Archive for November, 2014
Elizabeth Warren, the hardline progressive who took Ted Kennedy’s seat, won’t be the Democrats’ presidential nominee. If she ran, however, she’d be pounded mercilessly for statements like this:
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) went straight after Republicans, blasting the GOP on deregulation and trickle down economics during a Center for American Progress event on Wednesday.
“The Republicans have a pretty simple philosophy: they say if those at the top have more, more power for Wall Street players to do whatever they want and more money for tax cuts than somehow they can be counted on to build the economy for everyone else,” Warren said. “Well, we tried it for 30 years and it didn’t work. In fact the consequences were nearly catastrophic.”
That’s rich considering the fact that the economy created more full-time jobs in 6 months under President Reagan than have been created during President Obama’s administration. If high taxes, overregulation and big spending were the right elixir, the Obama economy would be creating 2,000,000 high-paying full-time jobs each year.
The truth is that Obamanomics’ cornerstone policies don’t work. They’ve never worked in creating robust economic growth that helps everyone. In President Obama’s America, the well-connected get special breaks, Wall Street gets monthly bailouts and the middle class, what’s left of it anyway, takes it in the shorts. If Sen. Warren wants to fight for President Obama’s policies, be my guest.
Sen. Warren’s policies are tired:
“We tested the Republican ideas and they failed, they failed spectacularly. There’s no denying that fact,” Warren said. “We know the importance of accountability on Wall Street, the benefits of having a better educated work force. The advantages that come from investments of high speed rail and medical research.”
‘Investing’ in high speed rail is a boondoggle. As for a well-educated workforce, the American people have been getting ripped off by government schools, aka public schools. Unions have hurt public education. Charter schools, while not being the sole elixir to the problem, are definitely a positive step.
This is positively rich:
“People across this country get it. Sure, there’s a lot of work to be done and there’s a long way to go before Democrats can reclaim the right to say that we’re fighting for America’s working people, that we’re fighting to build a future not just for some of our children but for all of our children,” Warren said. “No, we’re not there yet but don’t forget the good news. Our agenda is America’s agenda.”
The masses aren’t clamoring for a green economy. They’re shouting for a robust expansion of fossil fuel exploration. They’re insisting on limiting regulations on sources of energy that heat homes and power factories.
If Democrats want to run on Obama’s policies, which they’ll be forced to do, they’ll get soundly defeated in 2016. Moving further to the left won’t grow their party. It’ll set the Democratic Party back a decade or more.
Sen. Klobuchar’s op-ed in the St. Cloud Times would be easier to take seriously if she wasn’t MIA on other issues surrounding the military.
With grateful hearts, Minnesotans this month gathered on Veterans Day to honor the brave Americans who have served in uniform to protect our freedom. This day should be about more than just saluting our veterans. It also serves as an opportunity to renew our commitment to serve those who have served us.
After all, that is our responsibility, to do right by those who have stood tall on the front lines so that we can live free. This is especially true for soldiers returning from battle permanently injured and suffering life-altering disabilities.
It’s a bit hollow sounding, not because wounded vets don’t deserve the medical treatment, but because Sen. Klobuchar didn’t speak out when the military started sending out pink slips to officers still fighting in Afghanistan:
In a stunning display of callousness, the Defense Department has announced that thousands of soldiers, many serving as commanding officers in Afghanistan, will be notified in the coming weeks that their service to the country is no longer needed. Last week, more than 1,100 Army captains, the men and women who know best how to fight this enemy because they have experienced multiple deployments, were told they’ll be retired from the Army.
The overall news is not unexpected. The Army has ended its major operations in Iraq and is winding down in Afghanistan. Budget cuts are projected to shrink the Army from its current 520,000 troops to 440,000, the smallest size since before World War II. What is astonishing is that the Defense Department thought it would be appropriate to notify deployed soldiers, men and women risking their lives daily in combat zones, that they’ll be laid off after their current deployment.
Why was St. Amy of Hennepin County silent about this? Shouldn’t the Obama administration treat the men and women still risking their lives on the battlefield deserve better treatment than this?
As one Army wife posted on MilitaryFamily.org, “On some level I knew the drawdowns were inevitable, but I guess I never expected to be simultaneously worried about a deployment to Afghanistan and a pink slip because my husband’s service is no longer needed.”
The thing is that these troops are needed more than ever:
The nation should worry about the increased national-security risk of separating such a large pool of combat-experienced leaders. The separated soldiers are those who carry the deepest knowledge base of counterinsurgency operations. A senior Defense Department official warned: “If the force is smaller, there’s less margin for error. Let’s face it — things are pretty uncertain out there.”
Then again, that’s never worried Sen. Klobuchar. Since her first campaign in 2006, Sen. Klobuchar consistently talked about “ending the war responsibly.” Winning wasn’t important to her.
That’s why her op-ed rings hollow. This isn’t just about health care for wounded vets. It’s about giving them the resources they need to accomplish their mission. That mission is to defeat and destroy the terrorists before they attack again.
It’s hard to believe but today marks the 10 year blogiversary for LFR. It’s been an incredible experience. The first subject that I sunk my teeth into was the Orange Revolution in the Ukraine. These days, there isn’t much in the way of good news coming from across the ocean thanks to our incredibly inept president.
Back when I started, I did lots of writing about world events. After the 2006 election disaster, I started paying attention to state government. In March, 2007, I broke my first news story thanks to a great tip from then-Rep. Steve Gottwalt. It’s still one of my favorite posts:
I just got off the phone with Steve Gottwalt, who had some shocking news from the Capitol. Today, at a committee hearing, Cy Thao told Steve “When you guys win, you get to keep your money. When we win, we take your money.” This was Thao’s explanation as to how the DFL plans on paying for all the spending increases they promised their special interest friends.
The DFL still has the same mindset today as they did in March, 2007.
Bit by bit, I started doing original reporting thanks in large part to frustrated state legislators who were being ignored by the Star Tribune and the St. Cloud Times. In 2008, I started covering the candidate forums. They were quite memorable. I still remember Rob Jacobs telling 2 major groups that he wasn’t an expert on their issues (transportation that Monday, health care the next day) but that he was a good listener. Despite telling everyone covering the events that he was totally unqualified for the job, the St. Cloud Times endorsed him over Rep. Dan Severson. The good news from that fiasco was that the Times had egg on their face when Rep. Severson beat Jacobs by 10 points.
The last 3 years, I’ve spent lots of time being the taxpayers’ watchdog. I’ve scooped the Times so many times that I’ve lost track of how many times it’s happened. Hopefully, I’ll be around when the mismanagement comes to an end. Hopefully, it’ll happen soon.
If you appreciate the reporting I’ve done, feel free to drop a few coins in the tip jar. Thanks for being incredibly loyal followers to LFR.
Tuesday evening, Senate Democrats voted to reject Mary Landrieu’s bill that would’ve forced the federal government into issuing the permits to build the Keystone XL Pipeline. The All Star Panel discussed it on this video:
My favorite part of the segment is the final part of the discussion. Here’s that transcript:
BRET BAIER: George, do you expect a lot of stories on the civil war within the Democratic Party?
(Laughter from George Will and Steve Hayes)
GEORGE WILL: I don’t think so. It is interesting to note that maybe they couldn’t have saved Mary Landrieu but they could’ve at least tried. And they didn’t even try.
The experts knew on Election Night that Mary Landrieu was history. That isn’t surprising to people who’ve followed that race. The Democrats’ circular firing squad hasn’t officially convened in public but it’s certainly started outside the public’s eye. I can’t picture it stopping until there’s political blood on the floor and the Democratic Party is damaged going into 2016.
While this was Sen. Landrieu’s last stand, we’ll have to wait until 2016 for Hillary’s last stand. Behind every ebb and flow in presidential polling is a steady current just beneath the surface. Right now, that current is running against the Democratic Party. They’re no longer the party of hope and change. They’re the party of Washington, DC. They’re the party of obstruction. They’re the party that’s stopped listening to the American people.
Hillary is the poster child for people who stayed too long in DC. Just like Mary Landrieu’s magic has evaporated, so has Hillary’s. Hillary first set foot in DC 24 years ago. She hasn’t left since. While Bill finished his time in office, she established a residence in New York, then immediately ran for Pat Moynihan’s seat. After winning re-election, she launched her first presidential campaign. After getting beaten by Barack Obama, she got picked to be his first Secretary of State.
Just like Sen. Landrieu tried getting her Washington friends to help her win a fourth term, Hillary is counting on her Washington friends to help her win her presidential election. It’s a schtick that Louisiana voters didn’t buy with Sen. Landrieu. It’s a schtick that Americans aren’t likely to buy in 2016.
As for Sen. Landrieu and the Democrats, 2014 was a difficult year, mostly because they ran a bunch of retreads that cast their votes for Obamacare. Isn’t it ironic that the ACA is sinking as fast as Sen. Landrieu’s political career is sinking? Isn’t it ironic that the Democratic Party’s favorability ratings are dropping as fast as the ACA’s favorability ratings are dropping? It couldn’t happen to a more deserving bunch.
GM’s Recall Problems and MnSCU’s Leadership Problem
By John W. Palmer
Stephen B. Young, Global Executive Director of the Caux Round Table concluded in his introduction of the July edition of “Pegusus”:
Leaders are needed to achieve good stakeholder relationships, not mere managers.
The focus of the July edition of “Pegusus” was the Report to Board of Directors of General Motors Company Regarding Ignition Switch Recalls issued on May 29th, 2014 by Anton R. Valukas of JENNER & BLOCK.
http://www.cauxroundtable.org/index.cfm?&menuid=139
The Valukas report began with a section titled: GM’S LEADERSHIP, THE TONE AT THE TOP, AND GM CULTURE. In this opening section of the report, Mr. Valukas wrote:
As described elsewhere in this report, the slow pace of the Cobalt investigation and the emerging pattern of accidents potentially related to the safety defect were not escalated to the Company’s most senior executives who from time-to-time met with the Board. The Board of Directors was not informed of any problem posed by the Cobalt ignition switch until February 2014.
The key phrase in this statement is: “…The Board of Directors was not informed…”.
The safety defect associated with the Cobalt investigation was in an ignition switch. This defect has been associated with 32 deaths when Cobalts were involved in automobile crashes where proper deploying of the air bag would have saved lives.
The recent concerns of various Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) stakeholder groups in the performance of Chancellor Steven Rosenstone are not as serious a matter as the loss of lives but the setting of “The Tone at the Top” and the creation of normative practices that engender a lack of confidence in leadership have serious consequences related to the future effectiveness of any organization.
In the past year, the MnSCU Board of Trustees (BoT) were not informed about two very important matters. In the first instance, the Chancellor’s contract was renewed in secret. In the second instance, a $2 million consultant contract concerning the major initiative called “Charting the Future” was entered into without the BoT being informed. In June of this year, the BoT was informed of concerns regarding the Chancellor’s performance. In recent weeks the BoT has been acutely aware of problems in stakeholder relations.
How will the BoT respond to the problem? I hope the response will not be like GM’s where:
One witness described the GM phenomenon of avoiding responsibility as the “GM salute,” a crossing of the arms and pointing outward towards others, indicating that the responsibility belongs to someone else, not me.
At GM, it took a change in leadership to begin a process of changing the norms. That change in leadership required the engagement of the Board of Directors. It is to early in the process of change at GM to know if norms will in fact change, but it is not to late to see change in the behavior at the top. You don’t hear the new CEO of GM using semantics to minimize and employees are no longer being told not use certain words and to call a:
“Problem an Issue, Condition, or Matter”
“Safety = Has Potential Safety Implications”
“Defect = Does not Perform to Design”.
GM has a new CEO that is a straight talker. Here are a couple of examples of some of her straight talk:
“I… believe if you have a problem you better solve it. Because if you don’t solve it you won’t be here or the company won’t be here. ”
Mary Barra, NY Times: Jan 23, 2014
And in front of Congress:
From the concluding article in the July 2014 Pegusus written by Erik Sande:
The culture at GM appears to have been one completely lacking in effective leadership. In many cases, what leaders need to instill in their organizations, among other things, are trust and responsibility….
The absence of actual leadership, inspiring trust and accountability, the opposite of the diffusion of responsibility, was a plague within the GM structure. One can only hope that Mary Barra, the newly appointed CEO, will be able to change this culture for the better.
It is now time for the Board of Trustees to step up and establish trust and accountability to MnSCU’s stakeholders by recalling Chancellor Rosenstone and establishing high expectations for themselves and all their employees. Recalling might not be sufficient in the Rosenstone matter and it may take discontinuation of the model to establish trust and a shared sense of accountability to do what is right for Minnesota.
Latest Fall Enrollment Numbers—Heading Towards Third
by Silence Dogood
The MnSCU website lists current FYE Fall enrollment numbers for MnSCU universities as of November 16, 2014. When these numbers are compared with the final fall enrollment numbers, the following figure is obtained:
While these are not final enrollment numbers—they do not become final until 45 days after the end of the semester—they are probably not far from what they will be. There may still be some second trimester Senior-to-Sophomore classes left to be added but it is unlikely that it will reduce the FYE decline substantially.
It is clear from the figure that the enrollment fortunes for all of the MnSCU universities are not the same. In fact, Southwest is actually showing a small increase. If we assume that each FYE is equal to $11,500 in revenue (tuition and state appropriation), a decline of 283 FYE represents a loss of $3,254,000.
Tammy McGee, Vice President for Finance and Administration confirmed the budget shortfall in a November 12, 2014 email:
In May, the enrollment projection was increased from a decline of 3.2% to a decline of between 4-5%.
For those that are interested in the details, the MnSCU website shows that Mankato currently has 6,635 FYE for Fall semester compared to SCSU’s 5,735 FYE. As a result, in Fall, Mankato is larger than SCSU by 900 FYE. If you look at headcount and count all of the high school students that SCSU enrolls, SCSU is actually ‘larger’ than Mankato. However, it’s the 900 FYE difference that translates into budget dollars—not headcount. Presidents seem to enjoy talking about headcount enrollments because they are always larger than the more important FYE enrollment.
SCSU’s decline of 283 FYE for fall is nearly four times larger than the 72 FYE decline at Mankato. When you look at summer, Mankato had 204 FYE more than SCSU. Combining Summer and Fall FYE enrollments, Mankato has 1,104 FYE more than SCSU. Once again, using $11,500 for the revenue from the combined tuition and state appropriation gives Mankato an estimated $11,592,000 revenue advantage over SCSU. If allowance is made for the reduced revenue from concurrently enrolled students, since SCSU has a much larger penetration in the high school market than does Mankato, the revenue gap is substantially larger.
The following figure shows the FYE enrollment by fiscal year for Mankato and SCSU:
Through FY11, SCSU had an advantage in FYE enrollment over rival Mankato. Starting in FY12, Mankato became larger than SCSU (at least in terms of FYE).
The following figure shows the difference in FYE between SCSU and Mankato by fiscal year.
A positive number means SCSU’s FYE enrollment was larger than Mankato’s. Correspondingly, a negative number means Mankato’s FYE enrollment was larger than SCSU’s. From 2008 through 2010, SCSU’s lead was increasing. In 2011, SCSU’s lead was cut nearly in half. Beginning in FY12, Mankato moved ahead of SCSU. What’s potentially scary is that the rate of increase is increasing!
Combining summer and fall enrollments for FY15, Mankato is already ahead of SCSU by 1,102 FYE. With the numbers for spring still to come in, it might not be hard to predict that Mankato’s lead over SCSU will increase even more.
Perhaps SCSU needs to stop advertising being the “second largest university in Minnesota” and consider what it means to be number three.
Anyone who’s known me knows that I’m unabashedly a sports fanatic. Those people know that my first love is professional baseball. This afternoon, I saw Dawn Mitchell’s interview of Erin and Dan Murphy:
They’re neighbors of Twins great Tony Oliva. They started “the Official Tony Oliva Fan Group”, which they say “was started in 2011 by a group of 12 fans in a suburban kitchen.” Their “mission is to get Minnesota Twins Legend Tony Oliva inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame.” It’s great to see them putting this campaign together. It’s a disgrace that Tony Oliva isn’t enshrined in Cooperstown already.
Tony Oliva is one of a handful of dominant players I’ve had the privilege of watching in person. The best way I know how to illustrate Tony’s dominance is to explain that Rod Carew thought of him as his hitting instructor. While they were teammates. Rod Carew won the AL batting title 8 times. His best season was 1977, when he was the AL MVP. He won it by hitting .388, the highest batting average at the time since Ted Williams hit .388 in 1957.
What other player or coach could Rod Carew turn to that knew more about hitting than he did? That’s right. The only other player with that type of credibility was Tony Oliva.
Let’s take it a step further. In 1964, Tony became the first rookie to lead the league in hitting. That year, Tony finished with a .323 batting average. In 672 at-bats, Tony struck out just 68 times or once every 2 1/2 games. If you’re thinking that’s decent for a slap hitter, you’re right. That’s pretty good for a slap hitter. Tony Oliva wasn’t a slap hitter, though. That year, Tony finished with 43 doubles, 9 triples, 32 home runs, 374 total bases and a .557 slugging percentage.
That’s what a dominant hitter does. Tony Oliva fits that description perfectly. After his playing career, he worked with another Twins outfielder that turned into a great hitter. His name was Kirby Puckett. Kirby started as a slap hitter. He didn’t hit his first home run until his second season. After Tony suggested Kirby start lifting his front leg, Kirby started hitting home runs while hitting for a high average.
When good hitters hit a hot streak, their batting average for 5 games might shoot up to .450 or so. When Tony Oliva, Rod Carew, Kirby Puckett or Joe Mauer got locked in, their batting average for a series looks like the batting champion’s batting average in a slow pitch softball league. We’re talking about these gentlemen going 15-for-17 in a 4-game series or 11-for-12 in a 3-game series.
It’s time for the baseball gods to smile on Tony O. If Cooperstown doesn’t have room for a 3-time batting champion who played in 8 All Star games while winning a Gold Glove for defensive excellence, then Cooperstown’s reputation deserves to take a hit.
Add in the fact that Tony’s been one of baseball’s best ambassadors for the last 30+ years and that he’s worked with Twins hitters since the 1970s. Those credentials deserve to be enshrined in Cooperstown, NY.
That’s where you come in:
The Hall of Fame announced on October 30th that Tony Oliva and 9 others (Dick Allen, Ken Boyer, Gil Hodges, Bob Howsam, Jim Kaat, Minnie Minoso, Billy Pierce, Luis Tiant and Maury Wills) will be considered for election into the Hall of Fame. The Veterans Committee is considering the Golden Era (1947-1972) players and will be judging them based on their Record, Ability, Integrity, Character, Sportsmanship and Contribution to the team.
The 16 Voters are: Hall of Famers Jim Bunning, Rod Carew, Pat Gillick, Ferguson Jenkins, Al Kaline, Joe Morgan, Ozzie Smith and Don Sutton; baseball executives Jim Frey, David Glass, Roland Hemond and Bob Watson; and veteran media members Steve Hirdt, Dick Kaegel, Phil Pepe and Tracy Ringolsby. The vote will take place on Monday December 8th 2014 in San Diego CA at the Baseball Winter Meetings.
The best way to influence the voters is by writing them a letter. Click HERE to find out more information!
Please consider sending a letter or postcard to the Hall of Fame telling them why Tony Oliva should be inducted into the Hall of Fame!
Let’s get Tony into the Hall of Fame. He’s earned it and then some. While we’re at it, let’s get Jim Kaat in, too.
How Good Are The Projections?
by Silence Dogood
The fourth issue of the HuskyData Newsletter, “a regular newsletter dedicated to sharing data and information about SCSU and our students,” was released on Tuesday, November 4, 2014 and focused on enrollment projections.
The first figure shows the Fall 2014 NEF (New Entering Freshmen) Forecast Over Time. The original projection on February 5th was for an increase of 122 students over the Fall’13 enrollment which is an increase of 7.1%. That’s pretty amazing growth if it turned out to be true. By the February 19th projection, the possible increase dropped to 77 students yielding a healthy growth of 4.5%. That’s still pretty amazing growth.
By the March 5th projection, the number was reduced again to the value from Fall’13 for a net growth of 0%. From that point, the projections vary ±2% above and below the actual 30th day NEF enrollment.
So, for a month from February 5th to March 5th things looked pretty good or at least not too bad. The actual 30th Day NEF number of 1,683 represents a decline of 1.2% from the Fall of 2013 to Fall 2014. It’s still a decline, but at least less of a decline than the prior year. The following Figure shows the NEF Headcount from Fall’08 through Fall’14.
The headcount enrollment decline from Fall’08 to Fall’14 is 718 students, which amounts to a decline of 29.9%! Clearly, the percentage decline is staggering. Hopefully, the trend will not continue too far into the future. SCSU cannot survive as the second largest MnSCU institution, with much more declining enrollment. Believe it or not, this fall SCSU has only 33 more NEF than Winona State University!
The second graph appearing in the HuskyData Newsletter shows Forecasts of Fiscal Year 2015 FYE Enrollment at various points in time. The February 5th projection was for an FYE enrollment of 12,125. This represents a projected decline of 256 FYE for a 2.1% decline from the FY14 enrollment.
Unfortunately, the February 5th projection significantly overestimated the actual enrollment. “After adjusting for the unanticipated decline in summer enrollment,” the current projection is for an enrollment of 11,798 FYE, which is a loss of 583 FYE and a decrease of 4.7% from the FY14 enrollment. Looking at the plot, in May, the projection dropped by approximately 250 FYE but the summer enrollment was only down 100 FYE corresponding to a decline of nearly 10% in summer enrollment. Clearly, something more significant than the decline in summer enrollment affected the FYE projection in May.
If you look at the first enrollment projection in the HuskyData Newsletter compared to this final enrollment projection (11,798), the projection decreased by 327 FYE and by itself corresponds to a net decline from the prior year of 2.6%. Essentially, the enrollment decline for the latest projection is more than twice the original projected decline of 2.1% (an error in estimation of 120% error).
President Potter has repeatedly praised the Data Analytics Workgroup for the accuracy of their enrollment projections. If the budget for FY15 was built using the first enrollment projection, the big question is how much of a financial effect does being off by 327 FYE represent. Assuming each FYE produces $11,500 in revenue, 327 FYE represents $3,760,000. Considering the current projected budget deficit is $9,542,000, this ‘error’ represents 39% of the projected budget deficit. Clearly, whether or not the enrollment projection was right on target or off by 327 FYE, the budget is going to have to be cut by a very big number. However, one might like to know the bad news earlier so plans could be made to anticipate the shortfall rather than have to react to it.
Looking at the FYE projections for FY15, the latest data point shows the FYE number from November 2014. At this point, summer enrollment is already in the bank. Fall semester is more than half way through so the final fall numbers will only change by a small amount. Students have already started registering for Spring semester. Making a projection for Spring semester and ultimately the total FYE enrollment for the year at this point should be pretty accurate. Quite simply the majority of the FYE enrollment for the year is already known and there is pretty good historical data about the percentage of students returning in spring semester from fall semester. It’s kind of like counting the number of people in a movie theater at the beginning of the movie. Certainly, some people come in late but the change in the total number is very small.
If the enrollment projection of 11,798 comes to pass, the enrollment decrease will fall within the range 4-5% as revised in May (the announced March projection was for a 3.2% decline). While we can all argue about projections, I believe the final FYE FY’15 number will be closer to 11,719, which would correspond to a decline of 5.3%. We’ll see the actual 10th day enrollment numbers shortly after the beginning of classes in January. Either way, a decline of 4.7% or 5.3%, when coupled where the university started from its peak in FY10 (15,096), the enrollment is down over five years either 21.8% or 22.4%. This seems like a distinction without a difference to me. What is not a distinction without a difference is the over estimation of enrollment that then results in budgeting expenditures greater than the actual revenue generated. The effect of the over estimation of enrollment has resulted in the creation of the need to cut expenditures after a majority of the budget has been committed.
One can only hope that the error in estimation does not continue and the Data Analytics group learns from it’s mistakes and that the budgeting process will be based on more reliable estimates of enrollment and revenue. Another $3.7 million surprise for next year on top of this year’s $9.5 million dollar surprise surely will create major financial problems for SCSU.
According to this article, Rick Nolan is upset with outside groups’ smear campaign against Stewart Mills:
But the ads were also strongly disliked by Nolan, who was frustrated that he didn’t have the authority to pull third-party ads, or even talk about them with the group sponsoring them.
That’s total BS. It’s an outright lie. It’s true that Congressman Nolan can’t coordinate anything with independent expenditure organizations, from ad buys to GOTV operations. There’s nothing illegal if Congressman Nolan had issued a statement criticizing Nancy Pelosi’s PAC for running ads that bordered on slander. It wouldn’t have been smart for him to do that, though, because his ads were exceptionally similar to the ads run by Pelosi’s PAC.
WASHINGTON — The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee decided it would fund a lot of hit ads against 8th District Republican challenger Stewart Mills. So the Washington-based group recorded television ads and sent out mailers that mocked U.S. Rep. Rick Nolan’s opponent for his shoulder-length hair and his wealth obtained through a successful; and hard-working family business, Mills Fleet Farm.
Now that this election is in the rear-view mirror, it’s time to say some things that I didn’t say prior to the election. First, Nolan’s statements about there being too much money in politics is typical DFL boilerplate. It isn’t that there’s too many ads on TV.
It’s that there are too many spineless DFL politicians who won’t criticize their supporters for funding smear campaigns.
If Nolan was a man of integrity, which he isn’t, he could’ve criticized House Majority PAC, the DCCC and AFSCME’s PAC for running a smear campaign. Apparently, Nolan didn’t learn that the First Amendment protects people who criticize political campaign machines.
The ads were viewed by political friends of Mills as ridiculous, offensive and personally nasty. “They’re just so absolutely not grounded in any sense of reality. They’re going after a person’s appearance and also success … and isn’t success the American Dream,” Mills said during an interview during the campaign.
Stewart Mills highlights beautifully that Rick Nolan didn’t stand up for people trying to achieve the American Dream. That’s because Nolan spent the campaign criticizing achievement. Stewart Mills spent his entire campaign showing how the company he runs has done more to help the middle class than the entire Democratic Caucus has done in the last 10 years.
It’s time for Iron Range voters to decide whether they want someone representing them who tells them he supports them until election day, then ignores them the next 22 months. They made a mistake this time. They should’ve voted for Stewart Mills because he would’ve went to Washington to get PolyMet opened.
Now that the election is behind him, Rick Nolan will likely ignore the PolyMet issue for the next 22 months. That’s how Iron Range voters will know whether Nolan supports them or if he’s just committed to paying PolyMet lip service.
After reading this LTE, there’s no question that fascism is alive and well in the United States. Here’s what the LTE proposes:
Combined, about $43,781,720 was spent on campaigning just for the governor, Senate and U.S. House elections in Minnesota. Think what that money could have been used for in the state.
I realize it’s not a lot of money in the total scheme of things, but it sure could have been used for something better than all the advertising. There should be no money allowed except from individuals living in the state or legislative district. No money should come from PACs, corporations or unions; only from people who can vote! PACs, corporations and unions don’t vote.
There also should be no negative advertising. Period! Only advertising should be about the candidate’s position on issues and what the candidate will try to do if elected. Period!
Who made this person the arbiter of what’s protected by the First Amendment and what isn’t? This is what happens when schools don’t teach their students the Constitution. It’s what happens when parents don’t teach their children the Constitution, too. It’s what happens when buffoons don’t think things through, too.
Why shouldn’t PACs, corporations and unions have the right to participate in the political process? There’s nothing in the text of the First Amendment that says it only protects individuals’ right to free speech.
What’s particularly bothersome about this LTE is that he didn’t bother mentioning the fact that the DFL and Nancy Pelosi’s ads were particularly dishonest. The other thing that’s troubling is the fact that the DFL’s ads and Nancy Pelosi’s ads outright lied. Repeatedly. Though this isn’t a Pelosi ad, it’s of a similar nature:
That ad was run by NARAL Pro-Choice USA. It accused Cory Gardner, Colorado’s new senator-elect, of banning birth control. NARAL ran this slanderous ad despite their knowing that Sen.-Elect Gardner proposed making contraception available without a prescription.
The best way to clean up politics isn’t by limiting citizens’ participation in the political process but by defeating the politicians whose ads are essentially smear campaigns. Politicians won’t stop running smear campaigns until they don’t work anymore. This isn’t that complicated.
Another key step in eliminating negative campaigning is by tying outside groups’ spending to the candidates they’re attempting to help. While it’s illegal to for politicians to coordinate with these outside expenditure organizations, it isn’t illegal to issue a heartfelt statement specifically criticizing these smear campaign ads. For instance, a man of integrity caught in soon-to-be former Sen. Udall’s position could’ve issued this statement about NARAL’s smear campaign ad:
My campaign condemns in the harshest possible terms NARAL’s ad suggesting my opponent wants to ban birth control. While my opponent and I disagree on a wide range of issues, and while I stand ready to highlight those points of disagreement during our debates and out campaign, I can’t sit idly by while this smear campaign is carried out on my behalf. I hereby demand that NARAL Pro-Choice Colorado take this ad down immediately.
In the Eighth District, there was little difference between Rick Nolan’s advertisements and Pelosi’s advertisements. In fact, the DCCC’s advertisements against Torrey Westrom and Rick Nolan’s advertisements against Stewart Mills were cookie-cutter copycats of Pelosi’s advertisements against Stewart Mills.
I’ll have more to say on Rick Nolan’s spinelessness later this morning.
