An Idea Whose Time Has Come
By Mitch Berg
The best legislation happens when sarcasm turns into policy:
When Rep. Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, introduced an amendment that would require drug tests for Minnesota welfare recipients, Rep. Tina Liebling, DFL-Rochester, countered with an amendment to the amendment. If welfare recipients had to pee in a cup before they could get a check from the state, she said, state lawmakers should have to do the same.
“You should be ashamed. You should really be ashamed to be using poor kids” to score political points, Liebling told Drazkowski during floor debate.
Blanket drug tests for lawmakers, she said, makes about as much sense as blanket testing of participants in the Minnesota Family Investment Program, or MFIP.
To which every single Minnesotan responds “Hell yeah!” And those of us who work in the private sector added “if we have to take the whiz test before job offers become official, then yes, let’s make sure both welfare recipients and the legislature, and maybe every single government employee, does the same”.
To their credit, so did the House:
Liebling’s amendment might have been ironic, but it won enthusiastic support from both sides of the aisle. Liebling’s amendment to the amendment was adopted with the support of all but a dozen lawmakers, including House Speaker Paul Thissen. Drazkowski’s amendment passed by a vote of 83-49.
I’m sure the amendment will get scrubbed out over time. But for the moment, it makes epic sense.
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:21 am
I just love it when someone rubs a leftists’ rodent snout into their own feces!
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:35 am
“You should really be ashamed to be using poor kids”
Since the “kids” aren’t the recipients of the checks it’s doubtful that they would be the ones tested.
Am I missing something?
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:50 am
Adrain, when reading their legislative proposals and supporting propaganda you must think like an unscrupulous lefty rodent.
“Poor kids” means “Future Democrat voters”.
They already own the apparently drug addled, demonstrably feckless parents lock, stock and barrel. But it is imperative that future Democrat voters *never* be exposed to the idea that a handout isn’t completely free…and free includes any pre-requisite assumption of responsibility.
Can’t have the core base thinking for themselves.
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:51 am
14 year old unwed mothers, perhaps. (That’s on my mind because that is the age of the mother who’s stillborn went into the laundry)
April 23rd, 2013 at 11:29 am
Is the governor included? And I’m thinking that Senator Smalley should be on the list, too.
Publish the results. It would probably explain a lot of things coming out of St. Paul and DC.
April 23rd, 2013 at 12:33 pm
I think it’s a great idea and should be instituted immediately in the U.S. House and Senate. Implementation will be easy; you simply test everyone as they line up to whizz on the Constitution.
April 23rd, 2013 at 12:42 pm
Every month I get the wonderful job of overseeing drug testing for a group of kids, except in this case we don’t call them kids when they are wearing the uniform of the United States Army.
The indignation over welfare drug testing falls apart logically when you remember that everyone who serves in the military is subject to random testing at any time.
April 23rd, 2013 at 1:04 pm
This makes perfect sense. It is scary that if the media doesn’t vet these candidates, who knows what they have done in the past or are capable of. It also figures that an immoral, economically illiterate left wing stooge like Thissen would object. He’s probably got more skeletons in his closet than Al Capone did.
April 23rd, 2013 at 2:08 pm
“The indignation over welfare drug testing falls apart logically…”
Well, there’s your problem…
April 23rd, 2013 at 9:24 pm
The original proposal was for IQ testing.
April 23rd, 2013 at 11:14 pm
You are right, the Senate will probably strip it out but then again, it could get a life of it’s own.
April 24th, 2013 at 8:56 am
Florida has passed this legislation…prepare yourselves for an influx of dope addled “99%ers”.