Banana Republic of Minnesota: Mayo Clinic Edition

It's fun to write fiction.  But the power of speculative theories comes from their ability to explain current and future events.

My theory--based on complete speculation and no facts--that Democrat Gov. Mark Dayton (if reelected) plans to step aside to make way for his Lt. Gov. running mate/Chief of Staff Tina Smith--is looking better by the minute.

The Rochester Post Bulletin writes today about the political donation habits of the Mayo Clinic's top executives.  They have been giving--and giving generously--to the Dayton/Smith ticket and not a penny to the Republican nominee for Governor, Jeff Johnson.

You will recall that the Democratic state legislature and the Democratic Governor got together in 2013 to give $585 million in taxpayer funds to the private Mayo Clinic to expand its operations in Rochester.

Called the Destination Medical Center (DMC), the project was important enough that Dayton appointed his then Chief of Staff/now running mate/chief fixer/power behind the throne/(and in my fevered imagination) the next Governor Tina Smith as chair of the DMC board.

Executives at the private Mayo Clinic have reciprocated by donating to the Dayton/Smith campaign, $7,000 so far in 2014.  The Post Bulletin notes that many of these Mayo executives are recent converts to the Dayton cause, not having backed the Gov. with contributions during his 2010 run for a first term.

But that's just the way business is done in a banana republic--public tax dollars are steered toward private interests and the recipients reward with cash the politicians who made it happen.  Pay to play?  Perish the thought, it's all for the greater good, of course.

Rumor of the Day: Dayton to Step Down in 2015

[Note: the following has no basis in fact.  I just made it up.  But it explains a lot.]

Longtime readers will know that I don't trade in rumors.  But this one was too good to pass up.  It was too good because it explains much of the inexplicable in this season's election campaign.

Many were surprised when Minnesota's current governor, Democrat Mark Dayton, decided to run for reelection this year.  In his long public career, Dayton had never run for reelection to any office he had previously held.  At 67, Dayton is the oldest person ever to hold the office in Minnesota.  His ongoing health problems had many wondering whether the multi-millionaire Dayton would choose a comfortable retirement over the rigors of holding high office.

Rumors persisted that Dayton wasn't really running this time.  Speculation ran that he was waiting for a strategic moment to step aside--paving the way for a hand-picked successor and avoiding a costly intra-party nomination battle.  But the Democrat precinct caucuses, the state convention, the candidate filing date, and the primary election all came and went.  Now we are weeks away from the November election and Dayton is still on the ballot and out on the campaign trail.

So the rumors are shifting to post-election scenarios.  Should Dayton gain reelection for another four-year term (not a sure thing), rumors have him stepping down before completing a second term as governor.

Rumors center on the choice of Dayton's chief of staff, Tina Flint Smith, as his new Lt. Governor running mate.  Dayton's critics have pointed to Smith as the real power in the Dayton Administration.

The scenario runs something like this:  Dayton is reelected as Governor, Smith is elected as Lt. Governor.  They muddle through the 2015 legislative session and get a new two-year budget signed into law.  Late summer 2015, when everyone is on vacation, Dayton quietly steps down, making Smith the state's 41st (and first female) governor.

The thinking goes that the Democrats want to milk the Dayton name and fortune (and the goodwill surrounding the Dayton family) one last time in 2014.  Once a new Democrat administration is safely entrenched in St. Paul, the new Governor Smith then has three years to establish her own name and campaign machine for a 2018 reelection bid.

It may never happen.  But if it does, you read it here first.

Hired Guns, Part 10

It's my sad duty to report that the Shawn A. Towle arrested in St. Paul in July appears to be the same Shawn Towle who remains a member in good standing of the state senate's capitol press corps.  I reported yesterday on the incident.

Towle's July 2014 arrest--on a warrant issued in August 2010--was in connection with a 2007 DWI case.  Towle appears to have violated the terms of his probation, specifically, his failure to appear at two scheduled probation meetings in the summer of 2010. 

Records on file at the Ramsey County court house give Towle's 2008-era address as 213 Front Avenue, the same St. Paul address listed for his now inactive company Key Strategies, LLC.

Hired Guns, Part 9

I stumbled upon an interesting item on the interwebs the other day:  someone going by the name Shawn A. Towle was arrested in St. Paul on July 21, 2014.  According to records on file at the District court, this Shawn Towle’s arrest—on a 2010 warrant—appears to be related to a 2007 DWI case.

The curious item is the last entry in the court records:  a fine of $500 “paid directly to victim.”  Here’s hoping that this Shawn Towle is someone other than the blogger and capitol press reporter of the same name.

In Part 10, my hopes are not fulfilled.

Corollary 5

Over the weekend the Minneapolis Star Tribune returned from hiatus, resuming their election coverage with stories the last three days running.  In doing so, they seem to be proving true the old Borscht Belt joke about the local resort’s terrible food, whose punchline reads “and such small portions!”

In fact, the return of election news to the Star Tribune has inspired me to promulgate a Corollary 5 to  Glahn's First Law of media coverage:  Sooner or later (more likely sooner) every Democrat talking point will be reprinted as fact by local media.

Incumbent U.S. Senator Democrat Al Franken, the state Democrat party, and their front-group the Alliance for a Better Minnesota has determined that they will label Franken’s Republican challenger Mike McFadden as “Minnesota’s Mitt Romney.”  Forget for a moment that everything Romney said in the last presidential campaign turned out to be correct.

Millionaire Franken thinks it will help his campaign to portray businessman McFadden as a top-hatted, monocle-wearing, out-of-touch plutocrat.  The Star Tribune piles on with an article headlined, “New Al Franken ad criticizes Mike McFadden's corporate move to Bermuda.”

For those readers who get beyond the headline, it turns out that McFadden didn’t move anywhere, much less to Bermuda.  Somehow, the Star Tribune twists this non-move into support for Franken’s claim that McFadden is guilty of “tax evasion.”  Tax evasion is a Federal crime, punishable by jail time.  Neither the Franken TV ad, nor the accompanying press release, uses the loaded word “evasion.”  The Star Tribune, based on no evidence, decided to take the Franken charge one step further to smear McFadden.

The Star Tribune piece includes as “context” (“comes on the heels of”) the unrelated corporate move of Burger King to Canada.  If the party labels were reversed, the Star Tribune would have included references to Franken’s serial non-payment of corporate taxes, which the Star Tribune itself documented back during his first run in 2008.

Not to be outdone, Minnesota Public Radio goes after GOP candidate for governor, Jeff Johnson, using the Democrats’ preferred label for him as a “Tea Party Republican extremist.”  To be fair, MPR and the Democrats decided on the Tea Party extremist label for the Republican candidate even before the Republicans decided on a candidate for governor.

Democrats would have been embarrassed to write a headline like MPR’s “Johnson: ‘I am not a tea party extremist.’  As the political wisdom would have it, if you are on defense, you are losing.  To curry favor with the ruling party, state-taxpayer-dependent public radio is happy to pose “when did you stop beating you spouse”-style loaded questions to Republican challengers.

Apparently, focus groups find the phrase Tea Party Republican extremist” frightening.  Democrats hope to motivate their base and/or scare low-information voter with the epithet.

Corollary 5 looks to get a workout in the next seven weeks.

Missing In Action

Credit goes to the Minneapolis Star Tribune for running a front-page, top headline story on the Minnesota/ISIS connection, “Federal grand jury targets local terrorist pipeline.”

I have no idea what help that a Federal grand jury can provide in combatting what appears to be an imminent threat.  But the Star Tribune’s article provides a useful summary of what is known about the two dozen or so people with Minnesota connections who have gone to fight in the Middle East.

The Star Tribune documents efforts by local police—in several jurisdictions—the county sheriff and the Federal Department of Homeland Security, among other local and Federal agencies.

Conspicuous in their absence is any mention of state government involvement.  The state has considerable investigative and law enforcement capabilities located in the Attorney General’s office, the state Department of Public Safety, the State Police, the state airport commission and other agencies.

What, if anything, is state government doing to protect its citizens and aid the multiple investigations into terrorist recruiting in Minnesota?

MN’s Banana Republic: Fiber Optic Edition

In another late-Friday-afternoon news dump, the Administration of Democrat Mark Dayton quietly dropped plans to dig a two-mile fiber optic cable to the Governor’s Mansion.

After the least bit of media scrutiny (credit Minnesota Public Radio with the scoop), Dayton dropped the $261,000 project that would have resulted in construction underneath the street running through the tony Summit Avenue neighborhood of St. Paul.  The Governor’s mansion would have been the only location with access to the taxpayer-paid fiber optic cable, boasting 10 times the speed of regular internet connections.

Apparently, the optics of the fiber optic project are not favorable for the Governor in an election year.  We’re still not sure of the purpose of the project—security at the Mansion, better TV reception, faster internet—but the bungled handling of the project fits within the “let them eat cake” attitude of this Administration.

Election? What Election?

Amazing.  In a phenomenon that I first noted on primary election day, the Minneapolis Star Tribune does not have a single item on the 2014 election in its print edition of Friday, September 5, 2014.

Not one news story, not an Op/Ed piece, not a column or a column-inch discussing the event that will occur in only 60 days.

Minnesota will elect a governor, a U.S. senator, and three other statewide officeholders that day.  Voters in the North Star State will also elect eight representatives to Congress on November 4.  Early voting, by absentee, begins exactly two weeks from today.

The 2014 election in Minnesota may determine control of the state house of representatives and, perhaps, the United States Senate.  Seats on city councils, county commissions, park boards, and many other governmental bodies will be decided that day.

Unfortunately, even a careful reader of today’s Star Tribune would not be aware of that.  Of course, there are other newspapers, and other media outlets in TV, radio, and the internet.  But the Star Tribune styles itself as the state’s “newspaper of record,” with many other outlets taking the paper’s lead on what deserves coverage, and what does not.

The lack of news coverage of the election this cycle has been striking, given how competitive the races appear to be and how close we are to the event.  A lack of opportunities for what they call in the business “earned media” benefits incumbents, who enjoy greater name recognition.

In 2014, the incumbents just happen to be all Democrats.

Perhaps tomorrow’s edition will resume coverage of the election, putting the half-dozen or so Star Tribune staff reporters on the political beat back to work.  We’ll see.

Alliance for a Better Minnesota is “Worried”

Our friends over at the Democrat-front-group Alliance for a Better Minnesota (ABM) have a new TV ad out attacking GOP candidate for governor Jeff Johnson.

Entitled "Worried", the 15- and 30-second spots feature Laura Livermore, Classroom Teacher, Forest Lake.  The video was posted on You Tube by ABM on under the tag,

Tea Party Republican Jeff Johnson has a record on education that should make Minnesotans worried.

Apparently the pejorative “Tea Party Republican” must test particularly well with low information voters.  Or, perhaps its use in the ad is a sign the Democrats are concerned about turning out their base in an off-year election.

 

Roundup on the Minnesota/ISIS Connection

Here are a few useful links for those wanting to follow the story of Minnesotans fighting for ISIS:

KSTP-5--FBI concerned about terror recruitment in Minnesota

Fox Channel 9--The Reporters--first story

The Daily Mail--Minnesota men fighting for ISIS

Minnesota Public Radio--Jihad in Syria lures Somalis from Minnesota—from June 2014

MPR--FBI agent wakes up every morning worrying about the threat at home