Well, of course they will. Because it’s a bill proposed by a Democrats; that’s what they do. Forget about jobs; they have a duty to force the Senate into complete and utter inaction.
Archive for the 'General' Category
Talking Point Memo says that Republicans will filibuster a jobs bill in the Senate.
Fresh from my inbox:
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. (February 4, 2010)—Steve Kelley, who formally announced his run for Governor in October, 2009, has decided to end his campaign.
The full text of his email to supporters is as follows:
Thank you for being part of my campaign to transform Minnesota. I have been continually grateful for your words of encouragement, your advice, volunteer work and financial support over the last year. I am one of the fortunate Minnesotans who has had the opportunity to see firsthand the spirit of involvement that thrives in our state.
Even with your support, and the amazingly hard work of a dedicated and talented campaign team, I have not been as successful as we had hoped when the campaign began. As a result, I have decided to withdraw from the race for governor.
My wife Sophie has been a perfect partner in this campaign and in my public service. Our children Paul and Eleanor and our son-in-law Corey Orehek have worked hard and inspired me to work hard for them and for the future. And my parents and brothers and sisters have given me their support in ways beyond measure.
You have been generous in your support. One of the sad outcomes of this decision is that I will have fewer opportunities to work with you to make Minnesota the kind of place we see in our best dreams. I intend to return to my work at the Humphrey Institute where I have been privileged to be able to serve Minnesota.
I also intend to support the DFL-endorsed candidate for governor. To repair the damage done to our state, we must endorse a candidate in April, unite behind that candidate and win in November. Our fellow citizens deserve a DFL Governor in January 2011.
During the campaign I had the pleasure of getting to know better the other dedicated public servants who are seeking the DFL nomination. Through innumerable candidate forums and other visits with Minnesotans, I learned new insights from them about the challenges we face together and the solutions we must pursue.
I am immensely proud of my campaign team. Over many months they applied energy, intelligence and dedication to a challenging goal. It is has been a privilege to work with them.
I am confident that with the right leadership that engages the amazing Minnesotans that I met on the campaign trail, we can build a better home for our children.”
###
Kelley served in the Minnesota Legislature from 1992 to 2006. He is currently a teacher and senior fellow at the Humphrey Institute and the director of the Center for Science, Technology, and Public Policy.
1. We’re hearing that Steve Kelley is dropping out. Soon. Maybe by COB today.
edit: Totes.
edit: Totes.
2. We’re hearing that EdMN will be endorsing MAK sometime soon.
3. We’re hearing that SEIU will endorse Rybak before the convention.
That is all. Thank you for your time.
On Monday I reported that the Minnesota Supreme Court had declined to accept a amicus brief from Tom Emmer. That report was based on an order issued by the Court last week which accepted amicus briefs from several organizations, but did not accept a brief from Tom Emmer. Yesterday, the Court issued a new order and accepted the Emmer brief.
Luke Hellier of Minnesota Democrats Exposed thinks I should apologize to Rep. Emmer for my “lie.” Of course, Hellier’s own post shows that the Court order accepting the Emmer brief is dated February 3rd (two days after my post) proving that my post wasn’t a “lie,” it’s just no longer accurate. I am not going to apologize for a post that was true at the time it was written.
Sorry for my absence over the past week; I’ll be back to posting more regularly tomorrow.
I’m not going to attempt to update this regularly—that’s what the SoS’s site is for—but here’s where we’re at with 47.3% of the precincts reporting the straw-poll results:
Alright, fine, one more update before I go to bed. This is with 77.02% of precincts reporting:
| Candidate | Totals | Pct | Graph | |
| TOM BAKK | 1290 | 6.13 |  |
|
| MATT ENTENZA | 1444 | 6.86 | |
|
| SUSAN GAERTNER | 441 | 2.09 | |
|
| STEVE KELLEY | 878 | 4.17 | |
|
| MARGARET ANDERSON KELLIHER | 4216 | 20.03 | |
|
| JOHN MARTY | 2052 | 9.75 | |
|
| FELIX MONTEZ | 17 | 0.08 | |
|
| TOM RUKAVINA | 1517 | 7.21 | |
|
| R.T. RYBAK | 4589 | 21.80 | |
|
| OLE SAVIOR | 21 | 0.10 | |
|
| PAUL THISSEN | 1541 | 7.32 | |
|
| UNCOMMITTED | 3045 | 14.46 | |
Sure is interesting so far…
Pre-slumber preliminary thoughts: Straw polls aren’t worth much. After all, there’s a long way and a lot of steps between here and the convention (not to mention here and the general). Big things can happen—momentum can shift, scandals can surface, unions can endorse, and all that fun jazz. So, the most important thing to remember is to take anyone’s analysis (especially mine) with a huge grain of salt—no one knows how this will end up just because a straw poll of approximately 25,000 party activists was conducted. All that being said, there is one pretty glaring take away from the results tonight: Rybak and MAK are the main events. It’s surprising how big the drop off is to 3rd place and how crowded the bottom is. Does that mean the field will thin and the race for the endorsement will coalesce around those two? Almost certainly not. But it does mean that they get all the attention from being the two front runners—and I guarantee that not all of that will be good attention.
I get the feeling that the shivs are going to start coming out… please, please, please, prove me wrong.
It’s pathetic, to put it mildly, the hoops through which our system requires people to jump just to keep themselves healthy. And people with pre-existing conditions, such as Terri Carlson, have it worst of all. Carlson is currently counting down the time until she loses her eligibility for COBRA, at which point she will have absolutely no access to health insurance because she has C4 Complement Deficiency, a rare immune disorder. Carlson is just one of millions of people in the private insurance market who are denied insurance precisely because they need it so much.
A few other Twin Cities bloggers have made predictions about the DFL Caucus preference ballot and I didn’t want MN Publius to be left out. Our predictions are after the jump, but please bear in mind that the process of making these predictions was more similar to playing a game of “guess how many jellybeans are in the jar” than any kind of real political prognostication. I hope you’ll leave your own predictions in the comments.
The recovery is now well underway, it appears. The Bureau of Economic Analysis estimated on Friday that Real Gross Domestic Product grew by 5.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009, which is the fastest rate of growth since mid-2003.
So where are the jobs? They’re coming. In the language of economics, jobs are a “lagging indicator” — meaning that the economy has to be steadily and consistently improving before employers are willing to hire. But job losses have tailed off, and we should begin to see some job growth, although probably meager, this year.
A caveat needs to be made here, as well. First, a significant portion of the GDP growth we saw in the last quarter was likely driven by Federal spending measures that are still in place. We need to resist the urge to reduce spending now that the economy is “fixed.” It isn’t necessarily fixed, and we could easily still slide back into another slump. In fact, the Senate should pass the jobs bill passed by the House to pump additional money into the economy.
Overall, things are looking hopeful, but it’s going to take a long time for a full recovery. In part, that’s because we haven’t had a “real” economic recovery in a long time — we’ve replaced one bubble with another, and our economy hasn’t been based on us actually producing useful goods and services in over a decade. For a truly sustainable recovery, we need to start producing again — and that’s going to take some time.
Six years ago, we launched two Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, on a 90-day mission to collect data about conditions on Mars. They’re still going. Or rather, Opportunity is still going, and scientists are looking for ways to turn the stuck Spirit into a stationary laboratory; it can’t move, but it can still do science. That announcement was made on day 2213 of Spirit’s 90-day mission.
Every few months, after reading a report about one of the rovers, I marvel that they’re still going. In the span of their original 90-day mission, the rovers contributed immeasurably to our knowledge about Mars. They then proceeded to stretch their lifespan by 24 times their original mandate, and they haven’t stopped yet.
Below the break, as a Friday distraction, don’t miss webcomic xkcd’s take on the Spirit rover.
The dominant emotion amongst the American voting public these days seems to be rage. Barack Obama, as the president, is the most visible target of that rage, but plenty of it is directed at the Democratic Party, and at least as much at the Republican Party as well. It’s not even limited just to politicians: Ultimately, voters’ anger is directed at anyone they consider to be the Powers That Be.
The desire to punish the Powers That Be was on full display in a special election in Oregon, where voters passed the first new income taxes in over 70 years. The goal of the tax increase was to balance the budget, but “balance the budget” wasn’t the message that won the day:
Campaign ads by supporters highlighted banks and credit card companies and showed images of well-dressed people stepping off private jets. They also hammered on the $10 minimum tax that most corporations have paid since its inception in 1931. [The Oregonian]
Over the last six months, GOP has gleefully ridden this wave of voter anger to regain its relevance. But I think the Republicans are miscalculating the level of voters’ rage. They can’t bottle this populism and use it for their own ends; it will come back to bite them just as much as it will the Democrats.
The Republicans’ glee at winning a single special election is misplaced — as was the Democrats’ glee at winning two regular elections in 2006 and 2008. It has been over 3 years now, and it looks like neither party understands the level of populist fury amongst the voting public.
The Democrats won massive victories in 2006 and 2008 despite themselves. Voters recognized the Democrats for what they are: spineless and ineffective. They voted the Democrats into office on a single principle: Throw the Bums Out. The only thing worse than a Democrat was a Republican. Voters recognized them for what they are, too: incompetent at policymaking, and too good at playing politics.
The Democrats failed to learn an important lesson: Just getting into office isn’t good enough; you need to give the voters a reason to continue to support you. In the Democrats’ case, that would have meant bold action on Barack Obama’s agenda.
So what’s different today? Only the party in power. Voters are starting to gravitate to Republicans again, but not because they support the GOP. They remember all too well the failed policies the Republicans pursued, and they can see how the Republicans have poisoned our political dialog. The Republicans will most likely win in 2010, but just like the Democrats they will fail to understand why they won.
How long can the American public continue to rage against incumbents before (a) the parties get a clue or (b) a viable alternative to our two political parties arises? My guess is not too much longer.
Let me give you a few reasons to disregard the Rasmussen poll that is grabbing attention around the Minnesota political universe today:
- They only interviewed 300 people for each horse-race, so the margin of error is very high.
- They only conducted interviews on one night, which is considered bad methodology.
- I am skeptical of their likely voter model. As Joe Bodell points out, we haven’t had a competitive statewide primary in Minnesota for a while, so modeling is going to be very difficult.
- They misspelled R.T. Rybak’s name in the release (R.T. Ryback?)
- And the most important reason: a poll this early in the campaign probably only measures name recognition.
The counter-argument to all of this is:
- Polls are fun!
Very persuasive. So, assuming for the sake of this post that Rasmussen’s numbers are more predictive than those you might pull out of a hat, what do they mean? Find out after the jump.
When we bailed out the country’s largest banks, the consensus was that there was really no other option if we wanted to stave off financial collapse. Despite the fact that it left a bad taste in a lot of people’s mouths, we had to spend a lot of money to prop up banks that had made a lot of bad decisions — and reaped records profits from those decisions at the time.
But we didn’t give the banks all of that money because we approved of what they were doing; we did it because it would have been foolish to lead our country into a depression just for the satisfaction of denying the banks the money they needed. No, they didn’t deserve it, but the consequences could have been terrible.
Now, it’s time for the banks to pay us back. Word is the Obama administration is going to push for new fees on banks to recoup our bailout costs:
Top administration officials tell Morning Money that President Obama’s budget, to be unveiled next month, is likely to include a fee on banks designed to recoup some of the cost taxpayers incurred in the bailout, which specified that the U.S. government should be made whole. This will stop short of a financial transactions tax, and the administration has decided that a tax on compensation packages would be too easily evaded. The officials said the final approach has not been locked down. The chief goal is a fee that is not easily passed along.
People Are Shouting
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