{"id":2149,"date":"2008-02-20T13:15:24","date_gmt":"2008-02-20T18:15:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=2149"},"modified":"2008-02-20T13:15:24","modified_gmt":"2008-02-20T18:15:24","slug":"consider-the-fine-restaurants-of-eagan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=2149","title":{"rendered":"Consider The Fine Restaurants Of Eagan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Saint Paul – unable to balance its budget without getting an eternal subsidy from the parts of the state that aren’t <\/em>saddled with bills from decades of Tic management – is a perennial financial mess.<\/p>\n

The Republican National Convention, coming to town in September, should be a financial windfall for an awful lot of regional – not just Saint Paul – merchants, restauranteurs and hoteliers.\u00a0 Saint Paul’s city government certainly doesn’t mind <\/em>the extra traffic coming to town, although we know where the Gang of Five’s hearts really are.<\/p>\n

But I digress.\u00a0 With the “Gang of Five” in office, the RNC would also seem to be a big ripe suck for a city administration that never saw a tax it didn’t like.<\/p>\n

St. Paulicy, as usual, has the story<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The plan is apparently to increase the food and\/or drink tax during the time of the RNC convention.\u00a0 While Mayor Coleman’s heart will be in Denver \u2013 he realizes there will be a lot of fat cats and big wallets right here in the Capitol City when the RNC rolls into town.<\/p>\n

As the city looks at a tight budget, SPicy can imagine how this idea emerged.
\n
\n“We really don’t like the RNC \u2013 but there are plenty of rich Republicans.\u00a0 Like us\u00a0Democrats, they like to drink too.\u00a0 They like to eat, albeit better than we do.\u00a0 And since there is not a lot in the way of an expanded tax base in Saint Paul \u2013 the city really needs to find some more money.”<\/p>\n

<\/em>Bingo<\/p>\n

St. Paul raises the drink and food tax just for the week of the convention.\u00a0 When the evil Republicans leave \u2013 things go back to normal.\u00a0 What’s left behind is free money. \u00a0It’s clean and easy.\u00a0 No one gets hurt \u2013 and the GOP won’t miss the extra \u00bd percent.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

On the one hand,\u00a0but for a few demonstrably Republican-friendly restauranteurs and bar owners in Saint Paul, I’d be tempted to try to find a way to direct delegates and their money elsewhere in the metro for their dining and lodging needs (and, ironically and\u00a0hilariously, leave the city’s overtaxed hotels and food to the media and the protesters).<\/p>\n

On the other, it’s a great warning about what awaits this nation should the Tics win in November.\u00a0 Everyone <\/em>who’s not a ward of the state is a target of the state!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Saint Paul – unable to balance its budget without getting an eternal subsidy from the parts of the state that aren’t saddled with bills from decades of Tic management – is a perennial financial mess. The Republican National Convention, coming to town in September, should be a financial windfall for an awful lot of regional […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-convention-08","category-st-paul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2149\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}