Governor 1%

It’s become clear this past few days what “Governor” Dayton’s only real goal has been this past session: provide chanting points for the DFL and its paid messaging service, Alliance For A Better Minnesota.

Well, that and providing Wilfare.

Yesterday, Dayton vetoed a tax bill aimed at helping jump-start small business:

The plan would have given tax breaks for research and development, investment in new businesses, historic preservation and the Mall of America expansion. Tax rebates on capital equipment purchases would have been replaced by upfront tax breaks to small businesses purchasing capital equipment. Included was a provision Dayton sought: giving tax breaks to employers who hired veterans.

And in this lies the three biggest lessons of this entire fiasco of a session. They are simple, but apparently not simple enough to penetrate some moderate Republicans’ heads:

  1. The DFL – and especially the media that supports them – loves “bipartisanship”.  Provided it’s solely on the part of Republicans.
  2. The DFL’s goal isn’t improving Minnesota, or making a better life for Minnesotans.  It’s getting and keeping power.
  3. To get the power back that they lost in 2010, the DFL is engaging in a Big Lie – really, a series of small lies, aimed at winning over the votes of the naive, the addled, the stupid, the ingenuous, the disingenuous and the illiterate.

That third bit?  Right here:

But Dayton said the bill tilted too heavily toward business, to the virtual exclusion of homeowners, renters, farmers and senior citizens…”There is no question that Minnesota businesses have been hit hard by recent property tax increases,” he wrote. “But so has everyone else! … I remain committed to broad-based, comprehensive property tax relief for all property taxpayers, including — but not limited exclusively to — businesses.”

And there’s a Big Lie.  Dayton knows that property taxes are set by local government.  They – accountable at the lowest, most intimate level with their taxpayers – control their own spending.  Dayton, like all the bobbleheaded leftybloggers who also get their chanting points from Alliance For A Better Minnesota, is trying to convince just enough of the ill-informed that this is not to to eke out a legislative victory.

And here’s the message I want to make sure gets out:

After weeks of intense lobbying, state business leaders were unhappy with the veto.

Jobs – real jobs that help the economy grow, not state jobs – come from business.  Now, I’ve heard some business owners say they are disgusted by the performance of the MNGOP in this past session,.

In response, here are  your two answers:

  • Yesterday, we noted that the GOPers that were sent to kick butt for lower taxes have been largely holding their ground.
  • Here, in this veto, you see the bloody conundrum; sending the GOP home this November to “teach the party a lesson” will leave Mark Dayton in complete control.

If you are a Minnesota businessperson, the lesson is clear:  if you are Zygi Wilf, government is here to serve you.  If you are not?  Then government is here to tax you, regulate you, to force you to unionize…

…and eventually strangle you.

6 thoughts on “Governor 1%

  1. All this is true, but I think it still lets the Republican leadership off the hook. They had control of the legislative calendar. They should have told Dayton and the Helga Braiders that their precious stadium bill would only get a vote after the tax bill was passed. Instead, they gave Dayton what he wanted and in return he showed them his butt.

    It should have been obvious to everyone in the GOP that after Dayton and his ABM buddies ran such a cynical, nasty campaign against Emmer in 2010, there was no reason to assume that Dayton would ever act in good faith. He doesn’t play that way.

    If I were a businessman trying to figure out whether to support the GOP in this cycle, I’d be saying this — we’ll support you, but you need to put the Senjems of the world on the back bench. The GOP needs people like Dave Thompson and King Banaian in leadership roles, not the fools who ran the show this time around.

  2. Included was a provision Dayton sought: giving tax breaks to employers who hired veterans.
    If this had passed, would these businesses still have been able to call themselves “equal opportunity employers”?

  3. Say what you wil about T-Paw, but the guy knows how to play moonbats for the fools they are.

    The current GOP leadership utterly and completey failed to parlay their majorities into even one win, and worse, they let the trust fund baby beat them like rugs.

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