I’m against anymore bailouts, especially ones to companies who have unsustainable business models and compensation plans. Oh sure, they won’t have $25 million bonuses for the CEO anymore, but they are paying out more to former workers than they are to the ones producing the products the company sells. 

I’m talking about the auto industry and their billion line items of union pensions and salaries. 

We can’t bail them out. It won’t fix the companies. Frankly they should fail and be forced to rebuild. I’m sorry, I know it will be looked at as uncompasionate, but we can’t afford to keep paying union wages in this country. They are uncompetitive and driving prices above reasonable market levels. 

This is the perfect example of what social security and medicare will be doing in about 15 or so years. There are more people sucking on the program or company than are producing for it. 

I think Democrats are going to race to throw money at this one too, just like they did the other bailouts, to help cover it up so no one gets a chance to see why. 

Billion in losses simply because no one can buy the car because it costs too damn much to make it. How sending them $50 billion and not having them fix the problems that cause the whole failure in the first place is just plain stupid. 

I demand my handout too. Bail me out! Or else!

Before I left the house after lunch, I asked my dogs who they would have voted for, had I gotten them an absentee ballot.

Lugnut said Barkley at first because his commercial was really shortbus and he felt they had a bond there, but then he thought about which candidate would try to keep (my) his dad’s taxes lower so I could buy him more rawhides so he said Coleman. Rufus pontificated about the negativity of the whole campaign, the media bias, and the overall failure of Bush and Coleman to be a real conservative even with the Republican majorities earlier on but remembered how Franken was an anti-Catholic bigot so he’d have gone with Coleman anyways. 

Of course if I were a Democrat BPOU leader and not a Republican one AND my dogs have wanted to vote for Franken, I’d have gotten them absentee ballots and submitted them, just in case. (wink)

In case of what?

In case the election was so close it went to a recount and I could have challenged that my two dogs’ ballots be counted. I’d know exactly what ballots to have counted. Obviously I wouldn’t admit that they were dogs, but rather “friends” who live with me. 

It’d be 2 free votes for my guy. 

Now just imagine if I was an election judge and had access to unused ballots. I wouldn’t even have to make up a name. I could just mark a couple key races and run them through and no one would ever know……

Unless of course the race was so close that people had to look at the details and every single vote mattered. 

—-

What’s the point?

Minnesota needs major election reform. We will never really know for sure who won the US Senate race on election day as our election system should be able to do with out question. Recounts are simply rechecks to make sure you got it right in the first place.

What we see the Democrat Secretary of State allowing in this election is the possibility of what you see above. He’s allowing people to count or refuse to count ballots that were not properly submitted before polls closed. I’m sorry, but that is wrong.

It is high time we remove any possibility of fraud, abuse, or wrongful voting. Any fraudulent vote steals one from a legal and rightful vote. For all I know, my vote was stolen by someone who voted twice, or worse, didn’t even exist. How can I trust my Government when I don’t even trust the voting system?

There should be no new ballots counted after election night. You can’t “find” ballots in a car 3 days after the polls closed. The person screwed up at their job and should be immediately terminated. If we didn’t have this ridiculous same day registration Bravo Sierra, there would be none of this verification and challenged status crap. 

The longer this US Senate recount goes, the more votes Franken, and only Franken gets. I’m sorry, but that would mean only Democrats are incompetent when it comes to following instruction on how to vote. I’m sorry, I just don’t buy that. 

The law is the law and frankly our law is so full of loopholes and open for cheating it stinks and stinks badly. I’m willing to bet Ritchie will risk his career allowing any and all ACORN shenanigans play out. Late ballots. Fishy registrations…… 

Oh and another thing that helps show how eerily real my pretend dog votes are, why would Franken fight so hard for certain absentee ballots to be added to the count? Might he know exactly who those ballots voted for?

Am I saying that maybe people contacted Franken to say that his campaign should make sure that a few hundred specific absentee ballots which were thrown out from XYZ precinct, be added to the recount even though they were refused initially, because they are fake votes simply to stuff the ballot box? 

Well, can you prove to me that the people who filled out the ballots did so properly, are legal voters, voted in the right precinct, and only that precinct, and that they weren’t tampered with and added in after polls closed? 

Our election system should be able to do that with out doubt. It can’t. It pisses me off. 

Day 1 of transition, just like last 8 years of nasty partisan one-ups-manship and below the belt attacks from Democratic operatives. 

Just hours after President Bush and President-elect Obama met in the Oval Office of the White House, details of their confidential conversation began leaking out to the press, igniting anger from the president, sources claim.

“Senator Obama would be wise to keep close counsel,” a top Bush source warned. 

“BUSH AND OBAMA AT ODDS OVER AID FOR AUTO INDUSTRY,” splashed the NEW YORK TIMES in an exclusive Monday evening, quoting “people familiar with the discussion.” 

The two met at the White House in private, without staff. 

“Bush indicated at the meeting that he might support some aid and a broader economic stimulus package if Obama and congressional Democrats dropped their opposition to a free-trade agreement with Colombia,” claimed the TIMES. 

MORE 

The ASSOCIATED PRESS quickly followed with details of the conversation, citing “aides who described the discussion on grounds of anonymity, citing the private nature of the meeting.” 

Bush advisers view the leaks as an effort to undermine the president’s remaining days in office. 

“Senator Obama may not be familiar with a long-standing tradition of presidents holding their private conversations, private,” a senior adviser explained to the DRUDGE REPORT. 

Here is Bush treating Obama with respect that he never got, and the hatchetmen from the Democrats are already stabbing him in the back. 

I sure hope this is not a sign of things to come from the Obama administration. Will they use the press to attack Republicans every chance they get or have they realized they now have the responsibility to be “the Administration” to all of America?

Do Obama and his Chief of Staff Emanuel need to do some house keeping?

Or was this an approved leak? 

Not a very reassuring start for the guy who is supposed unite this country.

Amazingly Minnesotans said, yes, please tax me so the rich sonzabiches can have good theaters and the U of M can have money to test water. You thought it was over and that this was the end all be all and you wou;dn’t be bothered again. 

But you weren’t propoerly educated and the proponents were lying to you. Now the greedy millionaires have opened the flood gates for cultural welfare. 

With voters passing a state sales tax increase to pay for environmental and arts initiatives, the primary beneficiaries of the dedicated dollars are figuring out how best to take the next step.

Arts and environmental groups are debating how to communicate their priorities for the new money to state lawmakers.

Now we get to see the arts community, the stream huggers, and park pushers hire top notch lobbyists and spend millions to get the millions. 

Just brilliant folks. Just brilliant. 

Oh and btw: Boycott the Twins. The Pohlad family dumped million into this tax increase campaign.

Oh gee, I’m thrilled Tim Pawlenty is aiming to be part of the Republican rebuild….

But Pawlenty is concerned about the trouncing the GOP took nationally, especially in red states that turned blue.

“It’s time to turn the page,” he said. “Certainly we need to be true to our values and principles, but it opens the door to a discussion about how do you make the Republican Party more dynamic, energetic and successful going forward.”

Let me guess, ‘the era of small government is over’

We haven’t been conservatives! We haven’t had our conservative principles tried and rejected by the voters. We’ve had them rejected by politicians in office and strategists and pollsters in high paying GOP positions.

We will never be able to out bid the Democrats and win elections. Proof of that is Pawlenty’s failed barter with the Teacher’s Union. He upped education spending double digits and the teacher’s union still dropped a couple million defeating Republiocans, and guess what education spending is even further out of control and Republicans are on the verge of extinction in the state. 

Tim pawlenty is the last person I want included in the national discussion over where the GOP goes from here. Why? Because he has helped turn Minnesota Blue. Oh yes, he has. He was elected in 2002 when we were a legitimate Purple state. And now? We’re a real blue state with the GOP on the verge of irrelevancy in the State Legislature. And all of that was while PAwlenty was the defacto Republican leader who defined the party and set the agenda. 

It appears Pawlenty is aiming for a 2012 run to me. He’s already got people out there spinning his record as Governor (that’d be Ron Carey MNGOP Chair) and other trying to knock off the obvious frontrunner Sarah Palin (Vin Weber). 

Anyways, if you think as I do, that the problem with the GOP and why voters are drifting away from it is that we have ignored our principles and not governed or legislated like the conservatives we claim to be, then you will want to get involved in the discussion over the party. The powerborkers are going to try to “fix” the party behind closed doors and if we let Pawlenty, Carey, and the other strategists get away with it, 2010 is going to be even uglier and the party will be even less conservative (if that is possible with out officially becoming Democrats). 

If Pawlenty decides to run for another term as Governor, and that marker will be if Ron Carey runs for reelection as party chair, he will face a very serious challenge from the conservatives in Minnesota. It will be very tough for him this time around, unless of course Ron Carey sticks around to silence all opposition like he did in 2006 for Pawlenty. 

If we’re going to get this party out of the gutter, the people who put us in it can’t be the ones diagnosising the ills and prescribing the reforms.  The time for new blood in this party is now. Pawlenty can stick around and run if he wants, but the clingers on at the party who think he is a true principled conservative who cannot be questioned from the right are exactly the people who need to be sent packing.

Previous 08 Post Facto breakdowns can be found here.

#1 Senator John McCain: 

Duh! but he is far from alone. McCain couldn’t rally the base and voters to him. The ultimate ‘I told you’ so to beltway types and political pundits and politicians who believe standing on the double yellow line is the only way in politics. 

Those who thought John McCain was the best person should be remembered for such. We had the most liberal Democrat in the history of politics, why we needed one of the most liberal Republicans is beyond me. The good news is a big government, global warming believer, cap and trade pushing, interventionist candidate lost. The bad news, the other one who is the same, but worse did win. 

We needed a staunch conservative who could articulate what real conservatism was to Americans. Most are disillusioned that George Bush is a text book conservative. McCain chose to distance himself on the wrong issues, ante up on other center left ones Bush embraced, and strayed as far from true Government reform as possible. (ahem) Bailout bill, McCain voted for it.

Along with McCain, the DC powerbrokers in the GOP have failed again. The idea that permeates far too many Republican think tanks, columnists’ punditry, and political policy setting war rooms is that true conservatism is dead. I’d believe it if someone would actually try running on, then implementing it in Washington. But no one has.

Those who pulled the strings on the Republican side of this election, especially the ones lashing out at Palin now, will hopefully have served in their last official Republican role and be sent to the posh retirement homes for their types on K Street. 

#2 Governor Tim Pawlenty (R MN): 

The fruits of his 2008 electoral labor died on the vine when Sarah Palin got the job he had been angling for since the 2008 race began in 2007. He wanted that VP slot and losing it was devastating for him. 

The time he spent on the National media and campaign circuits meant he wasn’t back home minding the store. While the cat was away the DFL mice were playing. The Minnesota Democrats and liberal special interests were waging a war on the State House races and 134 great Republicans were forced to fight door to door to defend the entire party. 

Pawlenty wasted his star power and media attention on McCain and failed to make the case for balancing power in the Minnesota House of Representatives. He chose to hitch his wagon to a Washington gravy train and ended up putting himself behind the 8 ball in Minnesota politics. Democrats have an even bigger majority, albeit by just 2, to set the policy and simply wear down the Republican Governor and weak minded liberal (R)epublicans so they can pass bills and override vetoes. Now they only need 3 RINOs to override.

Had he spent time campaigning Minnesota on state issues and the conservative/Republican agenda here, I fully believe the State House results would have been far different. Pawlenty no faces another 2 years of a one sided shoot out on the goalkeeping Governor. 

#3 Republican Party of Minnesota Chair Ron Carey:

This is now his second straight dismal election cycle. Minnesota was on the verge of going red before Ron Carey. Here’s some facts of where we were before Carey and where we are now thanks to his leadership. 

2002 Elections resulted in the 2003-4 State House having : GOP 82- DFL 52

2004 Elections resulted in the 2005-6 State House having : GOP 68 - DFL 66

*** June 2005 Ron Carey was elected Party Chair. 

2006 Elections resulted in the 2007-8 State House having : GOP 49 - DFL 85

2008 Elections resulted in the 2009-10 State House having : GOP 47 - DFL 87

State Senate seats in Republican control have also dwindled under Carey. Upon his election in 2005, we were lead to believe Republicans could actually take control of the body. We were just 4 seats away from taking control in the 2006 elections. Republicans are now unable to sustain a veto. GOP 21 - DFL 45

Statewide Constitutional officers were dominated by Republicans going into the 2006 election. We held all of them except the Attorney General. After the 2006 election, we barely hung onto the Governor’s office, but only for the luck of the DFL Lt. Governor candidate not knowing what E-85 was when asked by a reporter. 

Republican members of Congress are also in decline as well. It was 4 to 4, but is now 3 GOP to 5 DFL. The Republican party has all but written off 4 of the Congressional Districts. A notion Carey promised against earlier in his tenure. 

And now we are on the cusp of losing a US Senate seat. Sen. Norm Coleman is having his reelection results recounted. The DFL Secretary of State has strong ties to ACORN, and guess what, ballots are appearing out of thin air and Counties are changing their totals to DFLer Al Franken’s favor. 

Oh and the sales tax has gone up almost 1% in parts of the state, including a Constitutionally passed one this election for the arts and outdoors. 

Far from a record of overall achievement. Hopefully Carey will announce his retirement from party leadership as soon as the recount is done and we can move forward to picking up the pieces and rebuilding the Minnesota Republican Party. 

#4 House Republican Minority Leader Marty Seifert :

He lost seats in this last election. He was unable to hold his caucus together on a veto override vote on  $6.6 Billion transit tax increase. He did not push his caucus on conservative issues like a state wide smoking ban and may have lost the faith of his fellow members of the state house along the way. I’d heard he would not be reelected to the position even before the election. I can’t believe he would after. 

Some have told me he had aspirations of higher office, and he is a great enough conservative that maybe he could do it, but he just doesn’t seem to have done a good job trying to be a caucus leader. 

#5 The Taxpayer’s League of Minnesota:

It fought against the millionaire’s amendment, oh sorry, it just seemed that way since the millionaire trust fund families of Minnesota banded together to pass it. The Outdoors and Legacy Amendment passed. This was a sales tax increase that passed in a time of recession and increasing unemployment. 

I love the Taxpayer’s League and it pains me to say it, but even though they were out funded by millions and millions in this one, it seems they are a loan wolf barking in the woods right now. They couldn’t mount a campaign or fundraising stream to stop a sales tax in a recession. Clearly they need some shaking up. Phil Krinkie is more than capable. They need to band together with new media, the radio hosts and blogs, and build a new educational outlet for the out of control spending and unaccountable government at all levels in Minnesota. 

#6 Center Right Minnesota Blogs: 

I know, this one pains me too, but the way the Republican party and conservative establishment treated their bloggers this year was a shame. Blogs are the future of the political world and hopefully this last media won election will be the final proof that the party not only needs to embrace blogs, but that they need to include them in the process. 

Sure, some blogs did manage to hold their head above water. Minnesota Democrats Exposed, the NARN/national blogs all did well, and True North emerged on the scene as go to places to find election news and commentary. But the media just doubled down and drank the “Change” kool aid and brainwashed voters as if they were the ones on the ballot. 

I’ll have more of a plan on what role blogs NEED to play in the future of the Republican party at a later date, but for now let’s just say that the Republican party leaders, candidates, and establishment wasted a huge advantage. 

Scores of us lowly bloggers are actively involved in politics and have our fingers on the pulse of the grassroots. We can reach readers who have abandoned the traditional media. We are a conduit to the grassroots base of the party, but we are also the ready, willing, and able alternative to the biased traditional media. 

The Republican party will continue its decline and dwindling electoral numbers unless the party embraces blogs and starts transitioning its media relations to favor those of us who agree with them. They have a friend in us and given a little help in expanding our readership, we will someday replace the biased local TV news and local papers in the minds of voters who want to find out about politics.

My hope is that the people who could change the media focus from the biased liberal to the blogs, realize just what they have been ignoring. We could build a partnership and forge a union that would make it so that most voters don’t turn to the Strib or WCCO to get their election news (ahem, the news Shelby and Editors, hack reporters, and spoon fed Editorialists see fit), but that will take some very highly paid and powerful people realizing that some of us very passionate people in our mom’s basement hold the future of information dissemination at their fingertips. 

I think I have a few more 08 Post Facto recaps in my head. Stay tuned.

I’m so ecstatic that we picked up a Democrat seat in 51A with Tim Sanders, but we’re not resting on our laurels after the election. David Balcom who ran in 51B and I had lunch today and talked about lessons learned and how to kick ass and take names for the next go around in SD51. 

I encourage each and every BPOU out there to look toward the future and how we can be better as a party next time. We need to better educate voters and remove dead weight from local party orgs. 

The BPOU Convention window, which is when we will elect new BPOU leaders is coming just around the corner in February to March. I encourage all BPOUs to start working on building a team that will work together and reform their operations to help make the difference. 

Like the State Party and many Congressional Districts, many BPOUs are held back by insiders who are stuck in the political world of yesterday and refuse to work together, locally, to win elections. 

The election may be over, but there is always another one coming down the road. It is high time that we understand that the off year is the perfect time to start laying the ground work for a better, more victorious Republican Party. I look forward to working with Mr. Balcom to reform our BPOU.

Here’s a run down of Anoka County State House races.

Three new Anoka County legislators elected to Minnesota House

We picked up one and held an open GOP seat. 

All in all, I think Republicans held their own in Anoka County.

It sounds like Barrack Obama did only leave Rev. Wright’s church because he got caught, not by choice. 

Obama’s Former Pastor Blames Media for Campaign Controversy

Well, it is nice that this type of information is coming up finally. Would have been nicer a few days earlier, but beggars can’t be choosers. 

Any bets on if the media will ask Obama about this?

Bravo sierra

Political pundits on the left and right agree that Sen. Barack Obama’s victory on Tuesday was due in large part to a well-run campaign.

Bullshito. 

Barrack Obama is the most inexperienced and unvetted President ever. The media never questioned his motives or policies and covered up every single one of his negatives. Obama’s campaign was well organized, but with out a loyal media, he’d never have won. 

Look, a 10 point or 100 vote win is not a blow out. Won big, but it isn’t like the entire Country lost its mind that day. Barrack Obama still holds less then Pro-American views and it will be interesting to see if he goes for the whole campaign promise list with the liberal Congressional leaders or not. If he does, it will destroy our economy. 

But back to this whole perfect campaign BS the media is pushing. Here’s a little example of just how in the bag the media is. 

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Yeah, well, you know what? I want to do everything I can to make this thing work, this new presidency work, and I think that –

JOE SCARBOROUGH: Is that your job? You just talked about being a journalist!

MATTHEWS: Yeah, it is my job. My job is to help this country.

Perfect campaign? Not unless you count the media’s work too. 

Hmmm, maybe if the media can “make one Presidency work”, then it is completely with in their power to make another one not work. Like the one who has had the media at his throat for the last 8 years. 

This Presidential race was far from a fair fight and the revisionist reporting is further proof of the sad state of the American media.