Last night I had the honor of attending a Chamber of Commerce annual gala with my mother and a few of her political friends. She invited me along thinking I’d enjoy having new people to torment with my rants. Among those of us at the table were a very nice lady who is currently serving at the capital, a county commissioner, and others that are involved in the party side of politics. The theme of the party was 70’s, and I will say that the whole event was lovely and entertaining. How ever, I am so grateful that I was born in 1975 and have no recollection of the clothing of the time if the costumes last night were at all representative. Our meals were served on small tin trays. I do have very found memories of the TV dinners tough I ate growing up. That Salisbury steak TV dinner when I was 4, yummy.

The conversations were mainly focused on our state Republican Party, (I was given a bit of dirt that I will be fact checking and post on if it turns to be credible, we may have had a lobbyist doing the people’s work) and how we are worried at its future. One gentleman and I went back and forth on the merits of the libertarian party, which could be a viable option for conservatives if the libertarians would broaden their platform. The isolationism and legalized drugs are not mainstream political party thought. My opinion of third parties is that they only seek to benefit their small core of supporters. (Yes much can be said about the 2 main parties, but third parties are ultra specific on issues. There doesn’t seem to be a “for the greater good” mentality on either end of the political spectrum. Take the green party for example; its only real goal is strong environmental regulation, period. They refuse to accept the fact that if they were allowed to have their policies as law, the US economy would collapse like never before. Their all out assault on all things corporate would lead to unemployment numbers that even Jimmy “misery index” Carter would be scared of. Political parties, to be at all viable state or nation wide, have to big “big tents” and allow for some unprefered views. They cannot have a policy or two and expect any chance at gaining enough elected seats to do anything.

The conversation was quite pleasant, but the blaring disco music made it difficult for the whole table to partake. Toward the end of the evening, the topic of term limits and lifetime pensions came up. Then one of the elected officials at the table perked up and joined our conversation. My belief is that term limits are very detrimental to a “government of the people”. If a person is in office for 15 to 20 years, they build relationships with lobbyists that supercede the voters, who the official should be listening to. Their judgment can be tainted, and favors will and do happen. I also expressed that term limits would cause a turn over of ideas. When you have the same people running things the same way for decades, it stifles the evolution of ideas. The more ideas that we can get to the table, the better off we will be. When all the decisions are made behind closed doors, the public is locked out of the agreements. The official mentioned that it takes almost four (4) years to even understand what happens on our state legislature’s tax committee. At the time, it didn’t dawn on me, but the fact that you have to be there for four years to understand the tax codes and procedures is a perfect example of my point.

The very people we are voting for and entrusting with governing us are creating a world only them themselves and an elite few can begin to understand. This is true in the federal, state, county, and city levels. Not to mention with in the political parties. Ron Ebensteiner, the chair of the MN Republican party is seeking his 4th term2 year term. He has been in since 1999. Since then Republicans have: not won a major statewide election with a majority. Yes, we have the governorship, and 4 of the 5 statewide state office, one US Senator, a 4/4 split on US Congress, but both Coleman and Pawlenty barley won with pluralities. If there were not a serious third party involved in those elections, the DFL would have won. The state went for Kerry in ‘04 by a mere 95,000 votes. The out state, or non-urban Twin Cities was solidly in the red this last year. Which followed national trends. We have all seen the map.

But there was a complete lack of message from the State party. It seemed like the party was busier trying to catch the DFL in some little campaign law slip up than it was relaying a solid message to the public. There was no cohesiveness across the state. It seemed like each candidate was on their own. The only time we ever saw Ebensteiner on TV was alleging that DFL MN A.G. had done some small election infraction. So the only time the regular folks who get their news in 30 minutes saw the Chair of the Republican Party, he was alleging another infraction to the election law, which by the way Ebensteiner himself had broken a time or two.

What did this lead to? In Minneosta, we have a 67 seat Senate (4 year term) that is up as a whole every 4 years. So in 2004 none of the Senate was up for election. It is solidly controlled by the DFL (7 plus seat advantage.) The State House of Representatives has 134 seats (2 year terms) and all seats are up every two years. The Republicans had a 14-seat advantage going into the 2004 elections. Because the Senate was shielded from accountability (not being up for election until ‘06) they were not allowing any meaningful legislation to go through its due process. (Allowing the State DFL party and the individual DFLers running in the House to focus the blame on the Republicans in the House. It was a highly coordinated and media supported attack, that went unresponded to by the State Party. This lead to 13 Republican incumbents loosing, compared to one DFLer. So now the State House is a 68 (R) to 66 (D) toss up.

The ‘04 election cycle performance was a shame. I hope that the people who shall be electing the Chair this year remember this dismal performance when they cast their votes. Poor performance does not need to be rewarded, no matter the party affiliation

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 27th, 2005 at 6:32 pm and is filed under Minnesota, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.