The next Chairperson of the Minnesota GOP? (minnesota.publicradio.org).
by Tony Petrangelo
Dec 14, 2012, 12:00 PM

The Weekly Wrap 12-14

♣ This went out over the Twitter, but there has yet to be any mention of it on the website itself. I made Twitter lists of all the Minnesota State Senators and Representatives for the 2013 session who are on Twitter and haven’t blocked me (which would be Senator Dan Hall, whom you can harass at @SenatorDanHall).

♣ My post on Monday got some attention, for both good and not so good reasons. First off the not so good. I made a mistake when I compiled the data that was used in the post and mislabeled Roger Erickson as a Representative who voted for the Marriage amendment in the Legislature.

As a Representative-elect it would have been rather difficult for him to have voted on the amendment in the legislature, since he wasn’t there.

From Representative-elect Erickson’s own words:

On the marriage amendment, Erickson said he doesn’t “see why we’re putting this kind of discriminatory language into our constitution.”

While certainly unintentional, mistakes do happen. So thanks to everyone who pointed this error out to me, there were lots of you!

That post got some favorable coverage to, as Pat Kessler referenced it in his reporting on Tuesday about the prospects for Marriage equality passing this session.

♣ The Republican Party of Minnesota, as I’m sure you are all aware, has myriad problems; lot’s of debt, no statewide elected officials and a brand that is in tatters.

And now they have to elect a new party chair to try and put the pieces back together. One person, in the form of overly concerned mom Marjorie Holsten, has already declared her candidacy to be a reality.

If you are unfamiliar with the antics of one Marjorie Holsten, behold:

When Holsten isn’t ruining prom for people, she’s a Tea Party activist. A Tea Party activist is just the kind of person the GOP needs running the show if they hope to ever win another race again is what I’m sure are the thoughts of the GOP establishment precisely. One can hope right?

Briana Bierchbach over at Politics in Minnesota wrote an article that goes over some of the potential candidates. Following up on that, Sally Jo Sorensen put all of those names on a desert island to see who survives.

♣ It was announced this week that Minnesota’s First Congressional District Representative Tim Walz has been named the Chair of the DCCC’s frontline program.

Congressman Walz is battle-tested and will be a tremendous leader in our incumbent protection program because he knows firsthand how to win in a tough district,” said Chairman Israel. “Congressman Walz will bring his problem-solving approach to this key position and will ensure that our problem-solving incumbents who face tough challenges will return to Congress in order to continue fighting for middle class families.

The frontline program is designed to help out incumbents in districts being targeted by Republicans. Tim Walz has been so targeted in each of his re-election races thus far and has (obviously) survived them all.

What I find interesting is the messaging that DCCC Chair Steve Israel uses in his statement, referring on multiple occasions to problem solvers. I expect to hear a lot more of that framing from moderate Democrats going forward.

♣ In more DCCC news, they’ve released a series of videos going after Republican members of congress for hostage taking in fiscal cliff negotiations. This may provide a bit of an early look at who the D-Trip will be targeting in 2014. Among the videos is this one about Minnesota’s Second Congressional District Representative John Kline:

♣ Markos wrote about the results of effective Republican gerrymandering of a bunch of states. The numbers are rather depressing for Democratic prospects of retaking the House of Representatives anytime this decade.

Given this, redistricting reform should be one of Democrats top priorities going forward. As Markos points out in his post, the states that had independent commissions draw the maps were the ones most likely to reflect the voting in the state.

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