August 26-29, 2010
Aug 26 00:56 Campaigning With Michele Aug 26 23:52 Let's Get Serious Aug 27 06:20 MPP Gets It (Badly) Wrong Aug 27 14:09 Meet Jim, the Actual Voter Aug 28 02:14 A Theme Emerges? Aug 28 13:16 Prayers Please Aug 28 17:35 Twins Notes Aug 29 07:40 Deconstructing Sturdevant's Argument Aug 29 14:26 Klobuchar, Clark Insult Viewers
Prior Months: Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul
Prior Years: 2006 2007 2008 2009
Campaigning With Michele
I just spent part of my afternoon campaigning with Michele Bachmann here in St. Cloud. Included in that campaigning was Michele addressing a room full of her biggest supporters at her new campaign office.
Earlier this afternoon, Michele stopped at C & L Distributing. Just like at other campaign stops, Tarryl's unenthusiastic trolls were there to greet the Bachmann bus with signs and protests. (I guess Tarryl's trolls didn't get the memo from Dayton High Command that tracking was supposed to stop immediately.)
SIDENOTE: When Sen. Dayton criticized the MNGOP trackers for being too close for him to campaign, those trackers stayed at least 15 feet away and it was on public property. Tarryl's trolls protested on private property. When Michele entered the building, she could've easily shaken the protesters' hands. Unlike Sen. Dayton, Michele took it in stride , politely smiling as she walked past the protesters.
One sign in particular caught my attention. It was a 'Thank You' card from the insurance companies, supposedly because Michele does whatever they tell her to do.
Andy caught this picture of the rather unenthusiastic hodgepoge collection of protesters:
We've seen the articles about how low Democratic enthusiasm is. Tarryl's trackers were the embodiment of that enthusiasm gap. They showed up, they held their signs, they went home. Rah. I was a little disappointed, though, when they didn't attend the grand opening of Michele's new campaign office in Waite Park.
During the tour of the C & L facilities, Obamacare was brought up as being a major drag on hiring. We were told, by the HR director, I think, that the extra paperwork alone makes it a huge burden and a huge cost driver.
When the C & L event was over, I was invited to join the Team Bachmann bus, an invitation I quickly accepted. The conversation on the bus was electric. As we approached Michele's office, one of Michele's staff announced that an estimated crowd of 50 people were awaiting us. That estimate was off by alot. There were easily more than 100 people eagerly awaiting at Michele's campaign office.
For a more complete description of the day's event, Andy's post is today's must reading.
Once at her campaign office, Michele emphasized the need to outwork the DFL and to work for each other. Michele said that it was important to get local candidates like King Banaian and Tom Ellenbecker elected so they could restore fiscal sanity to St. Paul's landscape. She said that it's imperative to elect Tom Emmer because he's got a plan for making government more responsive to Minnesotans. Finally, she said, it's imperative to elect Dan Severson as our next Secretary of State.
When Michele introduced King, King said that, not only are we Taxed Enough Already (TEA) but that St. Paul has Spent Enough Already (SEA), an observation that was greeted with enthusiastic applause. After the grand opening was over, I spoke with King. I said that, perhaps, last year's TEA Parties would lead to this year's SEA Change. Based on the things I'm hearing from around the state, that's a definite possibility.
According to Mark Sommerhauser's article , Tarryl spokester Carrie Lucking responded, saying "Sooner or later, voters are going to want to hear from Bachmann about what she's done in four years in Congress." Put Michele in the majority and give Michele a gavel and you'll see some serious reforms happening.
I'd also suggest that getting people to fight against the twin albatrosses of Obamacare and the failed stimulus is precisely what Sixth District voters want her to do. I said today that we don't need wimpy spending freezes like President Obama proposed this winter; we need spending cuts. We don't need a scalpel like then-Sen. Obama said in the debates; we need a meat cleaver.
One thing that Michele said that re-inforced King's claim that Democrats have Spent Enough Already is that the federal budget baseline has increased exponentially. The Pelosi Congress has raised spending by over $4,000,000,000,000 in 4 short years. (That includes the budgets and stimulus spending.) The national debt will increase an additional $10,000,000,000 over the next decade if Pelosi's spending spree isn't reversed.
I wrote a long time ago that Tarryl was facing a stiff uphill fight against Michele. After watching the professionalism and the work ethic of her campaign team, I'm more confident of my prediction than the day I made that prediction.
Andy will be back on the Bachmann campaign bus again this morning for Day 2 of the Bachmann bus tour. Here's Andy's advice on staying connected to Day 2's events:
You can follow my tweets as well as others who we crossed paths with by searching the hashtag #bbt10I wish I would've been able to join Team Bachmann on the tour (I was invited) but it didn't work out this time. Rest assured that I'll be following Andy's tweets and Andy's posts throughout the day.
The only question I have is whether the same unenthusiastic Tarryl trolls follow Team Bachmann around.
Posted Thursday, August 26, 2010 12:56 AM
Comment 1 by J. Ewing at 26-Aug-10 07:40 AM
The trolls probably WILL follow along. It's very hard to train new trolls all the time. :-/
Response 1.1 by Gary Gross at 26-Aug-10 08:38 AM
Jerry, forget the probably...They'll guaranteedly follow.
Comment 2 by eric z at 26-Aug-10 03:33 PM
The trolls are on the bus.
Comment 3 by eric z at 26-Aug-10 03:35 PM
Tarryl was busy working for the district while Bachmann was out tooting her horn:
http://www.hometownsource.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=14842:city-of-ramsey-needs-help-for-new-passenger-rail-station&catid=13:capitol-news&Itemid=29
Some are hard workers, and responsive to local needs.
Others want their face on the side of a publicity stunt bus.
Some are responsible. DFL are responsible. Some keep the eyes on the prize - jobs building a Northstar stop, etc.
Response 3.1 by Gary Gross at 26-Aug-10 04:31 PM
Some are hard workers, and responsive to local needs.Is it responsive to local needs to add undue regulatory & tax burdens on the people who'd prefer creating jobs. I don't think so. Is it responsive to local needs to favor radical health care ideas that will bankrupt the state & hurt businesses? I don't think so.
Others want their face on the side of a publicity stunt bus.Campaigns are about garnering positive publicity. If you didn't notice that, then you'd better start paying attention.
Some are responsible. DFL are responsible.Yeah, right. In 2007, the passed spending bills that increased spending by 17 percent & other bills that would've increased taxes by billions of dollars while we had a $2,200,000,000 surplus. That's your definition of responsible? This November, the voters will reject that definition of responsible.
Comment 4 by eric z at 26-Aug-10 03:37 PM
Forgot to say - bipartisan.
Ramsey's mayor Bob Ramsey, and council members Look and McGlone, and candidate Harry Niska are very tied to the GOP and were SD 48 and state GOP convention delegates.
So, what's Bachmann care.
Let Tarryl Clark help the GOP city officials. She's her own agenda.
Comment 5 by walter hanson at 26-Aug-10 05:43 PM
Eric:
Michelle voted against the $.8 trillion stimulus package, the trillion dollar health care bill, and the $26 billion teacher bailout.
You think those bills are responsible. Will you go out and spend $134,000 you don't have? Of course not. Yet you approve of Democrats who did or would've like Tarryl Clark who did that a million times worse for the country!
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Comment 6 by eric z at 26-Aug-10 06:25 PM
The job is serving constituent needs.
Clark did the job.
Bachmann only draws down the paycheck.
For now.
Bachmann has not created a single job in Minnesota beyond hiring local staff.
Bachmann is a prima dona who cannot dance when the curtain's up. She can schmooze with Glen Beck. What's that gotten the district?
If Bachmann wants to bus hither and yon for no good or productive reason, I guess it gets one bus driver a few hours of wages.
I'll grant her that.
Comment 7 by J. Ewing at 26-Aug-10 08:39 PM
Bachmann realizes that government cannot create productive jobs. ONLY private enterprise can do that. "Working for your constituents" should not include taking their money and spending it on non-productive things like a Northstar terminal. That's more like the constituents working for Taxin' Tarryl.
Let's Get Serious
Reid Wilson's article isn't just delusional. It's denying reality. Wilson makes some traditional, conventional wisdom arguments that aren't persuasive, starting with this one:
Money: On both a macro level and a micro level, Republicans are seriously behind in the money chase. Most candidates enrolled in the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's Frontline program for endangered incumbents have huge cash leads over their rivals, and the DCCC has nearly twice as much on hand as the National Republican Congressional Committee.Wilson didn't learn the lesson that he cited. Rep. Shea-Porter won in a wave election though she was clearly outspent. The lesson Wilson should've learned is that a different set of rules apply in wave elections than in typical elections. This is, in every credible political expert's view, a wave election. The only thing left to be determined is the size of the wave.
Plenty of newly elected Democrats won in 2006 and 2008 while being outspent, but they weren't outspent by much. Only Rep. Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H., won after being outspent by more than a 3-1 ratio. Republican challengers will close the gap over the next few months, but they have a long way to go.
Here's another reason Wilson cites:
Turnout: Beyond advertising, money pays for turnout operations, another area in which Democrats have a clear advantage. The Democratic National Committee has pledged $30 million in cash and services to turn out the estimated 15 million voters who cast their first ballots for President Obama in 2008, and the DCCC has put an average of five field staffers on the ground in 75 districts.If there's anything that's been proven througout the primaries it's that Democrats aren't energized. Money is important in putting the mechanics in place. Money won't take the place of enthusiasm, though, to voters. Right now, independents are turning out for Republicans because they're appalled with President Obama's radical agenda.
Furthermore, it's obvious that, in state after state, the GOP's GOTV operations are operating efficiently.
That radical agenda probably is driving the problems that this Politico article highlights:
In two close races, endangered Democrats are even running ads touting how they oppose their leadership.Each week, we read of new races that weren't endangered that now are. Look at Barney Frank's sudden Come-to-Jesus moment with Fannie and Freddie. If he wasn't at least worried, there isn't a chance that he'd turn on his friends running Fannie and Freddie. Now, he's telling everyone they should be abolished.
"Democrats kept thinking: 'We're going to get better. We're going to get well before the election,'" said one of Washington's best-connected Democrats. "But as of this week, you now have people saying that Republicans are going to win the House. And now it's starting to look like the Senate is going to be a lot closer than people thought."
A Democratic pollster working on several key races said, "The reality is that [the House majority] is probably gone." His data show the Democrats' problems are only getting worse. "It's spreading," the pollster said.
"We have been saying for the past 18 months this will be a politically challenging environment," said Chris Van Hollen, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. "That being said, we will retain the majority in the House. All of what you are hearing is the inside-the-Beltway chatter."Politically challenging??? When the other party is poised to win 10-15 seats, it's a politically challenging year. Republicans aren't looking at winning only 15 seats.
If GOP strategists don't have a realistic goal of winning at least 50 seats, then they're shooting too low. I'm not saying that they should be saying that publicly but I'm saying that they should be shooting for it privately.
Rep. van Hollen is kidding himself if he thinks that they'll be competitive this year. I'm certain he doesn't think that. When private polling shows Lou Barletta leading Corruptocrat Paul Kanjorski by 12 points, that isn't inside-the-beltway imaginations running wild. That's inside-the-district reality setting in.
If I had to bet, I'd bet that van Hollen's comments are based more on keeping morale from tanking so they don't get totally obliterated this November. Obviously, that's speculation but that's what it looks like to me.
Tonight during Greta's interview with Dick Morris, she said that nationwide, 350,000 more people had voted in Republican primaries than in Democratic primaries. That's a huge disparity in turnout, indicating a significant enthusiasm gap. That gap won't close between today and Election Day. If anything, it might widen a bit in that time.
Morris said that the biggest gain in a midterm election by either party came from the 1920s. That net gain in seats was 74. Tonight, Dick Morris predicted that the Republicans will eclipse that record. I'm still skeptical of that prediction but I'm thinking that the end result will be alot closer to 74 than to 34.
I'll also predict that the fundraising advantage that the Democrats currently hold will flip as people start realizing that Republicans will be taking control of the House. That isn't a bet-the-ranch type prediction but it's in the 'tidy sum of money' category.
If I had one piece of advice for my Democratic friends, it's that they'd better resign themselves to defeat and/or they start buying Maalox a couple bottles at a time. It's gonna be that bad.
Originally posted Thursday, August 26, 2010, revised 27-Aug 12:00 AM
Comment 1 by walter hanson at 27-Aug-10 05:52 AM
Gary:
Lets not forget we already had three trial runs at this model. Virginia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. At best you can say only one was a red state. All three were states that Obama carried in 2008.
The results:
Virginia statewide candidates won by over 15% despite turning out all of those first time voters who helped Obama carry the state.
New Jersey. A democrat governor who was a big ally of Obama was defeated handily despite the fact that a third party party candidate was taking away votes from Chris Christie.
Massachusetts. In an election which would've allowed the Democrats to cement control of the Senate through 2010 in the race for the Ted Kennedy seat the democrats couldn't win.
Wow. I wonder how bad those losses would've been if the Democrats didn't have their get out the vote drive and their money advantage.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
MPP Gets It (Badly) Wrong
All day Thursday, lib-bloggers used Twitter to whine about how a new political organization was acting suspiciously. It isn't a stretch to think that, in their eyes, Minnesota Future was the equivalent of being Satan's spawn. Even Rep. Ryan Winkler whined about its supposedly suspicious nature:
RepRyanWinkler MNChamber and Bus Pship killed section of disclosure act that would have shown who's funding shady conservative grps. http://bit.ly/9De561Rep. Winkler, what's your definition of a "shady conservative group"? Do you have a definition for
"shady conservative group[s]"? Or is this just you whining as part of your following the DFL talking points? It's time you got a grip and stopped your whining.
Here's what the article Rep. Winkler cited says in part:
Larson told the Associated Press last week that the group would help "pro-business" candidates.What we know about this group is that the group is headed by Chris Tiedeman and Jeff Larson. We know that they complied with Minnesota law in filing a campaign finance report. When I pointed that out to Rep. Winkler, this was his reply:
It isn't certain who is funding Minnesota Future. The group filed a campaign finance report on July 20th that said it had $820.45 in the bank. That means the group received most of the money for the ads after the August 10th primary. The next reporting deadline for committees to file a campaign finance report is September 21st.
RepRyanWinkler @LFRGary One month of attack ads without any info about who's paying for them. Sounds secret and shady to me.Shady? Seriously? It sounds like they complied with the law. Rep. Winkler, since when is complying with the law secret or shady? Furthermore, I'm wondering if Rep. Winkler has ever complained about DFL groups that attacked Republicans before disclosing who funded the DFL's attack organizations. I'm betting that he didn't.
I'm betting that he doesn't think that Minnesota Future's actions are secret or shady. I'm betting that he's saying this as a good DFL team player spewing that day's talking points.
Meanwhile, Minnesota Progressive Project is so confused that it confused two organizations with each other :
MN Forward, the front group for Target, Best Buy, Red Wing Shoes and other corporations has released a second ad . This one attacks the DFL MN-GOV candidate Mark Dayton. No surprise here, really. It was only a matter of time.If you watch the video to the end, you'll see the disclaimer at the bottom say that the ad was "prepared by Minnesota's Future as an independent expenditure without the approval of any candidate nore is any candidate responsible for it."
The next reporting date is Sept. 21, at which time Minnesota's Future will be required to file an updated report listing who contributed to the organization.
If MPP wants to be taken seriously, a minimum requirement would be to get the name of independent expenditure groups right. Saying that MN Forward was running a second ad isn't accurate. Minnesota's Future is actually running its first ad indicates MPP got this badly wrong. That didn't prevent them from getting in a cheapshot in their post by saying that "Target, Best Buy, Red Wing Shoes and other corporations" were paying for the ad buy.
At best, MPP can say that they think that that's who's paying for the ads. Without getting independent confirmation from "Target, Best Buy, Red Wing Shoes and other corporations", they couldn't know who's paying for it.
Rep. Winkler replied to Tom Scheck's tweet. Here's what Rep. Winkler replied:
RepRyanWinkler @tomscheck Secret attack ads--if businesses are behind it their CEOs should get the Tony Hayward treatmentGive Rep. Winkler an A+ for attempting to make mountains out of molehills. You'd almost think he meant it. Nobody's that warped, with the possible exception of Common Cause.
Minnesota's Future will be a force in this year's election. Sen. Dayton better grow a thicker skin because his economic package doesn't add up.
Posted Friday, August 27, 2010 6:20 AM
No comments.
Meet Jim, the Actual Voter
Tarryl Clark released an ad countering Michele Bachmann's Jim, the Election Guy, ad. As a Tarryl expert, I immediately recognized a number of innacuracies in Tarryl's ad. Using a series of Jim, The Actual Voter characters is cute but they don't work because the things they're saying aren't accurate. Let's go through their statements, starting with this statement:
Michele Bachmann attacked Tarryl Clark for balancing the budget, keeping taxes down for 95 percent of working Minnesotans.No she didn't. Tarryl voted to increase the most regressive taxes that Minnesotans pay. Here's the list of the regressive taxes she raised in the Transportation bill of 2008:
The bill also includes these other levies, all dedicated to roads, bridges and transit:Until Obama pounded the final nail in the economy's coffin, people in the bottom 95 percent of taxpayers were buying new cars. They were certainly paying higher registration renewal fees. In many counties, they were paying a higher sales tax, with some counties imposing a wheelage fee on top of that. That's before talking about the $20 "reinstatement fee for a license suspended for theft of gasoline." (I don't know many millionaires who've had their licenses suspended for stealing gasoline. Do you?)
- Higher registration renewal fees on future new car purchases, but no increases on currently owned vehicles.
- A half-cent rise in the general sales tax in the seven-county Twin Cities area, imposed without a voter referendum, plus a $20 excise tax on new vehicle sales in the metro.
- Local-option authority for half-cent sales-tax increases in the rest of Minnesota, subject to voter approval.
- Authority for all 87 counties in the state to impose a $20-per-vehicle annual wheelage tax. Three suburban counties levied the current maximum of $5 per vehicle last year.
- Increased fees for leased vehicle registrations, license plates, titles and drivers' licenses, plus a $20 reinstatement fee for a license suspended for theft of gasoline.
That's before we start talking about Tarryl voting to raise the state sales tax for the Legacy Amendment.
That's alot of regressive taxes. I wonder how Taxin' Tarryl, or her surrogates, expect to get away with their statements when the facts are that available. Perhaps, it's because truth doesn't matter with Tarryl?
Here's another statement that doesn't tell the whole truth:
"Tarryl cut her compensation and her office expenses."That's true. However, it omits the fact that Tarryl voted against cutting the Senate's stamp allowance :
One of the things the Senate GOP brought up was the fact that the legislature budgets for each legislator to use 5,500 stamps per year. The Senate GOP proposed cutting that number to 3,500 stamps per hear per legislator. Sen. Senjem said that, as Minority Leader, he uses approximately 3,000 stamps annually. Sen. Amy Koch , who made the motion, said that this amendment would save the Senate $56,000 per year .That's $112,000 this biennium that wouldn't be missed even in the least that Tarryl voted against saving. I'd argue that cutting personal office expenses while voting against saving the Senate's operating expenses is like saving a penny while spending a quarter. That isn't the type of fiscal responsibility I'm looking for.
The GOP proposal was defeated by a 36-29 margin.
Here's another statement that doesn't tell the whole truth:
In fact, she's cut 10 percent from the state's budget in the last 2 years alone.And she had to be dragged kicking and screaming to do it. Let's remember this from her appearance on @Issue With Tom Hauser:
Hauser: You can talk about reform all you want but reform inevitably ends up meaning that some people that are getting state services now won't be getting them after this reform, whether it be in HHS, whether it be in education, early childhood, any of those things.That's Tarryl saying that it's all but impossible to save $500,000,000, that we needed to raise taxes to eliminate the deficits that she created by spending the surplus.
Tarryl: Sure, and an estimate, a good estimate would be that maybe we could figure out how to save about $500 million.
That's right, people. When Tarryl started her only full term, Minnesota had a $2,163,000,000 surplus. At the time, legislators were warned that the economy was slowing down. Did that prevent Tarryl and her DFL colleagues and their special interest allies from spending most of the surplus without cutting taxes? Of course it didn't. The DFL legislature passed omnibus spending bills that would've increased spending by 17 percent.
When Tarryl talks fiscal responsibility, it isn't because she's interested in fiscal responsibility. It's that she knows that's CD-6 voters are interested so she'd better fake interest. Tarryl knows that if she doesn't, she'll be irrelevant this election.
The ad might be clever but it isn't accurate or hard-hitting. It will be dismissed within a week. Either that or it'll be laughed at. I'd argue that it'd hurt Tarryl's credibility but that's a stretch since people are quickly figuring out that she'll say anything to people to win votes.
In other words, Tarryl doesn't suffer from an overabundance of credibility. She never will.
Posted Friday, August 27, 2010 2:09 PM
Comment 1 by walter hanson at 27-Aug-10 03:49 PM
Gary:
A couple of things about the car taxes. Five subaran counties impose that five dollar wheelage tax not three. So for those people in the sixth district if you live in Anoka or Washington county you're paying an extra $5 because of Tarryl.
If you have had your car for three years take your reg tax which is over $100 and minus $99. Because of Tarryl you're paying that much extra on car tab taxes. My cheap compact car is $53 more than the $99 I would've been paying. No wonder why that percentage of taxes paid by the middle class and poor went up.
And if I remember right Tim Pawlenty was the person who was the adult and balanced the budget. The Democrats had to vote for it because Tim wasn't going to give them their tax increases or their automatic changes to get federal money.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
A Theme Emerges?
Earlier this week, Tarryl's trackers showed up at C & L Distributing carrying signs. One sign I read was a 'Thank You' card from the insurance companies thanking Michele for protecting their profits. (For more on that, check this post .) This morning, TakeAction Minnesota protested Gov. Pawlenty during his weekly radio show. Here's the picture from this morning's protest:
Forgive me but the skeptical side of me is thinking that a theme is emerging amongst the DFL radicals. That theme is that Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty are puppets of the evil insurance companies, which immediately makes them radioactive. There's two flaws with that approach, namely, that Minnesotans don't like single-payer health care and Minnesotans don't have a problem with capitalism.
Personally, I think there's a bigger storyline developing here. Gov. Pawlenty's plan, which has been in place since his first term, has held health care costs and health insurance premiums flat most of those years. Gov. Pawlenty's plan is based on market principles, which is why it works. It gives people the responsibility to shop for the best prices for procedures and tests.
Gov. Pawlenty says it gives them "some skin in the game." The bottom line is this: When people care about how much a procedure or a test costs, they'll hunt for the best deal. When that happens, prices flatten or drop. When a person deals with a small co-pay or low deductible, they aren't as likely to care about prices.
TakeAction spokeswoman Greta Bergstrom tried telling a tale of woe to the press :
"It's a gift to the health insurers," TakeAction spokeswoman Greta Bergstrom said. "These rates increase year after year, and we just want to know why he would turn down money that would look into that."Whether Minnesota accepts the federal funds or not, the insurance company will get the same amount of money if we keep the same type of health insurance system. The question is whether we'll pay for the insurance premiums with our cash or by adding more money to the national debt through subsidies.
Despite President Obama's and Speaker Pelosi's claims, Obamacare will drive insurance costs higher :
A survey of large businesses reports that employers expect their health care insurance costs to rise by an average of 8.9 percent in 2011. And to help cover those rising health insurance costs, more than six out of 10 employers also expect to raise their employees' share of the premium cost. Given that the average salary raise for 2011 is expected to be in the vicinity of 3 percent, it's likely many Americans are going to see any bump in their compensation eaten up by having to pay more for health insurance.Here in Minnesota, the DFL is campaigning like Obamacare is a positive for them. They're going to run into a hornets nest worth of trouble once they move outside downtown St. Paul and downtown Minneapolis. People don't trust this administration to get the big things right because they've screwed so many things up thus far.
Democrats know this. That's why some Democrats, like Joe Donnelley in Indiana and Jason Altmire in Pennsylvania were given permission to criticize the speaker that they voted for and the speaker that they'd vote for again if they got re-elected.
The DFL's theme, put as simply as possible, is 'special interests are evil'. Without a boogeyman, they've got nothing. The thing is, John Q. Public doesn't think that insurance companies are evil. They complain about them, sure, but that's the extent of it.
If there's anything that the DFL is good at this year, it's that they're proficient at misreading the public. People have read that health insurance costs will continue rising. When people heard about Obamacare, they demanded that their health insurance premiums drop. That isn't happening. It's heading in the opposite direction, which is why people hate Obamacare as much as they do.
Another thing that shouldn't go unnoticed is that the DFL really is anti-capitalist. Their boogeymen are all capitalists. Big oil, big insurance, big pharma and Wall Street fat cats have been their boogeymen since President Obama took office. That status has been justified from time to time but it's the exception, not the rule.
People are smart enough to know that jobs don't get created without capitalists. That's why the DFL's protests will fail.
Posted Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:14 AM
Comment 1 by J. Ewing at 28-Aug-10 09:44 AM
Well, if you can't get your candidate elected on their virtues, trash the other candidate. If you can't defend your agenda, trash the other candidate. If your candidate can't withstand an honest debate, trash the other candidate. That's the theme.
Prayers Please
DFL Senate candidate Larry Rice collapsed yesterday from a brain hemorrhage:
Democrat-Farm-Labor candidate Larry Rice plans to resume his campaign for Minnesota Senate District 13 next week after suffering a brain hemorrhage at a campaign stop.Please keep Larry Rice in your prayers.
Officials say Rice is expected to make a full recovery after the candidate went to the hospital following a voter forum sponsored by the Willmar Lakes Area Chamber of Commerce on Thursday.
Posted Saturday, August 28, 2010 1:16 PM
Comment 1 by James Douglass at 28-Aug-10 08:12 PM
In deed our prayers go out to Mr Rice and his family as we hope for a speedy and full recovery.
I want to see him healthy and defeated in the arena of ideas not felled physically.
Regards,
James Douglass
Garden City, Kansas
Twins Notes
Nick Blackburn pitched a masterpiece thsi afternoon in Seattle, throwing a 2-hitter at a feeble Seattle lineup. Rookie Danny Valencia scored the game's only run. Meanwhile, newly acquired Brian Fuentes threw 4 pitches to strike out Russell Branyan to end the game.
With Umpire Ron Kulpa giving the pitchers the benefit of hitting their targets and because they were working quickly, it soon became apparent that this would be a quick game. Blackburn got a bunch of ground ball outs early, which helped him enter the 6th inning with less than 60 pitches.
In his second start since being recalled from the minors, Blackburn was in total control. Chone Figgins' walk snapped Blackburn's consecutive hitters retired streak at 21 with 2 out in the 9th, ending Blackburn's day.
Manager Ron Gardenhire opted for Brian Fuentes in the situation because lefthanded hitters are only hitting .132 against him this year. A quick 4 pitches later and the Twins were celebrating another win. Branyan looked as outmatched as Custer at Little Bighorn.
What's clear to me is that Danny Valencia will be the Twins' starting third baseman for the next 5-10 years. He's improved as a hitter since getting his shot early in the season. More impressive to me is his defense. He simply makes all the plays, day after day, whether they're the routine plays or whether it's the play he made on a sharp one-hopper down the line off Ichiro's bat. After planting & throwing, he got Ichiro by a half-step.
Ichiro has lost a step or two. Later in the game, Ichiro hit a bouncer up the first base line which Cuddyer fielded cleanly. What's astonishing is that Blackburn had to cover and beating Ichiro to the bag. Five years ago, that isn't even a close play.
It's clear to me that Danny Valencia will win a bunch of gold gloves at third. His throwing arm isn't as powerful as Gary Gaetti's but he can bring it pretty good. His plant-and-throw plays get there in a hurry. His reactions going right or left are very good. His hand-eye coordination is excellent.
Getting Brian Fuentes for a player to be named later or "other considerations" means that the Twins got a gift for the final month. Like I said earlier, Branyan looked totally mismatched. He started Branyan with a change-up, which produced a feeble half-swing. He followed that up with a fastball that painted the outside corner. After missing with a breaking pitch, Fuentes finished it with another fastball that Branyan couldn't catch up to.
I'd still feel better if the Twins could acquire another veteran starting pitcher but this is a good baseball team. They've played without Justin Morneau, who was having a monster year, since before the All Star game. The Twins have the best post-All Star game record in the majors. Michael Cuddyer has played great since moving to first, too, with Jason Kubel moving from DH to right field. That, in turn, gave Jim Thome more at-bats.
Your lineup is pretty solid when your seventh and eighth hitters, Delmon Young and Danny Valencia are hitting .308 & .325 respectively. The bullpen was good before getting Fuentes, with Matt Capps doing a good job as closer and Jesse Crain pitching light's out since June. (Since the All Star game, Jesse has allowed only 8 hits in 20.1 innings, an opponents' batting average of .125. He's only given up 1 run since the All Star game, too, for a post-All Star game ERA of 0.44.
Factor in the Twins' stingy defense, with a major league leading 53 errors, and you've got a team that could be dangerous in the playoffs if they get their starting pitching to be more consistent.
Posted Saturday, August 28, 2010 5:35 PM
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Deconstructing Sturdevant's Argument
Lori Sturdevant's column purports to show the error in Rep. Emmer's budget thinking. Instead, what it does is it exposes the flaw in the DFL's thinking. This section is important in understanding the differences between Rep. Emmer's thinking and Sen. Dayton's thinking:
Add the federal money and the school IOU totals to 2010-11 general fund spending, and the sum is $34.6 billion. That's $1.7 billion, or 5 percent, more than the expected state tax receipts in 2012-13.Herein lies the DFL's flawed thinking. In their mind, anything that's been appropriated once should be forever considered necessary to fund. There isn't a business in the world that could survive that type of thinking.
So $1.7 billion is the real deficit? I asked Marx.
Not quite, he said. State budget forecasts project the cost of current state programs tomorrow. Since 2002, cost-of-living inflation has been excluded from the projections. (That bit of lawmaking legerdemain could be another chapter in my book.)
When businesses experience a downturn in revenue, they adjust their budgeting or they're soon bankrupt. Since businesses prefer making profits, they're often faced with a decision: do they adjust priorities, reduce or eliminate spending on non-essential items or do they just higher prices from their customers and hope that customers are willing to pay more for their products.
The difference is that, with government, they aren't often presented with this decision since their charging higher prices isn't a matter of convincing 'customers' to pay higher prices. Theoretically, governments can pass tax increases which are passed onto We The People. These tax increases aren't voluntary. They're mandatory because they have the force of law behind them.
Rep. Emmer thinks that there's too much replication in government. He often talks about the permitting process, where a farmer who wants to expand his operations could theoretically go before 5 different agencies, each in a different department of the government, each with the ability to squash the farmer's expansion plans.
Sen. Dayton's budget is built on the premise that the permitting process shouldn't be changed and that no other budget line items should be changed. That's foolish thinking because there's too much replication within government. That's before asking whether all the budget items are necessities. I'm willing to be that they aren't. In fact, I'm willing to bet there's alot of money sent to political allies that could be eliminated without Minnesota's taxpayers never noticing the difference in quality of life or in the delivery of important services.
In Rep. Emmer's Minnesota, each agency and each department would start their budget from scratch each 4 years. Instead of guaranteeing each department and each agency the same amount of money plus a little for inflation, departments and agencies would have to explain why their funding levels need to stay the same or be increased.
They'd have to prove that each item is a necessity and that spending that money would improve the lives of Minnesotans. Departments would have to prove that there isn't a better, less expensive way of delivering their services. Knowing that they'd have to justify every penny of their spending alone would likely change departments' budgeting habits.
I find it impossible to think that eliminating the replications found in the permitting processes wouldn't dramatically change what's needed to be spent. I refuse to think that there aren't health care reforms that wouldn't save hundreds of millions of dollars in the state budget.
Politically speaking, Sen. Dayton and Mr. Horner are sitting on a powderkeg. They keep criticizing Rep. Emmer for not having shown his plan to redesign government. He's entrusted much of that assignment to Annette Meeks.
When Annette Meeks finishes the project and the plan is unveiled, there will be alot of complaining from special interests who won't like the fact that their racket is getting eliminated. Sen. Dayton will certainly complain, partly because he's still thinking in terms of funding a 1980s form of government.
This is the 21st century. It's time we took better advantage of technology to make the cost of government less expensive. It's time we did a better job of setting sensible spending priorities rather than looking at taxpayers as the politicians' ATM's.
Counting all of those things is what brought Minnesota Management and Budget to a $5.8 billion deficit in 2012-13, Marx said. A candidate who says otherwise is "being subjective," he said. (Marx is a master of diplomacy as well as state finances.)Actually, I'd describe Marx as a disciple of the status quo. I'd agree that the $5.8 billion number is accurate if you didn't think that any of this biennium's spending was wasteful spending. I agree that the $5.8 billion number is accurate if I was convinced that there weren't less expensive ways of delivering services.
That's before asking how much money would be generated by Polymet hiring 2,000 people to start their mining operation instead of tying them up for a total of 7 years in the permitting process. How much tax revenue isn't realized when farmers in Clay County expand their hog farming operation in North Dakota instead of Minnesota because of the permitting process? How much tax revenue would be realized if 3M, Marvin Window and other companies expanded in Minnesota instead of other states?
These companies will keep moving elsewhere as long as Minnesota's government is this cumbersome and businesses are overregulated.
I didn't see proof that Ms. Sturdevant considered those possibilities in reaching her conclusions. It's important that, should she venture into the world of public policy again, she should consider those variables more fully.
Streamlining government, eliminating replication and encouraging dynamic economic growth will dramatically change Minnesota's budget landscape. We can't afford government harassing businesses. Government should make sure that businesses aren't polluting but then get out of their way.
Building a dynamic, fundamentally sound economy will cure most of Minnesota's budget ails. That's what Sen. Dayton and the DFL hasn't figured out. They're so focused on funding government that they aren't focused on creating a dynamic economy. Yes, they'll talk about jobs but that isn't the same as creating a dynamic economy.
In Sen. Dayton's mind and in the minds of the DFL, a bonding bill is a jobs bill. It isn't. It's a debt bill. It's a stimulus bill designed to give the economy a brief shot in the arm. A dynamic economy creates jobs that are still there a decade later.
It's time that Ms. Sturdevant, Sen. Dayton and the DFL figured out that there's a difference between funding the DFL's special interest allies' wish lists and building a dynamic economy. It's time that Ms. Sturdevant, Sen. Dayton and the DFL admitted that funding the DFL's special interest allies' wish lists is what's driving the projected budget deficits. Eliminating the pork and the replications is the best way to eliminate the deficit.
Posted Sunday, August 29, 2010 10:40 AM
Comment 1 by walter hanson at 29-Aug-10 08:00 AM
Gary:
The problem is that if you picked up the phone and called Lori
she wouldn't understand the concept that government is driving businesses and thus tax revenues to another state. They think that those businesses will want to stay in the state and go through this process.
Maybe when the so called deficit reaches $10 billion will that wakeup the Democrats.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Comment 2 by Rex Newman at 29-Aug-10 10:32 AM
Lori clearly cannot separate actual spending from bookkeeping. There is nothing enforceable about those IOU's to the school districts, for example. "Oh but we owe the school districts $1.9 billion!" No, the delayed payment schedule can be made permanent or even extended.
Adjusting for inflation, no doubt using the inflated Government Price Deflater instead of the CPI, is also bookkeeping, not a claim check.
Assuming what was passed before is binding on future Legislatures or Governors is more bookkeeping, not at all reality. Of course, we can always INCREASE it later, like GAMC.
This State ran on $30.7 billion this biennium and in this (so far) period of low inflation, $32.4 billion will be enough in the next, especially if Emmer can get the DFL to help trim the branches.
Comment 3 by Jeff Rosenberg at 30-Aug-10 09:41 AM
Gary, you've chosen to ignore Tom Emmer's own words. Emmer has claimed in multiple debates that we would not have a deficit if we simply held spending steady. That is not true.
http://mnpublius.com/post/1014235402/some-much-needed-context-for-tom-emmers-budget-claims
It's quite likely that there ARE some savings to be found through reform -- although Emmer won't say what "reforms" he wants to consider. But Sturdevant is writing about Emmer's claim that there is no deficit. His claim is demonstrably false.
Response 3.1 by Gary Gross at 30-Aug-10 05:30 PM
That isn't what Tom said. Tom said that revenues will grow by 7 percent. That means that we wouldn't have a deficit if we told gov't not to grow by less than 7 percent.
I'm objecting to the fact that Sturdevant didn't tell the total picture. She didn't talk about how much more money was projected to come in. She didn't talk about how much more business friendly Minnesota would become if we streamlined the permitting process. She certainly didn't talk about how Mark Dayton's budget numbers don't come close to producing a balanced budget.
Comment 4 by Rex Newman at 31-Aug-10 08:15 AM
"Emmer has claimed in multiple debates that we would not have a deficit if we simply held spending steady. That is not true."
Absolutely this is true, calculated many times. Adjusting for CPI and population doesn't even double spending every 20 years, but spending has been more than tripling every 20 years.
Klobuchar, Clark Insult Viewers
Two of Esme Murphy's guests this morning were U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar and State Sen. Tarryl Clark. If their mission was to insult Minnesotans' intelligence, then their mission was accomplished. Let's start with Sen. Klobuchar.
When asked about what needed to be done to get the economy moving, Sen. Klobuchar said that improving broadband access would be a major boost. While I think expanding broadband would be a positive thing if done the right way, I don't think it's the key to creating hundreds of thousands of new jobs.
Another of Sen. Klobuchar's insulting statements was saying that we need to speed up approval rates for medical devices. This coming from the woman who voted to kill medical device manufacturing jobs when she voted for Obamacare? It's time that Ms. Klobuchar admitted that she says one thing while doing another.
You can't pretend to be the champion for medical device manufacturers after you've voted for a bill that will cripple medical device manufacturing.
State Sen. Tarryl Clark essentially repeated the lies she's telling in her "Jim, the real voter" ad. She talked about how she's fiscally responsible, how she's voted to keep taxes down for 95 percent of Minnesotans and how she's cut her office expenses.
I debunked each of those myths in this post . Tarryl can't make those statements without omitting major votes that she's cast. She can't say that she's consistently voted against raising taxes on 95 percent of Minnesotans when she voted for increasing the gas tax, the wheelage fee, the state sales tax (think Legacy Act) and the metro sales tax in the 7 county metro area.
As for Tarryl's claim that she's the fiscally responsible candidate in the race, that's insulting and laughable. This statement was made by the woman who voted in 2007 for omnibus spending bills that would've increased state spending by 17 percent in the 2008-09 biennium. Fortunately, Gov. Pawlenty vetoed those bills.
SIDENOTE: The bills that Gov. Pawlenty vetoed had huge tails in them. Most of the bills had provisions in them that raised spending by even more enormous amounts in the out years.
During today's interview, Tarryl bragged about voting to cut state spending by 10 percent. Tarryl's attempting to take credit for cutting spending when the reality is that she told KSTP's Tom Hauser that it would be almost impossible to cut spending by more than $500,000,000. Tarryl had to practically be dragged kicking and screaming to vote to cut spending by 10 percent.
Tarryl's statements and Sen. Klobuchar's statements aren't surprising or unexpected. They've had a history of saying things that insult people's intelligence. They also have a history of sounding reasonable at first listen. That disappears once you think things through and evaluate what they've said through the prism of facts.
Finally, it's worth noting that today's interviews were disappointing from a journalism standpoint. Esme Murphy accepted as fact everything that Tarryl Clark said. She didn't ask how Tarryl could say she was fiscally responsible when she voted in 2007 to increase spending by almost 20 percent. That should've been automatic.
When Tarryl trotted out her "Washington isn't working for the people and neither is Michele Bachmann" line, why didn't Esme Murphy highlight the fact that Washington is being run by Democrats? Further, why didn't Esme Murphy ask what things she disagrees with Speaker Pelosi on?
Last week, when she interviewed Tom Emmer, there were lots of tough questions. This week, none. I'm fine with Esme Murphy asking Tom Emmer tough questions. I just expect the same when she's interviewing Tarryl Clark.
Posted Sunday, August 29, 2010 2:26 PM
Comment 1 by eric z at 30-Aug-10 07:52 AM
Gary, Washington is being held hostage and in gridlock by the party of no.
Tarryl Clark, this link:
http://www.hometownsource.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=14842:city-of-ramsey-needs-help-for-new-passenger-rail-station&catid=13:capitol-news&Itemid=29
Here in Anoka County, Clark is working to help the district; as is Jim Oberstar with it not even being his district.
Working with a city council with three GOP convention delegates who selected Jungbauer for reelection [Senate District 48]and went on as delegates to the state GOP convention that selected Emmer.
Bob Ramsey, mayor, and Matt Look and Colin McGlone. A council candidate, Harry Niska, is Jungbauer's campaign treasurer and his wife is a somewhat senior campaign staff person.
Did Clark get political, negative, or divisive? No, of course not. She sought to find the scope of the problem and needs, and to find ways to assist funding.
Bachmann meanwhile was on her ego trip bus trip, raising distrust, negativism, and divisiveness.
Clark can work with others - who want to cooperate and work.
Bachmann is not in that camp. She wants to prance and divide and do nothing for local officials and local needs. Clark got the bridge work financed in St. Cloud. Bachmann's only bridge effort was for the Stillwater area, where she's ineffectively pursued things but gotten the wanted headlines.
Get Real.
Clark is vastly the intellectual superior to Bachmann, also, and that matters. Michele Bachmann is an ongoing carnival barker clown combination, and a total embarrassment to the Sixth District.
Tarryl works hard. Bachmann schmoozes with Glen Beck and chases headlines. That has been the pattern, and I think enough voters will see that and will retire Bachmann, finally. It is overdue.
