Aren’t the Democrats the ones who complain that their opposition is in the back pocket of lobbyists?

We’ll come back to that.

We’ll also come back to this:  until redistricting last February, I spent close to two decades in the old House District 66B, which was represented by long-time DFLer and teachers union mouthpiece Alice Hausman.

Hausman, speaking at an event for which she apparently couldn’t find a lobbyist to substitute for her.

Republicans in the district used to call her “Alice The Phantom”, because she was rarely seen out and about in the district, except for the odd photo op.  Redistricting put her in 66A – but she’s the same Alice Hausman she ever was.

Like I said, we’ll be back.

——–

I went to the Capitol last night.  As usual, the number of pro-Second Amendment people dwarfed the number of orcs – in the overflow room I was in, it was 100 to about five, and that was much closer than it usually gets.

While all of the Republicans on the Public Safety committee stayed through the full three days of testimony, a variety of the DFLers picked up and left the hearings.

Hearings for the bills their people were introducing.  Representative  Hilstrom, Savick, Schoen,  Simonson and Slocum were largely absent from the morning’s testimony – at least, testimony from opponents of the gun grab bills.  I’m going to hazard a guess they’re present for the votes.

But more egregiously, Representative Hausman was absent for the readings of both of her gun grab bills – the magazine capacity bill and the “assault weapon” grab.   Which is not uncommon in the House; Reps have busy schedules, and it’s not uncommon for other representatives to fill in for them.

So who read Hausman’s gun grab bills?

Heather Martens, “executive director” (and, likely one of about three actual members, and that’s being charitable and assuming that they don’t actually charge to be members) of “Protect Minnesota”.

Heather Martens, exploiting an earlier crime victim in front of the Minnesota House.

(No, I’m not kidding.  The late Joel Rosenberg used to tell stories of going to “Citizens for a “Safer” Supine Minnesota meetings – Martens had to rename the group again after what was left of CSM’s credibility evaporated a few years back – where Martens presided over a table with nothing but Second Amendment activist ringers.  Not a single actual gun-grabber showed up for these meetings)

Martens – who, as has been noted in this space for the past decade, rarely if ever says a single truthful or factual word about the gun issue in public – read both of the bills to the committee for the record.  It’s the job the Representative is supposed to do.

This was brought up to Michael Paymar, the committee chairman.  He said it was fairly common for people to fill in for Representatives in front of the committee.

Which may or may not be true, but I’m going to hazard a guess that those people who fill in are almost never registered lobbyists.

I say “almost never”, because it’s against the House of Representatives’ purported “Permanent Rules“:

2.39 EXECUTIVE BRANCH OR LOBBYIST PRESENCE IN COMMITTEE. No House committee, division or subcommittee shall permit any member or staff of the executive branch, registered lobbyist, or lobbyist principal, to be seated at the committee table with members of the House during official proceedings of committees of the House.

“Presenting a bill to the committee” certainly counts as being “seated at the table with members of the House”.

So the facts are these:

• Representative Hausman was absent – according to staff, off doing non-House business – during the introduction of not just one but both of her gun grab bills
• Both of her bills were read by a registered lobbyist
• If a Republican had done this, there’d be an uproar
• BONUS FACT:  After all of the DFL’s whinging about “model bills” last year, in an attempt to impugn ALEC, all of the DFL’s gun grab bills are cribbed from legislation in other states, and are pretty obviously not just model bills, but really stupid ones

So there you go, District 66A. Your voice has been given over to a special interest group.

Are you proud today?

Numerous reports from the Capitol today indicate that Minneapolis 5th Ward Councilman Don Samuels brought a group of school children from Minneapolis to the Capitol to help the DFL pack the hearing rooms at the Paymar/Hausman gun grab hearings.

One correspondent wrote on Facebook:

The children Don Samuelson exploited, I witnessed holding paper signs saying, among other things, “No Guns” as they left the building.

I’m waiting on more photos from the Capitol.

Anyone recognize what school it is that’s sending kids, during the school day, to serve as DFL campaign props?

Twenty-odd years ago, when I first got involved in Second Amendment politics, the DFL controlled both chambers of the Legislature and the Governor’s office as well.

And so there was a constant tug of war every time a putative gun control measure came up.  Real Americans from greater Minnesota would pack hearings at the Capitol to oppose the bills.  So the DFL would jockey the hearing times, dates and places around to try to shake off as many outstate voters as possible.

It worked, to an extent; the Real Americans would only outnumber the orcs 600:20 instead of 1200:20.

In the days before there was an internet, that took some doing.

Today?

There are more hearings  planned for 10AM and 6PM today.  For the latest information, go here.

Democracy.  To the 2nd Amendment movement – it’s about showing up and being counted.  To the DFL, it’s about keeping the wrong people from showing up.

A constituent of Michael Paymar’s writes:

Michael’s domestic partner, Laura Goodman, is a former police officer and now head of security at St Kates.

I think Micheal needs to be asked if there are any semi-automatic handguns in his home and how large are the magazines?

Maybe Ms. Goodman owns nothing but M1911s!

First things first: Charlie Quimby of “Growth and Justice” and Dave Mindeman of MnpACT are two of a small, select set of Minnesota liberal bloggers who needn’t be under police surveillance or at the very least restraining orders.  I’m just giving credit where it’s due (although the idea that a group can be named “Growth and Justice” yet still stand for neither is just a tad bemusing).

But over this past week, both of them assailed Rep. Pat Garofalo’s statement on this past week’s “TPT Almanac” program; the Lakeville Republican claimed, in what struck me as a bit of hyperbole, that the broadening of the state’s sales tax to cover clothing will “destroy” border communities like Moorhead.

Always on the lookout for hyperbole to dissect, Mindeman and Quimby were on the job pronto.

Quimby was – as is his unfortunate wont – dismissive, in a post subtitled “Do We Believe Our Lying Eyes?”

Back in 2007 when Growth & Justice was presenting its Invest for Real Prosperity tax proposals to the legislature, I recall a member waxing nostalgically about his parents hauling the family across the North Dakota border to buy untaxed clothing in Minnesota.

The point of his anecdote was that if Minnesota lowered its sales tax and broadened its tax base—as economists recommend—this lucrative cross-border school clothing traffic would dry up, with terrible consequences for Minnesota’s border city retailers.

We’re hearing a version of the same tale…This week, Rep. Pat Garofalo objected on TPT’s Almanac: At the Capitol. He reported that a North Dakota Democrat was proposing eliminating the state’s tax on clothing as a form of tax relief.

“Retail businesses in border communities like Moorhead will be destroyed,” Garofalo said, attracting blogger Dave Mindeman’s skeptical response:

Mindeman interspersed some facts with the snark (which is to his style what dismissal is to Quimby’s) in his piece, noting – correctly – that North Dakota has a 5% sales tax, onto which Grand Forks and Fargo lard 2% in city sales taxes.

Oh my God….how would Minnesota compete?…Garofalo loves that flaming rhetoric doesn’t he?

Fact: North Dakota sales tax is currently 5.0%. Fargo, ND which is the booming ND metropolis across the river from Moorhead adds a 2% city tax. So here is the facts. Under Dayton’s tax proposal, Moorhead (which adds no city tax) would be 5.5%. Fargo would charge 7.0% Clothing may be exempt in the future, but Moorhead will still have clothing under $100 exempt as well.

And like most DFLers, Mindeman, like Quimby, can’t resist taking a homer shot at the Dakotas:

But let’s suppose North Dakota finally drops its state clothing tax just when the gap with Minnesota is closing.

Then what? Will Minnesota border towns really suffer? Were North Dakota retailers in the thriving cities of Fargo and Grand Forks suffering in silence all these years?

To which Quimby assents – with, to be fair, an actual study with real numbers:

As the Minnesota legislator said in that 2007 hearing, should I believe you or my lying eyes?…Looking at the literature studying economic activity in response to sales tax rates, I found research that supports the following points:

Response to differences in the sales tax depends on proximity of border communities. In other words, the farther you have to drive to avoid the tax, the less likely you are to do so.

How much does distance matter? A 2010 Utah study of local option sales taxes PDF* that investigated distance as a variable found increasing the tax rate lowers taxable sales (all else held equal) when there is a jurisdiction with a lower tax rate within 5 km, or about three miles. The effect disappears altogether within about 40 miles. This is to be expected for low-cost goods and everyday commodities. But it also appears to hold for expensive major purchases such as new or used automobiles.

All of that may be true.

But the effects of an individual tax like the Sales Tax, and its nuts ‘n bolts comparison with other sales taxes, while potentially interesting and certainly economics-class-fodder, are the trees that help you miss the forest.

For the real comparison between the states’ tax burdens – not just sales taxes, mind you, but taxes across the board – you need to ask yourself a key question:

“What did I see last time I went to the Moorhead/Fargo area?”  Or you could fill in the “East Grand Forks / Grand Forks area”, or the “Breckenridge / Wahpeton” area, or for that matter the “Worthington/Sioux Falls” metro area?

For starters, you’d know they’re called “Fargo/Moorhead”, and “Grand Forks/East Grand Forks”, “Wahpeton/Breckenridge” and “Sioux Falls”.  Because in every case, the North/South Dakota side is where the action is.

And it’s not just force of habit; it’s not even close.  The Minnesota sides of each of these metro areas (or clusters, in the case of Wop/Breck) are sleepy, moribund and dismal out of all proportion to their North Dakota neighbors.  They’re not competitors in any meaningful way.  They are all sleepy little bedroom communities with highway exits; whatever commerce, dynamism and action is happening in the area is happening west of the Red (or the Bois de Sioux, or County 17, as the case may be).

Forty years of wide tax disparity – Minnesota has the #7 overall tax burden in the US, while North and South Dakota are 35 and 49, respectively) has left a clear choice to all of those places; move west, and keep more of what you have.  The choice was more nuanced, of course, 40 years ago – when North Dakota was a sleepy agrarian backwater.  Today, with my home state an economic dynamo in both energy and technology, things are a little clearer-cut.  And at any rate – as noted by Quimby and Mindeman – fluctuations in the sales tax, or any individual tax, are background noise to the larger effect of decades of disparity; the Dakotas have better business climates; while the western 3/4 of both states are limited by their sparse populations (which is why working on the rigs out in the Bakken pays so very very well), but Fargo, Sioux Falls and Grand Forks are all well-developed cities with young, highly-educated populations and, at least in North Dakota, K-12 schools that are as good as or better than those in Minnesota.

So once you take a step back and stop the pointillistic crabbling about this remark or that individual tax rate, you see that the real issue is the long-term effects overall tax burdens have.  As the Dakotas prosper more generally and gain more people and – as seems to be their goal – turn more of that prosperity into tax relief, that disparity is only going to get starker.

Put briefly – the reforms of the sales tax won’t destroy Moorhead, because tax policies took care of that forty years ago.  There’s really not that much to destroy.  It’d be like harming business in Saint Anthony compared to Minneapolis; who’d know?

So here’s another question:  Up until 2 years ago, Wisconsin was addled by governments more dementedly “progressive”, as a rule, than ours.  That changed in 2010, right about the time Minnesota seemed to have some hope of shucking off some more of the dross of DFL legislative control.  Now, as NPR noted last week – in a report I’ll be going over later this week – Minnesota’s economy is stronger as a whole than Wisconsin’s.  But the improvement in Wisconsin since 2008 is dramatic;it’s improving fast, bouncing back from decades of neo-socialist perfidy.  What’s going to happen in Minnesota?

What do you think?  We’re raising taxes in the middle of a recession!  What happened in California, Illinois and France?

That said – we won’t know what’s going to happen until things tamp down for a while.  Will Minnesota’s government remain the shiny toy of Alida Messinger’s band of plutocrat dabblers and union fixers?  Will Republicans retain control in Wisconsin?  If so, give it a few years.  Then we’ll check back.

As to Fargo versus Moorhead?  That train left the station decades ago.  Changing the sales tax one way or another is just bouncing the rubble, as it were.

If this Atlanta woman had had a gun with only seven rounds in the magazine…

The woman was getting out of the shower when she was met by a strange man with a kitchen knife, police said. They said there was a struggle in the bathroom, and she fell in the tub. Police later identified the man as Israel Perez Puentes, a Cuban national who lived in Alpharetta.

“The male was armed with a kitchen knife, a struggle ensued between the two of them. She fell in the bathtub injuring herself,” Gwinnett police spokesman Edwin Ritter said.

The woman tried to fight the man off with a shower a rod, and he forced her into her bedroom, police said. They said she told her attacker she had money in the room. But she grabbed a .22-caliber handgun and shot the man nine times, police said.

Police said the man ran out of a back door and collapsed in the yard. He later died at the Gwinnett Medical Center. The victim, who was injured in the scuffle, was also taken to the hospital for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries. Police have not released her name.

…she might very well know what a Thanksgiving turkey feels like.

If a thanksgiving turkey knows what it’s like to be raped and then stabbed.

Point being, there are times – and they are not uncommon – when seven shots just aren’t enough.

To: Minnesota DFL Pundits, Politicians, Academics And “Journalists”
From: Mitch Berg, Mere Peasant
Re: Put Up Or…

All,

I’m going to take a moment to publicly reiterate a challenge I’ve posted in the past.

I challenge you – any of you – to debate the Paymar and/or Feinstein gun-grab bills.  In public.

Only ground rules:  We’ll do it in public, at a neutral location.  We’ll have actual debate rules – we can gnosh those out when we set things up.   Bring your “A” game.  You’ll need it.

Have your people call my people.

I am my people.

That is all.

They’re baaaaaaack:

House Public Safety Committee Chairman Michael Paymar, a long-time anti-gun advocate, plans to hold committee hearings on his gun control proposals beginning at 10:00 a.m. on Tuesday, February 5 through Thursday, February 7 in State Office Building Room 10.

The Metrocrats – as opposed to the outstate DFLers – certainly think they smell blood in the water; this is the first time in I think 15 years they’ve seriously considered broaching new victim disarmament legislation.

The press release – from the Gun Owners Civil Rights Alliance – notes:

At this time, none of his gun control legislation has been introduced. However, the NRA understands that Paymar’s gun control bills will likely be introduced later this week or early next week and include, at a minimum, the following attacks on our Second Amendment rights:

Paymar’s proposal hits the usual boogeymen:

• A proposed ban on Ugly Guns:  Paymar would ban firearms with scary military-looking cosmetic features
• Big Magazines: Paymar would force spree killers to carry 2-3 times as many magazines as they do before going on a shooting spree (and force law-abiding homeowners and citizens to reload 2-3 times as often if they are beset by determined, dissociative or chemically motivated attackers).
• Private Transfers:  While even some Second Amendment people think this – requiring all purchases to go through a federally-licensed firearms dealer (FFL), to close the non-existant “gun show loophole” – thinks this doesn’t sound too noxious on the surface, its byproduct -a paper trail for all guns – makes the next step, universal registration, trivially easy.

All three are, of course, utterly useless for curbing any kind of crime.  That’s why the proper term for such measures is Victim Disarmament, not “Gun Control”.

And at first blush, it looks grim:  the Public Safety Committee is 10 DFLers and 8 Republicans.
But there’s more to it than that.

So Here’s What Real Americans Need To Do

There are three real factions on the Democrat-controlled House Public Safety Committee

The first is the Republicans.  They all should get a call – especially if you are one of their constituents – to encourage them to stand up for what’s right, and thank them (if applicable) for their past support.

Representative Tony Cornish (R) – Republican Lead: 651-296-4240
E-mail: rep.tony.cornish@house.mn

Representative Debra Hilstrom (DFL): 651-296-3709
E-mail: rep.debra.hilstrom@house.mn

Representative Brian Johnson (R): 651-296-4346
E-mail: rep.brian.johnson@house.mn

Representative Tim Kelly (R): 651-296-8635
E-mail: rep.tim.kelly@house.mn

Representative Jim Newberger (R): 651-296-2451
E-mail: rep.jim.newberger@house.mn

Representative Andrea Kieffer (R): 651-296-1147
E-mail: rep.andrea.kieffer@house.mn

Representative Kathy Lohmer (R): 651-296-4244
E-mail: rep.kathy.lohmer@house.mn

Representative Mark Uglem (R): 651-296-5513
E-mail: rep.mark.uglem@house.mn

The next faction is the Metrocrats.  They’re mostly hopeless; they’re in office because Alida Messinger and her liberal plutocrat friends paid good money, and lots of it, for a bleeding-heart knee-jerk liberal government with all the baggage it brings.  Victim Disarmament, to these people, is not negotiable.

If you’re a constituent, of course, a phone call wouldn’t hurt; they need to know that their opposition is everywhere.  And a quick reminder of what bills like theirs did to the DFL in 1994 and 2002 might not hurt, either.

Representative Michael Paymar (DFL) – Chairman: 651-296-4199
E-mail: rep.michael.paymar@house.mn

Representative John Lesch (DFL): 651-296-4224
E-mail: rep.john.lesch@house.mn

Representative Joe Mullery (DFL): 651-296-4262
E-mail: rep.joe.mullery@house.mn

Representative Steve Simon (DFL): 651-296-9889
E-mail: rep.steve.simon@house.mn

Representative Erik Simonson (DFL): 651-296-4246
E-mail: rep.erik.simonson@house.mn

Representative Linda Slocum (DFL): 651-296-7158
E-mail: rep.linda.slocum@house.mn

Representative Dan Schoen (DFL): 651-296-4342
E-mail: rep.dan.schoen@house.mn

So when you break the committee down, it’s actually 8 Real Americans to 7 Orcs.

But here’s the important part:

Representative Paul Rosenthal (DFL) – Vice Chairman: 651-296-7803
E-mail: rep.paul.rosenthal@house.mn

Representative Shannon Savick (DFL): 651-296-8216
E-mail: rep.shannon.savick@house.mn

Representative John Ward (DFL): 651-296-4333
E-mail: rep.john.ward@house.mn

UPDATE:  As Colonel Flagg noted in the comments, let’s add:

Representative Erik Simonson (DFL): 651-296-4246
E-mail: rep.erik.simonson@house.mn

That’s two DFLers – Savick and Ward – from outstate districts that are chock full of Real Americans, both independent and DFL as well as GOP, who take the Second Amendment seriously, the very type of DFLers that were mowed down in droves in 2002 unless they broke with the Metrocrats.

And Rosenthal, who won on a one-time surge of DFL voters in a very purple district, who can’t afford to take Real American votes for granted in the much-more-normal year coming up in 2014.

And a polite, reasoned phone call reminding them that there are a lot of us out there in both parties who take our Second Amendment civil rights seriously, as well as those history lessons from 1994 and 2002, might just go a long way toward euthanizing Paymar’s authoritarian dabbling in its crib where it belongs.

Any questions?

Your mission is clear.

Let’s take a quick jaunt through history.

Spring 2011: Governor Dayton proposes a budget with a school payment “shift” – a delay of payments to schools until after an arbitrary date, the end of a fiscal year, to “move” the spending from one budget to another – of something well over $2 billion dollars.

May 2011:  The GOP delivers a balanced budget that includes a shift of a little over a billion dollars.  The DFL whinges that the GOP is “using a gimmick” to balance the budget.  Notwithstanding the fact that Governor Dayton had himself proposed a “shift” twice as large as the GOP’s.

June 2012:  The GOP proposes a bill to completely “repay” (i.e., pay before the arbitrary date) the existing “shift”.  Governor Messinger Dayton, incomprehensibly, vetoes it.

DFLers muttered that paying back the shift would have been  irresponsible, although they never really said why.

Election Season, 2012:  The DFL relentlessly beats the GOP over the head with its chanting point about “Short-changing the children!”, notwithstanding the fact that the GOP had made an effort to fix it, only to be thwarted by Governor Messinger Dayton.

At this point, to the DFL, the “shift” is a campaign bludgeon.

Mid January 2013:  The DFL proposes a budget that proposes paying back half of the “Shift”, but in a bill that – notwithstanding that the flood of other new spending and the tsunami of new taxes – has no funding mechanism, so the whole proposal is vapor.

Late January 2013:  A DFL legislator says the shift “is just another tool”.

Summary:  to the DFL, the “shift” has gone from “Irresponsible to pay back”, to “a fiscal assault weapon aimed at our children!” to “just a tool“.

Seriously.

Conclusion:  The DFL defaulted on their promise “to the children”; they defrauded the voters by saying they’d pay “the shift” back, and they lied about the Republicans’ plans to do the same. 

Discuss.

Special discussion point:  why haven’t Rachel Stassen-Berger, Tom Scheck, Tim Pugmire, John Cronan, Pat Kessler and the rest of the elite capitol press corps reported on this?

CORRECTION: First two grafs were 2011, not 2012.  Time flies when you’re fighting rapacious spendthrifts, doesn’t it?

Comparing two events:

And at least one of the people at the “Gun Control Rally” is a pro-gun ringer.

But compare the media presence, hey?

(Via Andrew Rothman at GOCRA)

The legislature’s been in session for a week, now.

And after running a fierce, lavishly-funded campaign telling Minnesotans that gay people were just like them, and that we “don’t have popularity contests with civil rights”, there is still no bill to undo Minnesota’s gay marriage ban – because Tom Bakk and Paul Thissen are worried about losing a popularity contest over gay rights.

Gays are planning a Valentine’s Day rally…:

They will hold a “Freedom to Marry Day Rally ” on February 14, kicking off what is expected to be a massive effort to rescind the current law banning same-sex marriage and replace it with a law blessing same-sex unions.

The Capitol effort comes after a multi-million dollar campaign last year that successfully turned back a ballot measure that would have constitutionally banned gay marriage in Minnesota.

Opponents say Minnesota may be the first state in the nation to vote against a same-sex marriage ban but that doesn’t mean the state will accept gay marriage.

…but they’re barking up the wrong tree.

Let’s make sure we’re clear on this; from 2006 to 2010, the DFL and its’ supporters whinged that while they controlled the legislature, they didn’t own the governor’s office, so there was no point to passing the legislation, since it’d just get vetoed.  Which is a lame excuse; if most people did, in fact, favor gay marriage, the futile vote on principle would redound to the DFL’s benefit in the next election.

But that was then.  This is now. The DFL controls both chambers and the governor’s office.  There is absolutely no political reason not to push a gay marriage bill – and if there were a political reason, it should be swept aside because, remember, we don’t have popularity contests with civil rights.

Except guns.

But I digress.  Gays – why aren’t you demanding the DFL get off its ass?

To:  All Minnesota State Legislators
From: Mitch Berg, Peasant
Re:  Powers

Dear Esteemed State Representative Or Senator,

I have  a couple of questions for you.

1. Do you support President Obama’s decrees, especially the ones trying to turn legal, law-abiding gun ownership into a public health issue?  I’ll ask you not to equivocate; yes, or no?
2. Are you supporting legislation this session to “control guns” in Minnesota?
3. If so – how do you plan to publicize your approval for the Administration’s actions?
4. If not, how do you plan to manifest this dissent politically?  Concrete terms, please.

Please make your stance on this issue as public as you possibly can.  It does need to be part of voters’ decisions in this next election.

As it was nationwide in 1994, and in Minnesota in 2002.

Thanks for your attention to this matter.

That is all.

Last week:  the DFL in the Legislature, with the aid of their PR arm in the Twin Cities media, exclaimed with great ballyhoo that they were going to “repay the school funding shift”.

As we noted at the time, the DFL promised – ballyhoo notwithstanding – to repay half the shift.  And they did it after Mark Dayton unaccountably vetoed the GOP’s plan last session to pay back the entire shift.

But beyond that, there’s one other clinker.

Take a look at the bill – HF1 – that relates to the “repayment” of the shift.

What’s missing from the bill?

Answer below the jump.

(more…)

If the Minnesota DFL didn’t have the “American Legislative Exchange Council”, better demonized known as “ALEC”, to turn into a boogeyman for the low-information voter, they’d have to make them up…

…oh.  Haha.  They already did make it up.

Nonetheless, the MNDFL – in this case, Senator Scott Dibble – has taken time out from its relentless drive to put every Minnesotan to work to introduce a bill aimed at ALEC:

If the measure became law, anyone who promotes or distributes model legislation would be required to register as a lobbyist. Under the measure, lobbyists and lawmakers would have to disclose any scholarship funds they get to attend events or meetings.

“It is aimed at ALEC,” said Minneapolis DFL Sen. Scott Dibble, the bill sponsor. “ALEC is a very strong influential entity.”

So isn’t it just a little…bitchy to write a law “aimed at” – that’s what Dibble said – a group that does exactly, exactly the same thing as the “National Council of State Legislatures”, or the “Progressive States Network”, or the political arms of all the unions do; write model legislation and try to persuade legislators to pass them into law?

Oh, there’s an out of sorts:

The measure would also apply to other national groups that push model legislation, that is, bills that are proposed and written outside of Minnesota and then tailored to the state. Dibble said a coalition of lawmakers interested in environmental issues would also be forced to disclose more information in the bill became law.

Well, isn’t that special.

I’m not so much upset that the DFL is wasting the legislature’s, and the peoples’, time to count coup over the head of an organization that does exactly what a roomful of other groups do at the Legislature.

No, what we should all be upset at is the role the Twin Cities media have played in serving as the DFL’s handmaidens in this demonization.  The Twin Cities media have written countless stories in this past year, entirely at the behest of left-leaning pressure groups like the Alliance for a “Better” Minnesota, about the “insidious influence” of ALEC – but you’ll scour the net in vain for even a trivial mention of the fact that the PSN, the NCSL, and an organic poo-ton of liberal activist and pressure groups do exactly.  The.  Same.  Thing.

I’d love to ask the likes of Rachel Stassen-Berger, Mike Mulcahy and Bill Salisbury why that is.

But I’d imagine the public doesn’t have a right to know that.

I’m going to give you all a little bit of homework.

Read this piece – “Risk, Relativism And Resources“, by Kevin Williamson, from National Review.   It’s a brilliant piece – and a beefy chunk of reading – on how risk-tolerance and risk-aversion affects peoples’ political choices.

Then tune in tomorrow, when I’ll be talking with Mr. Williamson on the Northern Alliance Radio Network, mostly (but certainly not entirely) about this piece.

And then think: how can we conservatives apply this to the task ahead of us – saving the country?

And I’ll also have David and David on the show:

No, not that David and David, although that’d be cool too.  No, I’ll have Senators Dave Thompson and Dave Osmek on the show as well!

Hope to see you then!

Today is the opening day of the legislative session.  And, as the media tell us with barely-concealed glee, the DFL has a Chicago-like stranglehold on all power in Minnesota this session.

So here are my fearless predictions:

Budget:  $40 Billion.

Taxes:  Broadly up, with a little window-dressing of “progressivism” to further the class war narrative.

Local Government Aid:  Like the alcoholic nephew that keeps hitting his parents up for money “for car repairs/bus fare/new clothes”, Minneapolis and Saint Paul and Duluth will be back begging for more money from the parts of the state that actually work to feed the monkeys on their respective backs.  Like your brother’s enabler of a wife, the DFL will go “oh, we can’t just cut you loose!”, and give them what they want.

Daycare unionization:  It’ll be rammed through like Roosevelt’s declaration of war.  All that union political support don’t come cheap; the purple shirts WANT RESULTS, capisce?  With a nod to Scorsese, (audio NSFW) “Day care providers don’t want to unionize?  F**k you, pay up!  Economy running slow?  F**k you, pay up!  Parents don’t want it, can’t afford it, and unionizing independent contractors makes no sense?  F**k you, pay up!” Look for Dayton to sic the state patrol on non-complying providers by the beginning of next year.

Election Law: Look for the 15 person vouching limit to be raised to eleventy billion.  Look for questioning a voter’s qualifications to be re-classifed a felony hate crime.

Gay Marriage:  The issue that put the DFL in office?

(Crickets)

Today, the Northern Alliance Radio Network – America’s first grass-roots talkradio show – brings you the best in Minnesota conservatism, as the Twin Cities media’s sole source of honesty!

• I’m in from 1-3.  I’ll have GOP House Minority leader Kurt Daudt in the 2PM hour, talking about the outlook for the GOP in this dismal-looking session.   I’ll also be talking with Karen Effrem of Education Liberty Watch about what we can do about the proposed social studies standards.
• Brad Carlson’s show – “The Closer” – is on from 1-3 on Sunday.

(All times Central)

So tune in to all four hours of the Northern Alliance Radio Network, the Twin Cities’ media’s sole guardians of honest news. You have so many options:

• AM1280 in the Metro
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Join us!

After a couple of terms of “serving” as the Eddie Haskell of the MInnesota House, Rep. Ryan Winkler finally has to start earning what passes, in DFL legislative circles, for “his keep”.

His first assignment in the majority?  Get Minnesotans working!

House Speaker-Designate Paul Thissen, DFL-Minneapolis, said in a news release today that Rep. Ryan Winkler, DFL-Golden Valley, will chair the Speaker’s Select Committee on Living Wage Jobs. Thissen said the group of DFL and Republican lawmakers will research, investigate, report and propose legislation to address the decline of living wage jobs, and look for ways to grow the economy and strengthen the middle class.

So let’s do our bit for government efficiency.  Let’s write Winkler’s report for him.

What kind of a report do you think Winkler – a guy whose “day job” is working for Ted Mondale, the heir apparent to the Mondale secular “The State Is My Mother” church – is going to write?  What kind of legislation will he propose?

Put your thoughts in the comment section.

A quick look back in time:  last summer and fall, the “coalition” of groups that handle all the DFL’s messaging (it’s really more a syndicate than a coalition, but tomayto tomahto) ran a wildly successful campaign to scupper the Marriage Amendment.  It was wildly successful at the polls, playing a key role in taking down the Voter ID Amendment and the GOP majorities in both chambers of the Legislature.

The campaign’s key points went something like this:

• “We don’t vote on people’s civil rights!”  – In other words, the “Right” to marry is absolute, not subject to “popularity contests”.  That’s the phrase not a few Amendment opponents used, in fact.
• “People who love each other should be able to marry!” – Note the phrasing.  It wasn’t “people who love each other shouldn’t have to undo constitutional rigamarole to continue their legislative efforts”.  No.  “Marry” was the word they used.   Every single time.
• “They’re just like the rest of us!” – With the unmistakeable inference that they should have the same rights we have.

Since then?  Nothing but weasel words from the DFL.

So – all of you pro-gay marriage people who came out in droves to defeat the Amendment?   The DFL used you for your idealism, and is now sitting on their hands on the issue because…

…why?

Because they don’t want to use the political capital it’d take to legalize gay marriage.

Their complaint in 2006-2009 was that the governor would just veto it (which was a stupid excuse, if you truly believe in principle; pass it anyway, and get the other side’s votes on record, if you believe you’re right! The GOP did!).

But now the DFL has both chambers and the governor.

And yet they’re sandbagging.

So when are you gay marriage supporters going to realize that you were used?

That it was all talk?

That the DFL will never follow through on their implied promise?

Ever?

Over at MPR, Tom Scheck brings us the latest DFL chanting point; the “links” between two GOP legislators (Rep. Gottwalt and Sen. Hann) who pushed a healthcare privatization bill in the last session, and the insurance industry.

 State Rep. Steve Gottwalt, R-St. Cloud, led the GOP effort to cut spending in the state’s Health and Human Services budget when the Republicans controlled the Legislature. Now, both he and his Senate counterpart [Hann] have business links to the insurance industry, which has some other lawmakers asking whether the arrangement violates ethics rules.

This is a chanting point that the DFL’s been working up for a while here.  The DFL’s beef is that…

…some Democratic lawmakers are raising questions about the arrangement.

“I can see why the owner of the business was pushing for the bill. It’s more business for him,” said Sen. John Marty, DFL-Roseville. “The fact that [Gottwalt] is now working for him, I’m disappointed in that.”

Health insurance brokers backed the legislation, championed by Gotttwalt’s counterpart in the other chamber, state Sen. David Hann, R-Eden Prairie.

The incoming chairman of the House ethics committee, Rep. Tom Huntley, DFL-Duluth, said: “If these are payoffs, then the ethics committee needs to look at it.”

And if there are not payoffs – and there aren’t – then will Huntley, Marty, and the idiot leftyblogger chanting point bots apologize to Hann and Gottwalt?

Read Scheck’s piece for the details.

But I have a few questions, here:

Who else are you going to have working on healthcare finance policy? A bunch of lawyers and social workers?  Who knows the financial side of the healthcare industry better than people who, y’know, work on the financial side of the healthcare industry?

Aren’t we cherrypicking the outrage we choose to feed to the media, DFL?  Shouldn’t we bar teachers from committees on education appropriations?  .  Union activists oughtta be at least recusing themselves from votes on Right to Work and unionizing daycare and personal care workers!   Do we want lawyers writing laws?  And don’t be trying to hide, there, Erin Murphy; I’m told you were the executive director of a nursing lobby group, and became the ranking DFLer on the Healthcare Committee.  Or Ryan Winkler, who is employed (heh) at Ted Mondale’s government-data-mining software company, sounding off about legislation that’d involve another data-mining company?

Of course, the DFL finds these kinds of non-corrupt “corruption” all the time, while practicing it themselves.

If only we had some institution – maybe with printing presses and transmitters, and people whose job it was to run down little facts like this?  Perhaps those people working for that institution could think of themselves as a holy, truth-seeking monastic order?  Call themselves “high priests of gatekeeping”, perhaps?

Just a thought.

By the way – lost in the contrived, DFL-agenda-driven “hubbub”:  the program that Gottwalt and Hann developed has been a huge improvement for the Minnesotans it was intended to serve.  “Healthy Minnesota” gives its participants vouchers enabling them to buy a standard insurance plan on the open market; it’s cheaper than UCare, and the participants get better, more personally-focused coverage than provided by the state. There are gaps – every insurance plan has ’em – but it was, as advertised, a huge improvement over UCare at lower cost.

In other words, it’s a government program that does what it’s supposed to do, and saves money to boot.

But “big business” is invovled, and that thought apparently gives DFLers explosive diarrhea.

The latest numbers – from the Met Council website – show that the Northstar Line is an even bigger cash suck than we’d predicted it’d be.

Click to see chart at a readable size.

Ridership is off sharply.  Operating subsidies are up; each ride on the Northstar line costs the taxpayer over $20.  That’s per ticket.

A source at the Capitol who’s been working the numbers on Northstar writes:

“One more point. The NorthStar lovers like to point out that one of the reasons that the numbers are down is because the Twins have sucked the last two years. Well, there does seem to be some truth (taken with a two-ton tablet of salt) to that…the numbers from April to October do give you the sense that the Twins could have an impact.

The source anticipates some of the counterarguments:

Of course, this ignores the fact that we, here in Frostbite Falls, tend to be rather sedentary during the colder months. Heck, just look at freeway traffic in the summer months, which is always higher than winter months.

But look at the numbers: Even if you give them ALL the increase in riders for Twins games, the differential averages to 1,026 per game. That’s down from 1,340 per game in 2011. If you’re gonna bank your success on Twins game riders…good luck with THAT.

The fact is, the Twins could win back to back World Series and the Northstar Line would still be hemorrhaging money.

Last March, conservative bloggers – Gary Gross, me, and others – warned you that the Dayton Administration’s plan to use gambling revenue to build the stadium was pure vapor, and that Ted Mondale (of the Sports Facilities Commission) was blowing smoke up Minnesota’s collective skirt, since gambling revenues have been shrinking, not growing.  Charitable gambling revenues have been falling off for years; the Administration’s plan involves having gambling receipts double.  Immediately.

Yesterday we noted that the Administration is starting to walk back the shell game.  And now we’re discovering that the main venue for the electronic pull tabs that the Administration is counting on – veterans clubs – just aren’t adopting the new toy.

Dave Thul, writing at True North, is on the story:

 So the question is why Legions and VFW’s are so unlikely to move into E-tabs? The answer is complicated, but boils down to three main reasons. First, demographics. The average gambling manager and post commander is over 60 and set in their ways.

Most post officers and bookkeepers are volunteers, so they don’t get paid for running the gambling operations. But they are financially liable for any mistakes they make, meaning a simple gambling system is a safe gambling system.

Second is technology and a bit of Luddite-ism. Despite efforts to get younger veterans involved, the majority of VFW and Legion posts in Minnesota have internet access only for email or transmitting legally required gambling reports. E-tabs require a high speed always on internet access. E-tabs are also 100% dependent on technology; a power outage or a computer virus means no gambling. Paper pull tabs can be opened by candle light if necessary, and bar staff are familiar with the possible ways to scam the system. E-tabs need additional plug ins, charging stations, always on wireless internet connections that are secure against hackers, and a big investment in training time for bar staff.

The third reason is survival. The smoking ban that took affect in 2007 was a devastating blow to VFW’s and Legions across the state, and resulted in a fair number of posts being closed. Ever increasing taxes, ever more burdensome regulations (remember most bookkeepers are volunteers) and a recession that is dragging out into a fifth year are all taking a toll in posts statewide. Faced with all of these issues, bringing E-tabs into a post is simply a bridge too far for most to consider.

Beyond that?  The actual game machines; the state isn’t approving them for use in the state, even if bars and clubs do start turning out wanting them.

So how much are the people going to have to cough up to pay for Zygi’s Real Estate Upgrade “The People’s Stadium”?

We’re not going to know for quite a while.

A source at the Capitol – who was heavily involved in the battle against public funding for the Vikings stadium – emailed me with his first “I Told You So” moment of the new political epoch:

I believe I said, all along the campaign for endorsement…the primary…and the general election:

“The numbers that are being projected, from gambling revenue, to pay the Vikings stadium bonds are wildly optimistic and won’t come true.”

I was right. And there are 32 references in the legislation to the General Fund. So guess who’s left holding the bag? That’s right…the taxpayer.

We were ALL sold down the river by the likes of Steve Smith, Connie Doepke, and Gen Olson…in SD33…one of THE most conservative districts in the State.

And I got their legacy…RIGHT HERE!

Both sides – well, two out of three sides at the Capitol, anyway, the “establishment” GOP and the DFL – lied to the people about how the state-funded improvements to Zygi Wilf’s real estate investment would be financed.

We – the conservative Republicans – warned you; we were right.

The new budget forecast is coming out today.

And it’s generally good news, showing that the GOP in the Legislature paid off hundreds of millions borrowed from schools, filled the budget reserves, and substantially reduced the structural deficit.

Not bad for a “do-nothing” legislature that started with a six billion dollar structural deficit, and was hobbled for two sessions by a governor who was operating under orders from his political mommy ex-wife to sandbag like his life depended on it, now, is it?

Tim Pugmire’s story at MPR quotes House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt…:

“Minnesotans are struggling in their lives and in their families and in their job situations,” Daudt said. “Our job is to make their life easier, not more difficult. So, if we do hit that fiscal cliff on the federal level and we double down and increase taxes on top of that, that’s only going to have a detrimental impact on our economy here in Minnesota, and it’s just going to make things more difficult for families here in Minnesota.”

…and Messinger marionette speaker of the house Paul Thissen:

But House Speaker-designate Paul Thissen countered that even families need to account for inflation as part of prudent budgeting. No matter what the forecast shows, lawmakers must come up with more than another temporary fix, said Thissen, DFL-Minneapolis.

Families, unfortunately, don’t have the ability to extort more money out of their employers.  Unless they’re government union employees, naturally.

“My hope is that we’re not just budgeting to the forecast, but we’re stepping back and actually creating a budget that’s going to work for the long-term stability of the state,” Thissen said.

In other words, if things improve we need to increase taxes and spending, and if they don’t, we’ll need to increase taxes and spending.

This DFL majority may be the best thing to ever happen to business in western Wisconsin.

Gay marriage is worth more to the DFL as a permanent wedge than it is as policy.

I predicted right after the election: defeating the Marriage Amendment, to the DFL, was about waving a bloody shirt to get out the vote; not  a prelude to doing anything to legalize gay marriage.

Legalization would galvanize conservative opposition to the DFL on an issue where the currently-rulling party doesn’t need the friction – and, more importantly, would deprive the DFL of one of its bloodiest waving shirts.

Some on the left – Sally Jo Sorenson at BSP, Aaron Rupar at the City Pages – are finally figuring out that the new DFL majority are talking out both sides of their mouths, although neither will, or knows to, put it in those terms yet.

So mark my words (and if you don’t, no worries; I’ll mark them for you); there will be no repeal of Minnesota’s statutory ban on gay marriage. Oh, there may be a token bill; Scott Dibble and Karen Clark will submit a proposal, which will die in DFL-controlled committee (with the DFL’s noise machine doing its best to paint it as “GOP obstructionism”).  By 2014, gay marriage will be exactly as illegal as if the Amendment had passed.  And by 2016, whatever the results of the 2014 House elections, the DFL-controlled Senate will have blocked it as well.