So who will the media be calling a “far right extremist” at the end of the day?

I’m going to be heading back in to the convention in a bit here, after some family business.

Which I say by way of noting that I’m waay too tired to actually post anything this morning so far.

The GOP’s rockstar diva puts her support behind the “hockey dad.”  Will her last minute endorsement score or just put Tom Emmer in the penalty box?

On the eve of the Minnesota GOP’s two-man dialogue for governor being pared down to a monologue, 2008 Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin has injected herself into the contest with the political equivalent of a powerplay goal for her self-described “hockey dad” candidate of choice, Tom Emmer:

A family man who wants to leave his kids a better future, a “hockey dad” who once played for the University of Alaska-Fairbanks Nanooks, a patriotic commonsense conservative who wishes to serve for the right reasons – that’s Tom Emmer, and I ask you to join me in supporting him for governor of Minnesota.

John “Policy Guy” La Plante asks the 60% question of the evening – is Palin’s endorsement worth having?:

So Sarah Palin has endorsed Tom Emmer. Is this good news for Team Emmer? I’m not convinced.

Why? Because, I suspect, most Palin fans are likely sympathetic to Tom Emmer anyway. But a Republican candidate must appeal to more than Republican voters to win in the general election.

For a good chunk of independents and Democrats open to voting for a Republican candidate, an endorsement by Sarah Palin is the kiss of death. They’re the mirror image of Republicans who disdain a candidate who

gets endorsed by the Star-Tribune .

Much like Emmer’s somewhat questionable choice of Annette Meeks as his runningmate earlier this week, the backing of Sarah Palin makes terrific sense in the context of a political universe that’s set to expire in an endorsement supernova sometime Friday afternoon or evening.  As the adage goes that there’s no bad press as long as they spell your name right, so goes the same logic for the choices that have defined Tom Emmer’s final week before the gubernatorial endorsement.  While picking a highly partisan activist to share the ticket and garnering the endorsement of a polarizing but beloved conservative politician are potential risks come November, they’ve ensured that for better or worse, everyone is talking about Tom Emmer less than 24 hours from what could be the pinacle or nadir of his political career.

But La Plante’s analysis is also spot-on.  Palin remains as much of a potential liability in the general as she is an asset in the endorsement.  And Emmer’s camp must be prepared, should he raise his arms in victory on Friday, to find his win credited to Palin’s involvement by the media in a pre-emptive strike to paint the Delano rep into the far-right corner of the electorate.  Such an outcome likely sounds fine to many on Team Emmer given that the alternative is a long fall and summer on the political bench.

11:55 – I voted.  And now I have to head home.  Back tomorrow!

11:21 – First ballot in for Auditor.

• Conlon (who dropped out during his speech) – 5
• Wiita – 327
• Gilbert – 548
• Anderson – 860

1078 are required to get the endorsement.  Rumor has it that Wiita is a friend of Gilbert’s.  You do the math.  This could be a long night.

11:08 – We’re informed the Auditor results are coming.  Soon.  Still debating picayune resolutions – the bane of these proceedings.  “a resolution in favor of a constitutional form of money”.  That’s what we’re talking about.

10:59 – Waiting on the auditor vote to come in.  And waiting.  They’re debating resolutions right now.

10:30 – Finally back.  I appeared with Marty Owings on KFAI.  Then I had to dash back to my district to vote for State Auditor.  We’re waiting for the results…and there’s Kohls with the gavel.

9:21 – Pat is on now.  I’ve been called to do a standup with KFAI.  Switch to Eckernet for updates for the next few minutes.

9:16 – We’ll start the speeches for Auditor now.  Watching the Anderson video now.

8:57 – Motion on the floor to unanimously endorse Chris Barden.  He’ll make a great replacement for Lori Swanson.

8:54 – The convention has unanimously endorsed Severson to run for Secretary of State.

8:49 – Sorry – I’ve been talking with Tim Burke.  Dan Severson is on stage.  I believe he’s running unopposed for Secretary of State.  Huge crowd of red-clad sign waving supporters onstage.

8:12 – Lee Byberg on the stage.  Endorsed candidate for CD7 – Collin Peterson’s district.  He’s got a thick Norwegian accent; I did not know this.  Him, I gotta book on the show.

“This is the American dream!  Have you ever heard of the German dream?  The French dream?  even the Norwegian dream?  Let me tell you, they  have those dreams.  They’re in America!”

“We are born American; it’s time to recommitt ourselves to the American spirit – to be come twice as committed to the American dream!  This is my story!  Our goal is not just to beat Colin Peterson – but to win the next generation!”

Byberg is tearing it up; Norwegians and “inspirational speaking” aren’t necessarily synonymous, but he’s got the mojo.  Saying all the right things to whip up the crowd.  After that rules debate, it’s nice to have the crowd whipped up.

8:06 – “Here’s a Constitution; it’s what I expect you to hold me and all of Congress to!  And once we do that, we will get the budget under control!”

8:04 – Jeff Johnson introduces Teresa Collette, St. Thomas law professor, endorsed to take on the “somewhat less brilliant” Betty McCollum.

7:59 – Pat Anderson is a row ahead, talking with (I think ) Bill Salisbury.  I’m going to try to scrag an interview with her.

7:55 -By the way – yeah, it’s white in here.  Just like a good chunk of Minnesota.  But I’m seeing all kinds of people here; black, Asian, Latino – my Senate District has an Iranian.  Or, as we refer to everyone, “Americans”.  Just so we’re clear on that.

7:54 – More rules debates.  Chatted with Charlie Shaw, my old pal from St. Paul Legal Ledger and Politics in Minnesota.  Looking like  a fun night in the press pit!

7:46 – “This is bulls**t”, says a leader from SD54.  “They’re letting everyone talk about…roll calls?”  They’ve spent a good 20 minutes debating the idea of the roll call…”

7:38 – I’ve just figured out why more people don’t get involved in politics; Rules Committee debate.

7:35 – Mark Drake from the MNGOP tells us that the nominating committee has placed Emmer, Seifert, Haas, Herwig and Davis in nomination.  Bob Carney apparently didn’t meet the threshold of signatures to make the cut.  I had no idea he was trying.  And I am astounded that Davis made it…

7:25 – I’m sitting with Kevin Ecker from Eckernet.  Michael Brodkorb is giving the Rules Committee report.

Kevin and I are looking at the huge lime-green Phil Herwig banner above the arena, and thinking he might have chosen a better motto; “Change We Can Believe In“.  Thinking this may not be Phil’s year.

7:20 – I’m actually a delegate in 66B this year – but I’ll be spending as much in the evening in the press pit as I can.  There’s elbow room, and easy access to the bathroom.  Hopefully nobody squawks; given that the only seat left was about 20 easts in from the aisle and people are jammed together pretty tightly.

Florida’s political version of Hernán Cortés burns his last ship back to the GOP as he tries to chart an independent path to Washington.

It was barely more than 12 months ago that Florida Governor Charlie Crist found himself basking the media limelight.  The politically-saavy governor of a swing state, Crist quickly positioned himself not only as the prohibitive frontrunner for Florida’s open U.S. Senate seat but as a presidential dark horse.  That one year later Crist is bolting the GOP while the party’s Senate leadership that had once backed him are now suing to drain his campaign coffers speaks volumes of how fickle political fortunes can be.

Much has been already written of Crist’s numerous campaign missteps and penchent to spend his dwindling political capital faster than a crack addict with a gold card.  Whether it was Crist’s ill-advised embrace of Obama and the stimulus (both literally and figuratively), his veto of a Republican-backed education reform bill or his Roger Muddesque inability to state why he was running for Senate, Crist’s once-famous campaign aptitude seemed to disappear into a Brigadoon-like political mist.  As NRO‘s Jim Geraghty notes:

You don’t get to be governor of Florida without a halfway decent sense of political judgment, and in fact that’s supposed to be one of Crist’s best qualities: He may not be the boldest or most principled politician, but he’s always been popular and displayed a knack for staying on the right side of Florida voters…

Yet during this election cycle, Crist’s keen judgment disappeared and was replaced with the bumbling instincts of some of our most legendary modern political blunderers…Almost every key decision made by Crist and his campaign since entering the Senate race has backfired.

Less has been written about Crist’s path forward.  While a few polls have shown Crist leading within the margin of error in an electoral ménage à trois with Marco Rubio and Kendrick Meeks, the political math remains at a calculus level of difficultly.  Crist would need a bare majority of independents plus nearly 1/3rd of all Republicans and Democrats to secure a plurality.  Just a political combination isn’t impossible but nevertheless rare among candidates not prone to wearing spandex and feather boas.  Nor is Crist aided when 52% of independents claim to be unwilling to vote for him under any circumstances, despite a 60% approval rating among the unaffiliated.

Undoubtably, an independent bid was Charlie Crist’s best chance of being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2010.  Unwilling or believing himself to be unable to seek the Republican nomination in 2012 against Sen. Bill Nelson, Crist has bet his once rising star on an all-or-noting Cortés-like strategy.  But left unanswered in his decision is how Crist believes he’ll be welcomed in Washington should he win. 

Should Republicans win the Senate seats they lead in current polling, the GOP would pick up 8 seats this November.  With California and Washington creeping into contention as well, one seat could easily tip the balance of power come January 2011.  Such narrow margins will bring tremendous political advantage to any independent Senate candidate.  Indeed, should the GOP come up one seat short, expect massive political pressure to be applied to Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) to switch caucus allegiances.  Unable to afford a credible candidate to his right in what will likely be an incredibly bitter general election against a well-funded Democratic opponent, Lieberman might be tempted to caucus with the GOP even if his party affiliation remains unchanged.

Crist has little such luxury.  While if victorious he’ll be courted by both left and right given 2010’s likely outcome, neither is likely to embrace him come 2016.  And should control of the Senate shift sharply away from a narrow divide, Crist almost certainly would be discarded, his political leverage gone.  Thus it would appear that Charlie Crist has gambled his entire political career on trying to acheive a single – and perhaps very lonely – term as Florida’s senator.

There are two types of people in the world; the kind that relentlessly sort people into neat taxonomies, and those who don’t.

Likewise, pundits (amateur and pro) fall into two camps; the ones that focus on the jerseys running around on the field, and the ones that look up in the stands to see what the crowd is doing.

Dave Mindeman at MnpACT looks at Tom Emmer’s choice of Annette Meeks as running mate and counts jerseys.

Well, first of all it tells us a little about what DOESN’T concern Mr. Emmer.

1) No help for geographic balance. Meeks is not a legislator. She does not have any natural constituency. She provides no special geographic advantage.

File this under “counting the jerseys on the field”. 

Which isn’t to say that there’s not some value in the conventional wisdom that tickets in Minnesota need to balance the Metro and outstate. 

But there are two flaws to the conventional wisdom:

1. For purposes of getting votes from people who will actually vote Republican – party sympathizers and anyone who can be convinced to be a sympathizer before November – Emmer is balanced, in and of himself.  He’s from the third-ring suburbs, which to0 the conventional wisdom are neither here nor there, but to conservative thought are pretty much the state’s center of gravity.   And, perhaps more importantly…
2. …while regional provincialism is usually very important in Minnesota campaigning, Emmer is banking, for this election, on there being a bigger dynamic at work; revulsion with excessive spending and ruinous taxation.  It’s not a real long shot.

Mindeman continues (and I”ll add emphasis):

2) No offset for ideologic balance. Meeks is a consummate party insider. She will have little name recognition outside of the political junkie subset. And she specializes in conservative public policy. Emmer seems to be telling us that Minnesota wants a right of center governing policy. Independents and Democrats don’t matter.

Again with the jersey-counting.  Look up in the stands.

Conventional wisdom among the jersey counters is that to attract someone who doesn’t agree with you right out of the gate, you need to give them something – a running mate, in this case – who does, as a sort of shiny object to distract them.   In other words, the conventional wisdom is that the GOP needs to “move to the center” to attract voters.

Emmer is taking a different tack; he’s going to spend the next six months giving voters in the “middle” a reason to move “right”.  Except it’s not a matter of left and right; it’s a matter of irresponsible versus prudent; sanity versus madness.  The future of this state and its prosperity is not  a partisan issue!

And Democrats and Independents “matter” not as passive populations to be appeased with potemkin place-holders, but in the way that actually complements their intelligence and dignity as humans; as people to be convinced.

And while it’s arguably risky, Emmer’s got two things going for him:

1. People across the board are very open to the message of fiscal prudence.  Even Democrats are getting scared of Obama’s, and Kelliher’s, lust for taxing and spending.
2. Tom Emmer does a great job of presenting his case to the unconvinced.  I’ve heard him on, of all things, Marty Owings’ “Radio Free Nation”, a left-leaning internet talk show, absolutely kill at explaining why fiscal conservatism works to a hostile but polite audience.   (And while I”ve never heard Marty Seifert face that kind of crowd, I’m told he excels as well).

Convincing the middle to move “right” is what put Ronald Reagan in office.  Emmer, being the single strongest stump speaker in Minnesota politics today, is easily equipped to do the same.

Secondly, the Meeks choice tells us some things that do matter to Emmer…..

1) Special Interests have a say.

Ah.  But those stalwart independents Kelliher, Dayton and Entenza will show us the way on that count, right?

Some of the speculation centered around an early preference for Linda Runbeck, but MCCL intervened….

MCCL staffers did express concern to Emmer’s people about Runbeck, said executive director Scott Fischbach. In 1994, Runbeck was among several Republican lawmakers who changed their votes and tabled legislation that would have required women to wait 24 hours before having an abortion.

Obviously, Emmer fears pressure from MCCL.

Well, the MCCL is certainly a powerful group.  But there are a few other points against the “speculated” (by whom?  when?  in what context?  Mindeman apparently doesn’t feel that’s important enough to tell us) rumored Runbeck candidacy is that she’s been out of public life for a long time, and her last appearance was a tough loss to Betty McCollum. 

That just might have played a role.

He talks the talk about standing up to lobbyists, yet walks the line for the first interest group that weighs in on his first decision making process. How strong are those individual principles?

For my part, I’ll await word the MCCL was “the first” group, or that Mindeman’s unsourced quote had anything to do with the decision.

But I won’t hold my breath.  While Emmer is pro-life, he’s no puppet of the single-issue social conservatives.  One of my most memorable interviews in the history of the NARN was at the State Fair last summer.  Ed and I were talking with Emmer.  Someone in the audience asked him what he thought about gay marriage.

“I don’t care”. 

It is, realistically, not an issue the Governor of Minnesota will ever deal with; it’s of no import.   But wouldn’t a puppet of the socialcons, speaking to the Patriot audience (the very embodiment of the conservative base) have toed the line?

Take Mindeman’s claim with a big block of salt.

2) Feels the Need for Stronger Public Policy Credentials. Emmer seems to be responding here to some criticism of his depth of knowledge in public policy.

Meeks likely will help blunt criticism that Emmer has weak knowledge of public policy and the issues facing the state.

His answer to that criticism is to embrace an academic. Meeks has no actual legislative credentials. She fosters and works inside think tanks. She is a member of the Met Council, but Emmer has openly talked about abolishing that entity. And Meeks herself, has published a paper which made the case for abolishing the office of Lt. Governor.

Right.  She’s no toady.  She’s got a mind of her own (unlike, for example, the DFL’s nominee).

Articulating public policy is far different from implementing it. Meeks can explain the logic of what she thinks should be done, but to put it into practice with real people and real budgets, well, that is quite a different story.

True.

If only there were someone on the ticket with years of experience in the Legislature. 

Emmer has indirectly told us a lot about his decision making process by this first real personnell decision. If Emmer wins the endorsement, and it seems likely at this point, then he will have locked the party into a conservative right ideology. Making a broader, more centrist case to the general public will be difficult.

Which may be a gamble.

And then again, this year, with the Tea Party at his back and the DFL noodling around with four more months of deciding between Same Old and Same Old, it might not be.

And it would seem that Emmer would be comfortable with that. The Emmer/Meeks ticket seems to be designed for another 45 to 47% maximum electoral vote strategy. With Tom Horner as the likely IP candidate, that isn’t going to work.

Only if everything breaks down by conventional wisdom – by counting jerseys.  Which is Mindeman’s game, and that’s just fine.  But…

Emmer has kept himself within the GOP/Tea Party bubble. He doesn’t look like a candidate who will reach out and broaden his base of support. He believes his current base is enough.

…the idea, this year, is to bring that huge, discontented middle over to the good guys.

It was a gamble 30 years ago when Ronald Reagan did exactly the same thing.

Is the time right?

Whether Emmer or Seifert wins the nomination, I’m pretty happy with the prospects.

It didn’t take a rocket scientist to predict Lori “Unofficial DFL PR Flak” Sturdevant’s Sunday column; it was a gauzy, florid paeon to Margaret Anderson-Kelliher. 

I come not to bury Sturdevant’s column – which was a howler…:

Before the balloting started, [Former state auditor, governor candidate, endorsed Lieutenant-Governor 2006 candidate, and former fair-weather Republican Judi] Dutcher and [former state Senator and two-time goober candidate Becky] Lourey, both now private citizens, predicted that this year would be different — not because it was finally a woman’s turn, but because of Kelliher’s other qualities.

“Margaret is such a candidate in her own right. She is so qualified for this job,” Dutcher exuded.

Lourey added: “There’s an energy here to endorse the person who can win in the general election. That’s Margaret, because of her communication skills.” Not her gender.

…and I certainly don’t come to praise this vapid group hug:

…A ripple of feminist pride added emotional punch to her victory celebration, revved up by Kelliher’s call, “DFLers, are you ready to make history?”

But there was no sense at the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center that an upstart girl had defeated the good ol’ boys….

 Noooooo!  Not a bit!…

She won’t be another guy in a gray suit. She’ll stand out, and compel voters to take a closer look.

Former Secretary of State Joan Growe…said Kelliher’s bid to make history should bring her primary and general election support from “Republican women, or former Republican women, and independents…Older women particularly might be drawn to the chance to elect the state’s first female governor… 79-year-old St. Paul delegate Joan Wittman confessed, “It would be a dream to me to elect a woman governor. I’d like to see it in my lifetime.”

The scary part was, though, that I pretty much wrote Sturdevant’s column in my head on Saturday night after I got the word of Kelliher’s nomination.

I could have practically published the whole thing, thought for thought if not word for word!

I knew, after decades of reading Sturdevant’s bald-faced mash notes to the DFL, that there’d be some combination of…:

• She’s an old pro!
• But yet a new voice!
• And an impromptu conclave of strong yet approachable women are spritzing her with concentrated Sisterhood!  Yay!  Sisters are doing it for themselves!
• In the meantime, the tough woman is going to be facing The Man In The Gray Suit!

And it occurs to me; why not save Sturdevant, the environment, and the body politic the trouble for next weekend, after the GOP endorses its’ guy in a gray suit candidate?

Because I think we’re all familiar enough with Lori Sturdevant’s list of cliches – the gauzy soft focus, Up With People vibe for Democrats, the rote invocations of Republicans past (who happened to vote, spend and act like DFLers), the victorian vapours at the idea that conservatism is making inroads in “her” state – to take the next big step.

I want y’all to write Lori Sturdevant’s next Sunday column.

We know it’ll be a wrapup of the GOP convention; she’ll be beholding the new GOP Gubernatorial nominee the way a new father beholds his baby’s first diaper.  Write the column, or some portion of it, in the comment section.  I’ll be moving this post up through the week to make sure everyone can enter. 

Winners will be announced Saturday night.  The prize?  I will publish the “winning” Sturdevant column before the Strib does, so the winner gets bragging rights, and an eternal place of honor on my Contests page.

Would you want more than that for this kind of prize?

And by all means, reprint this challenge in your blog, Facebook page, Twitter feed, the Dewdrop Inn, or wherever – and forward any entries you get.

I’ll be live-blogging the State GOP Convention this weekend – provided, of course, that the wifi situation pans out at the Convention Center.

My current plan is to attend, and live-blog, the State Auditor endorsement on Thursday, as well as the race for the Governor nod on Friday.  I may also pop in to some of the other stops at the party. 

This won’t be my first state convention, per se; I did manage to attend an afternoon session at the ’04 convention; the NARN broadcast, of course, from the ’06 event.  We won’t be broadcasting this year, unfortunately – but that means I actually get to pay attention to what’s going on on the floor. 

So it’ll be great!

Stay tuned!

Tom Emmer has picked Annette Meeks as his running mate:

Meeks is a member of the Metropolitan Council — a public body Emmer has singled out for criticism in the past. She founded and heads the Freedom Foundation of Minnesota, a, non-profit organization that “develops and actively advocates the principles of individual freedom, personal responsibility, economic freedom, and limited government.”

She volunteered to help promote the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul and was deputy chief of staff for former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Meeks was a key part of Newt Gingrich’s staff in 1994.  She’s got more experience at changing and improving government in her fingernails than the entire DFL ticket all rolled together.

Meeks is a spectacular choice.  And I don’t just say that because she’s an admitted reader of this blog.

Congrats, Annette!  See you at the convention!

Someone sent me an email about my post from Friday re the Seifert/Emmer DUI flap.  The writer noted that she believed the current laws are hunky-dory, because:

• Alcohol affects people differently; one person might be fine driving with a .08 Blood Alcohol Content (BAC) while another might act, in theory, like Foster Brooks.
• Prudence says that the suspicion of due process we’ve come to accept with DUI arrests – immediate loss of license – is OK.
• The fact that they were arrested is sufficient grounds to know there’s a problem.
• Driving is a privilege, not a right.

The writer had a point about the alcohol imits.  Alcohol affects people differently.  And “laws” require objective measures.  And while we’re being objective, we should note that there is virtually no evidence that BACs below .1 contribute to fatal accidents (other than the fact that the government calls every accident  in which a participant registers a BAC as a “drunk driving accident.  Every one.  If a meteor fell out of the sky on a car driven by someone who’d had three beers in two hours, it’d be called a “drunk driving accident”.  This is done at the behest of groups like MADD, who have become quite unhinged over the years; it’s dishonest at best).

So it’s correct that a BAC level doesn’t tell us everything.  Is the person measuring a .08 after having been a .16 six hours earlier, but is sobering up fast? Is it someone who had four shots in thirty  minutes, and is on her way up to a .18?   Is it a high school kid and inexperience drinker and new driver who had three beers in two hours and is speeding around like Mario Andretti with all sorts of liquid driving skill, or is it a 35 year old experienced driver who is driving just fine but has a broken taillight and runs afoul of a cop who needs to fill his quota?

The question you have to ask yourself is “is the law’s intent to curb drunk driving deaths, or is it to create criminals by criminalizing a fairly common behavior?”   Since there is no objective evidence that casual drinkers with ’08s cause deaths on the highway (that’s all people well north of .1), and the serious problems are most normally caused by repeat offenders who routinely driver well above .1, it’s most likely the latter – especiallly when you consider that the law distinguishes not one iota for the circumstances behind ones’ mild intoxication.  When the sheriffs put up a roadblock and start breathalizying people wholesale and corralling everyone who blows a .08, they’re not asking themselves “is this person on the up or down swing, do they have a history, can they rationally be expected to be a problem”.

No, they’re just racking up the fines.  DUI is  HUGE moneymaker, in fines, whiskeyplate fees, forfeited vehicles, court workloads (requiring more court staff, which feeds bureaucratic empires) and so on.  It’s in the state’s interest to make sure there are more arrests.  Cynically, it means they control more people (which Emmer’s second proposal would have partially rectified); without the cynicsim, it is an amazing amount of money coming in to government and government’s friends, the State Bar.

I was shocked when I wrote about this a few months ago that something close to 10% of Minnesotans have had some kind of drunk driving arrest.   10%?  That’s astounding.  Are 10% of the drivers on the road a danger?  If that were true, none of us should be on the street.

It’s absurd, of course.  Absent any kind of objective data linking .08 BAC with statistically significant numbers of fatalities (to say nothing of being *responsible* for them, which is another whole thing), it’s about nothing more than criminalizing behavior.

The letter from Sandra Berg cast aspersions about Rep. Emmer’s support for two bills in the legislature  last year (18 years after his most recent DUI arrest); one that would allow those accused of drunk driving to keep their licenses under certain circumstances, and another that’d take DUI arrests off the public record after 10 years of good behavior.

Here’s the deal principles are hard.  The thing about a principal is that it can hurt you as well as help you.  Due process and “innocent until proven guilty” are principles,  which most of us agree are good ideas.  But sometimes those principles mean an alleged murderer goes free due to a hung jury.  Ouch.

So when the letter writer writes “I think the arrest is sufficient prima facie grounds for [seizing licenses on arrest rather than conviction]  to be a prudent thing”  – well, isn’t that true for EVERY crime?  Think of what we could do for street crime if we just locked up everyone accused of any crime at all!  Or if we gave cops portable “Field Lethal Injection Kits” to use on accused murderers!

Saying “Driving is a privilege” doesn’t cut it; it’s a privilege that is a vital part of being able to earn a living for most people.  The fact is, in every other crime judges have (per the Fifth Amendment) the right to consider extenuating circumstances in assessing the accused’s circumstances between arraignment and trial; someone accused of five murders who has a twenty year criminal record and a speedboat waiting to take him to Venezuela might not get bail; someone in jail for the first time for having 15 unpaid parking tickets might get sprung for $100 and no other consequences.   Why is drunk driving any different?  Why can someone who got a .08 and has no record at all get the incredible burden of being without a drivers license, the same as someone with a .2 who’s already had several accidents and arrests?

Because a well-heeled, emotionally manipulative pressure group has made due process an unfashionable principle, that’s why.

So here’s the question; do you believe in the principles of due process and innocence until proven guilty by court and jury?  Or do you only believe in it for crimes where there is no  emotional baggage attached?

Walter Scott Hudson writes on the subject.

I’m going to the State GOP convention next weekend. 

As I’ve said elsewhere – I don’t do endorsements, myself.   I told the people at my district who I’d be voting for as a delegate; I suspect the campaigns both know. 

For the record, either Marty Seifert or Tom Emmer would be a better governor than any DFLer, living, dead or yet-unborn, as the leader of this state.  I’ll work myself to exhaustion for whomever wins the nomination.

Now, over the past few days there’s been a roiling froth about the campaign; the Seifert campaign sent delegates a letter from a Republican activist, Sandra Berg (no relation that I know of) regarding a couple of DWI-related charges, that his competitor, Tom Emmer, got 19 and 29 years ago – questioning not only his character due to the arrests, but some legislation he backed that’d have had the effect of treating drunk drivers as innocent until proven guilty and making DUIs private information after ten years of good behavior – in other words, allowing people who’d made  a dumb mistake to function and get their lives back. 

Drunk driving is an emotional issue – made all the more so by groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving and the rest of the drunk driving lobby.  It’s understandable; anyone who’s lost a loved one to a drunk driver is justifiably motivated to seek change.   But the .08 blood alcohol level limit is a ludicrious waste of resources, and the resources spent on hammering on first-time, only-time offenders with low levels of intoxication are largely a complete waste.

Question:  Does saying the above mean I “support” or am “soft on” drunk drivers and drunk driving?

But it’s ludicrous to treat attempts to make the system fairer and more rational as “sympathy for drunk drivers”.  Almost as ludicrous as assuming two mistakes made a generation ago are defining traits about a late-fortysomething guys’ judgment.

The Minnesota GOP needs to do a lot better than this.

This isn’t affecting my choice at the convention – whoever he is – one iota.

The Republican Party stands on the brink of an epic comeback.  Dropping to near-third-party status in 2006 and 2008 in Washington and in state houses around the country, things looked very, very bleak for the GOP.

But the Obama administration’s overreach, and the Democrat-dominated Congress’ ham-fisted pettifoggery in enabling the overreach, and the spontaneous uprising of millions of people, including many “swing” independents with a bad case of political “coyote uglies” for the Democrats, are what’s causing the Dems’ problem.  The National GOP is not.

Now, a lot of people – including, until the last year or so, me – misunderstand what the national Party is supposed to be for.  It is in charge of fund-raising, logistics, and support for national GOP candideates.  It is not the ideological clearinghouse for the GOP as a whole; that’s the candidates’ job. 

So as messed-up as the National GOP seems to be, what with staffers going to lesbian strip joints and Michael Steele showing his malaprop collection (granted, with the connivance of a media that likes its’ black people to be quiet and stay on Democratic political plantation), that’s not the problem.  Or at least not much of it.

The Democrats are bleeding right now because the American people want something other than an eternity of debt and a future of servitude to the government.

And except for some uppity conservatives – Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Jim DeMint, Tom Coburn and a small legion of others – the party’s response seems to be “we’ll get to fixing things when we get around to it”. 

Look, I get it; politics is about compromise, and right now the GOP, being a superminority party in Congress, is having to fight like hell to even get bad compromises.  That’s life, when you lose elections.

But when it comes to life after January, 2011?  Now is not the time to compromise.  Now is the time for a bold, strong, clear vision that shows all those disaffected, disgusted people who are dumping the Administration and rejecting Pelosi and Reid that there is an alternative, not just ofay, incrementalist reaction.  

More importantly, the party needs to not merely atone for its role in getting us here – the corruption and democrat-style spending from 2000-2008 that helped put the Dems in office in the first place; it needs to reverse that course in a way that nobody can mistake.

The National GOP and all of its candidates need a message that says “we are for stoppping the growth, rolling back the regulation, reinstating economic liberty, cutting taxes, re-limiting government, and undoing the damage of the past ten years”. 

I’m getting that from Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann and Paul Ryan.  We get it from Chris Christie.  When we need it, Tim Pawlenty shows it. 

We need a party of Chris Cristies, Paul Ryans and Sarah Palins; we need to show the American people that we are on a mission.

And for the most part, we are not.

There are millions of voters waiting to be convinced.  I ran into hundreds of them at the Tea Party last week; they want to be convinced.

So convince them.

The latest Rothenberg Report should put a damper on the regional left’s most-treasured shibboleth.  Along with Erik Paulsen in the Third District, Michele Bachmann’s race has been promoted from “Republican Favored” to  not even competitive.

U.S. Reps. Michele Bachmann and Erik Paulsen have been dropped from the Rothenberg Political Report’s list of competitive House races. Previously the the two contests had been rated as “Republican favored.”

Rothernberg is bullish on the party as a whole…:

Stuart Rothenberg is predicting wide gains for the GOP in November. So far in this election cycle, he has moved 44 contests towards the Republicans, while just four races have become more favorable for Democrats.

“Substantial Republican gains are inevitable, with net Democratic losses now looking to be at least two dozen,” Rothenberg writes. “At this point, GOP gains of 25-30 seats seem likely, though considerably larger gains in excess of 40 seats certainly seem possible.”

That doesn’t mean Republicans, and Tea Partiers, should let off the pressure.  We really need to do two things; deliver the Dems a defeat even more crushing than Clinton took in 1994, something that’ll send a generational message; “don’t socialize the US” (and, preferably, also make the Dems a third party, sooner or later).

And above all, we all need to make sure a big victory doesn’t make the GOP complacent.  This vote, as it stands now, will be a referendum on Obama, not an approval of any coherent vision in the alternative from the GOP.  Other than a few obstreporous conservatives like Bachmann, there really is no competing vision from the GOP yet.

And as we found in 1994, and Obama found in 2008, referenda against a sitting or departing adminsitration have short legs.

State Rep. Randy Demmer won the 1st District endorsement on Saturday, beating out Alan Quist and two more conservative candidates.

Demmer, a four-term state representative and business owner from Hayfield, a town southwest of Rochester, vowed to paint Walz as too liberal for his southern Minnesota district.

“We know Tim Walz is working with Nancy Pelosi,” Demmer said. “He’s right there doing everything she beckons him to do.”

For all his talk in 2006 of being independent and representing his district – which ranges from rock-ribbed conservative farmers, doctors and businesspeople in the south and the Rochester area to mewling liberals in and around Mankato – Walz has been nothing but a lapdog for Nancy Pelosi (although rumors that he actually ran and fetched a stick thrown by Madame Speaker are apparently false).

Demmer beat back a challenge from longtime conservative activist Allen Quist and two other contenders, who couched their bids in even more heated rhetoric.

…

Demmer, 53, took eight ballots over about five hours at the convention held at Minnesota State University, Mankato.

And that’s a good sign; while I prefer the more conservative candidates in general, Demmer is no Arne Carlson; his Taxpayers League rating is 64, which could be better, but it beats Walz sitting down.  And while abortion is not my litmus test issue, it does my heart proud to see that NARAL has give him a long string of zeros.  Put it this way – if he wins, it’ll be like Gil Gutknecht never left.  Perfect is the enemy of plenty good enough.

Downside?  Walz is sitting on $600,000; Demmer has about $10K in the bank.  He’s got a lot of ground to make up; even with a conservative tailwind, it’s going to be a busy year.

Any of my readers in the First – please sound off!

To: Rep. Betty McCollum

From: Mitc Berg, peasant in your realm

Re: Campaign

Rep. McCollum,

You’ve been in office for ten years, winning most years by huge margins.  Of course, this past few cycles have been great years for Democrats everywhere – so here in the Fourth District, it’s been just ludicrous; you’ve won by the same margin Brezhnev got in the 1970 Soviet elections.

And you’ve developed a bit of a reputation for dodging debates.  The rumor has it that it’s because you’re just not able of holding your own against anyone past about sixth grade.   But in a normal year, that’s OK – this is the Fourth District. In a normal year, the Fourth District DFL could endorse Ed Gein, Crispin Glover or a bag of Snausages and get 55% of the vote.

But this isn’t a normal year.  The GOP has a tail wind this year; you might not be a walkon this year.  Teresa Collette won endorsement with a pretty good head of steam.

So here’s the question; are you going to scamper like a scared kitten away from a debate and hide behind your friends in the media again?

That is all.

I’m out at Jimmy’s Convention Center in Vadnais Heights at the 4th CD Republican endorsing convention.

I’m kinda impressed that I found Vadnais Heights.  So the morning’s off to a good start.

Well, it was; Bev Aplikowski tells us that we have a long list of speakers.   That’s just fantastic.  I have to duck out of here at 11:45 to go do the show.

8:47 – Phil Herwig is kicking things off.  Phil Herwig is the gubernatorial candidate that makes Tom Emmer go “Yow – he’s far-right”.  Wondering if Leslie Davis is planning on showing up…

9:09 – Credentials report.  Speaking of credentials, I managed to check the MN Criminal History database, per Phil Herwig’s request.  No records for Emmer or Seifert.  What was he talking about?

Herwig’s big “bombshell” – “go on your computer and google your candidates and see that I haven’t knocked over a 7/11”.  Is he saying something we don’t know about Tom Emmer and Marty Seifert that Google (at a quick glance) doesn’t seem to know about?  (Funny – there are three of us in the 66B row of seats madly googling away trying to figure out what the flaming hootie-hoo

8:51 – Bill Haas is next.  He’s a former legislator from Bemidji.  Super-likeable guy, great business chops.  May get to the first ballot…

8:54 – Randy Gilbert, State Auditor candidate, up next.  I’ve interviewed him on the air.  He’s a sharp guy; I think that if Pat Anderson weren’t in the race, he’d have a great shot.  But I’m also thinking Pat is a 900 pound gorilla, figuratively speaking…

Is that Teh Andee Appelkowskie I see?   Why yes, it is!

Straight up 9 – Jeff Wiita, another Auditor candidate.  He makes a bit of hay with the fact that he’s a CPA.  His speech shows it; he talks like an accountant.  That’s not a bad thing, but it’s very much in contrast with Gilbert and Anderson.  On the other hand, he brought his daughter, who has the cutest delivery you’ve ever seen.

9:04 – And Pat Anderson rounds out the group.  She’s got the room pretty well organized, I think.  Good speech; I’ve heard it before, of course, but it’s a good one.

Talking with my BPOU chair Tom Lageson.  It’s the first time either of us can remember having all our primary delegates show up for a CD convention; we have all seven, plus probalby eight alternates.

9:12 – Marty Seifert and his wife are onstage now.  He’s hitting the right notes; “I’m the chief zookeeper; I’m looking for elephants, not RINOs”.    “We need to stop the influx of thousands and thousands of people who come here to take advantage of the welfare system”.    Bangs hard on the Minnesota Federation of Teachers, calling for spending cuts, shouts out for the military, and their defense of liberty.  “The second line of defense is you in this room”.  The small-l libertarian message is alive and well; the moderate Republican seems to be dead.   Good friggin’ riddance.

9:18 – Tammy Pust, candidate for Ramco Attorney, is asking to speak.  It’s a “non-partisan” race, but he’s believed to be a DFLer.    There’s about five minutes of speakers (myself included) on both sides of allowing her to speak.  She eventually won a vote to allow her a couple of minutes.  She notes that she’s the only DFL RCA candidate who’s not running for the DFL endorsement.  She’s speaking now; she’s stating a decent nonpartisan case, more or less; she notes that on the Roseville City Council, she was one of two that didnt’ vote for a tax increase.  I’ll give her points for cojones, walking into the lion’s den when it’s in high conservative dudgeon.

9:30 – David Schultz, another Ramco Attorney candidate addresses us.  Notes he’s a “very politically moderate Democrat”.   Notes he’s never run for office, and that Ramco Attorney isn’t a stepping stone for him.  Notes that he’s never been a party activist, and he hasn’t a chance of getting the DFL endorsement – but is asking for votes in primary and general anyway; notes he has “real legal experience”.

Some of the delegates are audibly upset we’re allowing non-GOPers to address the convention; they make a good point.  It’s an endorsing convention, not a campaign stop.   I hope CD4 revisits this at some point.

9:36 – Greg Wuersel, judge candidate, is on now.  He’s been out front on the issue of political judicial endorsements.  He’s a very entertaining speaker, with some great points about reforming the judiciary.  He’s speaking against the proposed amendment to bar endorsements; “tell them not just no, but hell no!”  Drew quite a round of applause.

9:41 – Tom Conlon, former St. Paul School Board member, now running for State Auditor again . Another great candidate; for many years he was the only elected Republican in the city of Saint Paul.    Really sharp guy, and he’s got great experience at winning quixotic quests; he’s running down his bona fides as a small-government warrior; the guy earned his stripes on the SPPS board.  In a race without Pat Anderson, he’d be a very strong candidate.  The GOP needs him to be in the game, somehow, somewhere.  Notes that Rebecca Otto, the DFL incumbent, is basically a wind-up chattering toy for the DFL; not a bad line to take in this room.  Also true.

9:46 – Bob Carvey – a “moderate progressive Republican” – addresses the group.  He’s running for governor.  Looks like a quaker minister.  I’m going to get some coffee.   So, it seems, is everyone else.  He’s bagging on unallotment.  Let’s just say this room won’t be carrying him to the governor’s mansion on their shoulders.  Says he’ll be running in the primary against whomever gets nominated.  His big platform item – bicycle skyways.   I repeat; enclosed, elevated bicycle (and Segway) skyways.

Oy.

9:52 – Tom Emmer is on stage now.  Seats are full again.  “It’s a good sign that Democrats are coming to GOP conventions to ask for votes!”  That draws a nice round of applause.  Introduces wife Jackie, “my best friend in this world”.  In two weeks, notes, we will be endorsing a candidate; notes we must all get behind that endorsee.  Huge round of applause.  Notes our party must be about perception of integrity.  Standing O.

9:57 – Andy Cilek of MN Voters Alliance gives update on Voter ID.   Tom Emmer still working the room – it’ll take him half an hour to get out of the place.

10:02 – Twila Brase from the Citizens Council on Healthcare speaking for the petition on infant DNA privacy.

10:06 – Bev Aplikowski notes that her novena got answered – her call for CD4 candidates was answered with seven candidates to run against Betty “Rubble” McCollum.  Field is down to probably three right now, and we’ll be deciding the endorsement today – but it’s a huge change in the Fourth.

10:12 – credentials report; it looks like almost all the primary delegates have shown up.  This is kinda big news, actually.

10:14 – Janet Beihoffer is looking for election judges.

10:20 – Dan Severson, SecState candidate, former Navy fighter pilot, and sitting House Minority Whip, is on now.   “If you don’t think SecState is important, i gotta name for you; Al Franken.  We elected a comedian; the joke is on MN!  MN didn’t elect Al Franken; Mark Ritchie did”.    Aggressive.  Good play in this room.   He presents a searing indictment of Mark Ritchie’s regime at  State.  He will be supporting voter ID.  Look for scabrous claims of “racisim” from the DFL long before any issues raised.

10:26 – Chair moves to push the gubernatorial straw poll up ahead of the Constitution Committee report.  Resounding approval.

10:29 – Michael Brodkorb, deputy chair, addresses the convention.   Notes that on May 1, all GOP candidates will leave unity breakfast as friends, all on same team.  This is a huge thing.

10:40 – My computer just in time for Leslie Davis’ speech.  I’m not kidding.

11:00 – We’ve spent the last 22 hours discussing some arcane point of CD4 central committee procedure as part of the Constitution Committee report.

11:04 – I’m told it’s only been 22 minutes.

11:09 – Finally calling the question for the Constitution Committee.  Maybe.  It was a report that was supposed to take three minutes.  Blah.

11;20 – Straw poll happening now.  Informal verbal poll of my tiny district (66B) – Emmer 5, Seifert 2.    Waiting for lunch.   I guess I’m not gonna get to vote for CD4 Rep endorsement.  Bummer.

11:28 – Tony Sutton, State GOP Chair, is onstage now.  “All districts are winnable…but it’s going to take work.  Can’t just watch Fox News and listen to Rush”.

11:35 – I had to take off to do the show.  Hopefully I’ll have results to pass along…

…and I was wondering if anyone could tell me how to find a “coffee party” today?

Anywhere?

Anyone?

Let me know. 

Mmm.  Coffee and debate.

Vulnerable Democrats are afraid Obamacare is going to drag them underwater this fall:

Tough votes for Obama’s health care plan have further complicated the re-election prospects of dozens of already vulnerable freshman and second-term Democrats. There’s even a chance the party could lose control of one or both houses in the midterm elections.

And the nervous Reps are responding like Brave Sir Robin; they’re running away from their constituents:

In districts and states where the overhaul was most controversial, town-hall meetings have been replaced with tightly controlled business roundtables and other gatherings with voters.

In Nevada, first-term Democratic Rep. Dina Titus defended her vote for the health care bill in a newspaper piece she co-wrote and in a meeting with female doctors. Facing a vigorous GOP challenge from a Republican physician, she acknowledged treading carefully.

“It’s more of a teaching tour than a selling tour,” she said of her recent appearances.

Expect to see lots of tightly-controlled, “on message” events, and virtually no meetings with uncontrolled groups of peasants.  Er, voters.

The obvious answer is this; if the Dems are too cowardly to face the people and answer for the damage they’ve wrought, the Republicans will have to do it for them.  Have town-hall meetings, Republicans.

In fact, have ’em in front of your opponents’ offices.

I’m feeling better and better about this November.

I was in the Press Pit at yesterday’s Bachmann/Palin rally at the Minneapolis Convention Center.

I’ll say this about the GOP; there was a time when most of the great speakers were Democrats; Ronald Reagan was something of an anamaly (and a few steps beyond being just a great stump speaker).

Ever watched video of a World War II airplane engine starting up?  The propeller starts to spin, as the starter cranks the engine over.  You know it’s spinning, as the spark plugs start to fire and you hear a few cylinders coughing, but you wonder when the airplane is going to take off.  And then, suddenly, it catches – and the propeller smoothly speeds up, and the engine takes on that hearty roar that catches you in the pit of your gut, and you just know that someone’s gonna get a bomb dropped on them.

That’s what watching Michele Bachmann speaking is like.  When she gets to the podium, you can tell she’s a ball of potential energy waiting to explode; she speaks without notes, and I suspect she goes onstage with a few ideas of where she wants things to go, and tries a few of them…

…and, imperceptibly, as the crowd warms up and as she, like that engine in the B17, catches on, suddenly she and the whole room just take off, and the plane lifts off the runway, you just know that a bunch of Sixth District liberals and sanctimonious state Dems and the national media are going to be dodging explosions the rest of the day.

And Sarah Palin?  When you hear the woman talk, you can see why the national Democrats and media (pardon the usual redundancy) have had to switch to full-time defamation mode, attacking her education, her family, her baby, her hobbies, her looks (and occasionally her term in office, although less-often substantively than, say, by filing and referencing disposable “ethics” complaints (attacks that Palin disposed of with grace and sharp, pointed humor – which is hard to see coming from most of her thud-witted competition).  If they had to take her on on the force of her personality and the power of her speaking, they’d be a third party. She spoke for about twenty minutes; while I compared Bachmann to a Rolls-Royce Merlin aircraft engine, Palin is more like a heat-seaking missile; she rocketed right off the rail toward her target.

Neither of them needed a teleprompter, by the way.

As to content?  Both of ’em borrowed from Reagan, addressing the character of the American people when challenged; the obvious subtext is, “we’re being challenged now”.

As to the crowd?  They said 11,000 tickets had been given away, including 1,000 at the door.  I stood up on my seat in the press pen – there were maybe 1,000 bleacher and floor seats, and the rest was standing room, and the place (Hall D at the Convention Center) was as packed as a good mosh pit.

Afterward, I wandered ovdr to the Hyatt, to see if there was any visible sign of the Dems’ purported counter-rally.

Other than a few black-clad hypstrz, I didn’t see a thing.  Not that I wanted to walk into the Hyatt to find out; I was feeling too good.

More later.

A few years ago, as the ’08 campaign was heating up, up, you started seeing the stories, asking “are evangelicals leaving the GOP?  The story was like so many – an idea looking for a trend – that fairly screamed “someone’s trolling to get ahead of a curve that doesn’t exist yet”.  (The answer, by the way, was “no – evangelicals just stay home if they’re not thrilled with their choices.

So I’m not sure what to think of this story, a CNN poll showing Democrats joining the Tea Parties:

They are not typical Tea Party activists: A woman who voted for President Obama and believes he’s a “phenomenal speaker.” Another who said she was a “knee-jerk, bleeding heart liberal.”

These two women are not alone.

Some Americans who say they have been sympathetic to Democratic causes in the past — some even voted for Democratic candidates — are angry with President Obama and his party. They say they are now supporting the Tea Party — a movement that champions less government, lower taxes and the defeat of Democrats even though it’s not formally aligned with the Republican Party.

I spoke at the Constitution Day Tea Party last year, and I took a very informal poll of my own; I asked people to give a shout and wave their arms when I mentioned their label of choice.  There was a small film of people who responded to “Democrat”.

The CNN poll, wonder of wonders, found…more or less the same thing:

To be sure, the number of Democrats in the Tea Party movement is small. A recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll shows that while 96 percent of Tea Party activists identify themselves as either Republican or Independent, only 4 percent say they are Democrats.

On the other hand, you can see where some Democrats – especially the blue-collar ones that stand to be damaged the most by Obama’s plans – might find some resonance; their parents did the same thirty years ago when Jimmy Carter presented them with the same dismal future.

Some of these disgruntled voters are taking part in the current Tea Party Express tour. The tour began in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s hometown of Searchlight, Nevada, on March 28 and is making 44 stops across the nation. It ends in Washington on tax day — April 15.+

Which is where I’ll be – at the State Capitol for the Minnesota Tea Party, after work on April 15!

See you there!

Speaking of  Quinnipiac polls…

The health care deform bill has already lit up the tea partiers…which could be good…or could be bad for the GOP.

It depends.

…on how (truly) conservative the GOP wants to be next time around.

Americans say they’ll vote for a Republican over a Democrat in the November elections by a 44 to 39 percent margin.

But the addition of a Tea Party candidate to the ballot changes the dynamic: The Republican candidate drops dramatically to 25 percent and the Democrat only slightly to 36 percent, while 15 percent would back the Tea Party candidate.

It strains the imagination to think that there are still 36-39 percent left that would still vote for a Democrat yet at the same time this data shows it’s the GOP’s race to lose and a right leaning candidate won’t fly (again).

In light of this data, loyal readers, who do you think is our (Wo)Man?

In the immortal words of some Oscar-winning song or another, It’s Hard Out There For A Pimp.

Even a poverty-pimp who’s held a sinecure largely on the basis of “elite” business connections that’d make Ken Lay blanche with embarassment.

That’d be Barney Frank.  The guy’s got a tough row to hoe, and I think the strain is catching up with him:

“It’s like the Salem witch trials, and healthcare is the witches,” Frank said. “There is mass hysteria.”

That’s right.  Obamacare is an innocent victim, caught up in mob hysteria (because what is the only thing mass movements do, when they’re not electing pretty-boy empty suits  to the Presidency?), supported only by a political party that came into this term with a near-epic mandate (although get back to us in November). 

Just like those witches.

I’ll give him some credit.  He got it half right.  At least Obamacare deserves to be lit on fire.

So they’ve done it.  The Obama Administration, speaking for about a third of the American people, jammed a nationalization of the Health Insurance industry down the American throat.

On the one hand, American people, you were warned.  If you voted for Barack Obama and are among the millions getting buyers remorse today as you confront the very real possibility that your health insurance premiums are going to jump like a point guard with a rocket up its butt as your access to service decays into a morass of DMV-like misery, remember – we told you so.  We told you Obama was going to do whatever he and his minions could to nationalize as much of the economy as possible.  And he said, even during the campaign, that it all started with socializing healthcare.  He telegraphed the punch, people!

I got a few phone calls yesterday.  “I’m scared”, they said.  I saw a bunch of similar comments on Facebook and Twitter.

Don’t be.

In the immortal words of Harry Dean Stanton’s “Jeb Eckert”  in that American trash-underground classic Red Dawn, there is a better solution.

Eckert knew everything he needed to about government “services”. 

And he had some simple advice for channeling emotions at times like this.

“Let it turn into something else“.

Now is the time for anger.  Constructive anger, mind you – partly because the left and media (pardon the redundancy) will be looking for every sign of anger, translating every fit of pique into an indictment of all dissent (even if they have to make it up).  But mostly because there is no time to waste.  There are only seven good campaigning months until November.

That anger needs to come out – politely, calmly, coolly as a wolf stalking its prey – at your legislators.  If your legislator voted against Obamacare – Kline, Paulsen, Bachmann and Peterson?  Call to thank them.  They need to know – even Democrats, like Peterson – that you appreciate them doing the right thing.

For the “bulletproof” Ellison and McCollum?  You may not think it does any good, and it may not flip any seats, but if Congress knows that there’s strong dissent even in “safe” districts, then they’ll know that the less “safe” districts are in trouble.

And in those less “safe” districts?  Jim Oberstar needs to know that the political trick he turned – the latest of many in a career built on a generation of pork-mongering – isn’t appreciated.  Especially all you Catholics in the Eighth District; he flipped his vote for thirty pieces of political silver. Find him a tree (rhetorically speaking).

And Tim Walz?  Does this man represent you, First District?  Does his vote to turn the Mayo Clinic into a public hospital make any sense at all?  Walz got his office by an upset win in a horrible year for Republicans; there’s no reason the district can’t redeem itself and the country by being rid of him for good.

Franken and Klobuchar?   They’re as safe a couple of votes for Obama as exist in the Senate.  But if you don’t think an avalanche of “no” calls will flip their votes, remember – Kent Conrad in North Dakota has to run for re-election in 2012.  He’s one of the most powerful men in Washington – right behind Byron Dorgan.  Who saw the train – you and me – coming, and decided to get out of the way.  If Conrad hears that the peasants are revolting in Minnesota, what will he think of his own, conservative, disproportionally Medicare-dependent constituency?

Make your calls.  And when (and, in the case of the gutless ones, if) there’s a town hall meeting?  Cancel your other plans.  Be there.  Be polite, but don’t back down.  They’ll have their goons there, just like The Man had in Birmingham and Selma.  It’s what banana republic tyrants do when they’re scared of those they see as their subjects.

When they have to bring in the goons in the purple shirts, that’s the good news.

So don’t be scared.  What’s in the past is in the past.  What’s important is that America learns its lesson before it’s too late.  We need to not only kick out of office every single person that voted for this abomination; we need to stomp the Democrat party without mercy, until it never gets up again. The urge to socialize America must be not just defeated at the polls; it must be obliterated.  It must be beaten into electoral gunk  that swirls down the drain of American history once and for all.

Politically, naturally.

Am I asking for too much?

Was Ronald Reagan asking for too much when he spoke in the seventies, at the very lowest ebb of America’s fortunes, influence and morale (so far), of ending the USSR ? 

Of course he was.  But doing the impossible begins with the impossible dream.

So don’t be scared.  Be angry.  And let that anger turn into the kind of motivation that wins wars, cures diseases, and sends stupid politicians back to their dingy law offices.

And then be there – at the demonstrations, on the phone, at the town halls.

The Democrats planted the wind yesterday.  We need to make sure they harvest a tornado.

…but chasing Bart Stupak (cynical whore, MI) from office with pitchforks and torches would be a fine one to put on your short list.

Yesterday’s cynical abomination has given Dan Benishek a big leg up in his race to replace Stupak this fall.  Here’s the facebook page.

I’m seeing it in the tweets of liberals who, over the weekend, seemed ever more nervous about Obamacare’s prospects.

Their number one target is the Tea Parties.  Some of these people simply froth with hatred (albeit crushingly ill-informed hatred) for America’s biggest grassroots political organization.

Look for every single transgression, no matter how stupid and far out on the fringe, by anyone attending a Tea Party rally to become top-of-the-fold news (in the way that the left’s organized depravity never was).

One thing is for certain; Tea Parties and anybody dissenting from the Administration needs to make sure they have people with video cameras standing by – because the left is far from above sending people with fake, outrageous signs to slander protesters and provide more fodder for the smear machine.