RT Cracks Wise

by Sean Broom | 22 Comments
October 31, 2007, 1:53 pm | Category: General | Tags: .

22 Responses to “RT Cracks Wise”

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  • Big Kahuna
    October 31, 2007 at 3:11 pm

    I hope the protesters are way out of hand and make total fools of themselves. Republicans were smart about this as they know they will not be able to help themselves and the protesters will turn many away from voting democRat.

  • Mockingbird
    October 31, 2007 at 4:01 pm

    BigK you live in fantasy land.

  • yep
    October 31, 2007 at 4:02 pm

    RT should at least consider running for Senate. I’d like to see a poll on Rybak’s favorability/name rec. vs Ciresi and Franken.

  • Big Kahuna
    November 1, 2007 at 9:30 am

    Rybak is hated in most of the neighborhoods in Mpls!! he only appeals to far left liberals, he is not electable to a higher office.

  • Big Kahuna
    November 1, 2007 at 9:31 am

    Mockingbird, do you remember a little backfire called the Wellstone Memorial? Average folks do not care for the tactics of leftist and the protesters will be just that. It will have an effect on the local races.

  • Randy
    November 1, 2007 at 11:33 am

    BigK — I am agnostic on whether he could be elected to higher office, but if Mayor Rybak is hated in most of the neighborhoods in Minneapolis, why did he win re-election by such a large margin (over, BTW, a traditional-lefty challenger)?

  • The Dog Walker
    November 1, 2007 at 11:46 am

    Sorry, BigK Randy is right.

    The leafy, wealthy, white neighborhoods of Minneapolis just loooove RT. It’s only those neighborhoods that have high crime, school closings, library closings and poor emergency response times that hate RT.

    Oh wait, that’s almost every neighborhood outside of Southwest and the Lakes.

  • Kerosene Hat
    November 1, 2007 at 12:31 pm

    As a Minneapolis resident I can tell you the reason Rybak wins reelections is because with effectively one party rule it is hard to unseat an incumbent. Those living in the city that lean right of even the Democratic center don’t have a choice on the ballet. That menas that if a person has the support of those in Kenwood or as TDW put it “The leafy, wealthy, white neighborhoods of Minneapolis” they more or less have a job for life.

    All this leads to the fact that Minneapolis is failing to fulfill it’s basic duties to it’s citizens and keeps having it’s elected official arrested for corruption. If people really knew how poorly the city was run (or how wide spread the corruption is at city hall) they would be pissed off but nobody who works there is willing to say anything because they all belong to the same party. Those of us who have to work through city hall can’t say anything either if we ever want a building permit or license again.

    RT hasn’t done anything of value as Mayor. He alternately alienates the police department by supporting the spoiled Critical Mass brats while allowing cops to get away with often brutal behavior against minorities. He placed a bunch of show piece cops downtown where crime is actually low while the neighborhoods where people live get nothing as crime rises.

    He is a DFL poster boy because he is pretty, articulate and drives a Prius. None of which makes him any more competent.

  • Randy
    November 1, 2007 at 3:11 pm

    The Republicans are to blame for the one-party rule in Minneapolis. The party has largely abandoned the city, and has failed for years to come up with an even remotely credible candidate for office. Arne Carlson represented a Minneapolis district during his years in the Legislature, and his lovely ex-wife was a Republican member of the City Council until her disgust with the religious conservatives led her to leave the party, so it’s not as if the GOP is automatically anathema in Minneapolis. In my part of town, our representative on the City Council called himself an “independent,” but everyone knew he was a Republican (he was Cal Ludemann’s running mate in ‘86). Yet he was re-elected without effective opposition, time and again.

    This is not a matter of the city turning left — the Republicans have turned to the extreme right. Remember a few years back when the Republicans endorsed a Minneapolis School Board candidate whose campaign literature was filled with rants about “tribal sexual practices”? The lame excuse was she gave the screening committee the “right” answers on abortion.

  • Big Kahuna
    November 1, 2007 at 4:56 pm

    In my part of town, our representative on the City Council called himself an “independent,” but everyone knew he was a Republican (he was Cal Ludemann’s running mate in ‘86). Yet he was re-elected without effective opposition, time and again.

    You just made the argument for KH. Why do you think he HAD to call himself “Independent”? Because anyone with an “R” behnd their name stands no chance in the inner city.

    I say that is the fault of the local DFL and how they created a class of dependents so they can count on those votes over and over.

    Republicans did not turn hard right on the cities, we left them for the liberals to run and actually enjoy watching them destroy the cities and have no clue as to why it is happening.

    I am not quite sure how anyone can support Rybak! Total asshat!

  • Brewlovenfreak
    November 1, 2007 at 4:56 pm

    Randy

    Who is your City Council represenative, the only Independent member that I can think of is Cam Gorden a member of the Green Party. The rest are Members of the DFL. But city hall is ran by/for downtown and the southwest corner of the city.

  • Big Kahuna
    November 1, 2007 at 5:02 pm

    Let’s see…

    Failing schools, much higher rate of crime than anywhere else, major traffic issues, pollution, drugs, gangs, you name it, the liberals own all that is bad in the cities!

    I am very happy to have the ability to cause business to move for financial reasons and I have simply set rules to all who will do business with my company that I will not work with any companies downtown nor will I give one dollar of business to any who advertise on Air America. :) Currently working with one vendor who apologized for his ad on Air America and pulled the ad once his business dollars were in jepordy.

    If you really want to succeed, get out of the inner cities and stop voting DFL.

  • Kerosene Hat
    November 1, 2007 at 5:21 pm

    Randy,

    The reasons that Minneapolis became a city of one party rule wasn’t the topic. It was what has happened since then. I remember a Strib article a few years back about how the last Republican elected official was retiring (she was past 70 years old if I recall and served on the library board). The truth is that since having complete control of the city the Democrats have become increasingly corrupt and egotistical. That has less to do with their party affiliation and everything to do with having zero checks and balances on their power.

    R.T. looks good because there is nobody to challenge him in the open and he can try to deflect from his own cities problems by pointing at the governor and president even though neither one has anything to do with the cities mismanagement.

  • Chris
    November 1, 2007 at 9:30 pm

    So Rybak wants to make Minneapolis comfortable for his wife and kids who will be protesting the Republican convention. That’s fine. Maybe it will encourage him to take crime in Minneapolis seriously for a change. Downtown Minneapolis, which used to be a safe and enjoyable place to go out at night is no longer safe or enjoyable thanks to Rybak’s policies.

  • Randy
    November 2, 2007 at 8:41 am

    Brewlovenfreak (Spell Check must hate that) — I meant my former City Council representative, Dennis Schulstad. He ran with an “I” by his name, but everyone knew he was a Republican. News reports used to refer to him as a Republican who runs as an independent (the only negative comment I ever heard about him was that he didn’t have the stones to say he was a Republican, and whom did he think he was fooling?).

    KH — Which came first, one party rule or the “topic”? The complete exile of Republicans from Minneapolis city government came about when the party did its sharp turn to the right. A case in point would be my parents, lifelong Republicans (Mom was a precinct chairwoman) who stopped going to caucuses and contributing time/money when the religious conservatives started dominating things. Less about abortion and prayer, more about fixing potholes, was what they wanted to see.

  • Kerosene Hat
    November 2, 2007 at 9:02 am

    Randy,

    I agree that the polarization of the parties has meant the Republicans have more or less abandoned the city and I don’t agree with the direction they have taken over the last 20 plus years. The current problems within the city however are due to the Democrats that have been in complete control for a long time now. City hall is a mess of corruption and that corruption is used to support the state DFL party as well. City council people shaking down local businesses for donations which they use to support other Democratic candidates, the city inspectors being used to take property from people so that the mayor can say he is combating crime, the library boondoggle and on and on and on.

    The truth is that RT is the head of a city government that is mostly incompetent and you can’t blame Republicans for that.

  • Richard
    November 2, 2007 at 9:45 am

    I’m a little concerned with the idea of “protest areas”. Wouldn’t that be the whole area? If I choose to carry a sign, shouldn’t be able to use public sidewalks? The idea of free speech zones isn’t going to work very well.

  • Randy
    November 2, 2007 at 4:43 pm

    KH, I don’t blame the Republicans for what the Democrats have done, but I do blame them for abandoning Minneapolis and leaving city government without an effective opposition to keep it honest. Unchecked power leads to arrogance and it’s destructive, no matter who wields it (look at Our Beloved Leader in Washington).

  • Big Kahuna
    November 2, 2007 at 4:43 pm

    Richard I was wondering that when I attended the Tax rally Jasen Lewis held at the capitol. We let the global warming folks come hang out with their signs yet when the Tax rally was over you should have seen the line of liberals standing guard making sure none of the Tax folks were allowed to walk through with any signs or shirts.

    The is no one like the liberals when it comes to shutting out any other views.

  • Nitro
    November 2, 2007 at 6:14 pm

    LOLOLS!!!

    “Big”, Colbert does that better than you do. Your posts are almost as funny.

    Keep up the great posts!

  • Kerosene Hat
    November 3, 2007 at 10:03 am

    Randy,

    I agree . I do think that the goal of both parties is unfortunately to gain unchecked power in as many places and for as long as possible. The Democrats achieved that in Minneapolis and the Republicans did at the federal level for a few years. The fact that the goal of either party when achieved seems be disastrous is a good reason to be an independent.

  • Richard
    November 4, 2007 at 6:48 am

    Until we get instant runoff voting in this state and nationally there will be no independents. There will just be this group, a known statistical constant, that can be used. How’s that Nader vote working out for you so far?

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