Residual Forces

Rep. Jim Abler is bitching again.

Dear Colleagues,

You may be wondering why I am behaving as I have been since my convention voted
58-42 to ratify my votes and actions over my 10 years.

Shockingly to me, Rep Emmer showed up at the convention on Saturday around 9:45,
declaring himself as representing the caucus. “Marty went south, and I went
north.”

Following a nice commendation of Rep Hackbarth for providing good representation
of his district (no mention of me), Tom went onto bash the “Democrat
transportation tax bill.” The entire speech lasted 7 or 8 minutes, during which
time the crowd got actively engaged, since as a group they were about 3:1
opposed to the bill and many were angry at me anyway. When comments came about
“those 6 republicans” Tom gestured in an encouraging way, and crowd whipped into
a frenz y against those 6 (including me) resembling an Obama rally. There was no
doubt as to the local object of this aggression, me. As he closed, he received
tumultuous applause and left.

When David Olson of the Mn Chamber arrived, he was treated harshly by the crowd
and booed due to the firey mood of the crowd after Emmer’s speech.

When I approached Marty prior to the convention for a letter stating that I had
been a good caucus member except for this singular vote with which he vehemently
disagreed, he declined stating that didn’t I remember that the caucus was not
going to do any help in my election. Which I accepted.

What shocked me is that the caucus would send Tom Emmer who has obvious and
unresolved anger issues toward me and expect his appearance in already tense
situation to go well. I think in human resource circles they call this the
Worst Possible Decision.

I have been a member of the caucus for 10 years, but cannot recall even any
stories about the caucus attacking a sitting member during an endorsing process,
especially when the opponent is “no endorsement” and particularly when that
member is supported by business and the MCCL.

The caucus punishment story about us 6 had died down with the advent of the
budget forecast and the governor’s response. The Emmer rant at my convention
has given all of this retribution talk new life, and we are now becoming known
as the party of the robot.

I think we had better look inside each of ourselves and see where we are going
to wind up politically and as a coalition.

I am sending this to members and staff both, because we are all in this
together. There has been too much silence already, and this matter has
escalated way too far. All our loyal crew deserves to know what is going on and
what transpired.

Now you know what happened.

If you don’t happen to see me at caucus, you shouldn’t be surprised. It is hard
to leave your backside open to a “family” who has tried to blatantly defeat you.

State Rep. Jim Abeler
Former Minority Lead
Health and Human Services Finance
Room 203 State Office Building
100 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
St. Paul, MN 55155
651-296-1729
rep.jim.abeler@house.mn
Fax: 651-296-1478

What he doesn’t realize is that he and his 5 friends broke the back of the coalition.

More later. Been a very bad day here for me.