One for you, nineteen for me

Mark Dayton's back and there's gonna be trouble/hey la, hey la, Mark Dayton's back
You'd better give the money back or else it's gonna double/hey la, hey la, Mark Dayton's back

The defender of the taxpayer came back to the Capitol, hot to repeal those taxes he raised last year:

Dayton had set a Wednesday deadline to pass more than $500 million in tax relief — a deadline that will not be met. The proposal includes about $57 million in retroactive tax relief for consumers with student loan debt, Minnesotans who adopted children and those who lost their homes to foreclosure. The tax package also wipes out new business sales taxes on telecommunications equipment and a tax on warehousing services, which was due to kick in April 1.

What's the holdup, you ask?

Dayton said senators do need a new office building and parking structure as the State Capitol undergoes a massive, multimillion-dollar renovation, but he thinks the $90 million price tag is high.

He called the glassy design “lavish” and out of sync with the capital campus, where buildings are generally grayish and brownish. “Does there need to be building? Yes,” Dayton said. “We need a functional building.”

Funny thing about that -- there's rather a lot of empty office space available down the hill in downtown St. Paul, complete with parking ramps and whatnot. But no, in Xanadu did Kubla Bakk a stately pleasure dome decree, so the money needs to stay right where it is, there, fella.

Meanwhile, across the St. Croix, it's a different story:

Senate Republicans Tuesday narrowly passed Gov. Scott Walker's $541 million tax cut proposal in a vote that guaranteed the cuts will become law.

The tax decreases — the third round of cuts by Republicans in less than a year — passed 17-15 with GOP Sen. Dale Schultz of Richland Center joining all Democrats in voting against the proposal. The proposal now goes to the Assembly, which passed a different version of the tax cuts last month with two Democrats joining all Republicans in supporting it.

With growing tax collections now expected to give the state a $1 billion budget surplus in June 2015, Walker's bill will cut property and income taxes for families and businesses, and zero out all income taxes for manufacturers in the state.

Okay, so let's review -- manufacturers in Wisconsin will have their income taxes zeroed out. Meanwhile,  in Minnesota a round of new taxes on business take effect this year and there's a pretty good chance they'll stay in effect because the grandees want their new building. Where did you want to do business again?

The always astute Brad Carlson sees some kabuki going on:

There are a couple of ways to look at this. First, lay the responsibility at the feet of the Senate and the haggling over their Taj Mahal new office building (which Dayton appears to have done). The Senate is not up for reelection this year, so make it appear the DFL governor and the Dem controlled House are the ones trying to save the day but are being obstructed by Bakk & Co. Their hope is it'll strengthen their reelection chops. Secondly, the GOP candidates for governor have a ready made sound bite. Did you see the bit where Dayton was essentially asked if he bears any responsibility for this conundrum of trying to cut taxes that he signed into law last session? The first word out of his mouth was "Sure." That's pretty much all you need.

Indeed.