Working hard for the money

March 23, 2015

Although it has kind of died down now, there was a great wailing and gnashing of teeth at the Legislature over the salary increases given by Governor Mark Dayton to his Commissioners, first by the House Republicans and their leader, Speaker Kurt Daudt, followed shortly thereafter by DFL Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk, who persuaded […]

by Steve Timmer

Miscellany – Uncle Billy gets a gig (1/30)

January 30, 2015

A perusal of the new roster of the staff of the houses of the legislature is always interesting, especially after a change in control from one party to another. And that’s true of the House staff roster this year, too. One of the names that popped right out at me was Bill Glahn, everyone’s favorite […]

by Steve Timmer

The car salesman from Crown

December 30, 2014

You want the undercoating, right?

by Steve Timmer

In other words, Bob is full of doo-doo

December 10, 2014

Tim Pugmire has an article on the MPR News website about how the Republicans are going to kick some, well, fecal material, at the Capitol next session. With their muck boots, apparently. (We’re going with a scatalogical theme today.) One of the new House committees is called the Greater Minnesota Economic and Workforce Development Policy. […]

by Steve Timmer

Mourning opportunities lost III

November 21, 2014

I. In the first two installments of the story (here and here), I discussed the systemic political failure of the DFL-controlled Legislature to pass electioneering and disclosure legislation. Another such failure was not passing the Quie judicial retention election plan and putting it on the ballot for voters. Presently, judges run for re-election, against an opponent, if […]

by Steve Timmer

Mourning opportunities lost II

November 20, 2014

In the original Mourning opportunities lost, I described the failure of the DFL controlled Legislature to pass an “electioneering and disclosure” bill in 2013 or 2014, and the contribution of that failure to the loss of the House of Representatives to Republican control in the recent election. I said I had another lost opportunity to discuss, […]

by Steve Timmer

Tom Emmer rides in a helicopter

October 15, 2014

Tom Emmer has a new television ad out touting how he will fix roads and bridges when he gets to Congress. After all, he did such a whiz bang job of it when he was in the Legislature. Well, not really. Anyone with half a memory will remember that Tom was one of Tim Pawlenty’s […]

by Steve Timmer