Shot in the Dark

Category: Dayton Dustbowl

  • The Dayton Dustbowl: Just A Little Compromise

    “Compromise”. That’s what the Dayton Administration says it wants (when it’s not calling the GOP “extremists” – which is kind of funny, “extremists” getting the majority of the vote last November, but I digress). Of course, the GOP did compromise; it hiked the budget, adding the money from the upgraded February revenue forecast to the…

  • The Dayton Dustbowl: Welcome To Mark Dayton’s Minnesota

    I gotta confess, when I hatched the “Dayton Dust Bowl” idea way back last fall, I had no idea it would catch on like this. But then, I didn’t think Minnesotans were dumb enough to elect a governor whose entire platform was “killing dynamism and growth in Minnesota” and “going back to the seventies”. But…

  • The Dayton Dust Bowl: “When Did You Stop Beating Your Wives?”

    Dayton “wants the GOP to be honest ” about their budget cuts: Gov. Mark Dayton is renewing his challenge to the Republican-controlled Legislature to come up with a balanced budget without raising taxes — and without hurting the state’s most vulnerable residents. “They aren’t being honest about the cuts they would have to make to…

  • Chanting Points Memo: How Are They Bogus? Let Us Count The Ways

    You remember the old lawyer’s bromide; “if the facts are against you, argue law; if the law is against you, argue facts; if both are against you, argue like hell”. The DFL is arguing like hell. The Dayton Administration and the various DFL cauci  have been claiming that the GOP’s budget proposal is a billion…

  • Where In The World Are Thissen And Bakk?

    Two weeks ago, the DFL in the House and Senate together provided exactly one vote for the Dayton Dustbowl budget. There was, of course, a theatrical letter from Dayton telling the various DFL caucuses not to vote for at – but there’s more than a little evidence that was sent to cover the fact that…

  • The Dayton Dustbowl: Foreman Says “These Jobs Are Going, Boys, And They Ain’t Coming Back”

    HutchTech is laying off a third of its workforce, and moving a chunk of what’s left to… …newly pro-business Wisconsin. Coincidence?  Correlation doesn’t necessarily equal causation.  Technology companies – especially companies that manufacture parts for PCs, which have been cheap commodities for years. Hutchinson Technology today announced it will shed 30-40% of its workforce in…

  • The Dayton Dust Bowl: Crickets

    I had no idea that when I  suggested last week that… …a Republican from a bullet-proof rural seat should sponsor the Dayton budget [and that] the GOP-controlled committees involved should pass it right through, so it can go to the floor immediately for a binding, highly-publicized, up-or-down vote. I think we should let the DFL…

  • Dayton Dustbowl: Missed Opportunity?

    It’s been two weeks, almost, since Governor Dayton submitted his budget proposal. The proposal, which jacks up taxes on “the rich”  by adding the highest state income tax in the nation on people who make over half a million a year, stil has no DFL sponsor in the legislature. None. Let’s make sure we’re clear…

  • Dayton Dustbowl: Too Stupid

    Mark Dayton’s budget:  three billion in new taxes. Minnesotans who make toward $200K – dentists, middle managers, car salespeople, a few really good, hard-working waitstaff, fairly capable software developers, and above all, successful enterepreneurs – will be paying 10.95%.  Over $500K ?  An additional 3% “surcharge”, meaning top-flight lawyers, successful doctors, quite a few upper…

  • State Of The State

    I’m reviewing Governor Dayton’s first “State of the State” address. Failure To Meet Me Halfway Is Like The Taliban Attacking Us, Or Something: Dayton kicked off with an invocation of 9/11 , and Bush’s invocation that “we are all united, and the nation has never been stronger”. Curiously, he jumped from there to scolding the…

  • DFL To Minnesota Taxpayers: “4+0=3, Winston”

    As I pointed out this morning, the notion of the “Budget Deficit” is at best a bit of manipulative spin; at worst, it’s an outright fraud on Minnesota voters and taxpayers.  Especially taxpayers. We walked back a couple of the more toxic myths about the Minnesota budget this morning, including the thing all Real Minnesota…

  • The “Deficit” Is A Fraud

    I’ve been fiddling about with trying to find more oblique, writer-y ways to say it – but sometimes the direct approach is best. Talk of a $6.2 Billion deficit is a fraud.  People who refer to is are mistaken at best, lying at worst. What we have is not a $6.2 billion deficit.  It’s a…

  • Forgive Me Father For I Have Sinned

    I have broken the Tenth Commandment. Quotes from “the Governor”: “Under our administration, state government will do only what is necessary – no more, no less,” [in] his first day in office [the governor authorized his Attorney General] to join a lawsuit challenging federal health care reform. Democrats, who controlled state government until Monday, had…

  • Sturdevant: “The DFL Set A Fiscal IED!”

    The old “take a theatrical look in the dictionary to set up today’s column”  trick is an old favorite for writers who’ve hit bottom in the idea bag but still need to crank something out.  I am, of course, nowhere near the bottom of the barrel – and I’ve always found the whole “Hey, lookit…

  • Top Five Reasons Dayton Should Not Be Governor – #5: We Are Better Than This

    Think back over the past six months of Mark Dayton’s campaign. Think over the ads he’s run.  Think back over the messages. Why would you vote for Mark Dayton? Now, make no mistake; the Dayton campaign – and its “third-party” advertising from the Alliance for a Better Minnesota, which is “third party” only on the…

  • Behold The DFL Jobs Plan

    After decades of control by the ultraliberal DFL and a GOP that was merely center-left until probably fifteen years ago, Minnesota has had business and corporate tax rates that rivalled some of the nation’s worst tax hellholes – New York, California, New Jersey. Liberals inevitably respond “well, look at all the companies that have their…

  • The Dayton Dustbowl: Really Really Dead Dead Dead On Arrival

    Between the Tea Party and the general distaste for more taxation and government spending, it might be  bad year to be proposing…taxing and spending. As I noted on Labor Day, Mark Dayton’s tax-hike-based budget plan is very likely dead on arrival at the legislature.  My rationale at the time was that Dayton’s tax hike was…

  • Media: AWOL Redux – Nothing Personal; Just Business

    Rachel Stassen-Berger, writing in the Strib yesterday: Republican candidate for governor Tom Emmer is all over the new Republican theme — Democratic candidate Mark Dayton doesn’t have a complete budget plan. Emmer hammered the point, made by supportive Republicans repeatedly during the past few days, on a Tuesday spot on Minnesota Public Radio. “Let’s start…

  • Media: AWOL! Day One!

    Remember in June and July? When the Dayton Campaign, and their minimum-wage minions in the leftyblogosphere, demanded that Tom Emmer release his budget plan? Because without an Emmer Budget Plan in place for their perusal, democracy itself was in mortal danger! The entire media was in on it. of course. Tom Scheck at MPR?  Yep. …

  • The Dayton Dustbowl: Living In A World Of Pure Imagination

    Remember last June? According to the DFL and their buildup of minimum wage leftyblog minions, the fact that Tom Emmer hadn’t released a detailed budget plan was a finger in the eye of The People.  They had a right to knoooooooooow!, after all.  And they had to knooooooooooow it right then and there, dagnabbit! Then…

  • The Dayton Dustbowl: Those Pesky Contractors Redux

    Remember when we first looked at the Dayton Dustbowl, back on Labor Day? We looked at all the holes in the original Dayton Dustbowl – the 1.0 version of Mark Dayton’s budget plan. One bit that got carried through verbatim in Dust Bowl 2.0 was this plan – to save $425 million per biennium by…

  • The Dayton Dustbowl: For The Record

    On the show on Saturday, I talked about how the Dayton “2.0” budget – his second shot at the budget, after his first attempt came up three freaking billion dollars short – was still one freaking billion dollars short. Someone called off the air asking for proof; I’d gotten into an interview, so couldn’t answer…

  • The Dayton Dustbowl 2.0: Not Ready For Prime Time

    After four months of demanding “details” from Tom Emmer, and a month of carping about the details that were actually released, Mark Dayton had to… …um, scrap his first budget and start over. The second try isn’t a whole lot better than the first. I’ll do a much more detailed analysis later, but at first…

  • The Dayton Dust Bowl: Even Scapegoats Have Limits

    Dayton Says: “Taxing the Rich” will raise four billion dollars. The MN Department of Revenue says: This proposal adds a new top bracket at a rate of 10.95% starting in tax year 2011. The 10.95% bracket is set at $150,000 for married joint filers, $75,000 for married separate filers, and $130,000 for single and head…

  • The Dayton Dust Bowl: Details, Details

    The Twin Cities media continues its ongoing wet tongue kiss of Mark Dayton.  This time, it’s Eric Black at the MinnPost – who sniffs that if you’re of those weirdos that focuses on big principles and visions of limited government getting out of the peoples’ way, then maybe Tom Emmer might be for you.  But……