(Excellent interviews with Tarryl Clark and Jim Meffert. - promoted by TwoPuttTommy)
Today, Bill Prendergast launches a thoughtfully alarming perspective from a Michael Tomaski column on the fear that seems to be taming the Democratic mule; the glut of conservative and conservative crazy media and the nation's economic malaise.
I doubt that Plato Avenue DFL brass are scheming with a bunker mentality (I know number of Democrats who are) but their two most potent congressional challengers, Tarryl Clark (CD6) and Jim Meffert (CD3) show no fear at all.
They are strong, tell-it-like-it-is candidates. They are motivators who have shucked the "Minnesota Nice" political procedurals in their respective takes on Michelle Bachmann and Bachmann's buttoned-down soul mate Eric Paulsen. Meffert and Clark are impassioned and honest candidates with media appeal and moxie. In its small way, DFL Senate District 42 (Eden Prairie and Minnetonka) is getting that message out on cable television and the Democratic Visions Channel on YouTube - regional television has ignored these two. So, check out these YouTubes:
See them on MTN Channel 17 Sundays at 7 pm and on Comcast Channel 15 (Eden Prairie, Richfield, Hopkins, Edina and Mtka) Wednesdays at 5:30 pm and Sundays at 9 p.m. and Bloomington Cable Ch. 16 on Tues at 2:00 p.m. & 10:00 p.m. and Wed at 2:00 p.m.
Whenever I meet these two, the Democratic Mule in me starts bucking and kicking with gusto and purpose. Our timid local progressives need to join MPP and a few others in some loud snorting, braying and kicking -- Meffert and Clark have earned a stampede of media support to carry them to Washington.
Congress is heading back home for the August recess this week. Apparently our Senators need to rest after they failed to take up both a clean energy and climate bill and an oil spill bill.
Legislative inaction must be more tiring than I realized.
Still, I don't view this month as a cooling off period. If anything, it's time to turn up the heat.
Over the next few weeks, Senators will be holding "town hall meetings" in their states. Last year, these meetings came to define the health care debate. This year, they could help us reshape America's energy policy.
If you are like me and you are still stunned that the Senate refused to pass a bill that would have created nearly 2 million new American jobs, put our nation at the forefront of the clean energy market and helped end our addiction to oil, then go to a town hall meeting and tell your lawmakers what you think.
Tell them that it is in America's best interest to embrace clean energy now.
And while you are at it, please tell them to block attempts by some Senators to weaken the Clean Air Act-the 40-year-old law that has saved hundreds of thousands of lives-in an effort to further delay reductions in global warming pollution.
Some naysayers claim that voting on visionary legislation is a risky proposition when we are this close to an election. They are wrong, and history proves it.
As I wrote in a recent blog post, 13 of the most powerful environmental laws were passed during the fall of an election year or in the lame duck sessions following elections.
We can pass comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation this fall, but only if we demand it of our lawmakers.
Use this August to make your voices heard. You can find your Senators' schedules by checking their Senate websites, as well as their candidate websites - Republican or Democratic.
I finally met Tarryl Clark in person a few weeks back in Eden Prairie for the taping of Demcratic Visions, the public issues cable and internet series that I produce for and through DFL Senate District 42 with a handful of other, unpaid volunteers from the southwest 'burbs.
Wow! Senator Clark has the heart of a progressive moderate and the smarts, moxie, confidence and drive to be the Sixth CD's next envoy to Congress. One feels comfortable and motivated in her presence. One can actually have an informed conversation with Clark. With Michelle Bachmann, one feels sequentially bemused, creeped-out and apprehensive. From a veteran TV guy's view, Taryll Clark can be the nation's next media phenom -- but one with staying power.
Tarryl Clark's segment with interviewer Tim'O'Brien is posted on Democratic Vision's YouTube Channel. Watch it after the fold ...
Just a quick report here- it was a slow year for the congressional forum and a bunch of loud rethuglicans tried to create some fake energy for their candidates. We DFLers were more polite, but held our own.
First of, Walz is a rock star, buring his repug and IP opponents. Even the Repug loud louts forgot their instructions and cheered him on.
In CD7, Peterson got no pass from the Repugs and newly IP candidate Metzge for his mixed voting records- they labeled him a liberal anyway, and tried to link him with Pelosi.
Tarryl Clark was well received, getting much applause for her reasoned stands on ag issues. Clearly Michelle made a mistake taking the FarmFest crowd for granted and blowing them off with her abscence.
In CD2, Shelley Madore scored a minor coup thanks to Klines and the DFL endorsed candidates abscense.
Bye for now (gotta shop for broadband for my new place in Lyon county), back with coverage of the governor forum tomorrow.
On June 26, 2009, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 219-212 in favor of HR 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES). Only eight Republicans - we'll call them the "Enlightened Eight" - voted "aye." These Republicans were Mary Bono-Mack (CA-45), Mike Castle (DE-AL), John McHugh (NY-23), Frank LoBiondo (NJ-2), Leonard Lance (NJ-7), Mark Kirk (IL-10), Dave Reichert (WA-8), and Christopher Smith (NJ-4).
Republicans voting for cap and trade in the year of the Tea Party? You'd think that they'd be dumped in the harbor by now. Instead, they're all doing fine. In fact, to date, not a single one of these Republicans has been successfully primaried by the "tea party" (or otherwise). Instead, we have two - Castle and Kirk - running for U.S. Senate, one (McHugh) who was appointed Secretary of the Army by President Obama, and five others - Bono-Mack, LoBiondo, Lance, Reichert, Smith - running for reelection.
Rep. Lance actually was challenged by not one, not two, but three "Tea Party" candidates. One of Lance's opponents, David Larsen, even produced this nifty video, helpfully explaining that "Leonard Lance Loves Cap & Trade Taxes." So, did this work? Did the Tea Partiers overthrow the tyrannical, crypto-liberal Lance? Uh, no. Instead, in the end, Lance received 56% of the vote, easily moving on to November.
Meanwhile, 100 miles or so south on the Jersey Turnpike, Rep. LoBiondo faced two "Tea Party" candidates - Donna Ward and Linda Biamonte - who also attacked on the cap-and-trade issue. According to Biamonte, cap and trade "is insidious and another tax policy... a funneling of money to Goldman Sachs and Al Gore through derivatives creating a carbon bubble like the housing bubble." You'd think that Republican primary voters in the year of the Tea Party would agree with this line of attack. Yet LoBiondo won with 75% of the vote.
Last but not least in New Jersey, Christopher Smith easily turned back a Tea Party challenger - Alan Bateman - by a more than 2:1 margin. Bateman had argued that "Obama knows he can count on Smith to support the United Nations' agenda to redistribute American wealth to foreign countries through international Cap & Trade agreements and other programs that threaten our sovereignty." Apparently, Republican voters in NJ-4 didn't buy that argument.
Across the country in California's 45th District, Mary Bono-Mack won 71% of the vote over Tea Party candidate Clayton Thibodeau on June 8. This, despite Thibodeau attacking Bono-Mack as "the only Republican west of the Mississippi to vote for Cap and Trade." Thibodeau also called cap and trade "frightening," claiming that government could force you to renovate your home or meet requirements before you purchase a home. Thibodeau's scare tactics on cap-and-trade clearly didn't play in CA-45.
Finally, in Washington's 8th Congressional District, incumbent Rep. Dave Reichert has drawn a Tea Party challenger named Ernest Huber, who writes that Cap and Trade "is widely viewed as an attempt at Soviet-style dictatorship using the environmental scam of global warming/climate change... written by the communist Apollo Alliance, which was led by the communist Van Jones, Obama's green jobs czar." We'll see how this argument plays with voters in Washington's 8th Congressional District, but something tells us it's not going to go over any better than in the New Jersey or California primaries.
In sum, it appears that it's quite possible for Republicans to vote for comprehensive, clean energy and climate legislation and live (politically) to tell about it. The proof is in the primaries.
It's been news, so you probably already know that Senate Republicans--and one incredible arse of a Democrat-- defeated a measure to keep extended benefits in place for jobless Americans last Thursday. In real numbers, this will mean over 1 million Americans (closer to home, an estimated 1200 jobless Minnesotans per week by September) will be losing unemployment benefits-their sole source of income. It means unemployed Minnesotans can now only qualify for a maximum of 39 weeks of benefits instead of 86 weeks-in a job market so bleak it is taking a record number of job-seekers nearly two years to find quality replacement employment.
Have you ever stopped for a moment to consider that these aren't just statistics? These are realities that will, in some cases, eventually take people's lives. It is an empirically-shown reality that poverty kills, and our Congress just voted to let a fair number of Americans expire. Believing anything else is a just a denial game we are playing with ourselves.
Radical cuts in social welfare spending by governments intent on reducing budget deficits can cost lives as well as cause economic pain. Researchers found that levels of social spending are strongly associated with risks of premature death, particularly from diseases linked to wealth and social circumstances such as heart attacks and alcohol-related illness.
This report reveals that ordinary people may be paying the ultimate price for budget cuts to social programs -- potentially costing them their lives. These included programs to provide support to families and children, to help the unemployed get jobs, and support for people with disabilities -- all of which could plausibly affect health.
Analyzing trends in the data, it was found that when social spending was high, death rates fell, but when they were low, death rates rose substantially.
Health and social welfare programs appear to be a key determinant of future population health that should be taken into account in ongoing economic debates.
If this doesn't give you pause, it should. What we have been hearing from conservatives, deficit hawks, Religious Righters, Tea Partiers-whomever you want to call the gang of social-program-slash-and-burn fanatics-is that in this time of economic turmoil,the very life of those individuals hardest hit by the this freak financial storm are not worth trying to save. Separate the wheat from the chaff.
The negative impact of joblessness on all apects of life is showing up more and more in the news as well. It's not just jobs unemployed Minnesotans are desperate to get. According to Pioneer Press interviews with County Work Force Centers, counselors there are reporting floods of inquiries about other forms of aid, including cash, health care and food assistance. And statistics from the MN legislature show that poverty in our state(defined as "how many Minnesotans are not financially able to maintain a minimum standard of living. Incomes must be well above the poverty level in order to be considered adequate") has been steadily on the rise since 2007, and is now nearing 10%.
This is the second part of a series on Minnesota's congressional delegation, the first part can be found here.
Among Minnesota's Democratic congressional delegation there are two in top leadership positions; Jim Oberstar is Chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and Colin Peterson is Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee. Both have represented the state for a long time; Oberstar for over 25 years, Peterson for close to 20, and both represent large, mostly rural districts. But as we saw with their respective SILVER scores, they are quite different in how they vote, at least in the 111th congress. While Colin Peterson had a slightly liberal for his district score of -.06, Jim Oberstar had a superstar level -.55. Let's take a look at their DW-Nominate scores over the entire course of their time in office to see if that changes our perception any.
What you see is that over the years Oberstar has become marginally more conservative while Peterson has made moves in the liberal direction. This becomes even more evident when you look at their current scores for the 111th congress versus their mean and first year scores.
111
mean
1st
+/- mean
+/- 1st
stddv
PETERSON
-0.175
-0.139
-0.103
-0.036
-0.072
0.0242
OBERSTAR
-0.539
-0.544
-0.550
0.005
0.011
0.0033
As we saw earlier, in the 111th congress Peterson is voting more liberally then he has in the past and Oberstar is voting slightly more conservatively. What you can also see by looking at the standard deviation of their scores, as well as the +/- versus the mean and first year, is that Peterson's voting patterns have shifted more substantially over the years then Oberstar's, who has essentially the same score now as when he started.
What does this mean? Well, Jim Oberstar has been voting the same way for 25 years and Colin Peterson has ever so slightly become more liberal than when he first joined the congress. If we assume the PVI of the 7th CD is the same now as it was in 1991 (a dubious assumption) then Peterson would've had a SILVER score of .08 in his first congress, compared to the -.06 he has so far this congress, a -.14 swing in the liberal direction. It's probably not incidental that his vote share has also risen steadily over the years to 72% in 2008. While Colin Peterson is no liberal, he is liberal for his district and getting more liberal every year.
Congressman Walz's campaign sent out a release today stating that he has raised 1 million so far for his re-election campaign.
With a $314,000 first quarter and $600,000 Cash on hand, Walz is in a good financial position. But it never hurts to raise more https://services.myngp.com/ngp...
Tim Walz Raises $1,000,000 for Re-election
More than 7,000 people join the effort
Mankato, MN - Today, Tim Walz for US Congress announced the campaign raised more than $1,000,000 for the re-election of Tim Walz. The campaign raised more than $314,000 in the most recent financial quarter and has a significant cash advantage with nearly $600,000 in reserves.
"I am humbled to receive such strong support from Republicans, Democrats, and Independents. With over 7,000 folks joining our grassroots movement in southern Minnesota, it is clear they value the effectiveness on behalf of veterans, our small businesses and working families," said Walz.
Real political leadership is an ongoing conversation within our community about our core values. Who we are as Minnesotans and what we need to do together to move forward. For far too long regular folks like you and I have not had our voices heard in Washington D.C. You deserve a congressional representative that will always ensure your voice is heard, both here at home and in Washington.
Over the last decade the middle class has been under assault. For-profit student loan companies have been taking our hard-earned tax dollars and selling loans right back to our kids in order to profit off the interest. Our country's biggest banks borrow money from the government at almost zero percent interest rates, while for-profit student loan companies have been charging a 6.8% interest rate on federally guaranteed loans to our kids. A vicious cycle that hands over our taxes to private for-profit financial institutions which then make money off of interest rates and put our kids into debt at the beginning of their working lives. Our kids leave college with student loan debt averaging $23,186 for a four year degree and enter an economy with the worst employment prospects since 1945. If today's students decide to postpone the inevitable and go on to grad school, law school or medical school, their debt burden grows by another $30,000 to $120,000 leaving our kids on the hook for anywhere from $53,186 to $153,186 dollars in debt just as they are starting out.
Dr. Maureen Hackett has received the endorsement of the DFL Veterans Caucus, and I'm proud to report we're holding a fundraiser for her this Sunday, with General (Ret.) Harry Sieben leading the charge - details after the fold.
Ezra Klein has the scoop (apparently), and the AP is picking up on it.
It's a numbers crunch on votes, and on the money to be spent, and the deficit reduced, and it looks like supporters of the bill have another piece of good news to keep the momentum going into the vote (whenever it occurs). The CBO's numbers look good.
Some momentum from Minnesota was added yesterday when Representative Jim Oberstar announced that he is a solid "yes" on voting for the bill. This announcement prompted "Catholics United" to start airing TV ads thanking Rep. Oberstar for his support of the the bill. The ads are part of a "broader national campaign to underscore Catholic support for health care reform," according to a statement released by the Catholic group.
According to a Democratic source, CBO has finished its work and will release the official preliminary score later today. But here are the basic numbers: The bill will cost $940 billion over the first 10 years and reduce the deficit by $130 billion during that period. In the second 10 years -- so, 2020 to 2029 -- it will reduce the deficit by $1.2 trillion. The legislation will cover 32 million Americans, or 95 percent of the legal population.
To put this in context, that's more deficit reduction than either the House or Senate bill, and more coverage than the Senate bill.
How they got these numbers, and whether there are important qualifiers, will be easier to say once CBO releases its analysis. But the bottom line is that this is the exact sort of score that Democrats wanted, and is in fact considerably better than some had come to expect they would receive. Coverage is better than the Senate bill, which will reassure liberals, and deficit reduction is better than either bill, which will reassure conservatives.
With the unveiling of the health reform reconciliation compromise set for noon ET, Democrats are beginning to leak results of the long-awaited Congressional Budget Office score of the provisions. They're pretty good.
The deficit over the first ten years drops by $130 billion compared to the baseline. Importantly, especially for wavering Democrats like Brian Baird, it reduces the debt by $1.2 trillion in the second ten years. Apparently, the CBO says that the bill would reduce Medicare expenditures by about 1.4% per year, extending the solvency of the program by nine years. Thirty-two million Americans will be covered -- about 95% of all those eligible. The cost over decade one: $940 billion. The release today will help Speaker Nancy Pelosi fulfill her promise of providing 72 hours to review the bill before the vote, which is on tap for Sunday.
First union to endorse in Third District race says Meffert will stand up for workers
EDINA, MN - Today the Teamsters Local 120 announced their support of Jim Meffert for Congress in Minnesota's Third District, the seat currently held by first-term Republican Representative Erik Paulsen.
Meffert said, "One of the most important things we can do to help struggling Minnesota families is make sure every parent can count on a good job at a fair wage. The Teamsters are leaders in the fight to improve working conditions, create good local jobs and strengthen our economy. I am proud to have earned their endorsement, and I look forward to working with them as we prepare to win the Third District seat for working families."
"In Congress, I will fight for a real jobs bill that puts Minnesotans back to work," Meffert added. "We have billions of dollars of repairs that need be made on our roads and bridges. We can invest in new infrastructure like broadband lines and a 'smart' electrical grid. We know that we'll create 18,000 jobs for every $1 billion we spend on public infrastructure. I'll fight to make these investments, restart our economy and build a foundation for long-term growth."
The Teamster Local 120 is the largest Teamsters Local union in Minnesota and the fifth largest in North America. Their endorsement adds substantial volunteer and organizing capacity for Meffert, who is steadily gaining support in the race to win the DFL endorsement on April 10th.
Jim Meffert is running for Congress to help get Washington working for Minnesota families again. As a nonprofit leader, Meffert has fought to expand health care access and lower costs. As president of the Minnesota Parent Teacher Association, Meffert has stood up for students and teachers and fought to improve Minnesota's public schools. Meffert is seeking the DFL endorsement and has strong support among Third District party leaders and legislators.
A letter from Teamsters president Brad Slawson, Jr. said, "Teamsters Local 120 is proud to endorse Jim Meffert to represent Minnesota's Third Congressional District. From his support of pension protection to his endorsement of the Employee Free Choice Act, he has committed to working on behalf of the American middle class. The issues he has championed as a candidate prove that Local 120 members would strongly benefit from his representation in Washington, D.C."
Perhaps the Democratic members of Congress should declare defeat and go home to prepare for the 2012 elections. They have already given away so much that what else can matter?
Public option is now off the table as was impeachment, charging war criminals, universal health care and much of what could benefit the American people. That means that buried under all the good things in the Health Care Reform bill, there is a multi-billion dollar payoff for the insurance companies. The public option was but a baby step toward the ideal the rest of the civilized world enjoys, single payer universal health care. Citizens will be mandated to give money to insurance companies.
I've been thinking about the DFL endorsement battles, and the battle to get elected in general. It's what I do. I think about elections, and how to win them, and how to organize to win them(among other things, I think about music, good books, and long walks on the beach). We all know that it really is a battle sometimes, elections can be rough.
We, as members of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party have the same general outlook on the issues. We are a big tent, so there is a wide array of viewpoints, a wide array of ideas, and a wide array of how to implement those ideas that flow through the veins of the DFL. It's good to offer a strong defense of one's candidate. It's good to be excited about someone who you think can do all the things you want them to be able to do. But what else do our candidates really need from us and us from them?
I believe, as supporters, our candidates need us to ask them the hard questions, and to tell them the truth rather than painting a rosy picture if the horizon is darkening. Our candidates need us to ask them what they want from us, and we need them to ask for our help. We need to trust our candidates and their staffers' framework for the volunteer work that they ask of us. We need to know that they need us, and remember that they need us so that they can know about that particular thing (issue), or that particular person ("Tiffany, the DFLer from down the road?" "Yeah, she'd be a great volunteer! But don't call her on Tuesday until after 3pm.").
We're the candidates' local connection. Our candidates need us to be a mouthpiece (or keyboard, as it were), but our candidates need us to represent them in an honorable and non-politically damaging ways. I say this in particular to remind everyone that the internet can be unforgiving (there are snipers everywhere). Our candidates need us to listen, and our candidates need to let us in on their strategic thinking at least a little bit, (if we can be trusted (how do we measure that? I'm not sure.)) so that we can understand. We need to level with one another to understand what we want from each other. They need to set our expectations, and we need them to surpass ours. Our candidates need us to be able to think about the "big picture." Our candidates need us, uncommitted and committed alike, to tell our neighbors now why a DFLer is a better choice in a generic general election match-up in the fall.
After the endorsement/primary battle is over, our candidates need us all to work together again to make the phone calls, to walk and knock on those doors. Our candidates need us to come together and drink the wine of a united front rather than sipping on our sour grape juice alone in the corner. They need us, and the party needs us to go out and talk to our neighbors about why it is so important to vote in any election. They need us to help drop "off-year" from the presidential/occasional voter's vocabulary.
These are the things that we need from one another in order to ensure success.
(Somehow, I think Dusty might be bringing this up on the radio tonight, on AM950, at 6:00 pm.... - promoted by TwoPuttTommy)
I've got a bone to pick with Maureen Reed. Yesterday Maureen Reed's campaign sent out a really whiney email implying that people are trying to twist her campaign's record. I figured I should probably chime in, you know because I'm bored and whatnot.
In the email Reed sent out she says people are claiming that she'll run as an independent and corrects the record saying that she's running as a 'Proud DFLer'. Ok fine, she PREVIOUSLY ran as an independent and claims rather boldly that she can rally independents. The reality is that her 2006 run dramatically underperformed other independents who've run in CD6. I don't know who or what a Binkowski is, but it seems to know more about reaching independents in CD6 than Maureen Reed.
About that independent record of hers... It's probably the reason Tim Pawlenty is waltzing off into the 2012 Presidential campaign sunset right now. Sure T-Paw bested Mike Hatch by 21,108 votes, and much of the blame can be pinned on the Hatch campaign, BUT the 141,735 votes that Maureen Reed helped peel away certainly can't add much to her proud DFLer status. By my count that's 120,000 reasons for us to blame Maureen Reed for Pawlenty's re-election.
