Archive for the ‘Tom Emmer’ Category
Liberals love talking about diversity and tolerance. Hamline’s initial hiring of Tom Emmer spoke well of those principles. Unfortunately, Hamline caved to their liberal special interest group supporters. Thanks to this Strib op-ed, though, Hamline’s diversity and tolerance is getting exposed:
While this page strongly differs with Emmer’s strident views on taxes, health reform, state’s rights and social issues, especially when it comes to the state’s proposed marriage amendment, the Hamline incident raises disturbing questions about academic freedom and administrative backbone at one of Minnesota’s most respected educational institutions.
Although Hamline officials declined comment for this editorial, it appears that the university reneged on at least one viable job offer, possibly two, because of last-minute faculty objections to Emmer’s politics, particularly his stance on gay marriage.
I’ll sum this up quickly. Hamline’s administrators don’t have a spine. They aren’t committed to intellectual diversity or academic freedom.
Hamline can’t argue that Emmer wasn’t offered the job either:
Tom: I hope all is well with you. I understand from Anne that you are interested in teaching Business Law. We have a spring section scheduled from 9:40-11:10 on Tuesdays and Thursdays on the St. Paul campus for which I could add you as an instructor if you are interested.
I hate to make you rush a decision but we have to put schedule changes in over the next week to have things ready for spring registration. If you are interested in this course, I need to get a copy of your CV and your SSN as soon as possible so we can get you added as an instructor in the system. If you have questions about the class, you can certainly give me a call. I don’t have the content expertise but I’m sure I can get you copies of others syllabi from past courses so you can see what is generally covered. I also think Bob Kramarczuk was/is going to contact you regarding doing some practice teaching in the MBA program so you can get a feel for the classroom.
With the job offer being substantiated with this official email, the question left is what went wrong. This information might help:
Things allegedly went south when Emmer showed up at a November faculty meeting. In a long letter sent to Hamline President Linda Hanson, Emmer details the back-and-forth conversations he had with McCarthy about faculty opposition.
According to Emmer, McCarthy continued to convey her support until the conversation where she said the university couldn’t bring him on board because of a “very vocal few” professors.
If President Hanson doesn’t have the spine to stand up to a “very vocal few” professors, then she isn’t qualified to be president of a university. Not only that, but it calls into question the need for a university president. If the faculty sets policy and makes hiring decisions, what’s the justification for having a president.
This paragraph bothers me:
That Hamline’s leaders apparently gave the boot to Emmer simply because of his politics suggest a startling lack of confidence in their students, faculty and the institution.
I’d argue it’s proof that Hamline have fascist tendencies. Rather than winning a debate, they’d rather prevent a merit-based discussion of differing opinions. That’s why they booted Tom Emmer.
FYI: Here’s the definition of fascism:
a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc. and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism.
If a tiny fraction of the faculty indeed have veto authority on faculty hiring, then that’s certainly fascism. If that same tiny fraction of the faculty won’t let dissenting ideas be presented, then they’ve failed at giving students a balanced education that explores all sides of a possible equation.
Hamline should be ridiculed for their intellectual timidity, their intellectual rigidity and their closemindedness. In my estimation, they’ve lost their right to be called educators.
Technorati: Hamline University, Fascism, Faculty, Tolerance, Debate, Academic Freedom, Political Correctness, Linda Hanson, Liberalism, Tom Emmer, Business Law, Conservatism
During Mary Lahammer’s segment of State Capitol politics, DFL Liar-In-Chief Ken Martin said “Unfortunately, this week, Grandma got run over by the GOP.” I knew when Brian Melendez announced that he was getting forced into retirement by Alida Messenger, Gov. Dayton’s ex-wife, that the DFL would take a hard turn left.
I didn’t think they’d go this over-the-top this quickly. I guess I should’ve expected that considering who they elected to replace Chairman Melendez. This is from one of the first Strib articles quoting Chairman Martin:
Ken Martin’s challenge as new DFL State Party chairman in a small way may be reflected in his brother.
Martin, of Eagan, recently spoke of a brother living in the northern exurbs, a carpenter by trade hard hit by the recession, who votes Republican.
He votes Republican, Martin said, because he’s wrongly convinced Democrats want to take away his guns, tax him out of his home, tell him where and where he can’t snowmobile.
None of that is true, Martin explained.
“He votes his fears over his hopes, over his pocketbook issues,” said Martin. “We just have to take those (wedge) issues off the books,” he said.
There isn’t a part of that article that’s even remotely close to the truth. That’s why I titled the post “Strawmen as far as the Eye Can See”.
What’s puzzling about Chairman Martin’s statement is that the House GOP devoted the week to debating the Tax Bill, the K12 Bill, the Public Safety Bill and one other bill that I can’t recall. None of the bills had anything remotely to do with seniors.
It’s impossible to negotiate with a political party that’s that disinterested in the truth. Just like ABM’s smear campaign this summer, which Chairman Martin as part of, the DFL seems disinterested in the truth.
This afternoon on Mitch and Ed’s show, they interviewed Sen. Roger Chamberlain. Sen. Chamberlain said that Gov. Dayton used words like draconian, saying that the Republicans’ budget work includes “a lot of drastic and very poorly thought-through, or not thought-through, actions.”
If those words weren’t coming from the candidate whose first two budgets didn’t balance, (the first missed by $2,100,000,000, the next by $1,000,000,000) I’d take him seriously. Gov. Dayton, whether you agree or disagree with his policies, has a mathematics skills problem.
His first tax-the-rich gimmick, he predicted, would raise an additional $4,600,000,000 in revenues. Later, he revised that down to ‘only’ $4,000,000,000. When the MMB finished examining the policy, they said it’d raise $1,900,000,000 in additional revenue.
In other words, Gov. Dayton was only off by a tiny 60% on the centerpiece of his economic package. Let me repeat that. Gov. Dayton was 60% off in his prediction for the centerpiece of his economic package.
Now I’m supposed to believe that his ex-wife’s appointed hatchetman after he’s accused the GOP of throwing Grandma under the proverbial bus? If the DFL and their political allies had a history of caring about the truth, I’d possibly give them the benefit of the doubt.
I wrote here about ABM’s hatchet job against Tom Emmer:
Settle in high flying corporate executives, because Tom Emmer’s Minnesota is going to be more fun than your last trip in a golden parachute. Here in Tom Emmer’s Minnesota, we believe that paying for good schools and hospitals is the job of the unwashed masses. That’s why the slightly regressive taxes of the past have been replaced by a massively regressive tax code in Tom Emmer’s Minnesota.
In Tom Emmer’s Minnesota, we don’t even care if you have your interns set up post office boxes all over the world to avoid paying your taxes. Even if those funds would go to fund nursing homes and other medical facilities, in Tom Emmer’s Minnesota we want nothing to get in the way of the gobs and gobs of money coming your way, not even fair play.
Rest assured, my very rich friend. This isn’t just a one-time deal. You can trust that in Tom Emmer’s Minnesota, solid investment in good schools, nursing home facilities, clean lakes, fixing roads or health care for “regular folk” will never get in the way of your extreme wealth and stealthy tax maneuvering.
This post on ABM’s blog was part of FactCheck.org’s study of campaign ads. Here’s the opening of their analysis:
Minnesota’s race for governor is pitting corporate money against money from labor unions and wealthy Democrats. So far, the misleading attack ads are all coming from the liberal side, and the corporate side is being badly outspent to boot. The Alliance for a Better Minnesota, a group funded by labor unions and the family of Democratic contender Mark Dayton, has raised nearly $1.7 million so far. Its ads have:
Accused GOP-endorsed candidate Tom Emmer of sponsoring a bill to “reduce penalties for drunk drivers.” That’s misleading. The bill would have required that accused drunk drivers be penalized only if convicted.
Said Emmer was “arrested twice himself for drunk driving.” That’s true, but the arrests were nearly 20 and 30 years ago.
Claimed Emmer voted against “corporations and CEOs” paying higher taxes. That’s false. He voted against a Democratic bill to raise state income taxes for all upper-income individuals, not corporations.
Claimed Emmer’s vote “created” a huge state deficit. That’s false as well. The deficit existed prior to Emmer’s vote against a Democratic plan to raise taxes to help close it.
Though that’s substantial proof that the DFL, through ABM and Ken Martin, didn’t hesitate in playing fast and loose with the truth, that isn’t the only ‘indictment’ FactCheck.org levies against ABM. Here’s another:
An earlier ad by ABM also contained false claims, accusing Emmer of supporting a plan that “created a huge deficit,” while opposing requiring “corporations and CEOs” to pay higher taxes.
The ad claims that Emmer “opposed a plan that would force corporations and CEOs to pay their fair share of taxes.” That’s false. The bill did not mention corporations or corporate CEOs at all. What it would have done is raise taxes on more than 100,000 high-income individuals, pushing the state’s top individual income tax rate up to among the highest in the nation.
The bill cited by the ad was actually a Democratic budget measure (H.F. 2037) to close a $3 billion budget deficit. Among other things, it would have raised the top state income tax rate, for individuals, not corporations, to 9.1 percent (from 7.85 percent) for all couples making more than $200,000 a year, and individuals making more than $113,100. That would have made the state’s top rate “higher than all but five states for single filers and six states for married joint filers,” according to the St. Paul Pioneer Press. The newspaper called the bill an “exercise in futility” because Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty had vowed to veto it.
An estimated 122,000 taxpayers would have been affected, and while that group no doubt includes some corporate CEOs, it also would have included many more small-business owners, doctors and other professionals, not to mention high-income farmers and retirees. And whether or not the higher rate is “fair” is a matter of opinion on which even Democrats are divided. It passed the state Senate by a single vote, with Republicans and 12 Democrats voting against it. It also passed the Democratic-controlled House but Gov. Pawlenty vetoed the bill, forcing the Legislature to return in special session and pass a revised budget bill, without any income tax increase, which the governor signed into law.
In the final analysis, there’s just too much proof that DFL leaders like Ken Martin are willing to slash the truth in the hopes of raising government control of Minnesotans’ lives. Martin’s statement about sweet, little Grannie is as devoid of the truth as ABM’s accusations against Tom Emmer.
Technorati: Alida Messinger, Mark Dayton, Ken Martin, Health Care, Tax The Rich, Deficits, HHS, DFL, Tom Emmer, Roger Chamberlain, FactCheck.org, MNGOP
I just caught a bit of Tom Bakk’s and John Marty’s press conference on th GOP tax bill. Frankly, it sounded more like the attack of a pair of whiners. I didn’t watch long because it was that whiney.
This morning, the DFL’s twitter brigade started a new chanting point: the GOP’s fantasy budget. According to Sen. Bakk and other DFL spinmeisters, the GOP budget isn’t serious, that it should be ridiculed.
First, the GOP budget is based on anticipated economic growth as a result of getting spending under control thanks to important reforms like Rep. Dan Fabian’s HF1. Spending is finally under control after the DFL didn’t set budget targets during their time in the majority.
In 2009, then-Speaker Kelliher brushed aside questions about putting a budget together:
Emmer’s question has become the mantra of state Republicans. In every public forum, at least one or two Republican legislators raise the question: If DFL legislators don’t like Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s proposed budget, why don’t they come up with one of their own?
“It’s strategic,” said House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, DFL-Minneapolis, of the Republican cry. “It’s designed to freak people out on our side, and it takes attention off the governor’s budget.”
I totally understand why Kelliher slipped the question. The DFL’s budget tactics always include whining about the GOP’s budget while not talking about their budgets. They want nothing to do with budgets because, at heart, they’re spending addicts. Spending addicts don’t like restrictions like budgets.
The DFL doesn’t even like their own governor’s proposal. That’s why it didn’t attract a sponsor earlier.
What’s standing in the way most of all is the DFL’s insistence on maintaining the status quo in government. That’s plain wrong. For instance, the Higher Ed budget will get cut. Both the Dayton budget and the GOP cut the Higher Ed budget:
Both the House and Senate bills would cut $411 million in projected state spending for higher education, more than double the reductions included in Dayton’s budget, as part of GOP lawmakers’ solution to Minnesota’s $5 billion shortfall.
Within the next decade, the current higher ed system won’t be able to sustain itself in its current form. The number of young people coming through the system simply isn’t enough. Having a glut of community colleges, technical colleges and jucos simply isn’t sustainable. That’s before considering the number of classes that should be taught statewide online.
In the context of the Airport Commission meeting, I talked with one of the board members afterwards. I told this person that we should shoot for more online classes, more than we even have now. I then said that the next step should be to move to an online version of Wisconsin’s Centers of Excellence system if it’s possible.
I’m not expecting those changes to be passed, signed into law and implemented within this biennium. That’d be actual fantasy. Still, it’s a safe bet that the DFL didn’t think of this because the unions would have a total fit.
This fits the DFL’s status quo mindset. If they don’t change anything, then their union allies won’t see major changes. That means they’ll be able to rake in the unions’ campaign contributions.
If the DFL ever proposed that type of reforms, they’d be primaried and run out of the union hall. That’s if they wouldn’t be tarred and feathered.
That’s why it’s predictable that the DFL attacked the GOP’s budget. If they didn’t, their union allies would question the DFL’s commitment to the status quo, which the unions prefer.
The GOP budget will require some tough votes. It’ll include a number of cost-saving reforms, too. The GOP’s reforms have been part of their agenda since literally the first week of the session.
The GOP’s grasp of reality is strong. Their budget deals with the reality that nobody is doing that well financially, not even the so-called rich. Gov. Dayton’s tax-the-rich scheme wouldn’t net the money that’s forecast.
I suspect that this information is what’s really troubling to the DFL:
The House state government bill also:
- Requires a 12 percent reduction in the state work force by 2013 and immediate hiring and pay freezes.
- Sets up a pilot program to study whether it is feasible to pay state workers based on performance.
- Appropriates $322,000 to reimburse counties for costs incurred in the 2010 governor’s race recount.
- Cuts executive agency spending nearly $95 million.
- Establishes a commission to review whether state agencies should continue to exist.
I’m betting that that last sentence is the one that’s bothering the DFL the most. To a DFL status quo activist, nothing bothers them more than eliminating bureaucracies.
Bureaucracies aren’t a way to measure man’s compassion. Increasing their budgets isn’t proof of wisdom. Never questioning these agencies’ existence is testimony to the DFL’s status quo mindset and their obedience to the unions.
Technorati: Mark Dayton, Tom Bakk, John Marty, Budgets, Deficits, Status Quo, Unions, Higher Ed, DFL, Reforms, Sunset Commission, MNGOP
This fall’s campaign taught me, repeatedly, that Tom Horner’s logic for running was built on dishonest premises. Having gotten defeated, things haven’t changed with Mr. Horner. Mr. Horner’s op-ed in Saturday’s St. Cloud Times offers another bit of proof of Horner’s intellectual dishonesty:
Republicans, who won majorities in both houses, are convinced Minnesotans want all solutions to fixing the state’s deficit to come from the spending side of the ledger. Democrats, backed by the election of DFLer Mark Dayton to the governor’s office, are equally adamant Minnesotans are willing to accept some higher taxes to maintain vital services.
If those are the only mandates Democrats and Republicans heard in the 2010 elections, Minnesotans better get used to another word: gridlock. Meaningful, long-term solutions won’t be found if spending cuts or higher taxes are the only two tools used by legislators and the governor in an effort to forge good policy.
If false choices were commodities, Horner’s campaign would’ve driven that commodity through the roof. It isn’t that he offered any serious policy initiatives. It’s that he spent his entire time suggesting that Tom Emmer and Mark Dayton were extremists who didn’t represent mainstream Minnesota.
That theory disintegrates the minute it collides with reality.
While it’s true that Republicans are adamant about not raising taxes, it isn’t true to say that their only strategy comes from cutting the budget. Republicans’ strategy on solving the persistent deficit problems hinge on strengthening Minnesota’s economy, streamlining the permitting process, reforming Minnesota’s regulations and telling each state agency and department that they need to justify every penny of their spending.
That hardly sounds like a simplistic ‘no new taxes’, cut-the-budget strategy for longterm economic growth and sustainable government spending. Rather, it sounds like a multi-faceted, thoughtful approach to strengthening Minnesota’s economy and lightening the tax burden on Minnesota’s taxpayers while still maintaining the services that are required.
This, BTW, is the message that the GOP legislature will be carrying this session. It’s also the message that resonates with TEA Party activists and Main Street Minnesota.
It’s time to discard Mr. Horner’s arguments that everyone but him are extremists. It’s apparent that he’s got a substantial ego and a poor grasp of honesty.
Technorati: Tom Horner, Extremists, Mark Dayton, Tom Emmer, Gridlock, Deficits
Ever since the MNGOP State Central Committee told some high-profile malcontents that they needed to start acting like Republicans, the DFL’s media lappuppies have trained their focus on lambasting Republicans.
This op-ed by the Winona Daily News is just more of the same we’ve heard before:
Former Gov. Al Quie had the right response – laughter. And it would be funny if it weren’t so sad. But Quie, along with other Minnesota GOP notables like Gov. Arne Carlson and Sen. David Durenberger have been banned from state Republican politics for two years all because they wouldn’t back Tom Emmer for governor.
So much for freedom of thought and choice.
And it would be silly and laughable if it weren’t so sad.
The two-year ban that Quie and 17 other Republicans face represents a sad shift for a party that once claimed to be “big-tent” for varying opinions.
The exile should be seen as a badge of pride for the 18. Names like Quie, Durenberger and Carlson are known for a thoughtful, collaborative approach. Their endorsements didn’t carry weight because of the party affiliation; they carried weight because they were statesmen, not politicians.
A big tent is worthless if there aren’t any unifying principles guiding a political party. More importantly than just the petty rantings of this editorial board is the fact that people expressed their agreement with the size (and principles) of the MNGOP tent. The reality is that people voted, across the nation, not just in Minnesota, that they wanted principled politicians who didn’t just go along to get along.
In droves, people have said they want politicians who say what they mean and mean what they say. Meanwhile, Sen. Durenberger, Gov. Quie and Gov. Carlson essentially said that they’re too big to be bothered by governing principles, living up to a party platform and actually doing things that identify themselves as Republicans.
By endorsing a snake oil salesman, they essentially said that that sort of loyalty was beneath them. They said that they’d prefer playing personality politics than being principled politicians.
At a time when voters across the state and nation are telling politicians that they want politicians with a spine, the MNGOP not only has the right to stand up to politicians who think they can do whatever they want. They have an affirmative responsibility to protect the conservative brand.
Should Republicans ignore the will of the people? That’s essentially what the Winona Daily News is essentially telling the MNGOP. They’re essentially saying that they should set aside principles because these 3 people are high profile people.
Meanwhile, voters showed time and again that they were perfectly willing to put a boot to unprincipled politicians’ backsides when these politicians got too big for their britches.
The editorial ignores the fact that there’s frequently spirited debate on issues within the MNGOP and that people like Jim Abeler gets along just fine with people like Tom Emmer.
If the MNGOP’s tent is tiny, how can people like Jim Abeler and Tom Emmer co-exist? The truth is that the MNGOP isn’t nearly as strident as the DFL and their compliant lap puppies would have people believe.
Technorati: MNGOP, Arne Carlson, Al Quie, Dave Durenberger, Identity Politics, Jim Abeler, Tom Emmer, IP, Tom Horner
Following this morning’s gracious concession speech by Tom Emmer, the MNGOP issued this statement:
“Tom Emmer and Annette Meeks have served Minnesotans with great distinction for many years. As conservative champions of lower taxes, reform, and smaller, sensible government, Tom and Annette waged a principled and optimistic campaign that Minnesotans can be proud of. While Tom may be conceding the governor’s race, his ideas that government must live within its means won the day as he led the ticket that took control of the state house and the state senate for the Republican Party. His message of smaller, sensible government will be what guides the legislature and is the political reality that the incoming governor will have to recognize. On behalf of the Republican Party of Minnesota, we wish Tom, Annette and their wonderful families all the best in their future endeavors.â€
I’ll take it a few steps further. While I congratulate Sen. Dayton for his victory, it’s important that he understand that Minnesotans essentially rejected his tax-the-rich scheme. They also said yes to the House and Senate GOP’s message of living within our means, reform and bringing state government into the 21st century.
Tom and Annette lost the race but won the war. Their ideas won the day throughout the state. Thanks to their message, Minnesotans can now rest easy knowing that they won’t have to worry incessantly about their taxes getting raised because spending is out of control.
Thanks to their message and the candidates’ hard work, there is a major check to Sen. Dayton’s plans.
That alone is worthy of our praise.
Technorati: Tom Emmer, Ideas, Vision, Reforms, Taxes, Annette Meeks, MNGOP, Mark Dayton, DFL
With Tom Emmer apparently ready to concede, it’s time to look at the incoming Dayton administration. First, congratulations are in order to Mr. Dayton. Your family’s riches bought you 4 years of hell.
Thanks in large part to ABM’s utterly dishonest ads, and your family’s funding of those ads, you made it appear as though Tom Emmer was as unqualified as you are. Now that the campaign is apparently over, however, and you’re faced with dealing with a Republican legislature, the mask will come off.
You can’t pretend anymore, not like you did when you told the state’s voters that taxing the rich was going to generate $4,000,000,000. That was exposed when the Department of Revenue said your tax-the-rich scheme would net $1,900,000,000, less than half of the money you said it would generate.
You didn’t put together a list of budget cuts either, meaning you’re stuck between a rock and a hard place in terms of balancing Minnesota’s budget.
Meanwhile, House and Senate Republicans will pass a long list of reforms that will expose you as incompetent and as a one trick pony who does the will of the DFL’s stable of special interest allies.
The GOP’s lists of reforms will take on the DFL’s special interest allies, forcing them to defend indefensible policies that benefit the special interests, not the people.
The bad news is that the Republican pro-growth, reform agenda will appeal to independents, giving them a great opportunity to add seats in both the House and Senate.
You can forget about your annual billion-dollar-a-year bonding bills, too, because Republicans will push bills that will create a dynamic economy, not a government-funded one like you’re proposing.
I hope your House and Senate candidates have fun campaigning on your failed agenda. Raising taxes and promising the special interests big payoffs won’t work next time.
The DFL should attempt to enjoy the next 4 years because they’ll be exiled for another long stretch after Minnesotans compare Dayton’s disastrous policies with the GOP’s appealing reform, pro-growth agenda.
Welcome to 4 years of hell, Sen. Dayton. You certainly deserve it.
Technorati: Hell, Mark Dayton, Special Interests, ABM, EdMinn, Tax The Rich, Deficits, DFL, Economy, Pro Growth, Reforms, MNGOP, Election 2012
I vehemently disagree with this AP article when it says this:
Minnesota Supreme Court justices are deliberating over a Republican lawsuit casting doubt about whether the number of governor’s race votes squares with rosters of voters.
The skirmish comes ahead of a presumed recount in a race where Democrat Mark Dayton leads Republican Tom Emmer by 8,770 votes. Depending on what the court does, some votes could be disqualified.
At issue is whether election administrators neglected to follow the law and match signed polling place rosters with final vote tallies. Some say they resorted to using generic receipts instead, which they argue is allowed under state rules.
What’s at issue isn’t “whether election administrators” ignored the law. What’s at issue is whether liberal justices like Alan Page are willing to ignore existing state law. If the justices rule that an administrative rule trumps signed legislation, then they will have essentially gutted the legislative process. If that’s their ruling, they will have essentially have argued that bureaucrats and justices make the laws and that legislatures and governors are essentially obsolete in making the laws citizens are expected to abide by.
If there’s a more absurd ruling than today’s ruling, I’m hard-pressed to think of it.
This MPR article highlights the absurdity:
The main arguments centered around whether the Supreme Court should directly interpret what is considered an out-of-date and ambiguous law or give credence to a rule created by the secretary of state that appeared to violate part of that law. Emmer’s attorneys argued that the court should follow the direct interpretation of the law and require election workers to count the number of voter signatures to make sure it matches up with the number of ballots cast on election night.
My first question is why any law that’s still on the books is considered “out-of-date”. If people don’t agree with the law, then it should be rewritten. Any justices who ruled against Tom Emmer got this badly wrong.
It isn’t their right to ignore written law. Their job is to rule on whether existing law is constitutional. In this instance, it clearly was.
When bureacrats’ ruling has more bearing on election law than legislators and governors, then it’s clear that bureaucrats have overstepped their authority. The minute that happens, the legislature needs to step in and limit the bureaucrats’ authority.
Hopefully, the new GOP legislators are writing that legislation as I’m writing this post. We pay legislators to write laws. We don’t pay administrative law judges to tell us that existing law isn’t relevant. Also, we don’t pay Supreme Court justices to write new law. Theoretically, we pay appellate court justices to tell us what the law says. PERIOD.
Based on this afternoon’s ruling, that isn’t what the Supreme Court did today. Considering the fact that this ruling dealt with the election of our governor, this ruling is all the more shameful.
BTW, I’ll have further comments if and when the justices publish an opinion. They owe use that much so we can at least figure out how they reached this opinion.
Technorati: Recount, Ruling, Supreme Court, Mark Dayton, DFL, Tom Emmer, MNGOP, Lawsuit, Election 2010
It’s official: Sen. Dayton has started whining about the recount process:
DFLer Mark Dayton lambasted (politely) the GOP’s move into court this morning, saying the party “is challenging the integrity of our election process.”
In an interview on Fargo radio station KFGO, the former U.S. Senator said the Republicans’ petition to the state Supreme Court to order local election officials to doublecheck Election Day vote totals “seems strange to me” and that the party is skating on “pretty thin ice.”
Continuing the ice metaphor, he recalled his days as a hockey player, saying, ” it’s sort of like you can lose the game six to four, and then you ask the judge to throw all ten goals into the lottery and you pull out six of them and hope that those are yours rather than the other team’s.”
He added, “It seems strange to me but I just live here.”
Sen. Dayton is right. The MNGOP is challenging the integrity of Mark Ritchie’s administration of Minnesota’s election system. They’re challenging the system because Mark Ritchie admitted the system is corrupt.
Let’s remember what Ritchie said. After the 2008 election, Minnesota Majority, who’s done great work on this issue, said that there were 40,000 more ballots cast than there were signatures on the signin sheets. Ritchie disagreed, saying that at most, there were 17,000-30,000 more ballots cast than signatures on the signin sheets.
What I know for certain is that at least eleven election judges stepped forward and signed affidavits saying that didn’t happen yet. Until reconcilliation happens, any recount effort will include ballots that weren’t legally cast, making any recount an exercise in illegitimacy. Until the ballot counts are right, we aren’t doing a legitimate recount.
It’s time Sen. Dayton learned that Republicans take the rule of law seriously. If Sen. Dayton gets upset when people follow the rule of law, then he’s got some serious issues.
I wrote here what the law demands:
Subd. 2. Excess ballots. If two or more ballots are found folded together like a single ballot, the election judges shall lay them aside until all the ballots in the box have been counted. If it is evident from the number of ballots to be counted that the ballots folded together were cast by one voter, the election judges shall preserve but not count them. If the number of ballots in one box exceeds the number to be counted, the election judges shall examine all the ballots in the box to ascertain that all are properly marked with the initials of the election judges. If any ballots are not properly marked with the initials of the election judges, the election judges shall preserve but not count them; however, if the number of ballots does not exceed the number to be counted, the absence of either or both sets of initials of the election judges does not, by itself, disqualify the vote from being counted and must not be the basis of a challenge in a recount. If there is still an excess of properly marked ballots, the election judges shall replace them in the box, and one election judge, without looking, shall withdraw from the box a number of ballots equal to the excess. The withdrawn ballots shall not be counted but shall be preserved as provided in subdivision 4.
That procedure is found in Minnesota code 204C.20, subd. 2. It’s extremely straightforward and easy to follow. Whether Sen. Dayton likes that law or not, the reality is that that’s the law and it will be followed.
The DFL is spinning reconcilliation as disenfranchising voters. The opposite is true. Letting illegally cast ballots stay in the ballot piles disenfranchises voters who followed the law.
There’s something else that must get asked, namely, how does a voter stand in line waiting to vote, then forget to sign the signin sheet?
Sen. Dayton is taking to the airwaves in an attempt to make it seem inevitable that he’ll be Minnesota’s next governor:
As for, Emmer’s petition to the Minnesota Supreme Court and a request to the State Canvassing Board to change the recount rules, Dayton said Emmer and the Republican Party know they’re way behind.
“They know they’re way behind,” Dayton said. “It’s just throwing spit balls at the wall to see which ones will stick.”
Dayton currently leads Emmer by nearly 8,800 votes.
Sen. Dayton couldn’t be more wrong. I don’t know that Tom Emmer is “way behind.” I know that the recount starts with Mark Dayton with 0 votes and with Tom Emmer with 0 votes. I further know that if votes are counted in the recount for which there aren’t signatures on the sign-in sheets, those are improperly counted ballots.
I’d also argue that Tom Emmer isn’t asking for a change in the recount rules. I’d argue that he’s simply asking that Minnesota state law be applied prior to the start of the recount.
Let’s remember that that 8,800 vote margin isn’t based on properly cast ballots. It’s based on ballots that haven’t been properly cast.
Regardless of the outcome of this recount, fairminded Minnesotans who work hard and play by the rules will insist that the rules be followed. Thus far, the DFL doesn’t appear interested in following the rules.
In my opinion, that will hurt the DFL in 2012.
Technorati: Reconcilliation, Recount, Tom Emmer, Lawsuit, MNGOP, Mark Dayton, Spin, DFL, Election 2010
This afternoon, Republican Party of Minnesota Chairman Tony Sutton announced that the gubernatorial recount is heading back to the Minnesota Supreme Court for the reconciliation process. The unfortunate thing about that is that most Minnesotans don’t know what reconcilliation is.
Simply put, reconcilliation is the process by which the number of ballots cast is reconciled with the number of signatures on the voter sign-in sheets at the voting stations.
Hypothetically speaking, if 200 people signed in at St. Cloud’s Ward 1, Precinct 1 but 225 ballots were cast, the courts could demand that 25 ballots be randomly picked from the pile, thereby bringing the number of ballots cast into balance with the number of signatures on the sign-in sheet.
The DFL will undoubtedly scream loud enough to wake up little children if that happens but that’s the remedy laid out in Minnesota law.
Mitch Berg’s post highlights Mark Ritchie’s corruption in this matter:
More Votes Than People: In 2008, the Minnesota Majority claimed that there were about 40,000 more votes cast than there were identified, signed-in voters in Minnesota. Mark Ritchie, Minnesota’s Secretary of State, said in effect “No, no no!â€, it was only somewhere under 30,000 votes.
That’s right. Even Mark Ritchie, the chief executive of our electoral system, admitted that that out of a little over 2.75 million voters, there were nearly 30,000 more votes cast than there were identified, signed-in voters. That’s a little over a percent of the entire voting pool. Over one in a hundred.
That’s over double the margin between the candidates in this year’s governor race.
That’s an awful lot of votes that, at first glance, via incompetence or fraud, and it really doesn’t matter which at this point, seem to have no connection with real, signed-in humans that showed up at the polls.
By Minnesota law, this needs to be taken care of. And it needs to be done before any recount takes place, to make sure that we’re dealing with real numbers, not inflated/mistake-driven/fraudulent ones.
As Mitch said, this is a big deal. If the number of ballots cast this year without the person signing in is similar to 2008, that’s easily more than enough to overturn Dayton’s lead.
This is why having an honest Secretary of State is vitally important to having clean elections. Unfortunately, we don’t have an honest Secretary of State right now.
What we have, however, are thousands of motivated voters who showed up at polls in Ramsey, Hennepin and St. Louis counties who stood in line, got registered on Election Day, and who then voted for Mark Dayton and Mark Dayton alone. That’s extremely odd and should be questioned.
Here’s the section of Minnesota’s election law that covers reconcilliation:
Subd. 2. Excess ballots. If two or more ballots are found folded together like a single ballot, the election judges shall lay them aside until all the ballots in the box have been counted. If it is evident from the number of ballots to be counted that the ballots folded together were cast by one voter, the election judges shall preserve but not count them. If the number of ballots in one box exceeds the number to be counted, the election judges shall examine all the ballots in the box to ascertain that all are properly marked with the initials of the election judges. If any ballots are not properly marked with the initials of the election judges, the election judges shall preserve but not count them; however, if the number of ballots does not exceed the number to be counted, the absence of either or both sets of initials of the election judges does not, by itself, disqualify the vote from being counted and must not be the basis of a challenge in a recount. If there is still an excess of properly marked ballots, the election judges shall replace them in the box, and one election judge, without looking, shall withdraw from the box a number of ballots equal to the excess. The withdrawn ballots shall not be counted but shall be preserved as provided in subdivision 4.
This is pretty straightforward. If there are more ballots in the box than there are signatures on the sign-in sheets for the precinct, then the election judge shall randomly pick ballots from the box until the number of ballots matches the number of signatures on the sign-in sheets.
Here’s part of Chairman Sutton’s statement:
“The most basic right of our election system is one person, one vote. We cannot have a system that allows more votes to be counted than legal voters. After the 2008 election, estimates varied that there were between 17,000 and 30,000 or more ballots than total voters. In 2009, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie pledged to match voter registration with canvassing board results to within a thousand. Ritchie has had two years to address this issue and yet we’re receiving reports today from election judges stating they did not reconcile the ballots cast with the number of signatures on the polling roster on Election Night 2010. These reports raise concerns about the instructions and written guides given to election judges by the Secretary of State’s office as to the statutorily required reconciliation procedures for Election Day but more importantly, raise serious questions about the integrity of the result of the election.
“Phantom votes have no place in the final vote count. There is a clear statutory remedy that must be followed, namely, that excess phantom ballots are removed from the certified vote count. Until reconciliation has been completed in each precinct, the legislatively mandated recount cannot begin. Today’s petition is of course within the legal framework of the canvassing process and the recount. We are seeking the court’s assurance that only legally cast ballots are counted. The next governor should be seated on January 3 with an outcome that has followed the letter of the law,†said Republican Party of Minnesota Chairman Tony Sutton.
“It is incumbent upon our election system to count each and every legally cast ballot and not include phantom ballots in the vote count. Our petition today is simply asking the Supreme Court to confirm that the number of votes matches the total number of voters on Election Day, as required by state law and that election officials follow the clear statutory remedy for the removal of phantom votes before the results are certified,†added Republican Party of Minnesota Deputy Chairman Michael Brodkorb.
If people don’t like the remedy prescribed by law, then their only remedy is to have legislators change how the law is written before the next election. It’s too late to change the remedy for this election because the recount is almost ready to start.
This remedy was anticipated, as this affidavit shows:
State law requires judges on election night to determine the proper number of ballots to be counted and, if necessary, conduct “reconcilliation” before producing a “summary statement” of results to the county auditor that, among, other things, identifies “the number of individuals that voted at the election in the precinct.” Minnesota Stat. 204.C20, subd. 1 and 204.C24, subd. 1(c). That process ensures that the numbers of ballots counted actually equals the numbers of voters who have signed the polling roster plus the voters who signed and registered on Election Day.
State law has long recognized that it is possible that more ballots may be cast than number of voters signed in and legally registered to vote. This is an anticipated event that state law requires local election judges to address on election day. If there are more ballots cast than the number of registered voters who sign in, the law requires that the number of ballots counted from the precinct to be reduced to equal the number of voters who signed in and registered through a prescribed procedure (i.e. reconcilliation).”
If the Minnesota Supreme Court doesn’t follow the solution prescribed by law, then I’ll take note of who votes to create their own solution, then work the next 2 yrs. to get those justices defeated. The rule of law is the rule of law and it must be obeyed.
Technorati: Recount, Reconcilliation, Mark Ritchie, DFL, Tom Emmer, Minnesota Majority, MNGOP, Election 2010