October 28-29, 2008
Oct 28 02:04 Wasting Money the Tinklenberg Way
Oct 28 03:40 Just Say No
Oct 28 04:25 The Case Against Obama's Foreign Policy
Oct 28 05:05 Megyn Kelly Embarasses Bill Burton
Oct 29 00:36 STUNNING!!!
Oct 29 04:18 Talk The Vote-- What a Night!!!
Oct 29 11:13 Election Observations
Oct 29 17:48 Rasmussen Reports Dramatic Pro-Coleman Movement
Prior Months: Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep
Wasting Money the Tinklenberg Way
El Tinklenberg is telling everyone that he's asking for their votes, that he'll be a moderate voice for the district. What he isn't saying is that he's got a history of wasting money in the jobs he's held before. As Gov. Ventura's Transportation Commissioner, Mr. Tinklenberg wasted thousands of dollars on MnDOT's annual 2 day transportation conference. Here's part of an article published in the Star Tribune January 21, 2003 highlighting Mr. Tinklenberg's wasteful spending habits:
The committees that plan the Minnesota Department of Transportation's annual two-day conferences in Bloomington say they handpick keynote speakers to get "experts in topics relevant" to the agency.Does this information convince you that El Tinklenberg will be a vigilant watchdog of Minnesota's taxpayers? This is utter nonsense. Let's remember that this was when we were heading for a budget deficit of $4.2 billion, the biggest deficit in state history. It wasn't just that he wasted that money on keynote speakers. He 'spread the wealth around' just like Sen. Obama intends to do:
During the past four conventions, MnDOT spent a total of $664,231 more than it recovered from vendors' fees and other income, records show. Keynote speaker
contracts for the four years totaled $114,430.
Some examples from the 2001 conference:
- $11,650 for a former ski champion's motivational speech.
- $12,950 for a team-building consultant who talked about ways managers can use fun to revitalize workers.
- $5,000 for a speech on "Intelligent Risk taking."
MnDOT has increased its spending on the event by about 61 percent, from $136,173 in 1999 to $219,300 last year, according to records obtained by the Star Tribune under the Minnesota Data Practices Act.What justification can Mr. Tinklenberg offer for increasing spending on their annual conference by 61% over 4 short years? That's a spending increase of 15% per year. These statistics prove that Mr. Tinklenberg spends other people's money irresponsibly. Is that the type of man we want serving in Washington?
During the past four conventions, MnDOT spent a total of $664,231 more than it recovered from vendors' fees and other income, records show. Keynote speaker contracts for the four years totaled $114,430.
Here's what the Strib reported in January, 2003:
When MnDOT was in a hurry to clean up a site that was to become a maintenance yard for the state's first light-rail line, it put an engineering firm to work without having a binding contract or money in place admittedly violating state law.That's what corruption looks like. That's the last type of politician we need to send to Washington.
Nonetheless, Kent Allin, an assistant administration commissioner who oversaw the department's contract regulators, warned Fisher of possible trouble on the $3.2 million contract for preliminary design work on light rail. The Minneapolis engineering firm BRW Inc. (now owned by URS Corp. of San Francisco) had the contract; the New York firm Parsons Brinckerhoff Quade & Douglas was a subcontractor.Mr. Tinklenberg obviously isn't bashful about cutting corners. He didn't think twice about ignoring the checks and balances that the legislature put in place. We don't need someone as ethically challenged as Mr. Tinklenberg in DC.
MnDOT wanted Administration to approve two large amendments that would change the nature of the original contract with BRW and increase its cost ceiling by nearly 75 percent. Such dramatic changes generally require competitive proposals to ensure that taxpayers get the best deal.
But Fisher told his staff that he wanted to get the contract "on the ground ASAP." Noting that Tinklenberg had personally asked him to approve the amendments, he ordered it done.
We need someone that has fought to reform the earmark system. There's only one person who fits that description. Her name is Michele Bachmann. Michele recognized the corruption that's filled the earmark process. Michele wants to make earmarks to be awarded based on merit, not on who'll vote for John Murtha's or Don Young's pet projects.
Posted Tuesday, October 28, 2008 1:14 PM
Comment 1 by Donavon Cawley at 28-Oct-08 12:05 PM
Under Elwyn Tinklenberg, MN-DOT established the Hiawatha Lightrail Line, the Northstar Corridor, overhauled the public transit system in the Twin Cities Metro Area, and vastly improved transportation infrastructure in outstate Minnesota. Michelle Bachmann, on the other hand, has spent two years in the Congress, and the only thing she's accomplished is a bill recognizing Minnesota's 150 years as a state, and spending way too much time making an ass out of herself on cable news channels.
While Tinklenberg's spending on dubious conferences is concerning, it remains clear who will actually get something accomplished in Washington, and it's not Bachmann.
Comment 2 by Gary Gross at 28-Oct-08 12:29 PM
Donavon, Mr. Tinklenberg cut license tab fees, thereby shorting funding for roads & bridges. He's directly responsible for shortchanging road & bridge repair projects.
Mr. Tinklenberg is a spineless wimp who won't fight to protect the taxpayers' wallets.
Comment 3 by anokacountyred at 28-Oct-08 10:40 PM
Bachmann was in the minority and the Democratic leadership wouldn't let her bills get out of committee, unless they benefited the Dems.
Just Say No
After years of wrangling, the DFL-dominated legislature finally passed a bill that puts a constitutional amendment that's supposedly needed to save the environment. Saturday night, I watched Rod Grams and Tom Emmer debate Ellen Anderson and Larry Redmond. What I saw Saturday night was an hysterical Ellen Anderson. Meanwhile, Tom emmer and Rod Grams were a poised team.
Former Sen. Grams looks as poised in this video as he did Saturday night in arguing against the constitutional amendment:
The Vote Yes people like citing a statistic on the MPCA website, which says that 40% of the lakes, rivers and streams tested thus far are polluted. These activists use this statistic for its shock value. The thing that the Vote Yes people won't say during this campaign is that only 846 lakes, rivers and streams have been tested thus far.
That's the PR side of this debate. That's important leading up to the vote. From a policy standpoint and good governance standpoint, though, it's almost irrelevant.
Steve Gottwalt is one of the GOP legislators that 'gets it'. Here's what he recently told me:
Legislators are elected to make funding decisions, not pass them off to the State Constitution. That's not what the Constitution is for! I am an avid hunter and fisherman who loves our outdoors. While many well-meaning outdoors and environmental enthusiasts think this shows support for the outdoors and clean water, it is an $11 billion tax increase over 25 years for a bunch of ill-defined programs. If we truly support our natural resources and outdoor heritage, then we lawmakers should go to St. Paul and approve funding for those purposes.EXACTLY RIGHT STEVE!!! This isn't that complicated. Legislators should set priorities, then fund the most important things first.
During Saturday night's debate, Sen. Anderson said that funding was inadequate that a rural town couldn't expand their water treatment plant, causing the government to stop the town's planned expansion. She said that that's proof that we need another tax increase.
I'd argue that, if this story is accurate, it's proof that legislators aren't doing their jobs. If legislators won't appropriate money to upgrade that town's water treatment facility so they can continue their expansion, then the legislators who ignored this town's plight should lose their jobs.
Even the Star Tribune gets it right this time:
Moving Minnesota toward a system of constitutional amendments to formulate funding would lock legislators and the governor into budgetary decisions that they are elected, and paid, to make. And with an anticipated recession and the resulting revenue shortfall expected over the next biennium, it will be more important than ever for elected officials to make the tough calls.Tom Emmer got it right during Saturday night's debate, saying that the problem isn't funding or taxation but rather that the legislature didn't display true political courage in making difficult decisions.
If the amendment is successful, it increases the likelihood that other worthy causes will line up to try to circumvent the legislative process and appeal directly for funding. This could result in the kind of government gridlock experienced in states such as California. And it would give elected officials less flexibility to address budgetary challenges in areas such as education and public safety.
At the end of the day, I expect this proposed constitutional amendment to fail by a fairly sizeable margin. Still, we need to get to the voting booth and guarantee this amendment's failure.
Posted Tuesday, October 28, 2008 3:40 AM
Comment 1 by J. Ewing at 28-Oct-08 09:10 AM
I worked the Taxpayers League booth at the fair, trying to get people's attention on this issue. The line I found most effective was "stop the tax increase, vote No." About 1/3 of the people would actually stop to ask, "What's it for?" To that my reply was, "Does it matter?" 95% agreed it didn't. That's the point here. If the legislature doesn't think it's important enough to spend existing revenue on, then it's not important enough to raise taxes for. There is SOMETHING in that $36Billion budget that is less important than this, and wouldn't be "locked in" like this is.
Comment 2 by Walter hanson at 28-Oct-08 09:20 AM
You know I think the people who want a no vote are missing a great argument.
Barrack Obama has said that the people who make less than $250,000 shouldn't have a single tax increase. It seems like if you're going to vote for Obama you have to vote no to support Obama's position of not doing a tax increase on people making less than $250,000.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Comment 3 by Alfreda Strawder at 29-Oct-08 08:22 AM
This so called ad that I have seen on T.V. is very upsetting and think it's down right wrond because Sen Obama was poor when he was yonger his mother was on food stamps and he really knows about being poor. He knows about paying a light bill and having this cut off. It's Jonh Mcain that has so many houses he can't even remember how many he has so don't say Mr. Obama does not know about being poor!!!
Comment 4 by eric zaetsch at 31-Oct-08 02:27 PM
An interesting post.
First the small town, perhaps the legislators would be best telling them growth is not a right or responsibility, if there's no state money nor enough local money, perhaps stay the size your are, and that might be best.
Where I live, Ramsey, in Anoka County, there was a recent disastrous attempt to grow things the way Met Council's always excessive quotas [they call them projections or forecasts]. An utter failure with a $19 million capital price tag on a new city hall and parking ramp in the middle of nowhere, etc., and there's none of the "more rooftops" tax benefit to civil buildings - they don't pay taxes. Boneheaded leadership is the only explanation. The mayor is NOT running for reelection. And that growth means more rooftops and more income for the community argument - each rooftop comes with a cost, and dense housing costs more for services than any incremental worth it adds.
Aside from that, you have capital spending "dictating" how future money must be spent - servicing and retiring the debt, so it is not alien to our way.
All that said, it seems that earmarking lottery income, auto registration and gas tax income, etc., is unwise if the premise is that ALL income goes into general funds and all disbursements are from general funds, on a regular budget cycle where priorities need to be reevaluated each cycle.
And people come and go at the legislature, yet the capital spending of one generation binds the next, even with tastes and capabilities changing.
It is an imperfect system, where counties with more public lands get subsidies of one amount or another and other demographic balancing is done.
In that context, and when there already has been an effort to earmark revenue from fuel and licensing for roads, this effort is not a bad idea. Did the other commentators support or oppose that road-way special allocation effort when it was on ballot?
The Case Against Obama's Foreign Policy
When I read this article in Haaretz , I was a little stunned. Here's what I read that stunned me:
French President Nicolas Sarkozy is very critical of U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama's positions on Iran, according to reports that have reached Israel's government.This isn't surprising to anyone who paid attention to Sen. Obama's deer-in-the-headlights reaction to Russia's invasion of Georgia. The only thing that makes this stunning is that Sarkozy's critique of Sen. Obama is as negative as it is.
Sarkozy has made his criticisms only in closed forums in France. But according to a senior Israeli government source, the reports reaching Israel indicate that Sarkozy views the Democratic candidate's stance on Iran as "utterly immature" and comprised of "formulations empty of all content."
Following their July meeting, Sarkozy repeatedly expressed disappointment with Obama's positions on Iran, concluding that they were "not crystallized, and therefore many issues remain open," the Israeli source said. Advisors to the French president who held separate meetings with Obama's advisors came away with similar impressions and expressed similar disappointment.Saying that Sen. Obama's policies weren't crystallized is code for saying that he didn't think things through, at least not enough to formulate a coherent policy.
Now Fast Eddie Rendell is trying to convince Pennsylvania voters that John McCain is erratic and that Barack Obama is the steady hand:
Well, Democrat Gov. Ed Rendell, speaking on behalf of the Obama campaign at a news conference, said there's no question who we want handling a crisis and the three presidential debates proved it.Brad Bumsted notes that Joe Biden opened this up with his "Mark my words" comment:
Which candidate was "calm, collected" during the debates?, Rendell asked. Which candidate was "angry, mad and lost his cool on a number of occasions and lashed out"?, the governor asked. "John McCain was the one, I think, that showed erratic behavior," Rendell said.
Wait.
Obama is the better candidate to handle a crisis because he was calm during the debates?
What was Biden thinking? By opening up the issue of being tested in a crisis he played to McCain's strength. It's the last area Obama wants reopened in the media.There is a precedent of a newly elected president who wasn't tested his first six months in office. That president was Ronald Reagan. At the time, Iran held 52 American hostages for the last 444 days of Jimmy Carter's administration. Approximately 5 minutes after President Reagan was sworn in, the airplane carrying those hostages cleared Iran's airspace.
Spinmeister Rendell tried to deflect it by saying it was only common sense and that there's historic precedent for presidents of both parties being tested early in their terms.
It isn't coincidence that Ronald Reagan was the oldest president elected. If elected, John McCain would replace President Reagan as the oldest man elected to his first term in office.
There's another historical precedent for this. JFK was young, charismatic and inexperienced when he met with Kruschev. After meeting with JFK, Kruschev was convinced that he could roll JFK. I suspect that Barack Obama would be tested early by Russia and Iran because he's inexperienced and clueless.
Things could get ugly in a hurry.
Posted Tuesday, October 28, 2008 4:26 AM
Comment 1 by DIRKA at 28-Oct-08 07:11 PM
Should't Rod be bailing his son out of jail instead of making commercials?
Megyn Kelly Embarasses Bill Burton
Check out this video of Megyn Kelly's defense of FNC after Obama spinmeister-in chief Bill Burton accused "FNC, the Drudge Report and John McCain" of manufacturing a news story after the audio surfaced of Sen. Obama's 2001 appearance on WBEZ where he talked about redistributing the wealth:
