The DFL’s Praetorian Guard: Still Praetorian. Still Guarding.

What do the headlines say about the legislative session?

The Strib: the session “imploded“.

The PiPress:  It “collapsed“.

MPR:  It “melted down“.

All fairly passive verbs; imploding, collapsing and melting down are all actions without authors.

It’d be much more accurate to say the session was killed.  By the DFL.  For political reasons.

Choo Choo Trains Are The New “Shutdown”:  As of yesterday, the Legislature had reached an agreement on a Bonding Bill.   The bill had been through conference committee.  The DFL Senate and GOP House had agreed to a bill without funding the Southwest Light Rail Transit line – a big GOP promise.  The bill – as bills coming out of Conference Committee are supposed to be – was ready for the governor’s signature.  It was ready to be passed with no further fanfare, assuming both sides went at it in good faith, of course).

As always, the DFL did not.

Two Minute Drill:   With five, count ’em, five, count ’em again, five minutes left in the session, the DFL introduced an amendment reintroducing Southwest Light Rail into the Bonding Bill.

Could this be because the DFL really likes their trains, and really really wants to see the choo choo built to Eden Prairie?

Could be.

More likely?  As DFL legislative candidates are starting to fan out across the state, trying to woo voters in a year when they have a Presidential option not much more inspiring than Ole Savior, the DFL wanted to induce a crisis – the death of the Bonding Bill, funding one of this state’s precious few legitimate jobs – and turn around and blame it on the GOP.

So the Transportation Bill didn’t “implode”, “melt down” or “collapse”.   It was given a poison pill.  It was blown up.  It was shot in the face.

Preparing The Battlefield:  But by taking a murder and calling it an accident, the media gives the DFL, and their propaganda arm Alliance for a Better Minnesota, a wide-open playing field on which to romp and play with public perception of the issue.

Mission accomplished!

6 thoughts on “The DFL’s Praetorian Guard: Still Praetorian. Still Guarding.

  1. So, do we sit helplessly by while Goebbels and Axis Sally sell this evil narrative, just like they always do? Any other suggestions?

  2. Add some roundabouts to light rail lines and you’ve got a winner, DFL. Too much “Europe” for liberals to ignore.

  3. Was watching the local Fox station this morning, when the anchors made a comment to the effect that you’d think they could pass a highway bill with a $900M surplus, and then went off into the fact that the conflict over how to pay to the highway bill killed it. I turned to my wife and said, “If you want an example of how screwed up the DFL is, if we have $900 in checking to spend fixing the pool, can you imagine us arguing about the need to get another job to pay for fixing the pool and not not actually fixing the pool until summer is over?”

    I don’t think the DFL is totally stupid here; after all they know the economic IQ of the folks who vote for them. They just want a campaign issue and to get even more in the way of taxes so they can waste the “surplus” on things they want to waste it on, like choo-choo trains. And the media will be in the bag to let them.

  4. Pingback: In The Mailbox: 05.23.16 : The Other McCain

  5. Nerd: The economics IQ of the average doofus in this state is an interesting study in density. Most still believe government creates wealth and jobs. Where do they learn this nonsense? – Northfield, Minnesota and the U campus, primarily.

  6. OK, let me get this straight: $900 million surplus, $269 million in tax cuts, and they still wanted to put the state further into debt? Why?

    Count me irritated as well that they did targeted tax cuts instead of broad ones. Why should the tax code be so complicated that even most engineers hire accountants and professional tax preparers?

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