Category Archives: Sports

Packers-Vikings Border Battle: Wanna Bet?

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In case you haven’t heard, there is a Vikings-Packers game happening this Sunday that has playoff implications.  A couple people seem to be interested in it.  It’s reportedly an even bigger deal than the Meineke Car Care Bowl.

So, of course, now is the time when rival state politicians customarily make a sporting bet over who will win, to prove to the commoners that they are just regular Joes obsessing about football like everyone else.

Usually the bet is pretty predictable.  If Minnesota wins, Green Bay pays in cheese.  If Green Bay wins, Minnesota pays in pork, or whatever industry the politician wants to court.  Hilarity ensues.  We all can’t get enough of it.  It’s one of the most hackneyed and enduring rituals in American politics.

But how about we spice things up with some more culturally appropriate gifts?

If the Vikings lose, Governor Dayton promises to pay up with…

  • Lifetime supply of Cargill’s breakthrough Lygomme™ ACH Optimum DAIRY-FREE cheese substitute
  • Lifetime supply of 3M Incontinence Care Lotion
  • Surplus Brett Favre Vikings jerseys
  • Hazelden group discount coupons
  • Bachmann-for-President game-worn tri-corner hats

If the Packers lose, Governor Walker promises to pay up with…

  • Lifetime supply of ratebeer.com’s Worst Beer in the World – the pride of Milwaukee,  Olde English 800
  • Complimentary Scott Walker Labor Day address to Minnesota  AFL-CIO
  • Liquid Sex™ ginseng aphrodisiac pills (WI is the nation’s leading producer of ginseng.  Who knew?)
  • Green and gold snowmobile suit tricked out with built-in pony keg and StepSaver™ urethral catheter
  • Photos of the Lombardi Trophies to decorate the Vikings new stadium

So, let the Border Battle Weekend begin.  And on behalf of Vikings fans everywhere, I’d just like say “may the worse team win.”

- Loveland

Three Reasons For The Silence On The Campaign Trail About Vikings Stadium Subidies

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In 2012, the dominant issue in the Minnesota Legislature was the debate about public subsidies for the Vikings Stadium.  No issue was more emotionally charged.  No issue was more polarizing.  No issue was more heavily covered in the news.

So just a few months later, why is this marquee legislative issue such an insignificant factor in the campaign for control of the Minnesota Legislature?  After all, based on last year’s debate, you might expect that  it would be The Issue out on the stump.

But I’m not seeing it.  The issue hasn’t been raised once in any of the many political direct mail pieces that have clogged my mailbox, or cable TV ads flooding my living room.  Moreover, I Googled “Vikings Stadium and election,” and found no stories where the mother of all legislative Issues was playing a prominent role out on the political hustings.

How about stadium champions like Senator Julie Rosen (R-Fairmont)?  Surely she must be getting pummeled for championing the Vikings’ cause.  Well, the Mankato Free Press reports that Rosen’s opponent Paul Marquardt isn’t making it an issue:

Marquardt isn’t critical of the stadium bill (other than Rosen’s failure to get a more iron-clad guarantee that the Vikings would keep their training camp in Mankato). His primary complaint isn’t even with Rosen herself as much as with the Republican majority she supports.

“They got hung up on constitutional amendments that were just a complete waste of time and taxpayer money,” said Marquardt, a retired union plumber. “… They created no jobs. And on top of that, we lost our homestead credit.”

On the other side of the aisle, DFL Senator Leroy Stumpf (DFL-Plummer) has no problem bragging to the St. James News about the economic development benefits of the stadium:

“We also have a good commitment on the part of Governor Dayton to create jobs by using the state’s bonding capacity for smart and strategic investments such as the Viking Stadium…”

Mostly, the issue seems to be missing from campaign debates.  When it does come up, it is much more low key than it was during the State Capitol debate.

So, why the has the Vikings stadium debate lost its political edge?

REPORTERS MOVED ON AND POLS FOLLOWED.  During the session, the Vikings stadium issue was the ultimate “water cooler issue,” an issue that almost all Minnesotans could and did discuss in their social spheres.  For that reason, the news media, looking to give the masses what they craved, covered the issue like none other.  Reporters stoked the fire almost daily.  But now that the issue has been resolved, reporters have dropped the issue cold and moved onto new hot button issues, principally the gay marriage ban and voter restriction constitutional amendments.   If reporters are interested at all these days, their interest is limited to whether the stadium roof will be retractable, and how many toilets it will house.  Politicians craft their messaging around what reporters will cover, and reporters have moved on.  As a result, the politicians have also largely moved on.

BIPARTISAN SUPPORT NEUTRALIZES PARTISAN ATTACKS. Because both DFLers and Republicans supported stadium bill, the political operatives who shape legislative campaign messaging have to be cautious about how they play this issue.  Neither party can have a coordinated party-based attack on subsidies, because valued members of both parties supported the subsidies.  As a result, the stadium subsidy issue takes a back seat to issues where the parties can have coordinated messaging, such as taxes, jobs, and education.

THE ISSUE HASN’T BEEN POLITICALLY POTENT IN THE PAST.  Finally, this issue doesn’t have a history of  providing a political payoff.  Like the Vikings, the Minnesota Twins also spent a decade in a bitter debate over ballpark subsidies.  But after the Twins debate ended, I am not aware of a single politician who lost their position over the issue.  If the Twins ballpark subsidy vote had led to a massive political bloodletting, you can bet that the Vikings vote would be a major topic in the 2012 debate.  But it didn’t, so it isn’t.

Whatever the reasons, this much is clear:  The Vikings stadium debate is ending the way all too many Vikings seasons have ended, in stone cold silence.

- Loveland

 

Note:  This post was also featured in Politics in Minnesota’s Best of the Blogs.

Bills’ Minnesota Currency Proposal: Change We Can Believe In?

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U.S. Senator Amy Kloubachar’s virtually invisible campaign opponent Kurt Bills borrows many of his policy ideas from his mentor, libertarian presidential candidate Ron Paul.  One of the least discussed of Bills’ proposals is his call for Minnesota to consider issuing its own currency.

Like Congressman Paul, Mr. Bills backs a national return to the gold standard.  In addition, Bills has sponsored state legislation to study whether Minnesota should adopt an alternative currency.  Bills’ bill (H.F. 1664):

“A joint legislative committee is established to study the adoption of an alternative currency by and for the state of Minnesota and its citizens, in response to the abdication by the United States Congress of its constitutional duty to regulate the value of its money, which it has failed to do through the Federal Reserve System.”

Financial experts are not so sure about Mr. Bills’ state currency idea.  For instance David Parsley, a professor of economics and finance at Vanderbilt University was quoted by CNN saying:

“Having 50 Feds” could debase the U.S. dollar and even potentially lead the country into default.  The single currency in the United States is working just fine.  I have no idea why anyone would want to destroy something so successful — unless they actually wanted to destroy the country.”

Despite the naysayers, the prospect of having a cool new state currency raises many creative possibilities for Minnesotans.

Name.  For instance, what would we call the new Minnesota currency?

MinneDollar quickly comes to mind, but that seems much too obvious.  Plus, if the dollar collapses, as Mr. Bills foresees, “MinneDollar” wouldn’t inspire much confidence, now would it?

Alternatively, perhaps Minnesota’s dollar could be called “ “The Viking,” to symbolize our ability to dust ourselves off after humiliating defeats, and come back for more humiliating defeats, without ever seeing the epic futility of it all.  Very Minnesotan.

Or, the corporatist Republicans controlling the Legislature might prefer to sell off the naming rights of the new Minnesota currency for a price, to someone like Twin Cities Federal (TCF) Bank, which  already owns the naming rights to a largely taxpayer-funded stadium, and is run by a former GOP Party Chairman.  Yes, Minnesota’s equivalent to “the dollar” could be called “The TCF.”

Finally, there is always “The Gopher.” What better name to carry on Minnesota’s rich tradition of picking really humiliating names to represent our state?  Plus, “Golden Gopher?”  Gold standard?  Get it?

Faces.  After we name our new currency, we, of course, need to put a good face on it.

America’s first President, George Washington, preferred faceless money.  He was staunchly opposed to putting President’s images on U.S. currency.  Modest George thought doing so was too self-aggrandizing, elitist and monarchical.  In other words, George was a socialist.

However, something tells me that the likes of Jesse Ventura and Tim Pawlenty wouldn’t let modesty get in the way of monetary immortality for themselves.  So we’ll let those former Governors fight it out to determine whose face is on our new Minnesota currency.

Why did I leave current Governor Mark Dayton off my list?  Ah shucks, Modest Mark doesn’t need that.  (Owning most of the new currency is good enough for him.)

Motto.  After our currency has a name and a face, it would need a motto, something akin to the saying on U.S. currency, “In God We Trust.”

If we go with selling off the naming rights, as contemplated above, I guess we’d need the new currency motto to be “Your convenience bank.”  Stop whining, it will grow on you.

“In Ron Paul We Trust” also could work, since Mr. Paul is the brainchild of all this, and because he is treated like a deity by his adoring followers.

But given the Minnesota Republicans’ obsession with proving they are tighter with the Almighty than everyone else, the GOP-controlled Legislature would probably make the motto something more like “In God We Trust, Unlike the Godless Liberals.” Bam.  On-message.

The more I think about it, though, the more I think my vote for the new Minnesota currency name goes to “The Loon.” I know it’s hackneyed.  But loons are graceful creatures with a gorgeous call that is closely associated with Minnesota’s iconic lakes.   Loons are our State Bird.  ”Common Loons” are both beautiful and “common,” just like the great people of Minnesota.

Besides, “The Loon” perfectly captures the merits of the Mr. Bills’ idea.

- Loveland

Note:  This post was also featured in the Politics in Minnesota Morning Report “Best of the Blogs” feature, as well as a “best of the best” in Minnpost’s Blog Cabin feature.

The Minnesota Vikings and The Butterfly Effect

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Part of chaos theory is something called the butterfly effect, the notion that even a minor change in a nonlinear system, such as the flutter of a butterfly’s wings, can result in large differences in outcome later on, such as the change in the path of a tornado.

Politics is a decidedly non-linear system, where small changes can definitely cause large swings in outcomes. Here are a few the behind-the-scenes flutters that caused the Vikings to finally prevail in their decade-long effort to secure stadium subsidies at the State Capitol.

A Recount.  00.4% of the vote.  That was Mark Dayton’s margin in a general election recount in 2010.  As a result, “Landslide Dayton” became the Vikings most powerful and committed supporter.

But what if Dayton’s 2010 opponent Tom Emmer had not started his campaign so gaffe-prone?  What if pennies had not been dumped on Emmer, turning an obscure issue like tip credits into an enduring symbol of an ideologically extreme candidate?

In a Republican wave election year, it’s easy to imagine that a few small improvements in Emmer’s campaign could have given Emmer an additional 00.5% of the vote, and the helm of state government.

If Emmer had prevailed, he would not have been as aggressively pro-Vikings Stadium as Dayton.  MPR captured Emmer’s position in 2010:

 ”I support a solution for a Vikings stadium, but I don’t think you give $700 million in taxpayer money and hand it over to a private business.”

Emmer suggested a voter referendum linking funds from a new casino to pay for the stadium. He also suggested community ownership (Green Bay Packers model) or giving Wilf the Metrodome.

The Vikings viewed all of Emmer’s demands to be bill killers.  So if Dayton hadn’t squeezed into the electoral end zone — after an instant replay review by the officials — the Vikings likely would not have squeezed into their stadium subsidy end zone.

A Leader.  Powerful House GOP Speaker Kurt Zellers opposed the Vikings bill.  So did powerful House GOP Majority Leader Matt Dean.  That could easily have spelled the end for the Vikings.  After all, there aren’t too many major bills that pass the House with the leadership of both parties opposing the bill.

So if the DFL’s highest ranking House member, the often powerless Minority Leader Paul Thissen, had joined Zellers and Dean in opposing the bill, the Vikings fragile coalition probably could not have scored.

It’s not often that a minority party leader swings the balance in our polarized Legislature, but Thissen did.

A City Attorney.  With the Metrodome site as the only viable option at the end of the session, the whole effort would have collapsed without an endorsement by the Minneapolis City Council, a very tall order at the time.  And if Minneapolis City Attorney Susan Segal had not ruled that a city referendum provision didn’t apply to the City’s stadium proposal, because the City didn’t control the funding in question, City Council Member Sandy Colvin Roy made it pretty clear that she would not have been the final swing vote in support of the proposal.

Vikings MVP?

Think about that a minute.  If a political pundit had predicted before the session that someone named Susan Segal would be the key to whether the Vikings would get their new stadium, even many political savants would have said “who?”

But Susan Segal, Paul Thissen and 00.4% of Minnesotans all fluttered their relatively small wings, and the Vikings decade-long stadium loss streak finally came to an end.

“A game of inches,” indeed.

- Loveland

Note:  This post was also featured as part of the “Best of the Blogs” feature in Politics in Minnesota’s Morning Report.

Vikings Post Game Show

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Is the Vikings Stadium bill a political boon or bust?  A new SurveyUSA poll brings political hand wringers mixed messages.

Post-game pondering.

One the one hand, Governor Mark Dayton, who unapologetically led a bone-crushing stadium drive, still has a very respectable 56% approval rating.  In other good news for supporters, 55% of Minnesotans are fine with expanding gambling, the primary state financing mechanism used in the bill.  Most (57%) believe that the Vikings will leave without a new stadium.  Bottom line:  An impressive 70% say that if a lawmaker backed the bill, it would either make no difference in their voting (47%) or make them more likely to support that politician (23%).

So, backlash?  What backlash?

But the news in the poll isn’t all skol-worthy.   A slim majority of Minnesotans (52%) either want the Vikings to stay in the Metrodome in its current plain Jane state (16%) or renovate the Metrodome (36%).  In addition, most citizens prefer racino (26% support) and a downtown casino (36% support) over the bill’s heavy reliance on electronic pulltabs (15% support).  Overall, 58% say the Vikings Stadium should be funded entirely with public funding.  Finally, a whopping two-thirds (67%) of Minnesotans say there should be “a public vote before any taxes are raised to pay for a Vikings Stadium,” something the Vikings bill does not allow.

So, political armageddon is nigh, correct?

The fact is, polling on the Vikings Stadium is a bit of a political Rorschach Test.  Politicians can see what they want to see in today’s polling, because Minnesotans’ collective druthers are divided.  As certain as state politicians and pundits’ claim to be about what they think voters want, voters themselves don’t seem to be at all certain.

Is a vote in favor of the Vikings Stadium a political “W” or “L?”  Well, the most difficult day to be a Vikings Stadium supporter was probably last Wednesday.  The most difficult day to be an opponent of the Stadium will be the Minneapolis-hosted Super Sunday in 2016 or 2017.   To every thing, there is a season.

- Loveland