I’m not sure whose bright idea it was to put Sen. Nicole Mitchell (DFL – Woodbury) on the stand yesterday.
It did not go well:
Maybe the defence was hoping the sheer overkill would spawn a sympathy vote in the jury?
The ones who truly don’t deserve a sympathy vote – her DFL enablers::
Joe Doakes, once of Como Park, emails:
It’s good to know that all the other problems in the state have been solved, leaving legislators free to take up this important question.Joe Doakes
After two years of “trifecta”, this sort of frippery is almost a relief.
Joe Doakes, formerly of Como Park, emails:
What SHOULD a person do in that situation?I’m curious to know what SITD readers think the result would be in Minneapolis versus Greater Minnesota? Charges or no?Joe Doakes
Joe asked for thoughts.
Mine: This is one case for which Mary Moriarty could be stirred from her stupor.
Greater MN? Depends on the county, but there’s a decent chance of actual justice.
The wages of DFL control are languishing as a backwater.
Count the zeros: that’s 90 billion in Pennsylvania…:
Google said it would invest $25 billion in the region in AI and data center infrastructure over the next two years, while investment firm Brookfield said it had signed contracts to provide more than $3 billion of power to Google from two hydroelectric dams on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania.
That’s $90 billion, with a “b.” One thing these projects all have in common is that none of them are being built in Minnesota. Instead, this is what we get: from KAAL-TV:
And 33 million in Minnesota:
As KAAL reports, “This new funding is expected to reach 225 new and developing businesses.” That works out to about $147,000 per business. Meanwhile, back in Pennsylvania:
The list of participating CEOs includes leaders from global behemoths like Blackstone, Bridgewater, SoftBank, Amazon Web Services, BlackRock and ExxonMobil and local companies such as the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, which deploys AI to bolster energy capacity. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, will also attend.
Some of this investment would have surely come to Minnesota if not for the many taxes, laws and policies enacted in the past three years to discourage private investment and weaken our electrical grid.
Other than the number of zeros, the big difference is that the big, Pennsylvania number comes from private investors. Ripe marks…er, taxpayers covered it in Minnesota.
So yeah – while I’m not tired of winning at the national level, I’m over it here locally.
I’ll direct your attention to the Alondra Cano corollary to Berg’s 21st Law. To wit:
Cano’s Corollary to Berg’s 21st Law: In Blue city electoral politics, “blue” never gets “lighter” or less “progressive”. There is only one electoral direction – more “progressive”.
Submitted in the affirmative:
The primary effect of Ranked Choice Voting is to protect “the establishment”, whatever “the establishment” is.
And when your establishment is basically Marxism…
Joe Doakes, formerly of Como Park, emails:
California has legal marijuana so of course there are farms to grow it. And it’s hot, dirty, stoop-labor, field work so the cheapest workers are illegal aliens, whom ICE is arresting to deport. That all makes sense.What’s the deal with the children? Were they truly slaves, kidnapped from their parents, trafficked across the border, held captive by adults, forced by cruel overseers to labor under the burning sun, as the article suggests? That would be horrible.Or did the whole family come over together, all working at the same farm? That would be illegal but morally acceptable. They still have to go back, of course, but there’s no glory in enforcing that law.Or are they young adults, maybe 15 or so, doing farm work (as we did when we were kids) because union rules, labor laws, and minimum wage rates make it impossible for young people to get entry-level jobs nowadays? That would be more annoying than horrifying and certainly not something to celebrate.I question whether the feds heroically rescued child slaves or simply arrested entire families. It’s frustrating when press releases read like propaganda.Joe Doakes
When people can’t trust their sources of information, they make up their own.
To: Lieutenant Governor Flanagan
From: Mitch Berg, Irascible Peasant
Re: I Have Questions. Let’s Be Honest, You Just Don’t Do Answers.
Lieutenant Governor Flanagan,
I caught this tweet over the weekend:
I’ve got two questions:
1. Does This Mean You’re Cutting Taxes? One of the main reasons families (who can’t afford to leave Minnesota) are “just scraping by” is Minnesota’s confiscatory taxes. Sales taxes in the metro (when you add local to state taxes) are up over 10%. The overall tax burden, driving by state taxes, is among the heaviest in the nation, and affects people at every level.
Given that the administration of which you were an aggressively co-equal part squandered an $18B surplus, I need to ask: does this mean you’re repenting of your wastrel ways?
2. Do You Share A Platitude Tech With Gov. Walz?. Your twitter feed is not just an endless series of banal platitudes, but “style”-istically they appear to be written by the same unimaginative pollyanna-for-hire.
Example:
Perhaps endless streams of platitudes are going to sound the same no matter who the writer is, but it just seems too close to be a mere coincidence.
3. You Know My First Question Was Sarcastic, Right? There’s no way “cutting taxes” is ever going to be on the agenda, is there? Ever?
So, with the revelation last week that hiring managers and the MN Department of Human Services need to explicitly justify hiring white (presumably especially male) candidates for jobs, it’s not unreasonable to wonder – there must be some kind of deeply racist person driving these policies.
Your reasonable question has been rewarded with an answer:
The tipster raised concerns about Phillips and claimed his social media page is “littered with racist comments about ‘white folk.’”
After reviewing a Facebook page under the name Vonnie Phillips — filled with the type of content described by the tipster and a video tagging a woman whose name matches Phillips’ wife in public records — Alpha News sent an inquiry to Phillips’ state email address.
In his response, Phillips confirmed the Facebook page was his and lashed out at Alpha News reporter Jenna Gloeb in a profanity-laced tirade defending his posts.
“Good luck,” he wrote. “My Facebook page is within the ‘protected concerted’ activity guidelines, therefore, do what you want; nowhere on my Facebook page lists my employer; and the person, the gutless, worthless coward that reported me, the hell with them, please tell them I said that fool.”
Ooof. Someone played that one wrong.
And played it, and played it…
The worst part, to me at least, isn’t Phillips’s statements or actions.
It’s the culture of bureaucratic entitlement that allows bureaucrats to think that they’re OK acting like this on taxpayer time.
Their supporters – real and automated – are rutting:
We can test whether that’s true or not.
Experiment: Put a group of cute girls in tank tops with order pads in the middle of an open field.
If a “Hooters” magically springs up, you got yourself a theory.
Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:
It’s nice that Amazon is so concerned about me, they send me email telling me how to avoid be scammed.It’s annoying they send the email to my cell phone at 3:09 am.I leave my cell phone on overnight in case I get an emergency call: the kids have been in a car accident or a tornado was sighted in our area. I don’t mind be woken up for that.I suppose I could opt out of receiving emails but then I wouldn’t know when packages were on their way. Is there a setting that says “send me stupid advertising spam at 6 PM my time”?Not generating much goodwill here, Amazon.Joe Doakes
As someone who tends to work more on the design and engineering side, the jokes about marketeers write themselves.
Or hopefully they do, because I don’t feel like writing them right now
Rarely do we mere mortals share a time and space with a person like Peggy Flanagan.
A person who has led by example her entire public life – including her early turn on the Minneapolis School Board…:
…starting the Minneapolis Public Schools’ meteoric rise in achievement over the past 20 years, turning it into the beacon of exceptional learning that it is today.
Well, she’s not resting on her laurels:
Brilliant.
Know what else are taxes, Madame Lieutenant Goverrnor?
Taxes.
Like the ones your administration and legislative “trifecta” jacked up, statewide, after squandering a $18 Billion surplus, accelerating Minnesota’s slide to “below average” in gross product per capita.
She could be our next Senator. Or Governor. Or whatever the machine decides they want her to be.
The Strib notes that the new Minnesota state flag is not getting traction outside DFL neighborhoods:
Don’t get me wrong – I like Brehm’s idea.
But I also think we should leave things as they are. Having two state flags – one foisted on the state by a pack of arrogant wannabe tyrants set on destroying institutions, the other flown in defiance – is a perfect metaphor for Minnesota today.
Divisiveness was the intent of the new flag.
In a state with a functioning GOP, that divisiveness could be driven home to roost – a powerful metaphor for a campaign built around rolling back the tyrannical excesses of the gaggle of middle school mean girls of all genders who ran this state into the ground.
If the MNGOP won’t do it, someone needs to.
Just in case you’d forgotten that Rep. Morrison is a doctor, even after her starting 1,000,000 tweets, website postings, Facebook posts, soundbites, TikToks, Reels, Instagrams, Snapchats and MySpace posts:
A lab coat.
In the well of the House.
Does she keep a lab coat in her office, in case there’s some emegency where someone in a lab coat needs to respond?
Or just because saying “I’m a doctor” for the 1,000,001st time still hasn’t convinced anyone?
As the nation creeps up on a 250th birthday, at a time when it’s better to be a human being than at any time in recorded history, in large part due to the nation that is celebrating that birthday, and yet somehow in the worst social shape since its 192nd, and maybe its 85th, I hope you all have a great holiday.
Hey, at least it’s not as grim at that 248th birthday…
It’s getting difficult to find numbers small enough to measure how low “Rolilng Stone” has gone.
It’s easier to quantify the number of readable non-musical pieces they’ve run since PJ O’Rourke left whatever’s left of the once-legendary magazine: zero.
But however far they fall, Rolling Stone manages to violate the laws of physics to find a little more room to drop.
Rolling Stone is to fact-checking…what “Dog Gone” was to fact-checking.
There are no numbers small enough to measure how low Rolling Stone has fallen.
I got a quick laugh at this one from Matt Little, who’s running to try to replace Angie Craig in CD2:
I”d love to know what’s this “full range of vision” he’s talking about?
All seven of them voted in absolute lockstep on every single issue. Not one of them broke ranks with the DFL majority on any vote. Every last one of them voted to squander the “surplus”, to run up the state budget 40%, for a $6B deficit, for the thoughtcrime database and for healthcare and free tuition for illegals, for ignoring out of state custody orders when parents with Munchausens by Proxy brought their kids to Minnesota to get transed, for red flag gun confiscation and universal registration laws…
…for everything.
There is not one degree of difference between the voting records of DSA radical Zaynab Mohammed and “moderate” Grand Hauschild.
Or Matt Little, for that matter.
How to make it in America: Come to America via the immigration system. Adopt the values that made America great. Work hard, raise good kids, give a good value for the money.
How to make it in Minnesota: Come to America and, in apparently no particular order: Commit a crime, ingratiate yourself with the bureaucracy, make get lots of taxpayer money.
Wilson Tindi holds a director position at the Minnesota Department of Education, where he audits taxpayer spending and oversees internal accountability.
…
Tindi was sentenced to two years in prison and ordered to register as a predatory offender. His sentence was stayed for five years, but he was also sentenced to 210 days in the workhouse, records show.
However, despite the felony conviction and offender status, Tindi serves as Director of Internal Audit and Advisory Services at MDE, according to public records and his LinkedIn profile.
Wonder if there’ll be a riot if he’s fired?
A leftist murders two Jews in DC. Big Left staged riots in LA and (almost, again) Minneapolis.
The mainstream media attacks…
…well, who do you think?
“White Supremacist” group membership dropped by an order of magnitude every generation over 100 years from millions in the 1920s to the single-digit thousands in 2016.
But we’re to believe that, now, all of a sudden, it’s because they think they won?
Hope Walz – a 25 year old reportedly working as some kind of social worker – on the Mamdani election:
“The top 1% that exploit all of us down below?”
She’s been the child of a Congressional representative or governor since she was five years old, and has had every form of access, power and privilege imaginable.
Like Mamdani himself – not to mention most “revolutionaries” – she’s is a “One Percenter”.
Now, if there’s a field that’s worse than teaching when it comes to requiring lots of paper credentials to advance, or hold a job, it’s social work -and Ms. Walz has decided that graduate school is a form of privilege and won’t be attending.
Which means she’s going to be going for a “job” in “public service”, doesn’t it?
The Piglet can’t be happy about this latest Star-Tribune poll:
Gov. Tim Walz’s approval rating has dipped below 50% since his failed run for vice president last year, and about half of Minnesotans say he shouldn’t run for a third consecutive term in 2026, according to a new poll. The results suggest the DFL governor could face headwinds if he runs for re-election again, particularly from voters in greater Minnesota and the suburbs outside Hennepin and Ramsey counties. He also faces opposition from a majority of independents who disapprove of his performance.
The new Star Tribune/Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication Minnesota Poll found 49% approve of Walz’s performance and 50% disapprove. A previous Minnesota Poll conducted last September found 53% of Minnesotans approved of Walz’s performance while 44% disapproved.
It’s only the second time Walz’s approval rating has fallen below 50% in the Minnesota Poll.\
It’s hard to read much history into this “Minnesota” Poll; the poll has changed hands so many times since its heyday from 1989-2012.
But this is not great news for Walz.
I don’t expect him to go out without a fight, of course; he – or Gwen – palpably craves national office. The question is, given:
…will the Tim Walz brand support another run?
I suspect we’re going to see a huge reconstruction effort. Which I frankly hope succeeds, at least through DFL convention season.
Postscript: wouldn’t now be a great time for the MNGOP to suspend its circular firing squad and actually focus on fundraising and fighting a campaign?
Joe Doakes, formerly of Como Park, emails:
Attorney General Keith Ellison’s office recently hosted an all-day continuing legal education program titled, “Price, Access, and Power: Exploring Grocery Costs, Food Access, and Competition.” Several speakers advocated for breaking up grocery retailers and establishing government grocery stores in areas that don’t have them, such as high crime zones and Indian reservations.
A leading candidate for mayor of New York City favors government-operated grocery stores (and you know whatever they get, Minneapolis must have).
The next Democrat crusade is food. They want to take over your grocery store and run it “fairly,” you know, like the Post Office or the DMV.
Thomas Sowell quipped, “Much of the social history of the Western world, over the past three decades, has been a history of replacing what worked with what sounded good.” This sounds like more of that.
I just have one question. After Democrats have made private grocery stores unprofitable and replaced them with government grocery stores, what happens to consumers when AFSCME goes on strike??
Joe Doakes, Wal-Mart Grocery shopper
If government groceries work as well as government schools, we’ll have a raft of remedial programs and consultants and…
…aaaah. I get it now.
December 6, 1941: “A modern war would inevitably turn into a trench quagmire like the First World War”
June 24, 1950: “The next war will be, at best, a mobile industrial clash of titans, and likeliy end with mutual nuclear annihilation”
March 7, 1965: “This war is going to be a conventional war to contain Communist aggression”
August 1, 1990: “This war is going to devolve into a quagmire that will destroy a generation and enervate a nation”
October 3, 1993: “American technological power and training will enable us to walk all over these primitive tribesmen, and restore order just the way we did in Kuwait”
October 18, 2001: “As we discovered in Mogadishu, the Islamist terrorist’s willingness to die will make any war between us an endless quagmore
March 19, 2003: “American technological prowess and our experience liberating Afghanistan in record time will enable us to prevail against the Iraqi Army, Republican Guard and Fedayeen in short order.
June 22, 2025: “Iran will inevitably be another Iraq”.
Joe Doakes, formerly of Como Park, emails:
Transgender people claim they just want to be accepted. I can do that. But my idea of “accepted” is the way Colonel Potter treated Corporal Klinger on the television show M.A.S.H., more “tolerated” than “celebrated.”You want to wear a dress? Fine, go right ahead. But it doesn’t get you out of standing watch. It doesn’t get you into the nurse’s shower with Major Hoolahan. It doesn’t get you any special privileges at all.Certain males Want to act like girls, but everyone knows they’re Not girls, so we aren’t willing to Treat them as girls. Your transgender fantasy is your own. I am not required to participate in your fantasy, not even with your choice of pronoun.Wear a dress if it makes you feel pretty. But you don’t get to shower with the girls or pitch on their softball team. Being weird doesn’t make you special. It just makes you weird in a dress.If you have a problem with that attitude, well then, you have a problem. Don’t whine about it, deal with it. As a real woman would.
I’m old enough to remember Tim Walz saying we needed to change our political rhetoric.
And if you’re older than a week, so are you.
How’s that going?
So, back to normal.
Hey – check this out:
Suddenly the media does know what a woman is!
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