Polinaut: January 24, 2006 Archive

Briefing - January 24, 2006

Posted at 6:31 AM on January 24, 2006 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)

All sorts of neat political factoids today.

First, gubernatorial candidate Mike Hatch is at the center of two stories. The Star Tribune has an article with Hatch suggesting he'll go to the primary even if he doesn't win the endorsement. Not surprising since Hatch has never been the darling of DFL insiders. It's been 1990 since the DFL endorsed candidate has beaten an incumbent in Minnesota and most of the quotes in the story suggested the DFL has recognized that endorsing a candidate who has not pledged to honor the party's endorsement is not a crime against nature. It is, however, an admission that the endorsement doesn't mean anything anymore.

The St. Cloud Times is reporting that Patty Wetterling has met with Hatch about a spot on the ticket. She also denies being pressured to drop out of the Senate race by supporters of Amy Klobuchar.

That was some kind of stinging rebuke -- delivered in a judicial sort of way -- from Russell Anderson yesterday, the new chief justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court. It came at his swearing-in ceremony, hours after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to overturn a lower court ruling that allows judicial candidates in Minnesota to seek contributions, and participate in party politics like any other politician.

"Justice in Minnesota is not for sale," Anderson declared. If you didn't hear it, just click here (Real Audio required).

Some blogs ripped Polinaut last week for daring to cite a Zogby poll, so we have no clue how they'll like his methodology this time (of course, we don't know how they liked his methodology last week either since they wouldn't discuss it), but a new poll shows a sharp drop in the number of people favoring legalized abortion in the U.S.

The survey shows that 52% favor abortion, including 10% who saying they believe it should be available, but that the government should not pay for it.

Forty-three percent oppose abortion, though most of those believe there should be exceptions in the cases of rape, incest, or when the pregnancy posed a grave threat to the life of the mother. A total of 9% said they “always oppose” abortion.

The blog DFL Senate has a humorous note about the National Republican Senatorial Committee breakdown of Senate races in the country. Click on the map for Minnesota and you get this message:

Senate Races 2006 No information is available at this time or there is no Republican challenger.

Which is odd since the blog Kennedy vs. the Machine reports on Liddy Dole's assessment of the Minnesota Senate race. Stay tuned. Maybe there is a candidate the NRSC doesn't know about yet.

Minnesota Democrats Exposed carries details of a breakfast GOP boss Ron Carey hosted this morning with Republican bloggers.

Ranum out

Posted at 9:15 AM on January 24, 2006 by Bob Collins

Sen. Jane Ranum, DFL-Minneapolis, is the latest Minnesota legislator to announce she won't run for re-election.

(Update 10 a.,m.) Rep. Dan Larson, DFL-Bloomington, says he'll run for Ranum's seat. That could put the House 63B seat in play, but Larson is holding open the possibility of a re-election campaign to the seat if he doesn't get the DFL endorsement in his bid for Ranum's seat.

(Update 11:53 a.m.) With Ranum's exit from the Legislature, here's the list of changes from the squad that ended the 2005 session. Unless otherwise noted, those on the list will be involved in the 2006 session.

(Update 2:15 p.m.) - They're dropping like flies at the Capitol. Rep. Scott Newman, R- Hutchinson, says he will not run for re-election, he wants to run for judge, although he hasn't said which seat. His release today is an example of unleashing judicial candidates to say what's on their mind. Newman outlined several cases decided by Minnesota courts that he thought were wrong, including a Ramsey County judge's order on maintaining core services during the government shutdown last year. From a media perspective, judicial campaigns might actually be worth paying attention to now.

SENATE
Mark Ourada (R)* - Buffalo
Dave Kleis (R)* - St. Cloud
David Gaither (R)* - Plymouth
Sen. Bob Kierlin (R) - Winona
Sen. John Hottinger (D) - Mankato
Sen. Sharon Marko (D) - Cottage Grove
Sen. Jane Ranum (D) - Minneapolis

HOUSE
Rep. Joe Opatz (D) - St. Cloud
Rep. Matt Entenza (D) - St. Paul
Rep. Jeff Johnson (R) - Plymouth
Rep. Jerry Dempsey (R) - Red Wing
Rep. Ruth Johnson (D) - St. Paul
Rep. Scott Newman (R) - Hutchinson
Rep. Fran Bradley (R) - Rochester

Democrat Terri Bonoff claimed Gaither's seat, DFLer Taryl Clark won Kleis' seat. Ourada's seat went to Republican Amy Koch.

On the reaction front, the blog SD63: red life in a district of blue says:

As you can imagine, this is a significant reshuffling of the deck for SD63 for the '06. A while back I hinted that Senator Ranum may not run for re-election, but that was because I suspected she would be running for Amy Klobuchar's current position.

Sad news from Waseca

Posted at 1:34 PM on January 24, 2006 by Bob Collins

Sorry to report the death of Barb Penny, wife of former congressman Tim Penny. She died Monday of pancreatic cancer after a lengthy battle. She was 51.

Visitation will be Friday from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. at McRaith
Funeral Home in Waseca, followed by a memorial service at 10:30
a.m. Saturday at St. John Lutheran Church.

So that's why they call them "blue" states

Posted at 3:34 PM on January 24, 2006 by Bob Collins

Democrats are pessimistic folks, at least where the economy is concerned. So says a new survey from the Pew folks.

Overall, about a third of Americans (34%) rate economic conditions as excellent or good, while nearly twice that number say they are fair or poor (64%). Views of the economy are more favorable than in the fall, when economic attitudes were shaken by two major hurricanes and a spike in gas prices, but remain below where they were a year ago (39% positive in January 2005).

As has been the case through much of Bush's presidency ­ and in stark contrast to the Clinton years ­ public views of the economy are deeply split along political lines. Republicans generally see an economy that is thriving; 56% judge it as excellent or good. Democrats and independents see it much more negatively; just 28% of independents and 23% of Democrats say the economy is doing well.

Kelley snaps back

Posted at 4:03 PM on January 24, 2006 by Bob Collins

Gubernatorial candidate Steve Kelley has fired back at Mike Hatch's apparent decision not to honor the DFL Party endorsement.

From a release today:

Senator Kelley is focused on winning in November. He declared: “It’s time to stop dividing the party—I am abiding by the DFL endorsement because Democrats need to be united to win. I know that DFL delegates want to win in November. Those delegates are smart—they will choose the candidate who can win. I disagree with Mike Hatch that the winner at the DFL convention will win because of some political purity test. The DFL has changed since Hatch last ran for governor. Thousands of new people have gotten involved in recent years: moms and dads who care about health care; business owners who are concerned about early childhood education; workers who care about renewable energy. These diverse people can’t be boxed in by Hatch’s old-hat way of thinking

He didn't say "no," and he didn't say "yes"

Posted at 5:14 PM on January 24, 2006 by Bob Collins

The deep-pocketed Mike Ciresi will announce his political plans next week, according to MPR Capitol bureau chief Laura McCallum. Ciresi is a prominent trial lawyer who led the state's lawsuit against tobacco companies in 1998.

Supporters of DFLer Amy Klobuchar will be sweating it out until Ciresi's announcement. A tough primary battle against Ciresi, could deplete a sizeable chunk of the war chest Klobuchar is hoping to spend against Mark Kennedy.

Walz gets Koz cred

Posted at 8:24 PM on January 24, 2006 by Bob Collins

First District congressional candidate Tim Walz picked up some serious national blogger attention when Daily Koz featured him as a weekly "Fighting Dem."