Same old same old

It always happens and everyone knows it, but no one does anything about it. But Bad Orange Man has noticed:

Everyone considered him the Broward of the County

And the same game is going on in Arizona, where somehow a 51-49 McSally margin is changing because the votes they are counting in Maricopa County are now 60-40 Sinema. Democratic strongholds find votes, lots of them, after the election is over, and the votes always swing the election to the Democrats, just as they did in Minnesota for Al Franken in 2008. The Dems intended to steal the election in Georgia, too, but that's not going to happen. This time.

Additional votes found after the fact always help Democrats. Always. This won't end well.

Still thinking

What It All Means? You know, the Grand Sweeping Conclusions?

Don't have any. But a few more thoughts are in order:

• Is the job of an Attorney General to be the president's wingman? Eric Holder thought so, as did Loretta Lynch and Janet Reno, and they all acted accordingly. That was okay then. Apparently things have changed.
• Eric Holder, you might remember, routinely ignored Congressional subpoenas. And apparently, that was okay, too. I'll be curious to see how that tactic goes over if the new Attorney General follows the same game plan next year.
• The single biggest thing the next AG should do is make sure that the Janus decision is actually implemented. Someone I know exceptionally well is in AFSCME and, as a result, I see a fair amount of AFSCME materials. At least in Minnesota, AFSCME wiped its butt with the Janus decision. That has to change.
• Generally speaking, Republicans in Minnesota have volunteers. The DFL has mercenaries. It's never going to be a fair fight under the current conditions.
• If self-regard were hard currency, Jim Acosta would be wealthiest man in the world. If the White House were to freeze out CNN entirely from asking questions, that would be an issue. But I don't have a problem if they put Acosta in time-out. Sam Donaldson used to be obnoxious, but he never got physical with White House staffers.
• Tony Evers is going to be a thoroughgoing train wreck. The key for Wisconsin Republicans will be to let him.

End of Sessions

First Impressions

On balance, more bad news than good from election day, especially in Minnesota. Thoughts? Oh, I have a few:

• This state is turning into Illinois, at least electorally. The metro area has gone decidedly to the left in the last 4-6 years and outstate is becoming more conservative with each passing cycle. Since the majority of the population is in the metro area, it's becoming awfully difficult for any Republican to win a statewide election. No one did yesterday.
• Tim Walz is going to be a weak governor. He was a backbencher in Congress and nothing about his record suggests he has the sort of experience he'll need to be effective. But he did have the one thing that matters -- the letters DFL after his name. I like Jeff Johnson, but he didn't stand a chance.
• Keith Ellison is an ethical dumpster fire and a guy who, to be frank, doesn't give a damn about the law. And he's our new Attorney General. This is really the most disappointing result of the evening. Doug Wardlow wouldn't have been my first choice to be the Republican standard-bearer, but he ran a good campaign. It wasn't enough.
• The sneaky part of the evening in Minnesota is that the House flipped back to the DFL. That means a whole lotta grandstanding is coming up and not much is going to get done, because the Republicans will continue to hold the Senate. 
• Keeping with the demographic changes, they become most evident in the Congressional delegation. CD1 and CD8 turn red, while suburban CD2 and CD3 go blue. I'll spend more time on these results in a later post, but I'll say two things for now -- it's a shame Jason Lewis lost. He was actually trying to do some things to make life better. Angie Craig will feign bipartisanship, but opearationally she'll be Betty McCollum with a mostly surpressed hint of Tennessee twang. That seat could flip back in 2020 if a few things break correctly. As for Erik Paulsen, he got what he deserved. It looks like voters who could have helped him, especially 2nd Amendment supporters, sat on their hands, while the voters Paulsen was courting went with the empty suit DFLer Dean Phillips. This was totally predictable. 
• Over in Wisconsin, it looks like Scott Walker is out. Too bad -- he's the most innovative politician we've seen in the Upper Midwest in a long time. It's tough to win three terms. The good news, if it can be called good news, is that Tony Evers will be a trainwreck and the Republicans will retake the governorship in four years, after Evers spends four years mewling and whining and failing to repeal Act 10. People will get sick of his act quickly.
• On the federal level, the House will be under the management of the California Democratic Party for the next two years. That's potentially a blessing in disguise, because Speaker Pelosi is going to be especially effective for the Republicans as she reminds America that she is an elderly and incoherent loon. And I'm eager for the electorate to see more of Maxine Waters on television, because she will be on all the time. I'm sure another Dem loon of the California variety, Peter Schiff, will try to hassle President Trump, but I would also guess that Trump will, before the new Congress is seated, declassify and release all the documents about Russiagate, which will effectively cut Schiff off at the knees. Also, expect a lot of braying about Trump's tax returns in the next two years.
• Meanwhile, in the Senate, the Republicans will have a stronger hand. The final numbers aren't in yet, but several key states flipped red, including Florida, North Dakota, Indiana, and Missouri. It looks like the Dems will flip Nevada, but that might be it, and at this point Montana looks to be a Republican pickup as well. And in Texas, Beto O'Rourke, the biggest fraud of all the frauds the Democrats ran in this cycle, can go have a seat next to Wendy Davis. I do wish John James had won in Michigan and that Karin Housley would have won here, but it wasn't meant to be. 
• Other than Walker's unfortunate defeat, the most consequential governor's election was in Florida, where Ron DeSantis held off straight-up socialist Andrew Gillum. Gillum is really a bad dude, but his charisma made him a formidable candidate. DeSantis isn't my favorite, but it was really important that he win, and he did.

We'll have a lot more to say in the coming days. 

Election Day

Go exercise your franchise. Or don't. I'm going to. We'll see what happens tonight.

Who loves ya, baby?

The thing speaks for itself:

John James is a wonderful candidate, but he's likely to fall short in this cycle. I suspect he'll be back, though.

Best Guesses

I don't trust polling much, because I suspect pollsters aren't having much luck getting people to answer their phones these days. We still have a landline phone and we never pick up a call from a number we don't recognize; while I'm almost certain someone has called us to find out how we feel in this household, the pollsters couldn't tell you. And that's what happens with many people.

So that means any predictions we make about the election are going to be wild guesses. But since it's the day before the election, here are my guesses:

Will the Democrats take the House of Representatives? Yes, but narrowly, and mostly because the courts in Pennsylvania redrew the congressional districts there in a way that grossly favored the Democrats. This will cause Trump some heartburn, to be sure, but some of the people who will become committee chairs are such loons (Maxine Waters? Really?) that it will be tough for the Dems to hold the House in the next cycle.

Will Scott Walker survive in Wisconsin? Yes, but barely.

Will Tim Walz win the governor's race in Minnesota? Yes, but I'm less convinced of that than I was a few weeks ago. Walz hasn't been very visible and when he has been, he's been shaky. Jeff Johnson has run a better campaign this time around, but I still don't think he'll be able to overcome the DFL machine.

Can Karin Housley win? Yes, but I don't think she will. But I am not confident in this prediction. And Tina Smith, if she wins in 2018, will have a big target on her back in 2020.

Will Doug Wardlow beat Keith Ellison? Yes, because the DFL machine won't get Ellison enough votes outside of Hennco and Ramco to get the job done. Ellison could also endanger Walz.

Who wins the Minnesota House? We've heard almost nothing about this; in my particular district, the DFL is running essentially unopposed. I think the House will stay with the Republicans, primarily because metro area district vote totals won't affect what happens in, say, Sleepy Eye.

Who wins the MN congressional races? Down the list of contested races:

CD1:  The DFL and outside groups threw a lot of money behind Dan Feehan, but I think Jim Hagedorn wins.
CD2:  Jason Lewis is probably going down, but Angie Craig is a fraud and deep down many of the voters in CD2 already know it. If she wins, she'll be vulnerable in 2020.
CD3:  Dean Phillips is Stewart Mills with better press. In a more just world, he'd be crushed. But Erik Paulsen has run a terrible campaign and is probably out the door.
CD8:  Pete Stauber wins easily. Joe Radinovich is an astonishingly poor candidate.

Could Collin Peterson go down in CD7? Dave Hughes has no money, but seeing Collin Peterson ads on metro television in the last week suggests Peterson is worried. I wouldn't bet my house on Hughes, but it would not surprise me if he retires Peterson.

Give me your guesses in the comments.

Where are we?

No facts presented in this feature -- let's face it, in 2018 politics, facts are difficult to get. Opinions are everywhere, though. Here are mine:

• I suspect the long knives will be out for Keith Ellison after this election. I've never thought he could win statewide office and his campaign for attorney general has demonstrated that nicely. The larger question is whether or not he'll hurt the other DFL candidates. Doug Wardlow could be a very useful fellow in the AG's office.
• While it would be wonderful if Jeff Johnson could pull of the upset and win the governor's race, my guess is he falls short. Tim Walz is not a particularly strong candidate and nothing about him suggests he'll be any good at being a governor, but the DFL machine in the metro will likely be enough to get him elected. 
• You know what would give us a better Minnesota? The demise of Alliance for a Better Minnesota, that's what. Their latest attack ad, in which they exploit a handicapped young man, is beyond the pale. Every ad they run is filled with lies and yet somehow KSTP's "Truth Test" and WCCO's "Reality Check" never get around to vetting them. Wonder why that is? No, you don't, because you know the reason why already.
• Lately some Wisconsin ads have been airing here. The Dem candidate for governor, Tony Evers, has the personality of lint and is frankly creepy, but he's running neck and neck with two-term Scott Walker, one of the most consequential politicians of his generation. I know that people get fatigued with politicians over time, but it's astonishing to me that Evers is even close.
• Amy Klobuchar, Tina Smith, and Tammy Baldwin are all up for election. They are all dismal, but all are likely to return to Washington. There's a chance that Karin Housley might beat Smith, who has never won a statewide election, but I'm not confident that Housley will get there.
• We may flip four Congressional seats in Minnesota. It's almost certain that Pete Stauber is going to Washington in the 8th, and it's quite possible that Jim Hagedorn is finally going to get elected in the 1st. But it's also looking likely that Erik Paulsen is going down in the 3rd, and Jason Lewis will be fortunate if he is reelected in the 2nd. I knew Paulsen a little bit when we worked together at Target and he's a good guy, but he's run a poor campaign against Dean Phillips, who has more money than King Canute and came up with a good shtick. Lewis went to Washington and actually did some useful things, but his district is turning left and the odious Angie Craig has an excellent chance to beat Lewis. If Lewis loses, we'll miss him more than most people realize.

What do you think?

il miglior fabbro

A lot of skulduggery afoot in Minnesota. Our friend Brad Carlson is on the case:

 At the end of the day, the lust for power is turning people into subhumans. Some of you may believe that my description of these events as political "terrorism" is a bit heavy handed given that people normally reserve such a word for radical Islamists who are willing to die for a cause while taking scores of "infidels" with them. But given these awful activities likely dissuade many from seeking elected office, it's safe to say that it is due in large part to people feeling overcome with terror (i.e. terrorized).

Yep. Brad shares a shocking tale at the link. You should read it all.

The obligatory recap

So what happened yesterday? A few thoughts:

• I was surprised Jeff Johnson won, but in retrospect I should have seen his victory over Tim Pawlenty coming a mile away. Johnson was the GOP nominee in 2014, so he's hardly a newcomer. Pawlenty had a lot of money behind him, but little rationale behind his campaign. In important respects, the dynamic was the same as what happened to Tommy Thompson when he lost to Tammy Baldwin in the senate race in Wisconsin in 2012; the brand name is rarely enough and the politician with the name still has to make the sale. The business about Pawlenty's dissing of Trump was a factor, but Pawlenty's evident disdain in dealing with the state party (he blew off the nominating process and the convention) was far more important. Johnson has been campaigning hard all year. The party activists were out in force and they voted for Johnson. Other than an ad attacking Johnson, Pawlenty was barely visible. Pawlenty thought he was invincible. Guess not.
• On the DFL side, Tim Walz will be hard to beat. He has a dozen years of experience pretending to be a moderate and he'll tack to the center now that he has the DFL nomination, but operationally he's no different than Erin Murphy. Johnson's task will be to demonstrate that Walz is a phony. As for Lori Swanson, good riddance. We can also hope that Mike Hatch, the éminence grise behind Swanson, is finally gone as well.
• I wonder how Alliance for a Better Minnesota is going to play things now. They were clearly planning to carpet-bomb T-Paw, but he's gone. Let's see what the big brains do.
• Keith Ellison is a dumpster fire, but he won the Attorney General's race easily. Can he make the sale statewide? I suspect Doug Wardlow, the GOP nominee, will get some help. Ellison is a deeply corrupt individual and the notion that he should be attorney general is preposterous, but those three letters after his name carry a lot of weight.
• Ilhan Omar is a fraud, too, but she's almost certainly going to Congress. The good news is she'll be a nonentity backbencher. Betty McCollum will save a seat for her.

Game on!

(Less than) One week out -- Attorney General

While the governor is ultimately more consequential, the attorney general of a state has a lot of power. The incumbent AG, Lori Swanson, lost her endorsement at the DFL convention and decided instead to run for governor. That opened up the door for a bunch of candidates on the DFL side. Of this group, the most prominent is Rep. Keith Ellison, who is giving up his seat in Congress to run for the office. Nearly everyone on the right worries about Ellison, but many do for the wrong reason. Ellison is a Muslim, so some think he'd try to impose sharia law or something like that. That's silly, of course. We have over a decade of evidence to weigh Ellison and it's pretty clear -- the only thing Ellison wants to impose on the people is, well, Keith Ellison. And that is reason enough to oppose him. His dim identity politics and Farrakhan footsie are simply tools in his quest for self-aggrandizement. He wants out of Washington because he couldn't be the big kahuna at the Democratic National Committee. If he can control the power of a state attorney general's office, he can indulge his impulses, including harassing Donald Trump. And he may get his wish.

The other candidates in the field include the guy who won the DFL endorsement, political newcomer Matt Pelikan. Pelikan is a straight-up SJW type and could finish last, because there's no compelling reason for his candidacy. Tom Foley was once the Ramsey County Attorney but hasn't been active in politics for nearly 25 years now, making him well past his sell-by date. Mike Rothman and Debra Hillstrom both come from the more moderate wing of the DFL and would likely conduct themselves in office similar to the way Swanson and her predecessor, Mike Hatch, ran the show. Rothman was Mark Dayton's commerce commissioner and he got an endorsement from the Star Tribune, but he's almost a complete unknown. Hillstrom has been in the Lege for nearly 20 years and has also been a prosecutor in Anoka County. She'd probably do the least harm of the five, but she's not going to beat Ellison in a primary where the key advantage is name recognition. Advantage: Ellison.

On the Republican side, the endorsed candidate is Doug Wardlow, who served one term in the Lege and has subsequently been mostly in private practice. He's a typical Republican candidate -- rock solid on understanding the role of government and more interested in protecting the citizenry than in mounting noisy crusades. He would be great. Wardlow first has to fight off the surprise candidacy of Bob Lessard, who was a big wheel DFLer on the Iron Range since the beginning of the Pleistocene Epoch. Lessard is a big outdoorsman/conservationist and well-known in the state, but is remembered mostly by people who are approaching retirement age. People who know who Lessard is will also know he's not actually a Republican, so in the end I suspect Wardlow will win the primary. It will be interesting to see if any of the big money comes into Minnesota to support his candidacy, especially if Ellison gets the DFL nod. Stay tuned.

One week out

Primaries are next week in Minnesota. I haven't written about them yet. Probably should. Quick synopsis, starting with the governor's race:

Governor: I'm not particularly impressed with any of the DFL candidates, but it may not matter because this election is shaping up as a test of the overall strength of the DFL machine and its support system, especially Education Minnesota and the Alliance for a Better Minnesota. If you've been watching the ads on television, most of the portside messaging is attacking Tim Pawlenty, who apparently was governor a long time ago, maybe succeeding Karl Rolvaag, but one can't be sure. I would guess Tim Walz will prevail, but there's very little to recommend him. He has spent six terms in Washington as a backbencher, but he's less frightening than Betty McCollum, so he has the institutional support. Lori Swanson must be gaining, because there was a big hit piece in the Intercept about her. This is largely being ignored in the local media, of course, but I suspect Walz will make use of it in the next week. The earlier attacks on Swanson's running mate, crusty old Rick Nolan, were designed to help the endorsed DFL candidates, Erin Murphy and Erin Maye Quade, who appear to be running a distant third, despite (or perhaps because of) the DFL endorsement. The Erins are a little loony, frankly, and while they carry the DFL endorsement, the party apparat would prefer Walz or Swanson sotto voce, because they (theoretically) wouldn't get destroyed on the Iron Range. The best news about this lineup is Walz giving up his congressional seat, which should be good pickup possibility for the Republicans in November. Advantage: Walz, for no particular reason.

On the Republican side, we have Jeff Johnson, who I personally like quite a lot, against the aforementioned Pawlenty. Pawlenty is probably going to win, but Johnson, who got chloroformed by Mark Dayton in the 2014 election, is giving it a go despite an obvious lack of resources. Pawlenty wasn't a terrible governor, but I'm not sure he deserves another go. Either of these two fellows would be a big improvement over Mark Dayton or the collection of nasties on the other side, but I'm not sure either has what it takes to win an election when ABM and the teacher's union are done with them. Johnson is trying to get nastier, but I'm not sure he's going to be tough enough to stand up to the onslaught. If Pawlenty wins, he'll have all the money he needs, but he'll have a muddled message and an indifferent record to defend, making him the de facto embattled incumbent. Pawlenty barely won in 2006 over the sputtering Mike Hatch, who didn't have the trained assassins of ABM working for him. If Johnson prevails, I'm guessing the big money folks behind T-Paw will take their bankrolls and go home. Advantage: Pawlenty.

Next: Attorney General.

Happy new year

It's 2018. This will be a hectic year, but we remain committed to keeping this feature rolling.  Light posting until mid-week.

More bullets

Fighting through a case of writer's block, but we do need content, so. . .

• Watched most of the Vikings game and was surprised at how well they played. It will be interesting to see if they can sustain the level of play they showed last night. If the offensive line plays well, they could be dangerous, as there's talent on the field.
• I don't know who the sideline reporter was on the second game, but he was incoherent. The New York Post has a pretty good description.
• I commend this piece by Victor Davis Hanson to your attention.
• The Minnesota Supreme Court doesn't want to deal with Mark Dayton's actions. I suspect they will have no choice.
• So do Minnesotans live in the happiest state of the union? Discuss.

Walz comes tumbling down

Can you contain your excitement?

U.S. Rep. Tim Walz said Monday he is running for governor in 2018.

Walz said in a phone interview that he brings a "passion for Minnesota" and a "proven ability to get things done working with other folks."

A Mankato DFLer representing the First Congressional District, Walz was elected in 2006. DFL powerbrokers have been hoping Walz would run, given his ability to garner votes in greater Minnesota. Walz has been re-elected in tough Democratic years like 2010 but barely squeaked by in 2016 despite facing weak opposition. Walz ran ahead of DFL presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, who lost the district by 15 points. 

From what I can tell, Walz hasn't proven he can win votes anywhere but Mankato and Rochester. That's a start, but he's going to be a tough sell in the metro. Given what happened in 2016, there was a good chance he was going down in the next election cycle in his congressional district, so he might as well give it a go for governor, especially given the announced competition:

He joins State Auditor Rebecca Otto, Rep. Erin Murphy and St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman in the DFL race. Others considering a run are U.S. Rep. Rick Nolan, Rep. Paul Thissen and Attorney General Lori Swanson. 

If you can find a compelling candidate out of that gaggle, let Ken Martin know.