Ethics Hoo-Ha

After 2 1/2 hours of argument and testimony Monday evening, the House Ethics Committee indefinitely delayed a decision on censuring Rep. Arlon Lindner, R-Corcoran.

According to one witness, this part stood out:

"Anderson, Lindner's attorney, had his secretary (and wife of 22 years) sit at the testimony table. She stated that she was preparing the letter and typed all of the names. She then went to a "red book" and got the addresses. She implied that she got the -Black from that red book and that since the B was capitalized, she thought it was a name. She then tearfully stated that she was working under stress because she had just returned from out of town, dealing with her mother's cancer surgery, etc."

[It] "sounded like an honest mistake until the folks on the other side went scurrying off to get their copies of the "red book"-- apparently a listing of all members of the legislature and their contact info. Turns out the -Black thing isn't in that red book. Anderson was forced to admit, to the collective gasp of the standing room only audience, that he had created a list of complainants with their personal characteristics indicated. In all the other cases, he separated the name from the personal characteristics with commas. In Walker's case, he used a dash. He then had to own that he was responsible for the gaffe, not the sniffling wife."

I don't know that I am convinced that Lindner should be censured by the House. What really should be happening is the Republican leadership should be removing him from his authority positions on any committees. Republicans should likewise be vocal about personally censuring his remarks. They are not, so one can only assume they (quietly) agree with Lindner's bigotted views on blacks and gays. That Lindner keeps getting re-elected is troubling, as well.

Quid Pro Appointum Redux

I voted against Tim Pawlenty, that's probably obvious. At election time, although I disagreed with his politics and that his "no new taxes" pledge was wrong-headed, I believed he was at least a hard-working, honest guy.

The last few months have demonstrated that I was wrong. He's just another corrupt politician. I commented on his laughable appointment of Vicki Grunseth to chair the Metro Airports commission a few weeks ago in Quid Pro Appointum -- Act I, apparently.

But now comes the news that Pink-Slip Pawlenty has created a position for Ryan Bronson at the DNR, despite such deep cuts in the organization that it'll be a miracle if they can perform their function at all. Bronson will be the hunting and fishing retention recruitment coordinator. While many dedicated, necessary DNR employees will be laid off, Bronson will be getting paid $55,000 a year in this newly created, but wholly unnecessary, position.

Ryan Bronson was a former political director of Pawlenty's campaign, but of course that has nothing to do with the creation of this job, does it?

Overwhelmed by mass mediocrity

Sorry for not keeping up -- it's just not possible, these days. The amount of wrong-headed policy and regulation being output by the state's officials is so large there's just not enough to time to point it all out and comment on it. I often think of just throwing in the towel. People are just too into their own individualistic pursuits to bother noticing that they are being turned into a society of willing slaves by oligopolistic groups in power.

Quid Pro Appointum

In another joke on the citizens (you know, those people singled out in the Constitution as being the only ones who have the power to vote), the Pawlenty administration has made a mockery of the concept of government for the people, instead preferring government for the benefit of wealthy corporations. In this instance, he appointed Vicki Grunseth to chair the Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC), a woman who has virtually no qualifications for the job whatsoever other than being a party-line Republican who knows how to take marching orders from Pawlenty or Northwest Airlines, as they see fit. Virtually every adult I know is ten times more qualified than this sycophant. Of course, Northwest Airlines is very happy with the selection -- so happy one wants to know how much money they dumped into the Pawlenty campaign (of the $520,218 they donated in the 2001-2002 election cycle, ignoring, of course, the personal contributions of its executives). However, someone should coach Northwest CEO Richard Anderson on improving his spin, since the goals of government versus the goals of private enterprise are quite different. Anderson comments on Grunseth's position by saying, "the airport commission is going to run more like a business." -- as if this were a Good Thing. He's missing the fact that private enterprise strives to make profits for its owners, while government strives to provide representation for all citizens and to provide them with cost-effective services as they so require.

He's probably right that MAC will be run as if it were NWA's own business from now on, now that those pesky citizens are out of the way.

No wonder suburban Republicans think we need to pave every last inch of the inner cities. They are so geographically challenged that their idea of a 45-minute drive during afternoon rush-hour traffic takes them on an indirect route through both downtowns. State Rep. Lynne Osterman, R-New Hope, trying to get from the Capitol in St. Paul for a speaking engagement in Bloomington decided it would only take 45-minutes leaving at 3:15pm, driving via I-94 through St. Paul and then Minneapolis to I-35W to I-494 in Bloomington, 6 miles further than taking I-35E south to I-494, and 7 miles further than the shortest and quickest route of taking West 7th Street / Highway 5 and/or Shepard Road from St. Paul to 494.

Rep. Osterman is obviously not the only person who has made or will make such a navigational mistake. But one has to wonder when legislators and politicians take on micro-managing our transportation infrastructure as if they were experts, when they clearly are not.

How much is that politician in the window? The one with the lobbyist tale?

The Tim "King of the Suburbs" Pawlenty administration is showing that it knows some Latin, specifically quid pro quo. Turns out they have given a big break to a Florida insurance company that made a hefty donation to their campaign. For a mere $15,000 contribution, the American Bankers Insurance Group was able to cut their fine for illegal business practices in Minnesota by more than a million dollars.

Nice, when you're a company facing legal action in a number states. Besides Minnesota, Massachusetts, Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington D.C., Washington state, West Virginia, Wyoming and Wisconsin have all pursued legal remedies and have been financially compensated.

All your base are belong to us

Metropolitan Council District 9 candidate Bart Rehbein of Centerville says, "It doesn't make sense to get people living in a certain area and commuting in a certain way when you know they're probably not going to." Huh? Are you want to speak the English?

He's probably trying to say there's no point in doing regional planning because people will just do what they want to anyway. Doh! The fallacy is this: when done properly, regional planning results in zoning, infrastructure like transportation and utilities, tax breaks and much more which provide various incentives and disincentives for living or commuting in certain ways. People are still free to choose, but maybe now they will choose differently because they will be presented with a different set of options, a different group of benefits and costs.

The latter thinking is being demonstrated successfully around the country, even in the worst of the sprawling cities like Atlanta, Dallas-Ft. Worth and Denver. Typical of our local officials now in office, they continue to leave their heads in the sand, intentionally ignorant or willfully dishonest.

From the Foxes Guarding the Chicken Coop Department

The newly-elected King from the Suburbs Governor Tim Pawlenty nominated attorney Jane Volz to head the Department of Labor and Industry, the department charged with enforcing labor laws in Minnesota. Now it turns out that Ms. Volz didn't bother abiding by the very laws she would enforce as commissioner of this department when it came to her own employees. That was the news a week ago. Despite King Pawlenty's expressed support, it appears the governor's administration has decided to cut their losses and are forcing her to resign.

Volz's law practice specialized in employment law, so if anyone should have been aware they needed unemployment coverage for their employees, she should have. Any remarks about not knowing about it are disengenuous at best and outright lies at the worst. Besides, when was ignorance of the law an excuse?

As Patrick McFarland, executive director, Anoka County Community Action, recently wrote, "It should not surprise anyone that Tim Pawlenty, an attorney who violated Minnesota campaign law to get elected governor, selects as labor commissioner Jane Volz, also an attorney, who violates the very Minnesota labor laws she is charged to enforce."