The first reaction I had after reading DFL State Party Chairman Brian Melendez’s statement was “That’s the best you could do”? My next reaction was that Chairman Melendez had just publicly accused Tom Emmer of being principled. Here’s the text of Chairman Melendez’s statement:

“Tom Emmer’s dismissal of ‘compromise’ as a valuable political tool is just a recipe for more of the same self-serving gridlock that we have seen under Governor Pawlenty. The failure to compromise has produced a government shutdown, frequent stalemate in policy debate, and historically staggering deficits, and it has put the state’s credit rating at risk. We can’t afford another governor who refuses to compromise when so many Minnesotans are out of work and the state’s deficit is spiraling out of control.

“Politics is the art of the possible, and compromise is what makes real solutions possible in a heated political environment. Minnesota needs a governor who will be a governor for the entire state, not just the political right or the political left or the special interests. Tom Emmer’s recent comments show that he lacks those skills, or, if he has them, he thinks that they are a waste of time.”

This type of gotcha communications doesn’t persuade voters. I know the intent is to ‘put the other guy’ on the defensive but that isn’t what it accomplishes. It merely informs John Q. Public that the DFL isn’t addressing things important to voters.

Frankly, I’m left wondering what the real message behind this is. I’m certain that I know what its intended message is: Tom Emmer doesn’t believe in compromise. This year, I don’t think that’s what voters will think, though. What I think they’ll hear is that Tom Emmer is a principled man who doesn’t compromise just for the sake of looking agreeable.

With spending restraint being one of this year’s hot button issues, saying no to status quo spending is a positive thing. It’s worth noting that Gov. Pawlenty vetoed the GAMC bill, which led to Matt Dean’s work in negotiating with the DFL and winding up with vastly superior legislation that brings accountability to the system and saves Minnesota’s taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.

Chairman Melendez says that “Politics is the art of the possible.” I can’t argue with that. Thanks to the House GOP standing on principles, what became possible was significant GAMC reform. That’s the type of possibility most Minnesotans hope our next leader exhibits.

Finally, what’s evident is that Chairman Melendez doesn’t like it when the DFL doesn’t get its way. He’d rather see Republicans moving in his direction. Thankfully for conservatives, Tom Emmer thinks that the purpose behind reaching across to the other side of the aisle is to pull the DFL in our direction.

Tom’s principled conservatism is appealing to a wide range of voters, from conservatives to common sense independents to conservative Democrats. That’s the type of coalition we’ll need to keep the governor’s mansion in GOP hands.

Tom’s common sense approach and his principled conservatism is why I’m proud to serve on Tom Emmer’s Steering Committee.

Technorati: Tom Emmer, Conservatism, Negotiation, Matt Dean, GAMC, Reforms, Tim Pawlenty, Veto, Fiscal Restraint, MNGOP, Brian Melendez, DFL, Election 2010

Stick a fork in the Slaughter Solution. It’s done. Based on this Roll Call article, that strategy died with the Senate Parliamentarian’s ruling:

The Senate Parliamentarian has ruled that President Barack Obama must sign Congress’ original health care reform bill before the Senate can act on a companion reconciliation package, senior GOP sources said Thursday.

The Senate Parliamentarian’s Office was responding to questions posed by the Republican leadership. The answers were provided verbally, sources said.

House Democratic leaders have been searching for a way to ensure that any move they make to approve the Senate-passed $871 billion health care reform bill is followed by Senate action on a reconciliation package of adjustments to the original bill. One idea is to have the House and Senate act on reconciliation prior to House action on the Senate’s original health care bill.

Wobbly House Democrats don’t want to vote for the Senate bill without a guarantee of the Senate passing a bill that fixes what’s broken in the Senate bill. House Democrats thought that they’d found a solution with the Slaughter Solution, in which the Senate bill would be deemed passed the minute the House passed a bill fixing the Senate bill. Under the Slaughter Solution rule, the House wouldn’t even vote on the Senate bill.

With the Senate Parliamentarian’s ruling, that solution disappeared.

I just finished a blogger conference call with Dr. Phil Gingrey and Rep. Cathy McMorris-Rodgers. This Roll Call article was the basis for my question and followup. I read them the opening paragraphs of the article, then posed my initial question. I asked specifically if the Senate Parliamentarian’s ruling just made Rep. Clyburn’s whip duties significantly more difficult. Their opinion was that it did make Rep. Clyburn’s job much more difficult.

This ruling won’t kill the bill but it’s going to make life alot more difficult for House Democrats. Now they’ll have to trust that their Senate colleagues will want to pass and be able to pass a bill fixing the problems with their bill. Earlier this week, Rep. Thad McCotter said in an interview that the House Democrats’ biggest obstacle “isn’t from across the aisle. It’s from across the Rotunda.”

In the best of times, there’s a tension between the House and Senate. Add the historic nature of this bill and the profound differences between the House’s bill and the Senate’s bill, plus the fact that the public is emphatically opposed to this bill and it’s understandable that tensions are running high between House and Senate Democrats.

Add into this mix Harry Reid’s latest statement:

Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) moved Thursday to put Senate Republicans on the defensive over health care, sending a letter to Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) in which he dared the GOP to vote against reform.

If anyone has a worse sense of where the public is at than Harry Reid, I don’t know who it’d be. Dr. Gingrey and Rep. McMorris-Rodgers said that they’d be surprised if a single Republican, House or Senate, would vote for the bill. Sen. John Cornyn, chairman of the NRSC, and Minority Leader McConnell both said that Republicans will run on the health care issue.

With the latest CNN poll showing 73 percent of the American people either outright opposed to the Democrats’ bill or wanting Congress to start from scratch, it isn’t a matter of whether Republicans will run on this issue. The question I’ve got is how many Democrats will run away from this bill this fall. I’m betting Democrats won’t want to talk health care during their campaign.

I’m betting that they’d rather align themselves with Eric Massa than with the Democrats’ health care legislation.

Technorati: Bloggers, Cathy McMorris-Rodgers, Phil Gingrey, Doctor, John Cornyn, Mitch McConnell, NRSC, Louise Slaughter, Rules Committee, Deeming, Reconciliation, James Clyburn, Speaker Pelosi, President Obama, Whip Count, Democrats, Parliamentarian, Election 2010

Cross-posted at California Conservative

I’ve had it up to here with the White House’s spinning about Chief Justice John Roberts. The tipping point was reached when Propaganda Minister Robert Gibbs said this:

In a statement sent to reporters, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said that the only troubling thing was the 5-4 ruling by the court, which said that corporations could spend unlimited amounts of money advocating on behalf of candidates in elections. Roberts leads the court.

“What is troubling is that this decision opened the floodgates for corporations and special interests to pour money into elections, drowning out the voices of average Americans,” Gibbs said. “The President has long been committed to reducing the undue influence of special interests and their lobbyists over government. That is why he spoke out to condemn the decision and is working with Congress on a legislative response.”

That’s downright insulting. President Obama repeatedly and consistently ignored what We The People said about Obamacare during last August’s townhall meetings. President Obama totally ignored the hundreds of thousands of calls to Congress last January and February about his failed stimulus plan. He ignored what We The People said in the elections in New Jersey and Virginia and the special election in Massachusetts.

While he was ignoring the American people, there’s no arguing that he made time for Andy Stern visits. Not only did he meet with Andy Stern but he gave the unions a huge $60,000,000,000 tax break on their Cadillac health insurance policies.

Now he has the audacity to say that he’s committed to “reducing the undue influence of special interests and their lobbyists over government”? When did that commitment start? Did that commitment start after hiring lobbyist after lobbyist to work in his administration?

Just this weekend The New York times published a list of names, a rather long list of names of people, who are working on Obama’s transition team or who have accepted jobs in his White House who are either former lobbyists or who have close ties to lobbyists.

The Times reports that some of those people were lobbying as recently as this year.

Mr. Gibbs hasn’t answered those questions satisfactorily. In fact, he’s ignored those questions just like President Obama has ignored what the American people have said.

When President Obama or his spinning surrogates complained that special interest groups would soon drown out the voice of the American people, what he’s really doing is complaining that his favorite special interest groups won’t have the stage all to themselves this election season.

The Supreme Court defered to the Founding Fathers’ wisdom, saying that everyone should be able to express their political views. They said that presidents don’t get to pick which interest groups can express their political views and which ones can’t. What they said was that the First Amendment says that Congress can’t make laws that prohibit or limit the free expression of political thoughts or opinions. PERIOD.

That isn’t what the Obama administration believes in, though. Here’s what Mark Lloyd said on the subject of the First Amendment:

“It should be clear by now that my focus here is not freedom of speech or the press. This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least, blind references to freedom of speech or the press serve as a distraction from the critical examination of other communications policies.

“[T]he purpose of free speech is warped to protect global corporations and block rules that would promote democratic governance.”

He then said this:

“In Venezuela, with Chavez, is really an incredible revolution, a democratic revolution. To begin to put in place things that are going to have an impact on the people of Venezuela.

“The property owners and the folks who then controlled the media in Venezuela rebelled, worked, frankly, with folks here in the U.S. government, worked to oust him. But he came back with another revolution, and then Chavez began to take very seriously the media in his country.

“And we’ve had complaints about this ever since.”

It isn’t difficult to make a compelling case that the Obama administration wants to shut up the people that disagrees with them but wants to guarantee that the special interest groups that agree with him can speak freely.

They’re upset that the U.S. Supreme Court didn’t ignore the First Amendment of the Constitution. They’re upset that they don’t set the rules for who is censored and who can speak freely.

After Propaganda Minister Gibbs’ statement, Washington’s other mental midget stepped into the fray. Here’s what Harry Reid said:

“Do you think John Roberts knows or cares how people get elected?” Reid said, adding that the justices on the court lack understanding of the practical impact of their decisions.

A spokesman for Reid said the senator backs Obama’s push for legislation to more closely regulate corporate campaign spending.

Sen. Reid didn’t complain about when President Clinton was accepting tens of millions of dollars in soft money in 1996, then using the special interest groups’ money to drown out Bob Dole’s voice.

FOOTNOTE: Sen. Reid, it isn’t the U.S. Supreme Court’s role to know or care how people get elected. Their role is to interpret the U.S. Constitution, its amendments and the treaties it’s signed. Their’s isn’t a policymaking position.

Now that the Democrats’ favorite special interest groups have to fight on a level playing field, Sen. Reid is complaining. Much like Mr. Gibbs’s whining, Sen. Reid’s complaints are falling on deaf ears.

The notion that this administration is committed to weakening the influence of lobbyists and special interest groups is insulting. It doesn’t bear any resemblence to the truth or to reality.

Technorati: SCOTUS, Chief Justice, John Roberts, Constitution, First Amendment, President Obama, Robert Gibbs, Mark Lloyd, Andy Stern, SEIU, Harry Reid, Censorship, Democrats

Cross-posted at California Conservative

Last night, Sanu Patel-Zellinger sat down for an interview with me. For those who don’t recognize Sanu’s name, she’s the GOP endorsed candidate for HD-40B. Sanu’s story is an inspiring one. Her task is seemingly daunting, with her opponent being Ann Lenczewski.

I was impressed with Sanu’s answers, especially when she spoke about how Minnesota is losing job: “Right now, we are losing some companies to other states. TCF moved out of Minnesota. The other thing is to make it easy for those owners to run their business.

While some regulation is necessary, we need to make sure that the consequence of the regulation does not hamper the growth of business.”

As the senior manager of international merchandising at Best Buy, Sanu certainly is aware of Minnesota’s business climate. In fact, I’d argue that she has a better understanding of business-related issues than Rep. Lenczewski has. One thing I’m positive of is that she’d hit the ground running if elected.

Sanu’s answer to my question on business regulation impressed me, too. Here’s her answer:

Regulation must first and foremost pass the ‘consequence test’ of making sure we will not hurt jobs and growth of business. Good intent is a start, good consequences is a must.

Too often, Democrats pass the ‘good intentions’ test but fail miserably with the ‘good results’ test. I wanted to know if there was something that guided Sanu’s decisionmaking in this regard. I was impressed with her answer:

All regulations tied to jobs, taxes and education would be my first focus. Also, in general, while we need regulations, we need to make sure they provide the desired consequences and also are constitutional.

The fact that Sanu considers it important that regulations are constitutional is impressive. All too often, Democrats put in place regulations that hamper lower levels of government, often in the form of unfunded mandates. These unfunded mandates often turn mayors into city administrators, automatons rather than decisionmakers.

I want someone who will fight against unfunded mandates and overreaching government. I’m betting that most conservatives and independents do, too.

When I said that “government has a way of overstepping”, Sanu replied by saying “As legislators, we are promising to serve the public. So it would be the responsibility of those in office creating and approving laws to make sure they uphold the rights the Constitution provides every American.”

I find it impressive that Sanu starts from the perspective that she’s a public servant. It’s also impressive that, if she was elected, would take seriously her affirmative responsibility to guarantee that the laws that get passed “uphold the rights the Constitution provides every American.”

After interviewing her, I strongly recommend that people in HD-40B help elect Sanu Patel-Zellinger. Find out how you can help by visiting Sanu’s website and finding out what volunteer opportunities you can help with.

I know from my previous post that Sanu’s support is strong. That’s what I found most impressive initially. After interviewing her, the most impressive attribute for me is her attitude that she’s a public servant first. Visit Sanu’s website and find out what you find most impressive about her. You’ll be glad you did.

Technorati: Interview, Sanu Patel Zellinger, Best Buy, Regulations, Unfunded Mandates, Taxes, Capital Flight, TCF, MNGOP, Election 2010

There are several thousand political lifetimes left between today and Election Day, 2010. That means there are tens of thousands of political lifetimes left between today and the next presidential election. Still, Scott Rasmussen’s polling must be causing Mr. Axelrod to drink Maalox by the bottle:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Wednesday shows that 22% of the nation’s voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-three percent (43%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -21. That matches the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for this President.

as bad as those numbers are, these numbers should scare Chris van Hollen and Robert Menendez:

Forty-two percent (42%) of Democrats Strongly Approve while 72% of Republicans Strongly Disapprove. Among those not affiliated with either major political party, 17% Strongly Approve and 45% Strongly Disapprove.

I’ve been around politics long enough to know that the president’s party does exceptionally poorly when that president is that unpopular with independents. That president is like an anchor around their necks. It’s the type of weight that can’t be escaped from.

What’s worse for Rep. van Hollen is that Speaker Pelosi is tying another anchor around their necks. Technically, that anchor is called deeming, which I wrote about here. In the real world, news like that make people worry whether it’s the first step on a slippery slope to becoming a banana republic.

The most important thing to take from these numbers is that Democrats are hugely unpopular with independents. The next most important thing to take from these numbers is that, if Republicans outwork the Democrats, they’ve got a legitimate chance at winning an historic victory this November.

Technorati: Polling, President Obama, Democrats, Independents, Republicans, Voter Intensity, Election 2010

Cross-posted at California Conservative