Matt Martin

Mary's Campaign Notebook

tptadmin — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 16:36:33 -0500

McCain, Ventura and the rest of the big political news of the week courtesy of political reporter Mary Lahammer. Mary also drops in on a group of Minnesota bloggers...

Blogger Happy Hour

Mary Lahammer — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 10:21:46 -0500

Thanks to MDE and MnPublius for hosting a bi-partisan happy hour for bloggers. We were there to work (and alas not participate in happy hour) but it was so refreshing to see active, engaged, partisan and non-partisan people talking, laughing and getting along. The perception is that people on the left and right hate each other. Talking to people face to face makes it much harder to say or maybe even write mean things. It's so easy for people to fire off inappropriate and cruel comments on the web. That's much harder to do in person. Creating these personal connections is key. It's fun to see the faces behind the words we all read. Some of these blogs are consumed by thousands of people a day. No one I talked to was exactly sure where blogs are going, but most seem to agree sky is the limit — and many also said that non-partisan gatekeeper journalists are still important (thanks). Look for video on my Campaign Notebook Friday on Almanac.

Here's an update on why some, especially left-leaning, bloggers did not show up. Centrisity said "Bottom line, MikeDE is NOT, repeat NOT a blogger. Many of us struggle with giving him any credibility or even hinting that he is 'one of us.' Mike's effectiveness is geared toward him being perceived as an independent blogger, allowing for him to push MNGOP talking points and research while providing cover for the party." Joe Bodell from Campaign Report wrote to me that "I try to keep the differences between my public persona and my flesh-and-bones self to a minimum. I'm simply not comfortable spending leisure time around a group of people in which you can find individuals who have called me 'unpatriotic' and much, much worse in their own corners of the blogosphere." Clearly there are some strong feelings in this important election cycle.

Reflections on the Smoking Ban

Matt Martin — Tue, 15 May 2007 15:56:29 -0500

Protecting People or Protecting Choices?

While I'm sure that every Minnesotan with a set of eyes is likely to want to read more on the smoking ban about as much as they'd like to read a dissertation on ear wax growth, I humbly ask you to indulge me for a moment. Don't worry, though, this isn't so much about the pros and cons of banning smoking in public, indoor places statewide as it is an analysis of the implications of this kind of legislature. I think that the passage of this ban demands that we reflect on the philosophy of Government that allows such a ban to be passed and how we should or should not apply that philosophy down the road. Plus, I promise not to talk about the dang thing again after I get this one last piece out!

Ever since the birth of liberalism as a viable political philosophy in the 17th Century (yes, it can be traced further back, but Locke is a turning point) there has been an ongoing debate about how far an individual's personal liberties can practically extend. For if the liberties of all people are going to be recognized, there will naturally be areas where these liberties overlap. In such situations there are reasons, then, to favor one person's liberties over another's for a variety of debatable reasons. The classic example is when someone's desire to exercise their free will recklessly threatens the life of another; in such cases we as a society have (rightly so) decided that the well-being of the latter person is the dominate liberty. This, of course, is one of the more simplistic examples one can think of. Given that we cannot foresee all the different manners in which one person's personal liberties might interfere with another's, political philosophers have long sought to establish a construct that provides a rational reason to choose one liberty over another. This has, unsurprisingly, produced a wide variety of competing theories without much consensus.

For me (and for those who were just about to fall asleep, this is where things get interesting ... at least for poli-sci junkies), John Stuart Mill's On Liberty provides the most important step, historically, in the direction of an actionable construct of personal liberty. In chapter one, Mill lays out the grounding principle:

...the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.

This one paragraph has had more influence on how we, as Americans, think of liberty than, arguably, any other paragraph ever written. There are of course holes in the principle Mill lays out, some of which I'll hit on later, but fundamentally I find it to be fairly consistent with our modern conception of liberty: People can do what they want as long as they don't hurt others.

Which brings us back to the smoking ban. It's odd that something as mundane as lighting up in a bar so perfectly gets at the crux of one of the biggest holes in our conception of liberty. For while Mill clearly states that restricting someone's actions in order to protect them from themselves is not acceptable (a controversial notion to this day, but one that I wholly endorse), he also states that we do have the right to restrict action in order to prevent harm to others. So, we can't tell smokers to stop smoking because they're harming themselves but we can tell them to stop if it's hurting others. Hey, I guess that perfectly covers the statewide smoking ban for indoor places then! Well, maybe not entirely…

One important exception that Mill went at lengths to make (although his arguments were filled with holes in this area) is that it doesn't count as harming someone if the harmed person consents to take the risk (This is the idea that the anti-smoking-banners tap into when they say "If you don't like the smoke, go somewhere else!"). Consent is important here because it rightfully leaves out those who have the inability to truly consent, such as children, but it is unclear whether or not there are conditions under which an adult may not be able to consent in a sufficient manner. The absence of deception is the first condition that Mill requires for true consent, but he doesn't go much beyond that. Is it, to pick an applicable example, possible to say that one cannot truly consent to a situation if socio-economic factors push you into that situation? If, I don't know, a particular job puts you into harms way and you have no other way to support yourself, can you truly be consenting to it?

This is a tough question to answer and it's the reason that everyone who supports the smoking ban cites worker safety first. For the patron it's an easy argument, "take it or leave it" but the worker may not have the option to “leave it” due to economic necessity. In some areas a bartending job may simply be the only mode of sustainable employment for someone in a given age group or social class, and in those situations I think we do have an obligation to protect them from harm. That being said, let me outline the conditions that are needed in order to trigger this obligation: a person has to be in a job where second-hand smoke harms them regularly, his or her options for employment outside of that job are extremely minimal, the work environment doesn't offer a smoke-free environment to work in, and, if given the option, the person would rather work in a smoke-free environment. That's a pretty narrowly defined situation.

It is my contention, therefore, that it is the duty of government not to provide for the protection of an individual's health but to ensure that an individual has the option to protect his or her own health. Under this construct the government has the right to enforce legislation that ensures that every Minnesotan has the opportunity to work in a smoke-free environment, but they do not have the right to mandate that every work environment be smoke-free. Why? Because the former protects an individual's right to determine their own fate while the latter merely constricts the actions of individuals in order to protect a few individuals that have consented to a risky situation.

In the end, I personally don't really care, on a practical level, whether we ban smoking in indoor place in Minnesota. In fact, as a non-smoker I'm sure that I'll enjoy it as much as I've enjoyed the ban in the Twin Cities. Moreover, I see it as a rather inconsequential test of liberty in the grand scheme of things. However, it does present a much needed opportunity to reflect and remind ourselves of where we draw the line. As John Stuart Mill wisely noted freedom of action, and subsequently freedom of discourse, is a necessary condition for intellectual and social progress. The smoking ban bill may be an inconsequential transgression of this principle, but it remains a transgression. And, as such, it requires that we as a society reconsider and articulate how we define liberty. If we do not take this step back and set rules for ourselves, I can imagine many more opportunities for the majority to become tyrannical, which could result in tragedy. For without our God-given right to make mistakes, we cannot truly learn.

Protecting People or Protecting Choices?

What's "Your Fair Share"?

Matt Martin — Tue, 1 May 2007 16:18:24 -0500

As I wrote in my previous column in this space, I think that the DFL leadership in the Senate and, to a lesser degree, the House has made a strategical error in the formulation of their budget plans. Ceding the language of "America's highest income tax bracket" is an almost inexcusable mistake and the accompanying sales tax increases don't help the cause. That being said, the Governor has led us down a path that leaves us at a crucial juncture with only two options: raise revenue or dismantle Minnesota's legendary quality of life.

Slowly but surely I think Minnesotans are beginning to wake up to this reality. Whether it's the extra minutes each day that your commute is taking from your home-life, the steady decline of our public school system relative to the rest of the nation, or the ever increasing sting of the property tax bill, everybody is starting to see and feel the pinch. Which is where the state legislature's slight fumble finds its silver lining: a renewed interest in debating the merits of the tax code.

As you may or may not know, I produce a radio show on AM950 called "Minnesota Matters" (Live M-F 5-7pm!!), and after a few months of discussing the legislature's budget plans I can tell you that the most sure-fire way to get people to call-in is to start talking about taxes. We don't even have to talk about tax-hikes, a mere mention of the "tax" word is enough to get every person with a pulse to pick up the phone and try to get their opinion on the air. To some degree I anticipated this level of interest in the subject, but what I didn't anticipate was the intensity of the response. A few people might call to opine on the merits of various solutions but then, inevitably, a rabidly anti-tax individual will call in to enumerate the reasons that the government has no right dipping its hand in his purse and the flood gates open on calls.

The responses to the tax question both on the show and on the street are as varied as the range of plans before the legislature, but I have picked up on one primary point of contention between the two sides of the debate: what is your fair share?

When you distill the debate down to its core contention there are, essentially, two camps: the dollar amounters and the percentagers. For those in the former camp, your "fair share" is more or less defined by the dollar amount on the check you write to the state (or the IRS for that matter). The expectation is that every member of society should pay in a defined amount; after all, a rich person doesn't use the highways or the police appreciably more than a middle class person (there's a debate even there, but just let me play devil's advocate). And while for most members of this camp paying slightly more than the average for higher income people and less than the average for the destitute is negotiable, the "fair share" is still determined by the dollar. When the person you're sparring with over tax policy exasperatingly asks the question of what dollar amount is "enough," you know you've found a member of this camp.

For the second camp, the "percentagers," one's "fair share" is determined by a percent of their income. Under this measure the dollar amount on the check isn't nearly as important as is the level of commitment relative to the individual's means. Indeed, this is why the most recent tax incidence study has been trumped out so many times during this debate. The study indicates that when all taxes are considered the middle class in Minnesota is paying roughly 12.3% of their income to the state while the rich (defined here as making over 400K) pay in only 9.6%. Obviously, those who find themselves in the percentage camp interpret this as an example of the wealthy failing to pay their fair share. When the person you're sparring with over tax policy exasperatingly cites the tradition of progressive tax policy in the state of Minnesota, you know you've found a member of this camp.

I put forth and attempt to define the distinction between these two ideological starting points because I think the lack of recognition of the depths of this difference prevents many honest discussions of tax policy from even getting started. I would postulate that there are more people who find themselves in the "percentager" camp but it's surprising how many are on the other side and the range of circumstances from which they come. Personally, I would assert that it is a moral obligation for those who are better off to give more to the cause; an obligation that dates back to Abraham's tithing in the book of Genesis. And there are also scores of economic theories that support the idea that the wealthier should contribute a correspondingly greater proportion. But, I digress.

Once we accept this difference of position and determine which camp holds the dominate opinion, we can move on to the more practical details such as whether higher income individuals should be made to give above the median rate, or how high the rate need be set. But until then we're going to hit a roadblock every time we get to the line about "your fair share."

As I wrote in my previous column in this space, I think that the DFL leadership in the Senate and, to a lesser degree, the House has made a strategical error in the formulation of their budget plans.

The State of the State Legislature

Matt Martin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 09:01:19 -0500

If you've opened a newspaper in the last 2 weeks you've no doubt heard the news: the DFL controlled state legislature has voted to change the name of our lovely state to "Taxapalooza," and, yes, Armageddon is on the way. Or that's what Tim Pawlenty, Ron Carey, and their Republican stooges around the state would like you to think. And, to the detriment of Minnesota, they seem to be winning the messaging war.

Although there's no doubt that the budget plan coming out of the State Legislature is going to get vetoed, I think it's an interesting study in Minnesota politics and the power of accessible messaging.

A convergence of factors have left the DFL Legislators fighting an uphill battle in selling this spending package they've cooked up:

A one-time budget surplus has proven to be a potent talking point for the local righties despite the fact that it provides no continuing revenue and is largely eaten up by inflation. After all, why would we raise taxes when we have all this extra money to begin with?

The Governor's occupation with a shot at VP has hardened his mind-numbingly myopic anti-tax pledge (by the way, if sticking to a promise made to a single organization to the detriment of the rest of the state isn't being beholden to special interests, I don’t know what gets you that label these days) and there's little doubt that the House and Senate's plans have a red pen coming their way.

The potency of the phrase, "highest tax bracket in nation."

And finally, the most significant of all the obstacles: the quick connotations that come from saying, reading, or hearing that your taxes are going up.

So, let's dive into these one by one.

First, there's no surplus, at least not in the way that one usually thinks of a surplus. The analogy I've been using is the difference between a bonus and a pay-raise. What Minnesota has on its hands is a one-time bonus for good behavior, not a pay-raise that we're going to see the fruition of every year. That means that none of this can be used to, say, raise the budget for education—we can use it to build a new school, but we can't use it to pay the teachers for that new school. And, to make the surplus even less useful, most of it is consumed by mere inflation. The force that you and I contend with every day but the government, in all its brilliance, leaves out of its budget allocations.

Second, the Governor should be governing, not kowtowing to his potential national conservative base by upholding a no-new-taxes pledge. Outside of the face-value stupidity of the pledge, the certainty of a veto that this pledge brings is what the local conservatives are using as a talking point. They argue that the House and Senate DFLers are wasting everyone's time with a budget plan they know will be vetoed. But we, as a party, should not legislate based upon the Governor's stubbornness; we should legislate based upon the needs of our citizens. We promised property-tax relief, health care reform, education solutions, and a better transportation system to the citizens that voted DFL, and that's what we're attempting to deliver, veto threat or not.

Third, the DFL Senate leadership had their heads somewhere dank and dark when they decided on pushing this tax bracket. I hate to admit it, but this just has to be said. When you're facing a Governor that has a no-new-taxes-pledge and a GOP party organization that is just itching to label you a "tax-and-spend" party, you don't propose the nation's highest income-tax bracket; you just don't. I don't know if someone dropped the ball on research, or if there's some bass-ackwards strategy behind this thing, but it is a messaging nightmare. Yes, I know, even with a 9.5% tax bracket the wealthiest, by percent, would still not have a tax burden as high as the middle class in Minnesota, but it's still an incredibly stupid plan. Not only will we almost certainly see this trumpeted in the next election cycle, even in the House races (people have a tough time separating the goings-on of the different chambers), but it significantly eases the case the GOP is making to Minnesotans. We could have done this at a slightly lower tax rate, and we should have.

Which brings me to the fourth obstacle, the tax-averse attitude of the average American. Although the Senate plan is an elaborate invitation for years of Republican talking points, the House plan is close to sheer brilliance. Without the ball-and-chain that is the "highest tax bracket" talking point, we may have had a shot (and still do) of selling the fact that the House plan raises the income taxes of less than 5% of Minnesotans and raises them only incrementally for that group. And the plan simultaneously provides significant property tax relief for over 90% of Minnesotans. So, the bottom line is that if I talk to random people on the street I can honestly tell over 9 out of 10 of them that the check they write to the State Government will actually be smaller under the House DFL's plan. I can sell that.

Ultimately this state needs more revenue. But most Minnesotans don't understand that our overall tax burden puts us in the bottom half of the states. Most Minnesotans don't know that the average state tax incidence for someone with an income of over $350,000 is 4% lower than that of someone making $50K. Most Minnesotans don't know that our economy growing slower than most American states for the first time in decades. And therein lies the fundamental problem of this DFL legislature: making the message heard. Even outside of election considerations, the only shot this legislature has of getting any of these proposals past Pawlenty is if the voters resoundingly support them. The DFL leadership needs to present Minnesotans with a compelling, easy to understand solution that they can rally behind. Fortunately, they still have a shot at winning some hearts and minds.

When this bill comes out of conference it will no doubt have a budget plan that provides significant property tax relief for the vast majority of Minnesotans, increases funding for early education drastically, puts us on the track to fixing our broken transportation system for the first time in a decade, and does it all without raising the annual taxes a cent for over 9 out of 10 of our citizens. And, much to my pleasure, it almost certainly won't have the highest tax-bracket in the nation.

The voters of Minnesota put the DFL in power in order to provide real solutions for the litany of real problems that Minnesotans face. Instead of artificially holding ourselves to special interests, we are listening and responding to the cries for help across the state. That is something that is to be applauded, and the Governor would do well to listen.

Bloggers

tptadmin — Wed, 4 Apr 2007 19:59:29 -0500

Top bloggers Michael Brodkorb from Minnesota Democrats Exposed and Matt Martin from MN Publius join Mary live the House Gallery for their perspectives on the session so far.

When the Reigning Champs Ignore the Locals

Matt Martin — Wed, 4 Apr 2007 09:27:46 -0500

With the understanding that this particular Web-space, along with my own, is usually set aside exclusively for the discussion of Minnesota politics, it's with great reluctance that I steer this particular column towards national events. After all, there is no shortage of national voices to fill the need for Presidential punditry, but there can be something truly local about a Presidential race that is missed if not examined through the local lens. So, in short, bear with me for a moment.

The first quarter fundraising numbers are beginning to be unveiled by the campaign organizations that have imparted so much sweat, blood and tears into their conception, and let me tell you, things are as exciting as ever. Although the revealing of dollar amounts a full nineteen months before an election may not be enough to get the average (wo)man's blood boiling, for us politicos it's like NFL draft season: a preview of how good each team might be. But it's particular exciting if you're in the right division: the Democrats.

Let's start with the weaker division though. For the Republican Party this must be like some strange Morman nightmare. See, the GOP is about as coherent as the Beatles after John Lennon met Yoko Ono. On one hand you have the financial base of the fiscal conservatives that have, in my estimation, been realigned with traditional Reagan Republicans who yearn for a smaller, more efficient Government. And then on the other hand you have the spiritual (pun intended) core of the party: the social conservatives. These two divisions of the Republican party have been barreling on full-steam towards a head-on collision and it looks as though there will be no avoiding it in 2008.

Rudy Guiliani may be the closest thing that the traditional, fiscal conservative base has to cling to this cycle (although he's far from satisfying the needs of many Reagan Republicans) but he is about as far from a social conservative main-stay as you can conceivably get. But with $15 million in the bank in the 1st quarter with a later start than the other GOPers, Guiliani is showing that he's got a real shot.

McCain, on the other hand, is faring even worse than the reports would have led me to believe. John McCain, once the Republican party's one seemingly unbeatable candidate, raised a dismal $12.5 million (what a statement about our political system when raising $12.5 million can be labeled "dismal"; a thing McCain no doubt would have much to say about). The Straight-Talk-Express has hit quite a few road-bumps and these numbers are showing it. Outside of the huge reservations that his own party are having about Johnny boy is the albatross of the surge-policy hanging around the Senator's neck. Even though George Bush's surge policy is in effect a gutted, emasculated version of McCain's proposed plan of attack, it's close enough that McCain will be judged by it (and likely bury his political aspirations next to it). In short, McCain's Q1 numbers show that he not only faces a lack of support within his party but that he cannot make up for this lack of internal support anymore by bringing in fringe members of the party.

And then there's the Coca-Cola abstaining surprise: Mitt Romney. Raising $21million (nearly as much as the current lead-Dem (although Obama has yet to announce his numbers (more on that next column (quadruple nested parentheses!!!)))) as a Republican in this environment is no small feat, but doing so as a flip-flopping Mormon from Massachusetts is simply amazing. And while I don't mean to down-play Mr. Romney's achievement, I think this really speaks to the weaknesses of the GOP right now. Without a true fiscal or social conservative, much less a twofer, the GOP base has found a limited amount of agreement in a second tier compromise. Mitt isn't perfect, but maybe he's ranked #2 on enough ballots to win.

Now, I opened this column with the promise of a local lens but have so far focused almost exclusively on the facts of the national Presidential field. As promised though, I do have a point here. The most substantial problem that the Republican party has right now is compromise. They simply can't seem to coalesce around an electable, potent, state-swinging candidate but have instead (at least for the mean time) focused on a look-alike wannabe. Mr. Guiliani could be a very potent force in slightly left states like Minnesota (although we're really a very left state) but these candidates will probably never see a chance at a general ballot here. Why? Simply because the Republican party has put such an emphasis on ideological loyalty that it has blinded itself to the changing reality of American sentiment.

Not only will this stubborn insistence on party purity hurt the GOP in its attempt to keep the White House, but it will potentially have even more widespread effects in other federal races. For example, it has been a poorly-kept secret that many hard-lined Republicans in Minnesota have been planning a right-wing challenge against Congressman Jim Ramstad because he, gasp, voted with the Democrats on the Iraq War Resolution.

To make an increasingly lengthy article short, it is because of states like Minnesota, and not in spite of them, that the Republicans are in a lot of trouble this cycle. Middle of the road states, like Minnesota, where elections are decided more by the ideas they embrace than the ideologies they push are going to find themselves for want on the Republican side in this coming election. And fortunately for us Democrats, the most recent fundraising numbers show that the Republicans haven't yet gotten past their internal divisions and begun to focus on winning.

Coming up in the next column: the winning division, Democrats.

Real Progress Despite Seifertisms

Matt Martin — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 10:46:04 -0500

A brilliant editorial ran in last week’s Pope County Tribune that almost perfectly expressed how I feel about the current GOP leadership down at the capitol. The piece was titled "Take a deep breath, Rep. Seifert." and I'd like to take a moment to echo that very same sentiment.

With staggeringly wide DFL majorities in both the State House and the State Senate, the GOP leadership has found itself in the tricky position of being forced to talk about substantive issues. Unlike his predecessor, the new House Majority leader, Rep. Tony Sertich, seems to be determined to forge a legislative path that closely follows the desires of Minnesotans.

Healthcare, education, property tax relief, and the environment—these are no longer the ignored interests of people across this great state; they are the guiding interests of the DFL-controlled legislature. Just yesterday the House introduced an education plan that would increase funding for our schools by $919 million while simultaneously offering property tax relief. Moreover, the bill gives property tax relief to 90% of Minnesotans without raising the income tax of 90% of Minnesotans a dime. What is the GOP's response to this masterfully crafted legislation? Get the Veto pen ready, Governor!

The truth is that the GOP leadership at the capitol isn't comfortable tackling real issues because they know that in Minnesota Republicans don't win on the issues. Prior to the 2006 elections it seemed that all we heard from the State Legislature had to do with Marriage Amendments, Abortion Rights, and Conceal and Carry—in short, divisive and distracting issues. But in November the people of Minnesota clearly and resoundingly sent a message to the capitol: we want a change!

So, after November the newly elected DFL legislature accepted the call of the people and refocused the energy of the capitol on the issues that they had been sent there to deal with. And for a moment it looked as though Tim Pawlenty and the GOP leadership in the legislature might actually follow along. But boy, was the honeymoon short. Now we have a Governor that is more focused on the waning campaign of a Septuagenarian than Joe Minnesota, and a Minority Leader in the House that seems to take more pride in his own witless one-liners than his voting record. Alas.

Whether or not the bold new DFL legislative agenda, one that follows the will of Minnesotans, will ultimately fall to the Governor's veto should not be a consideration just yet. DFLers need to continue to focus on the bread and butter issues that will help restore this state to its former stature. For if state Republicans and the Governor choose to continue to stand in the way of progress, I certainly won't feel bad reminding the people of Minnesota about their lack of vision come November of 2008, 2010 and beyond.

Accountability, Accountability, Accountability

Matt Martin — Wed, 7 Mar 2007 08:26:58 -0600

Over the past two weeks the Walter Reed Army Medical Center has become more than a simple medical facility located in Washington, DC. Just as New Orleans before it, Walter Reed has become tangible metaphor for the lack of accountability and oversight that this administration has made a central tenant of their modus operandi. But unlike New Orleans, Walter Reed carries with it an embarrassing peek into the plaguing hypocrisy of the Bush administration and the prior Republican Congress. While casting those who question the direction of the Iraq War as unpatriotic, President Bush and his previously loyal Congress cast aside the patriots that come home from Iraq broken and battered by cutting the funding that is to sustain them.

Yet, we would be foolish to lay the blame for this garish hypocrisy at the gates of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and move on. For while the remaining Republican Representatives and Senators have been forced to put on a new face of responsible opposition, many of them were quietly (and some vocally) complicit in the irresponsible actions that led to Walter Reed over the last six years. President Bush may be Commander-in-Chief, but it took many "aye" votes in both houses of Congress to lead us down the path we find ourselves on.

The most embarrassing failure of the previous Congress was its complete failure to carry out its constitutional duty of oversight. Why has it taken this long to figure out that a system that has been widely reported on as broken is, in fact, broken? Why has there been a total lack of investigations into the shady areas of the Iraq war? Why was this past Congress so insistent on cutting taxes while simultaneously writing a check for the full amount requested every time a supplemental funding bill for Iraq came around?

Clearly we need to look for the answers to these questions nationally, but we, as Minnesotans, also need to look closely at our own DC delegation. The answers we're looking for may be found underneath the plaque that reads "Former Chairman, Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations."

Bloggers

richard — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 21:46:35 -0600

The top bloggers behind Minnesota Democrats Exposed and MN Publius join Mary to talk about the evolving Senate race and Capitol politics.