These are keepers. Stories with significance and a bit more of a shelf life.

 
2021
  • Gambling with Cultists (03/14/2021): I spoke with two men who have made thousands of dollars challenging QAnon cultists to bet whether Trump would hold on to power despite losing the election. 
  • America’s Best Suburb (1/22/2021): I live in New Albany, Ohio. So does a notable billionaire. So too, once, did the notorious sex trafficker, Jeffrey Epstein. In this piece I try to explain this most artificial and, at times, sinister of places. 
 
2020
  • The Proud Boys Come to New Albany (10/03/2020): A hate group decided, for some reason, to march in my upscale, lily white suburb. I decided, for some reason, to meet them. 
  • “Medallion Status” and waking up from a comfortable sleep (08/20/2020): A book about coming to grips with one’s tenuous hold on marginal fame helped me come to grips with the end of my time at NBC. 
  • The Pandemic Diary (02/2020-on): The year was consumed by the pandemic. So too was my writing. Between February and June — with a couple of updates later in the year — I devoted 121,927 words to it and what it meant for all of us. 
  • The Ghost of Police Brutality Past (03/09/2020): I got a ticket from an old cop. Given what he was like when he was a young cop, it’s amazing that he managed to hang on to his job long enough to become an old cop. 
  • Tuesdays With Anna (03/03/2020): Each Tuesday I take my daughter to piano lessons and we have a cup of coffee. It’s way more special than that sounds.  
  • Examining Your Luck Tree (02/26/2020): Did you really work hard for what you have? How much did good luck play into it? You don’t know until you really examine it. 
  • Long Chile, Ohio2, and the Snack Rack (02/14/2020): My kids both went viral. My daughter because of an absurd map she drew. My son because he put a bunch of snacks on an ironing board. It made me realize how weird it is to be a Gen-Z kid. And how lucky I am to have a couple of Gen-Z kids. 
  • A Supposedly Fun Thing That Was Pretty OK (01/23/2020): I went on a cruise. It was OK. Of course this was before a global pandemic killed hundreds of thousands of people with cruise ships being a particularly effective infection vector. 
  • Life During Forever Wartime (01/03/2020): As the United States seemed poised to launch yet another senseless and needlessly destructive war of choice, I looked back at the many, many times we have done so in my lifetime and realized just how thoroughly, and destructively it has shaped us.


2019

2018

  • Thoughts on the Midterm Elections (11/07/2018) A blue wave, yes, but only the first step on a long journey back to sane governance.
  • The Lies of Brett Kavanaugh (09/28/2018) Brett Kavanaugh lied repeatedly about matters big and small during his confirmation hearing. I catalogued them.
  • UNC’s Football Stadium: Memorial to the Leader of a White Supremacist Massacre (09/19/2018) The University of North Carolina has buried the slave-holding and white supremacist past of some of the leading figures in its history. Including that of its football stadium’s namesake who murdered black citizens of Wilmington, North Carolina in a heinous massacre in 1898.
  • The Pappy Van Winkle Heist That Wasn’t (09/14/2018) — I spoke to the so-called “Bourbon Bandit,” who stood accused of the greatest whiskey heist of all time. Turns out there was less to the story than that which was first reported. And more.
  • Arguments from Authority (08/31/2018) — My daughter’s teacher told her class that she would not trust a sports writer with a political science background. Which . . . yeah, inspired a bit of a reaction on my part.
  • Gen-Z at the Old Ballgame (08/20/2018) — Baby Boomers? Gen-X? The Millennials? Pfft. After a night at a baseball game with my kids, I can tell ya, they ain’t got NOTHIN’ on Gen-Z.
  • OH-12 special election: a bad outcome but a good result (08/07/2018) A Democrat ALMOST won my heavily-Republican congressional district. After covering this for a year, I offer up my final words on the matter.
  • Don’t forget how vile Donald Trump is. Don’t forget who put him in power (07/13/2018) — With a new scandal virtually every single day, it’s easy to forget how vile Donald Trump is. It’s also easy to forget that he is not some unprecedented anomaly who sprung from the head of Zeus. Let us remember what he is and who put him in power.
  • It is not “uncivil” to stand against indecency (06/25/2018) — Pundits value politeness, but like Joseph Welch before us, we should call out indecency when we see it and demand leaders and institutions which are moral, ethical and just, calls for civility be damned.
  • There are no shortcuts when it comes to building a civilization (06/10/2018) — We used to do  public works for the common good in this country. We still should.
  • 29 Things About My Trip to England (05/28/2019) — Pretty self-explanatory musings of an Anglophile who doesn’t get to England very often.
  • The Gathering Sound (05/27/2018) — I went to England to follow the band James around. To dip on in, to leave my bones, leave my skin, leave my past, leave my craft and leave my suffering heart.
  • Happy Birthday Karl Marx? (05/09/2018) — I am not a Marxist, but I play one on the Internet sometimes. Here’s why.
  • There’s More to Medicine Than Profit (04/15/2018) — Investment banks worrying that curing the sick is not profitable is an indictment of our health care system.
  • Paul Ryan’s Legacy: A Lack of Accountability (04/11/2018) Paul Ryan is retiring from Congress before having to answer for the damage he has done to America. This is the GOP’s standard operating procedure.
  • Privatizing the V.A. is Obscene (03/30/2018) — It is the nation’s responsibility to wage war. It is likewise the nation’s responsibility to care for those it sends to fight, kill, die and be damaged in those wars. Outsourcing that for profit is obscene.
  • To win elections, appeal to working Americans (03/14/2017) — Conor Lamb, a Democrat, won an election in a deep red district in Pennsylvania. He did it by not hesitating to appeal to working Americans in a plain and straightforward manner. The approach should be followed by every politician, everywhere.
  • Great Moments in a Broken City (03/07/2018) — The real estate market of San Francisco and, increasingly, many of America’s largest cities, is utterly broken. That, in turn, has broken the cities themselves.
  • We can do more than offer “thoughts and prayers” (02/15/2018) — Sensible gun control is not difficult. If you want to implement sensible gun control.
  • Treat the little mooch and send it home with the rest” (02/11/2018) — A heart-wrenching immigration case in Arizona reveals how our nation is suffering from crisis of empathy.
  • Weed and Realignment (01/04/2018) — Nearly two-thirds of the public wants legalized marijuana but politicians do not. How did that happen and what does that mean for American politics?


​2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

  • The Car Wreck (12/26/2009) — I was in a bad car wreck when I was 14. I didn’t get a scratch, though.
  • Radio Days (11/29/2009) — I was a DJ at a radio station when I was in high school. It was a gas.
  • Jobs I’ve Left: An Inventory (11/23/2009) — I’ve had a bunch of jobs in my life. This is all of them.

2008

  • How I got to Ohio (06/06/2008) — People ask me why I live in Ohio. You can thank the Navy and the first Gulf War. Even though I wasn’t a part of either of those things.
  • The Great 2003 Road Trip — I took a month-long road trip back in 2003. A few years later I wrote it up in 14 mini-chapters. This page is the introduction and links to all of it.