.

The larger problem -- if you are a young person looking for an entry-level job, automation is limiting your options. In a world of kiosks and automatic burger making machines, a skill set to have will be troubleshooting equipment malfunctions. I don't know too many teenagers who can swing that one. We all dine with Joseph Schumpeter eventually.

Frankie MacDonald is on the case

In case you were wondering about the snowstorm tomorrow:

The best weatherman out there.

You run your mouth and I'll run my business, brother

Advice that will not be taken:

Just days after President Trump spoke of a “running war’’ with the media, his chief White House strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, ratcheted up the attacks, arguing that news organizations had been “humiliated” by the election outcome and repeatedly describing the media as “the opposition party” of the current administration.

“The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while,” Mr. Bannon said in an interview on Wednesday.

“I want you to quote this,” Mr. Bannon added. “The media here is the opposition party. They don’t understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States.”

I immediately thought of this song:

You run your juicy mouth and I'll run my business, Brother, 
Just run your juicy mouth and I'll run my business, Brother, 
You always tellin' me what to do, 
Sayin', "I wouldn't do that if I was you!"
You run your mouth and I'll run my business, brother.

Trump has been president for a week and one thing we certainly know about his presidency is that people who buy ink by the barrel and really, really, really outraged about it. The internet is replete with news media types who are so busy denouncing the Leader of the Free World that they aren't actually spending enough time unpacking what he's doing. They are, however, quite certain of some things. The New York Times article I've linked makes this assertion shortly after recording Bannon's broadside:

The scathing assessment — delivered by one of Mr. Trump’s most trusted and influential advisers, in the first days of his presidency — comes at a moment of high tension between the news media and the administration, with skirmishes over the size of Mr. Trump’s inaugural crowd and the president’s false claims that millions of illegal votes by undocumented immigrants swayed the popular vote against him.

Emphasis mine. We know this is false? I really don't know how many illegal aliens undocumented immigrants voted, because those who would ordinarily be charged with investigating such things won't do it. I have no idea if Trump is right. I don't think he is, but I don't know it. And neither does the Times, but that doesn't matter if you have an agenda to pursue. I'll run my mouth and they'll run their business, brother.

It's easy to look at Bannon's statements and believe he's being thuggish. It's always unnerving if a government official tells anyone to keep their mouth shut. But the second part of Bannon's statement is the key point -- the continual shrieking from Trump's many opponents means any understanding of why he won the election isn't important. His election and his presidency are both illegitimate by definition.

I've spent a lot of time in this feature trying to answer the question the Times refuses to consider. I've been trying to listen. Gino offers insight over at his place:

"Somebody on our side, for a change."
I heard variations of this phrase most of the day.

As I've stated before, I'm a mill worker. I've been there just shy of 25yrs. Fully one half of my co-workers have been there longer than I. Needless to say, we are an aging bunch without many options left, and this is still the best gig we can get.

It's still the best gig because after this, there is not an other gig to be had.
The factories are closing. Automation has made it possible to do more with fewer workers. This is not a bad thing. Automation also makes the work a little less hard on our aging bodies, too.

Progress being progress, me and my 125 co-workers are under pressure with every contract. Give up more benefits (we've not much left anymore). Give up more pay. (a 40hr paycheck can no longer pay a man's rent in Southern California. There was once a time men bought agreeable homes and raised families with stay-at-home mothers. Those guys are all retired now.)

The author of the Times piece, Michael M. Grynbaum, really ought to talk to Gino, or Gino's co-workers. He won't, though. He'll run his business, brother.

Goodbye to all that

I thought about doing a tidy summation of the Obama years, but we're still way too close to say What It All Means. Way back when, when Barack Obama burst upon the scene, I kept thinking of this song:

Eight years on, it hasn't really changed much. The lefties on my social media feed are filling their pages with soft-focus pictures of their hero; others have turned their profile pictures to solid black, as though the dawning of Trump is the End of Days. So yeah, it's a cult of personality. My fear is, for at least some of his supporters, the incoming president is just a different flavor (orange whip?) of the same thing. But we'll have at least four years to explore that question. And so will the Democrats:

As Trump takes over the GOP and starts remaking its new identity as a nationalist, populist party, creating a new political pole in American politics for the first time in generations, all eyes are on the Democrats. How will they confront a suddenly awakened, and galvanized, white majority? What’s to stop Trump from doing whatever he wants? Who’s going to pull a coherent new vision together? Worried liberals are watching with trepidation, fearful that Trump is just the beginning of worse to come, desperate for a comeback strategy that can work.

What’s clear from interviews with several dozen top Democratic politicians and operatives at all levels, however, is that there is no comeback strategy—just a collection of half-formed ideas, all of them challenged by reality. And for whatever scheme they come up with, Democrats don’t even have a flag-carrier. Barack Obama? He doesn’t want the job. Hillary Clinton? Too damaged. Bernie Sanders? Too socialist. Joe Biden? Too tied to Obama. Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer? Too Washington. Elizabeth Warren? Maybe. And all of them old, old, old.

I dispute whether all eyes are on the Democrats, but we'll leave that aside. The piece I've linked, written by Edward-Isaac Dovere of Politico, is quite good, because it gets into the true legacy of the man leaving the stage; the party Barack Obama has helmed for the past eight years is truly in desperate straits. You'll want to pack a lunch, but it's a smartly reported piece and worth your time.

Goodbye, Dayton's

You're not gonna make it, after all

It hasn't been Dayton's for a long time now, but the huge set of buildings that was once the flagship of the Dayton Hudson department store chain, where Mary Tyler Moore famously tossed her tam, is now being closed for good by its current owner, Macy's:

Macy’s Inc. is closing the biggest store in downtown Minneapolis.

The retail giant said Wednesday that it is selling the three buildings on Nicollet Mall that the store occupies, a place known to Minnesotans for decades as the flagship of the Dayton’s department store chain. A New York firm with a record of remaking older properties will take over.

The move ends more than a century of department store retailing in the heart of Minneapolis.

Shoppers have wondered for several years whether the store would survive as Macy’s was shuttering stores in city centers across the United States. Company executives signaled last year that they were seeking a buyer for the Minneapolis property after they failed to form a redevelopment team for the site.

Macy’s announced the deal as part of a larger restructuring that involves dozens of other store closings and a cut of about 10,000 of its 150,000 jobs across the country. About 280 people will lose their jobs when the downtown Minneapolis store closes in March.

I worked for Dayton Hudson, now known as Target, for nearly ten years. I spent a lot of time in the downtown store, but I really didn't buy that much. If I needed something, I was more likely to buy it at Rosedale. I was hardly alone in that, and Macy's is keeping its Rosedale location open. Thousands of office workers in downtown Minneapolis would walk through the store every day but I'm guessing they didn't buy much, either.

The downtown department store of my youth was H.C. Prange, which had a six-story monolith in downtown Appleton, Wisconsin. I'm guessing this picture was taken about 1970 or so, around the same time that Moore tossed her tam:

The big white puzzle palace on College Avenue

Many towns had a big department store like Dayton's or Prange's. Chicago had Marshall Field's, Detroit had Hudson's, Los Angeles had Robinson's. They were great places to shop and, for a kid who didn't have money, a great place to kill an afternoon, as long as you kept your hands off the merchandise. Those days are long gone. The downtown department store has been going away for a long time now. Prange's decamped for the mall years ago and is now part of the Younkers chain. The Prange building in Appleton is now a multi-use space that includes offices, a children' museum, and City Hall. The old white monolith has been opened up somewhat; this picture shows the building from the opposite side and was taken about five years ago:

Windows on the world

Things change. The business model that made sense for Prange's, and for the Dayton family, is no longer viable. The business model for suburban mall shopping locations seems to be changing even as we go about our business now. In 20 years, a mall Macy's may seem as quaint and out of date as the downtown buildings we remember. One could write books about the reasons for these changes; people do. We adapt, though -- we always adapt.

The Gophers start over, again

That didn't take long:

First-year University of Minnesota athletic director Mark Coyle fired football coach Tracy Claeys and most of the team’s assistants Tuesday while calling for a cultural overhaul in Gophers sports.

Coyle gave a blistering assessment of the football program, which has been engulfed in turmoil for three weeks, and declared Tuesday night a need for more “integrity and class” across athletics.

Gophers football has been roiling since Dec. 13, when Coyle suspended 10 players in connection with an alleged Sept. 2 sexual assault. The players responded with a two-day boycott, and Claeys publicly supported their stance, pitting him against the administration.

Thoughts? Yeah, I have a few:

• Even if the scandal hadn't taken place, there was a better than even chance Coyle would have ashcanned Claeys anyway. The most important person in any D-1 athletic department is the head football coach, and I'm certain Coyle wanted to have his own guy in there.
• I have no way of knowing how much Claeys knew about the incident on Sept. 2, but he should have handled things differently. I understand the instinct of standing with your players, but your players don't sign your paycheck. Publicly defying your bosses rarely goes well.
• There was a time when the Gophers didn't have institutional advantages over their competitors, but that time is now past. I'm a Wisconsin Badgers fan and I love Madison, but there's no reason the Badgers should be so far ahead of the Gophers. Just the lure of performing in a major metropolitan area, with a dynamic economy, should be a great incentive to play here instead of in Madison. It's even more alarming that the Gophers have generally lagged behind Iowa. I travel through Iowa City regularly these days and while it's a nice, generally prosperous town, it's not exactly a dynamic place. The Gophers should be able to out-recruit the Hawkeyes every time.
• Having said all that, the right hire could change everything. It's easy to forget now, but when Barry Alvarez arrived in Madison in 1990, the Badgers fielded horrible teams in football and men's basketball. There had been no real success in either sport for 30 years. Alvarez changed that and his athletic director, Pat Richter, gave him and basketball coach Dick Bennett the institutional support he needed to build a program. In 2017, the Badgers are almost always in the Top 25 in football and have been a Top Ten program in better years. They have also been a consistent NCAA tournament team in basketball. The Gophers aren't anywhere near that level. Is there another Barry Alvarez out there? If Coyle can find one, things can change.
• Of the coaches who might be candidates, I'd be looking at either Craig Bohl or Chris Klieman. Klieman is the head coach at North Dakota State and Bohl, the head man at Wyoming, is his predecessor. The Bison have been one of the best smaller college programs around and both guys know how to win. Chasing Les Miles or Chip Kelly would be a mistake. The hottest name out there is P. J. Fleck, the coach at Western Michigan, but I have a feeling he'll be headed elsewhere.

We can be like they are

As nearly everyone has noticed, 2016 has been a tough year for celebrities. The list of famous people who have passed away in this calendar year is remarkable, and we've had two more in recent days -- George Michael and Carrie Fisher.

Some of the performers in question have been moribund for a long time -- Michael hadn't released anything of note for years, to use just one example. An aphorism often credited to Charles de Gaulle -- "the graveyards of France are filled with indispensable men" -- rings true. We don't get to keep everyone. It's also a reminder that we are all on the same general path, although our individual trajectories vary widely, and for a lot of us who valued the lives lost in this year, we are forced to think, if only briefly, about our own mortality. If you are, as I am, over the age of 50, it's quite reasonable to assume you are playing the back nine. We mourn for many reasons.

Dilettantism

We got back from my hometown of Appleton, Wisconsin, yesterday. It was a short visit, really only a day, but it was nice to see most of my family. And by being in Wisconsin on Christmas Day, I missed the weather chaos in the Twin Cities.

We're definitely in a news lull here -- it's tiresome to continue writing about the latest eruptions of rage coming from the Left, especially since it's increasingly evident that the incoming Trump administration is going to be spending significant resources trolling its enemies. It's not a game worth playing, really.

I'm giving some thought to how this feature will operate in 2017. I've vowed many times to spend less time on politics and more time on other topics; perhaps this will be the year to make that happen. I'm not going to shut things down here, but it's possible we won't have as much content as in previous years. We have a lot going on in our lives these days, as my children are now (mostly) adults. The dynamic has changed. Stay tuned.

Existential threat?

As the old saying goes, personnel is policy. And the President-elect has made quite the pick for the Environmental Protection Agency:

Liberals and the environmental left have gone into a tizzy over the selection of Oklahoma attorney general Scott Pruitt as Donald Trump's pick to head of the Environmental Protection Agency.

House minority leader Nancy Pelosi says the Pruitt nomination must be blocked "for the sake of the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the planet we will leave our children." New York AG Eric Schneiderman says Pruitt is a "dangerous and an unqualified choice." Independent socialist senator Bernie Sanders declares the Pruitt pick is not only dangerous but also "sad." The League of Conservation Voters calls Pruitt not just a global warming skeptic but "an outright climate denier."

If you think that reaction is a bit strong, try this one from Obama hand Dan Pfeiffer:

High praise indeed

Pruitt has been a prominent member of a group of attorneys general who have been fighting against EPA rulemaking, especially where the energy industry is concerned. This isn't particularly surprising, given he is from Oklahoma, a state that produces a lot of energy. Does that make him an existential threat?

The larger meaning of the Pruitt nomination is simple -- the Washington bureaucracy needs to be reined in. Trump may actually be serious. We'll be watching.

#Never is here

I've had both a #NeverTrump logo and a "Hillary for Prison" logo on my sidebar for most of the year. I've removed both. So now what?

My #NeverTrump stance flowed from three beliefs:

• I assumed his boorishness and inexperience would make him too toxic to be elected and deliver the White House to the Clintons. I was wrong about that.
• I believed he would govern as a Democrat, but with less of a pants crease than David Brooks might prefer. That may happen.
• I also assumed that, if, mirable dictu, Trump would get the keys to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, he would turn out to be a fraud and a charlatan and would destroy the Republican Party brand. That may happen, too.

So, where does that leave me? I’m willing to take a wait-and-see attitude on Trump. If he uses his power wisely, I will support him. If he doesn’t, I’ll remain critical. I don’t think it’s really that different from where many of my fellow citizens are. And it's the stance I would have if somehow a different Republican were standing where Trump does today. My loyalty doesn't belong to any person, because every person has flaws.

While it was hardly inevitable that Donald Trump would be president in 2017, it is inevitable that 2017 and the years to follow will be a struggle. Trump can do things to make life better, but the heavy lifting will have to come from all of us and most of the work ahead is beyond Trump's control. Time to get to it.

Lightning Round - 090616

Seems appropriate, as lightning is flashing all around me as I write this stormy Tuesday morning. Let's start with some video.

 

She's the picture of health. No question about it. Anyway...

• Is the campaign about the direction of the country, or about monetizing campaign funds? Read and decide for yourself.
• Remember how we were told Barack Obama would improve foreign relations? How's that working out, Mr. President?
• The talk around town, and all over Minnesota, has been about the end of the Jacob Wetterling story, after 27 long years. The idea that a stranger would abduct and kill your child is one of the greatest fears any parent has. We've seen a big change in how kids live their lives since that fateful day in 1989; many parents aren't willing to risk letting their children run around unattended. When I was Jacob Wetterling's age, I could go anywhere in town and my parents never worried about it. Those days are gone. Danny Heinrich, the monster who took Jacob, took away a lot more than one child.
• Wisconsin 16, LSU 14. A very satisfying result. And just a guess -- we're going to be waiting a long time for another SEC team to come north.
• I don't know if Sam Bradford can save the season for the Vikings; I tend to doubt it, actually. Still, give the Vikings credit for taking a chance -- while their defense is young and talented, the window for Adrian Peterson is closing and they may not have another year to wait.
• I'm not crazy about the Packers releasing Josh Sitton. I'm even less crazy about him going to the Bears. Ted Thompson better be right.

Do You Know the Way to Arden Hills?

If you live in the northwestern part of Ramsey County, the potential and the pitfalls of the old Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant area are worth consideration. This is what the area looks like now:

A big ol' brownfield

Can you imagine it looking like this?

Stop messing 'round with your tricks

That is a picture of Santana Row, a development in San Jose, California, which in turn is modeled on Paris. Are you skeptical? So was the Arden Hills City Council:

The company chosen to oversee one of the biggest developments in the state is asking the suburb of Arden Hills to move its City Hall onto the site and to approve residential buildings as high as 12 stories.

Developer Bob Lux of Alatus LLC on Monday outlined the company’s vision for a town center on hundreds of acres at the site of the old Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant.

I'm having a tough time imagining the market for a 12-story building in Arden Hills, but who knows?

Lux and his colleagues outlined a project whose town center would resemble Santana Row, the celebrated Parisian-style development in San Jose, Calif., with waterfront amenities recalling the band shell area on Lake Harriet in Minneapolis.

Another model for a town center featuring movie theaters and restaurants would be St. Louis Park’s West End.

“People from North Oaks and White Bear Lake would be coming here for entertainment and meals,” Lux said. “The people who designed West End are working for us and learned some lessons from it.”

I suppose they could -- Highway 96 is a nice road that's been rebuilt over the past decade, but I'm not certain they will. But we'll leave that aside:

The key to making the new project a walkable, pleasant environment, the developer stressed — rather than “seas of parking lots” — would be a mass grading of the entire property. That would allow for large stretches of underground parking below commercial and multifamily sites while creating fill to be used elsewhere.

“You would have no competition almost anywhere in the metro area,” he said, adding that the site is within easy driving distance of both big downtowns.

Negotiations, in effect, over the height of buildings began almost at once: It has long been clear that where Ramsey County is comfortable with an urban village, Arden Hills prefers something more suburban.

Asked what he can make work, Lux said that financially speaking, “eight stories would be the minimum” for some town-center areas. “I know it works with 12; if capped, 10 to 12 I know could work, I’d probably say 10. Tour some projects with me and I think you’ll be more comfortable with the height.”

Walkable, but within easy driving distance. And there you have the conundrum. As anyone who has traveled in the area knows, the interchange between 694 and 35W is one of the most notorious bottlenecks in the Twin Cities. We're seeing a great deal of road construction now, especially on 694, which will help matters, but it's still tough driving around here. I suspect people might come out here, but unless the traffic flow improves dramatically, I'm skeptical about getting repeat business. And I'd be curious to see what the market is for apartments or condominiums in a multi-story building in a suburban area. Land is at a severe premium in a place like San Jose; not so much here.

I'm going to be watching this closely, because whatever happens in Arden Hills will greatly affect its neighbors.