The Minnesota Court of Appeals has upheld a lower court ruling that the 2003 gun permit law is unconstitutional. Supporters of the law seem to be running out of options. MPR's Tom Scheck has the lead:

In the opinion, Judge R.A. Randall writes that the Court of Appeals was not ruling on the gun law's merits, but rather on whether the process by which it became law is constitutional. The state constitution says lawmakers cannot combine unrelated subjects into one bill.

Legislative supporters attached the gun language onto a natural resources bill in 2003 to force a full Senate vote.

The question people have been asking me since the original court decision on this law is, won't this put a whole bunch of laws in jeopardy because the Legislature does this all the time? The answer apparently is no. This is only the fifth time courts have thrown out laws on this basis since statehood. The fact is the Legislature doesn't do this all the time. Even the huge omnibus budget bills generally contain related subjects. But still, lawmakers say they're being more careful. And as Scheck notes, there are still a few steps to go before there's a final word on this law:

Gov. Pawlenty spokesman Brian McClung says the governor will lobby the Legislature to pass the bill again. He says there have been few problems with permit holders.

"The experience that we had really debunked the "Wild West" argument that had previously existed, so at this point this is something that is in the hands of the higher courts and the Legislature. If the courts don't take action then we feel the Legislature will need to react," he said.

But critics of the legislation say they don't know if permit holders have broken any laws because police aren't allowed to release that information.

Sen. Wes Skoglund, DFL-Minneapolis, says he will fight any attempts to get a new law passed.

"We do know of a security guard who shot somebody in the back. We do know of a case of a man who shot at his brother because his brother drove on the grass. We do know of multiple cases like that. We don't know of the others. We don't know what other people are carrying guns and pointing them at people because it's all private data. The law that they passed says you can't reveal that," he said.

Republican House Speaker Steve Sviggum acknowledged that it may be more difficult to get the bill passed in the Senate He says he doesn't intend to take any action on a new bill until the Minnesota Supreme Court weighs in.

In some other news from the Capitol, a state Senate committee that took the unusual action of issuing a subpoena to force the CEO of Northwest Airlines to testify before them finally got their man. They reached a deal to avoid the subpoena. And according to the Pioneer Press once they got their prey, the Senate tigers turned into pussycats:

[CEO Doug] Steenland was never flustered by any question pitched his way. He was not pressed hard on hot-button topics such as the outsourcing of aircraft maintenance work. Actually, going into the hearing, the committee agreed that he wouldn't have to answer any labor questions.

In a Q&A session after Steenland's presentation, senators asked him about matters such as the removal of pillows from Northwest planes, the prospects for in-flight cell phone use, airfares to Atlanta and Northwest's views on Twin Cities metro-area reliever airports.

Leaders of the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association had hoped that Northwest would be held "accountable" by the committee for job cuts that, in the union's view, violate agreements Northwest made with the state in the 1990s.

In recent years, some 3,600 of the union's members have been laid off. And the union fears another 1,000 may lose their jobs.

"There were a lot of softball questions," Ted Ludwig, local president of Northwest's mechanics union said of the committee's interaction with Steenland. "It's nice to be treated like royalty."

And finally, the budget debate is beginning. The House Ways and Means Committee agreed on two sets of budget targets Tuesday night...one that counts on gambling revenue and one that doesn't. And if that wasn't problematic enough for the GOP majority, it looks like the DFL is actually going to put up a fight this year. This is from MPR's Michael Khoo's story:

Committee Democrats blasted the two-pronged approach as unwieldy and irresponsible. Tom Rukavina, DFL-Virgina, joked that if House leaders want to leave all options open, they should consider a third option that puts Democrats in charge of the process.

"I'm just sitting here flabbergasted," he said. "This has to be the bonehead idea of the decade. I don't know anywhere in House rules where we had a budget based on a possible passage of a bill possibly in a few weeks or maybe three weeks or who knows how many weeks."

...DFLers proposed several amendments to use $350 million in the state's cash flow account to boost spending in other areas. Tom Huntley of Duluth says the extra money could have been used to preserve state-subsidized health care for thousands who could lose coverage under the GOP proposals.

"This budget, according to the Department of Human Services, will cost 22,500 people their health insurance," he said. "And again, these are hard-working people, most of whom have never been on welfare and certainly don't want to be on welfare."

Republicans, however, argued that draining the cash flow fund would leave the state without a financial cushion as it balances daily revenues and expenses. And Rep. Fran Bradley, R-Rochester, who chairs the Health Policy and Finance Committee, argued that Huntley's amendment allowed state health care expenditures to grow unsustainably.

"This is sort of a fantasy world. I could get into all the business about how generous our taxpayers are and everything," he said, "but from a fiscal point of view, this ignores the reality of the huge inflation and the fact that we've got to do something to bring these costs into check."

Hang on tight. Things are going to get interesting from here on out.