In the world of Rock and Roll, in the words of Neil Young, “it’s better to burn out than fade away”.

In the world of Bruce Springsteen’s music, when characters screw up, they flame out big-time – and usually take other people down with ’em.

In “Johnny 99”, from Nebraska, the protagonist – “Ralph” – gets laid off from a job at a car plant. He gets “too drunk from mixing Tangueray and Wine” – itself a major botch – and shoots a night clerk. It instantly changes his life; he goes from being a regular guy to a lifer overnight. His life is completely screwed, he declares as he’s sentenced.

Now judge I had debts no honest man could pay

The bank was holdin’ my mortgage and they were gonna take my house away

Now I ain’t sayin’ that makes me an innocent man

But it was more `n all this that put that gun in my hand

 

Well your honor I do believe I’d be better off dead

So if you can take a man’s life for the thoughts that’s in his head

Then sit back in that chair and think it over judge one more time

And let `em shave off my hair and put me on that killin’ line

Clearly, the character of Ralph/Johnny didn’t preconsider his actions according to the long-term consequences one might expect from them – but then if Mr. 99 had merely thrown up and gone to bed, the song would be a pretty mundane commentary on the human condition. People do act in ways that ignore their actions’ long-term consequences, in ways big and small, all the time.

And there’s the point.

Another of conservatism’s key tenets is the idea of prudence; a conservative measures actions against their likely long-term consequences, and tries to decide and act accordingly.

They also recognize – as Johnny 99 did not, until the end of the song – the consequences of failing at this.

And among the many reasons Springsteen’s music resonates with conservatives is that the characters, for decades, illustrated the princple, in ways positive and negative, in a way that sounds like…

…well, real life.

(more…)

I’m not sure if there’s a fund to support George Zimmerman’s defamation suit against NBC News over the intensely dishonest, misleading editing job they did in the aftermath of the controversial shooting (which we talked about as it happened)..:

“NBC saw the death of Trayvon Martin not as a tragedy but as an opportunity to increase ratings, and so to set about the myth that George Zimmerman was a racist and predatory villain,” states the civil complaint in its opening salvo against NBC.

(Also at The Washington Post: Can Zimmerman prevail against NBC?)

NBC’s editing of the 911 audiotape in the Martin case became a public fixation after the media-monitoring Web site NewsBusters.org noted editing oddities on a “Today” show broadcast March 27. Here’s how NBC News portrayed the audiotape:

Zimmerman: This guy looks like he’s up to no good. He looks black.

The full tape went like this:

Zimmerman: This guy looks like he’s up to no good. Or he’s on drugs or something. It’s raining and he’s just walking around, looking about.

Dispatcher: OK, and this guy — is he black, white or Hispanic?

Zimmerman: He looks black.

Zimmerman thus didn’t volunteer a racial profile of Martin; he was asked to provide it, a point that the lawsuit makes in colorful fashion: “NBC created this false and defamatory misimpression using the oldest form of yellow journalism: manipulating Zimmerman’s own words, splicing together disparate parts of the recording to create illusions of statements that Zimmerman never actually made.”

…but if there is, I’m going to send a buck or two.

In a just world, everyone involved in that story at NBC should rot in jail for the rest of their lives.

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.

True story – I was watching this video (embedding has been disabled, so you gotta click over) yesterday, probably about 2-3 hours before I heard that Dave Brubeck had passed away at 91.  It’s jazz guitar great George Benson playing “Take Five”.

I’ve never been a huge jazz fan.  Not quite to this level…:

…but it’s not like I’ve never felt that jazz, especially in its late-fifties bebop incarnation, was a self-indulgent, self-referential little musical ghetto that squares just weren’t intended to get.

Sort of like this:

But I saw Dave Brubeck in 1985 at the U of M. It was bebop, and very very very proficient…

…and unexpectedly human. Which was not something I’d expected.

“Take Five” was his biggest hit – selling a million copies, which was unprecedented in the jazz business:

RIP Dave Brubeck.

“Smart Diplomacy” apparently means “represent your country abroad with egomaniacal empty skirts who gave you lots of money“:

The commander in chief is mulling whether to appoint Wintour, one of his biggest reelection campaign fundraising bundlers, as ambassador to the United Kingdom or France, according to Bloomberg News’s Hans Nichols.

(Facepalm)

NOW notes that Obama’s cabinet is about 30% women, and they are not amused:

Currently, the president, who garnered 55 percent of the women’s vote on Election Day, has eight females in his 23-member cabinet. According the National Organization for Women, that number isn’t nearly high enough.

NOW president Terry O’Neill, in an interview with The Daily Caller, explained that she would like to see complete gender parity in Obama’s second-term cabinet.

To pay back all the chits that the Administration owes, it also needs to have 2-3 Afro-Americans, 3-4 Latinos, an Asian, a gay secretary (maybe two for affirmative action)…

…and it’d probably be the right thing to do to make ’em all unionized.

Read more:

Minnesota’s Latino community voted overwhelmingly for Barack Obama and, more importantly at the moment, for the DFL.

And; what did they get?

Minnesota’s achievement gap among Latino high school students is the worst in the US:

Minnesota has the largest Hispanic achievement gap with Latinos lagging 33 percent in graduation rate than their white counterparts. Only 51 percent of Latinos graduated from high school in the state (the worst Latino graduation rate of any state), whereas 84 percent of whites graduated from high school in the same state. Our nation’s capitol, the District of Columbia had the second biggest achievement gap, with 30 percent.

So here’s a question for all you Latino DFL voters; other than rhetoric, what’s your DFL vote getting you?

Jovan Belcher’s KC Chiefs teammates know where the actual blame for his murder-suicide tragedy actually lies…

…and it’s not the gun:

 “If you have daughters, you should (have a gun),” Chiefs defensive lineman Shaun Smith said Monday. “You have to protect yourself. You work so hard to get to where you at, I’ll be damned if I’ll just let someone take it from me.”

Linebacker Brandon Siler, who had Thanksgiving dinner with Belcher, also had no problems with guns.

“Well, a majority of people own one, especially in the places where they’re legal. Most of the time they’re for self defense or sport,” he said.

They’re refusing to participate in an “anti-gun parade” in Kansas City.

Speaking of parades – the New York Daily News‘ Vera Chinese and Stephen Rex Brown are apparently marching in their own little anti-gun parade (emphasis added):

 The unusual questions about guns and the gridiron came days after Belcher, 25, blew away his girlfriend, Kasandra Perkins, 22, in their Kansas City home Saturday.

Let me guess; just to watch her die?

Nope – no media bias there.

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.

To:  Dave Mindeman
From:  Mitch Berg, Non-Physicist
Re:  Elementary Logic

Mr. Mindeman,

I had yogurt, oatmeal and orange juice for breakfast this morning.  Then the sun rose.

Clearly, the yogurt, oatmeal and orange juice caused the sun to rise.

Thus, I owe it to humanity to have yogurt, oatmeal and orange juice tomorrow, lest the world be plunged into darkness.

You might respond “but Mitch, your breakfast didn’t cause the sun to rise!”.

To which I’d reply “No, it is a FACT!  I had my yogurt, oatmeal and orange juice.  And then the sun rose!”

You might reply “Mitch, that’s just stupid.  You’re taking a correlation between two factoids and claiming causation.  You’re ignoring the fact that the earth is rotating on its axis once a day, giving the sun the appearance of rising in the east…”

“Dave, Dave, Dave.  Bubbeleh.  You’re rationalizing.  And clearly afraid of something.  Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to go play “Moby Dick” on the tabletop with pencils, to prevent the volcano from blowing up under Los Angeles.  Again”.

That is all.

(more…)

To: Speaker Boehner
From: Mitch Berg, Unruly Peasant
Re: Another Stupid Decision

Speaker Boehner,

You really are hell-bent on pissing away whatever power you and your caucus have, aren’t you?

Hint:  You’re going to need more support than just Hugh Hewitt and Lori Sturdevant in 2014.

That is all.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

Democrats’ generation-long money-laundering scheme to steal money from responsible towns to subsidize big-city profligacy is ending, thanks in major part to Tim Pawlenty and Republican legislators fighting to balance the budget.

Turns out is IS possible to live within your means. Who knew?

Sure.

And after two more years of untrammeled DFL rule, we’re going to have to teach it to the state all over again.

Rock and roll has always been, ostensibly, about upsetting the existing order.  In the beginning, its very existence upended what passed for “order” in popular culture, at least to the extent of helping create a “youth culture” – something that’d never existed before, and really started in America.  As culture and the genre evolved through the sixties, pop music smeared itself in the “revolutionary” rhetoric of the rest fo the counterculture; in the seventies, the punk counter-counterculture (at least in the English art-school variety) flipped the hippies’ putative idealism on its head in an orgy of self-indulgent nihilism.  Post-punks – U2 would be the most famous and enduring of the bunch) in turn, flipped that on its head in an welter of often self-righteous activism.

And against that backdrop, the music of Bruce Springsteen has always been refreshingly non-revolutionary. (more…)

To:  Dog Gone, Chanting Point Congruency Analyst, “Penigma”
From:  M Berg, overly patient guy
Re:  “Crap Legislation”

Ms. Gone,

Last  legislative session, in the wake of Governor Messinger Dayton  vetoing the “Stand Your Ground” Bill – which had just been passed by a bipartisan majority of legislators – you insisted volubly that the bill was “crap legislation”.

When asked repeatedly to please elaborate with details as to exactly how the bill – which, I remind you, was passed with a convincing bipartisan majority, and was largely identical to similar laws that have been roundly successful nationwide – was “crap”, you begged off due to time commitments.

Fair enough.

But you’ve not only found time since then to…

• leave dozens of your, er, long comments in my comment section
• indulge in a bit of unearned name-calling
• trumpet your own dearth of information on the subject (complaining, for example, that Minnesota didn’t share the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension’s information with the federal NICS database – a shortcoming the Cornish bill would have fixed)

So enough equivocating, dodging, and smoke-screening.  Why, exactly, was Cornish’s bill “crap?”  Please be specific; attempt to submit actual facts that logically connect to a thesis, so we can debate the issue. 

I don’t think you can.  I think you were reciting the chanting points the left put out on the subject – which I have spent years patiently, laboriously, factually and completely debunking on this blog, and will no doubt do again after 2014 – and you don’t really understand the issue.  In fact, if I were a gambling man, I’d bet serious bank on it.

But by all means go to it!

That is all!

Yesterday, I noticed that even some of the brighter leftybloggers are figuring out – or drifting in that direction – that the DFL majority in the Legislature isn’t going to knock itself out to legalize gay marriage.

But there’s another angle to this.

The DFL (or, more accurately, the various non-profits that control the DFL’s entire messaging effort) created an unprecedented turnout against the Marriage Amendment.

The rhetoric was crude, zoomed in on the lowest common informational denominator; “Marriage is about Love!”   “Who are we to get in the way of Love between two people?!”  “Say no to hate!”

If you are a gay MInnesotan, who no doubt turned out in excess of 100% against the Amendment and for the DFL last month?

If you are one of the mass of Minnesotans who was inveigled into feeling warm fuzzy feelings about same-sex marriage by the parade of celebrities, washed-up ex-Republicans and model TV families?

If you’re one of those libertarians who figured “what can it hurt?”  Who believed that  the issue was truly about “no hate!”, and who didn’t wanted to be called a “bigot?”

Here’s the deal:  if the DFL doesn’t, on the first day of the session, put forth a repeal of Minnesota’s anti-gay-marriage law, and ram it through committee and to the Governor’s desk like Jared Allen chasing down a quarterback, then you were all played for suckers.   You and your vote were nothing more than pawns in the DFL’s political power grab.  And their inaction will mean that the DFL has no more use for you that for a used condom; you’ll get about the same treatment.

And if you are a DFLer – say, a DFL blogger or tweep – who doesn’t push, relentlessly, for the DFL to get the anti-gay marriage legislation repealed, and a gay marriage law enacted immedately, then you are not only aiding and abetting the DFL’s hypocrisy, but you are hypocrites yourselves.

So what’s it gonna be?

If you’re not complete hypocrites, you should have this done by March.

(more…)

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

20-something Cold Spring cop killed. PiPress article claims he didn’t draw his service revolver. Really? I thought all the kids wore Glocks.

If they got that wrong, what else is wrong?

Or is Cold Spring so backwards they actually issue pistols and require cops to use wheel-guns?

Joe Doakes

Como Park

Well, it could be one of those “retro chic” things that all the kids are doing.  Or maybe a cop that watched “Get Shorty” and became a revolver fan.

But I’d suspect a reporter who assumes “service revolver” is a technical term for “any firearm a cop carries, from a Glock to a shotgun to an AR15 to, occasionally, a revolver issued to him by their department”.

Not to make fun of the tragedy; my condolences to Officer Decker’s family.

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.

Last week, I addressed a Dave Mindeman post about the DFL whose highlight was Mindeman saying, essentially, “the beatings will continue until morale improves, and you’ll like it!”.

Well, no – his idea was the business has nothing to fear from DFL hegemony in the state.  We can debate that – indeed, we will – but in fact the bulk of my critique had more to do with his claim that business does better when Democrats are in charge. It’s just not true.

Mindeman responded last week with a post entitled, presumably with no irony intended, “Answering Mitch Berg with a Blizzard of Facts“.

The “unintended irony” bit is because most of the flakes in his “blizzard” that aren’t utterly irrelevant or non-sequiturs reinforce my point, and undercut his and, more importantly, the DFL’s and the lefty establishment’s (for whom Mindeman is a reliable crier).

Example:  He pointed out the liberal meme that “the economy does better when Democrats are in the White House”.  I responded that while that is “true”, it’s also dependent on macroeconomic context that goes way beyond the sitting President’s party.  Here – check that part out for yourself:

So when Mindeman writes…:

1. According to McGraw-Hill’s S&P Capital IQ, the S&P 500 has rallied an average of 12.1% per year since 1901 when Democrats occupy the White House, compared with just 5.1% for the GOP.

2. Gross domestic product has increased 4.2% each year since 1949 when Democrats run the executive branch, versus 2.6% under Republicans.

3. S&P 500 GAAP earnings per share climbed a median of 10.5% per year since 1936 during Democratic administrations, besting an 8.9% median advance under Republicans, S&P said.

Again, as I pointed out, there was more to it than just the “D” or the “R” attached to the guy at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.  The “Blizzard of Fact” completely dodges the important part – all that inconvenient context.  It merely piles data together to repeat a flawed thesis.

(And data from before 1933 is both irrelevant – the economy was fundamentally different before The New Deal – and a bit of a red herring, since there really was only one Democrat president between 1901 and 1933, the loathsome Woodrow Wilson, whose economy “benefitted” from massive wartime deficit spending).

Mindeman seems to have learned “fact checking” from the “Dog Gone” liberal obedience school: Google some figures, print ’em, and huff derisively at the fools one must suffer.  To be fair, it’s all one needs among leftybloggers.

But Dave’s not at the 331 Club anymore.  He goes on:

And just in case Mr. Berg wants to highlight Obama’s tenure….

A. Corporate profits have surged an average of 51.8% under Obama, the best out of any stretch of party control since 1933, S&P said.

Sounds good, right?

Except it’s not because business is banging along on eight cylinders.  It’s because businesses are sitting on their cash.  They’re laying off workers, and outsourcing jobs.  They are not investing in new plants, new products and new hires.

Mindeman’s factoid seems to support his thesis – but if you look at the context behind the figure, you find it supports mine.

B. The S&P 500 has also climbed an average of 12.3% each year since Obama’s inauguration, far outpacing the 3.3% mean return for his predecessor.

Asked and answered.  Businesses are sitting on cash. As noted over and over by pundits on both sides of the aisle, they took the bailout money and put it into CDs.  They’re outsourcing.  They’re getting leaner, and buckling in for a rough ride.  They are not expanding; they are sitting tight, tightening payrolls, paring back expenses, blowing out inventory.

That translates into booming profits – but not because business is healthy, thriving and growing.  Or has Mr. Mindeman not noticed the unemployment rate?

And just in case you question my sources… they all come from Fox Business News…an analysis from September 4, 2012.

Well, that’s great.

Unfortunately, they do nothing to change the fact that Mindeman’s thesis – that economies do better, historically, under Democrats than Republicans, is only true on the  most superficial level possible – a correlation between numbers and dates that ignores causation.  And, notwithstanding the unearned condescension…:

But facts never settle anything for conservatives.

…still ignores it.

Note to Dave Mindeman; your “blizzard” did nothing to address any of the historical or macroeconomic context behind the numbers; the fact that from 1945 to 1970, we were the world’s only functional export economy; the fact that some of the greatest shocks to the economy happened to occur during GOP administrations – the 1953 and 1958 Recessions, the Oil Embargo, Reagan’s sweating out of stagflation, the transition after the Cold War, the Dotbomb and 9/11 recession, the Subprime Mortgage collapse, none of which (except the 1982 constriction) had anything to do with Republican policy, or indeed, presidential politics of any stripe.

It was less a “blizzard” than a drizzle of non-sequiturs; a rhetorical version of yelling “pay no attention to the history behind that curtain!”.

And saying “conservatives aren’t convinced by facts” is a cozy bit of name-calling – but the fact (!) is, facts without analysis and context are just…well, snow.

———-

I don’t mean to be too hard on Mindeman.  He’s one of the small cadre of Twin Cities’ leftybloggers that doesn’t deserve to be under police surveillance.  Leaving the pro forma  condescension aside, the guy actually tries to debate.  Kudos to him.

But here are some bonus questions:

If business does so well under liberal Democrat rule, then…:

• Why is Paul Krugman’s wet-dream state California floating toward the surface, its belly slowly rotating toward the sky, with a private sector that is leaving the state as fast as moving trucks can be secured?
• Ditto Illinois, which seems, more than any other, to be the state the MN DFL most idolizes?  It’s taxes are among the country’s highest, and its debt is out of control, and it is collapsing bit by bit.
• Indeed, why are 9 of the 10 states with the lowest unemployment not only run by GOP governors, but have fundamentally GOP cultures – while most of the worst performers are Democrat (or southern Republican, which have plenty of other problems that have little to do with politics)?
• You say unemployment isn’t the sole arbiter of economic heath?  OK – how about business climate?  Eight of Forbes’ top ten states for business climate are Republican (and mostly the ones with the low unemployment).  Eight of the bottom 10 are run by Democrats (Alaska is mostly Federal property and a hard place to do business; Mississippi is a basket case no matter who runs it).
• But if you’ve read my blog, you know that states are rarely purely culturally and politically Democrat.  Like the rest of the nation, even “blue” states are mostly like Minnesota – Democrat-clogged urban cores surrounded by red.   OK – every one of Manpower’s 10 Worst Cities to Find a Job” is Democrat, as are all of 24/7 Wall Street’s Worst-Run Cities in America.  Detroit, Newark, Chicago, Camden, Los Angeles, the District of Columbia, Cleveland, Toledo, Philadelphia, Sacramento – all have for generations been Democrat sinecures; all are collapsing, all are miserable business environments – entirely due to generations of Democrat policies.

Mindeman concludes, more or less, by saying he believes business will benefit from DFL control.  It’s a faith-based statement.  And that’s fine; one can cheerlead one’s team as much as they want.

But judged against actual evidence viewed in meaningful, complete context, it’s pretty clear that’s all that it is.

Nope. No blizzard here.  No need to even button your jacket.

To:  NBC
From: Mitch Berg, guy counting down the days ’til pitchers and catchers report
Re:  “Sportscasters”

Dear NBC,

Yesterday, Bob Costas used your “sports” air time to babble an uninformed, utterly wrong anti-Second-Amendment screed.

Now, don’t get me started on sportscasters and sportswriters and “sports radio” people; for the most part, they are at the cutting edge of everything that’s wrong with America.  They glorify a sports culture that once at least paid lip service to the best our society had to  offer, but today mostly glorifies all that is base and stupid in our culture.  And let’s not kid ourselves; whatever they glorify, it’s all about making bank for the people that own the teams that give the Sports Media a market, which in turn allows you, NBC Sports, to make bank yourselves.

And when they get into politics?  Forget unions and welfare; sportswriters, sportscasters and the drooling baboons and chattering lemmings that take them seriously were the ones that badgered the Legislature into giving Zygi Wilf a billion-dollar spiff to his investment.  Just as they did in turn for the owners of the Twins, the Wild and the Woofies before them. Sports America is the biggest welfare state there is.

And now we have Bob Costas – a guy who wants to be his generation’s Frank DeFord so badly you can smell it on the wind – using your “sports” airtime to prate and gabble about the Second Amendment.   As if taking an troubled boy with a talent for running or blocking or tackling or catching a ball, glorifying his talent from the age of eight on, allowing him to grow into a rich, spoiled, entitled adult with no education or sense of perspective to feed the system that has made him, his team owners, Costas and all of you obscenely wealthy along the way, didn’t have a role in creating someone so unstable he thought he was justified in killing another human being.

Let’s put this another way; after a career spent making America’s sports industry (and, incidentally, himself) rich, what caliber of handgun did OJ Simpson use?

Or is there a Bob Costas riff against butcher knives out there that I’m not aware of?

Oh, yeah – I don’t watch NBC Sports, and haven’t for decades, so any threat to boycott will be an empty one.  But you get the picture.

That is all.

Governor Dayton’s transportation advisors are advocating taxing the crap out of gasoline, and jamming people onto buses and trains.

Is anyone surprised?

The recommendations include two ways to raise $15.2 billion through a higher gas tax — an upfront hike of 10 cents per gallon followed by annual 1.5-cent increases for 19 years, or a series of 3.5-cent increases over five years with 1.5-cent increases for 15 years afterward. The state gas tax currently sits at 28.5 cents per gallon, including a 3.5-cent surcharge.

That’s forty cents a gallon.  So far.

And when Democrats see Money Pits, what’s their first urge?

Fill them with (our, taxpayer’s) money!

Another $4 billion for transit would come from increasing the sales tax in five Twin Cities counties by a half percentage point, or a nickel on a $10 purchase. Raising vehicle license tab fees roughly 10 percent would bring in another $1.1 billion.

Let’s make sure we’re clear on this:  this is a removal of five billion dollars from productive use in this state’s economy, to build more “light rail” to run from Minneapolis to Eden Prairie, from Minneapolis through the Brooklyns, from Minneapolis to wherever people aren’t and don’t currently want to go.

Democrats around money are like pit bulls around hamburger:

The 19-member group led by Transportation Commissioner Tom Sorel picked the costliest of three options it studied.

What do us conservatives always say?  “Elections have results”.

And one of the results of this past two elections is that Scott Dibble is now creating tax policy…:

The report comes as the Democratic governor is preparing to unveil a tax overhaul after pushing for years to raise income taxes on top earners. It’s unclear how the array of transportation taxes will fit into his plan. Democrats will take over both houses of the Minnesota Legislature in January, creating an opening for tax increases after years of Republican resistance.

“My sense is the governor would very, very much like to get us back in a posture of making these needed and key investments,” said Sen. Scott Dibble, a Minneapolis Democrat who served on the advisory committee and will head the Senate Transportation and Public Safety Division.

…which is a little like putting Kim Kardashian in charge of the Department Of Sleazy Guys And Video Cameras.

UPDATE:  Dave Thul in the comments notes that the GOP should let Governor Messinger Dayton and the DFL run this straight through the legislature.  I agree; let them have their names on the votes.  And any Republican that votes for it, to give the DFL “bipartisan” cover on this stupid idea, should get primaried back to the stone age.

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 be talking about the future of the GOP conservatism and the Tea Party and taking your phone calls.  I’ll be talking with Senatoor Dave Hann – the incoming Senate minroity leader – about the upcoming State Central meeting, and of course the upcoing session.
• 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
• Streaming at AM1280’s Website,
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• UStream video and chat .
• New – send us an SMS text message – 651-243-0390
• Good ol’ telephone – 651-289-4488!
• Podcasts are now available on the AM1280 page!  (Saturday show is #2 – Sunday is #3).
• And make sure you fan us on our new Facebook page!

Join us!