Senate District 39.

Senate District 39 has a foot print in Chisago County.  Our friends in the southern part of the county have a different set of representation.  Here is who you want to vote for.

Senate District 39 - Karin Housley:  One of the voices on the St Croix River, Karin is a well know and liked real estate agent for Kellar Williams.  Her friendly style and energy would make for great representation for Franconia and Shafer!

District 39A Representative - Bob Dettmer:  A true class act.  A man's man who has an impressive resume.  Having talked with him on several occasions, I can tell you that this is the kind of guy we all like to have our backs.  What makes it better is that he is a "true" conservative!

Confused!?

I have been hearing for months about how terrible it is that Chip Cravaack's family has been moved to New Hampshire.  That this does not allow him to properly represent the 8th congressional district.  Never mind the facts.  Chip's wife was given an opportunity to advise within her company.  That move would need her to be closer to the office.  Additionally, having a young family, it only made sense that they are close to their mother on a daily basis.  No matter where he resides (which happens to be in North Branch) as a congressman, your life is on the road constantly.  I personally know Chip.  I have stood outside the doors of the floor of Congress talking to him about this.  I can tell you as person who is plugged into not only his local office but, with his staff at the campaign office.  Chip is always in Minnesota or DC.  He takes his job seriously.
Now that I have gotten that off my chest.  I have two easy questions to ask.  Why is the DFL making a big deal about it?  Why are they or their special interest groups constantly pushing this topic?  Rick Nolan lived in DC.  Oberstar lived in Virginia.  Neither of them spent the amount of time in this district that Chip has.
Additionally, our sitting (hopefully for only another 6 days) Senator Amy Klobuchar is married to a professor who teaches at the University of Baltimore.  No reasonable person would ever think that means she lives here.  If he teaches in Maryland, naturally you would expect she spend a fair amount of time with him on the East Coast.
It doesn't bother me that he works and most likely lives in Baltimore.  It doesn't bother me that she would spend time with her husband.  What does bother me is that Democrats (and the groups they associate with) will go to the ends of the earth to make sure every person in the 8th district knows about Chip. But would never reply to a question like, "why the double standard?"

http://law.ubalt.edu/faculty/profiles/bessler.cfm

Need Help With Minnesota Supreme Court Judges?

After some research MNCC has decided to support the bold letter candidates in each race.

GRIFFITH vs. Gildea(I)

ANDERSON(I) vs. Barkley

TINGELSTAD vs. Stras(I) ----- either are good choices but, slight edge to Tingelstad. (Vocal about judges being elected not appointed)

Hope this helps you at the ballot box.

Who do we endorse?

Minnesota Commonsense Conservatives look for candidates who understand the basic needs of government.  Ones who oppose bloated, over sized, big government bureaucrats.  Now we recognize that there are few perfect candidates.  But, this list is a reflection of individuals who are hitting the marks or are closer to them than their opponents.

United States Senate - Kurt Bills (R).  This guys understands how economies work better than most any Senate candidate I have ever heard speak before.  Now while I recognize that he may not bake as good a cookie as his opponent,  he definitely gets that government needs some "Econ 101".  After many years of teaching high schoolers these basic principals, I am sure he can get into the minds of his Washington counterparts.  Not voting for this guy should be a crime!

United States Congress (8th District) - Chip Cravaack (R). Most of us know Chip by now.  He has been working hard to represent his district.  A true man of courage, who also supports his wife's career and future.  I admit he has made some votes that made me scratch my head.  But, considering that he is a Republican in one of the biggest Democrat hotbeds in the entire state of Minnesota, it isn't fully a surprise.

Minnesota Senate (32) - Sean Nienow (R). I cannot think of a better representative to give his constituents a full understanding of what St Paul's "inside baseball" looks like.  This man knows the way it works and has no problem pointing out the issues.  A true champion for the tax payer.  Sean fought tooth and nail against the wasteful spending in our state managed healthcare system.  That alone deserve your vote.

Minnesota Legislature (32A) - Brian Johnson (R). The most soft spoken of the group yet, one of the most rigid conservatives you will ever know.  Brian has served his community well for many years as an officer of the peace.  He has seen the best and worst in people.  He truly is a candidate who wants to make his district a great place to live.  That has been proven by his service to Isanti County.

Minnesota Legislature (32B) - Bob Barrett (R). Not only do I like to say his name.  I am proud to list him as a friend. It may seem biased that I would talk well about a friend but, his accessibility to the public is what created that friendship.  A deeply honest guy who wants to help shape a good future for not only his family but mine as well.  Top that with his strong working relationship with Sean Nienow and you have the makings of top shelf representation for Chisago County.

Chisago County Board (D1) - Rick Smisson. New ideas, new face and clear vision.  Rick Smisson has the making of a game changer in the County.  His real life experiences matched with a tenacity.  Rick could bring a nice balance to a board that needs a face lift.

Chisago County Board (D5) - Darrel Trulson. Talk about a candidate who knows how to bring people together, this is that one.  Darrel has a great blend of political understanding and likeability.  He has a way to make people listen and often change their minds.  He would be a great balance to Smisson.

........further endorsements to come.

MNCC Election Picks

Starting tomorrow (Tuesday) I will be posting Minnesota Commonsense Conservative picks for the elections.  This would include the State Supreme Court Candidates everybody forgets to check before going to the election boxes.  Stay tuned all week!

Letter to the employees.

This is a fairly long article.  Rather than post it here is the link. I wonder what people would do if more "bosses" wrote this type of letter to their staff.  Maybe people would pay a bit more attention?


http://finance.yahoo.com/news/ceo-workers-youll-likely-fired-131640914.html

Petraeus Throws Obama Under the Bus

Breaking news on Benghazi: the CIA spokesman, presumably at the direction of CIA director David Petraeus, has put out this statement: "No one at any level in the CIA told anybody not to help those in need; claims to the contrary are simply inaccurate. ”

So who in the government did tell “anybody” not to help those in need? Someone decided not to send in military assets to help those Agency operators. Would the secretary of defense make such a decision on his own? No.

It would have been a presidential decision. There was presumably a rationale for such a decision. What was it? When and why—and based on whose counsel obtained in what meetings or conversations—did President Obama decide against sending in military assets to help the Americans in need?

The Weekly Standard: William Kristal

Women Decide for Whom the Buck Stops

There's a new woman voter out there. Empowered women are holding themselves to the same standard they hold men to, and it's showing up in the public opinion polls. Female concerns over the debt and the deficit, not the usual gender issues, have dramatically increased as the Nov. 6 election bears down upon us.
The Gallup Poll now shows Mitt Romney trailing the president by only a point among women who are likely to vote in 12 swing states. This follows a Pew Research Center poll taken after the first presidential debate showing that President Obama's 18-point lead among women had shrunk to a tie, 47 percent to 47 percent.
"In every poll, we've seen a major surge among women in favorability for Romney," Democratic pollster Celinda Lake told USA Today after the first debate. These polls find women increasingly concerned with the deficit and debt, just like men. The social issues continue to be more important to women than to men, but these issues no longer dominate the discussion.
Hillary Clinton's famous needling of Barack Obama four years ago -- "the buck stops in the Oval Office" -- suggested that he didn't have the leadership qualities required in a president. She reprised the theme this week, inadvertently or not, when she fell on the president's sword to take the blame for the national-security fiasco in Libya.
Her attempt to rescue the president with her declaration that "the buck stops with me" follows the litany of mixed metaphors in search of someone to blame for the deaths of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans in the terrorist assault on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. The president stands accused of "throwing Hillary under the bus," she's accused of "getting Obama off the hook," and the State Department has become the "broken link" in "the chain of events" of a major security failure. The "failure of intelligence" contributes a new definition of incompetence at the highest levels of government.
When a president hides behind the skirt, or actually the pantsuit, of his secretary of state, it's enough to tempt even a feminist to put national security above the social issues.

http://townhall.com/columnists/suzannefields/2012/10/19/women_decide_for_whom_the_buck_stops

Pay gap between government, private sector widens to 34 percent

The gap in pay between federal employees and private-sector workers has jumped 8 percentage points since last year, according to new data presented at a Federal Salary Council meeting Friday.
On average, federal employees earn 34 percent less than their private-sector counterparts, according to the council's analysis.
The pay gap, which is calculated using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics based on pay in 34 locality pay areas, was 26 percent last year.
The council, which is made up of labor representatives and pay experts, makes recommendations on federal pay to the President's Pay Agent.
Over the last several years, the council's analysis has shown the pay gap increasingly widening.
Still, two years after President Barack Obama proposed a two-year pay freeze for civilian government employees, the issue of whether and how much feds are underpaid remains contentious.
A Congressional Budget Office study released in January found, overall, federal employees actually earn about 2 percent more in wages compared to private-sector workers, with wider differences based on education level.
But a June 2011 report from the the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, indicated government pay outstripped private-sector pay by 14 percent.
In reviewing various statistics on federal pay, the Government Accountability Office said the widely divergent results were due to the different methodologies the various studies used. Attempting to compare or extrapolate from them would be "potentially problematic," GAO auditors said.

 http://www.federalnewsradio.com//189/3085581/Pay-gap-between-government-private-sector-widens-to-34-percent

GAFFNEY: The real reason behind Benghazigate. Was Obama gun-walking arms to jihadists?

President Obama’s once seemingly unstoppable march toward re-election hit what he might call “bumps in the road” in Benghazi, Libya, late on Sept. 11, 2012. It might be more accurate to describe the effect of the well-planned and -executed, military-style attack on a diplomatic facility there as the political equivalent of a devastating improvised explosive device on the myth of the unassailability of the Obama record as commander in chief.
Thanks to intrepid investigative reporting — notably by Bret Baier and Catherine Herridge at Fox News, Aaron Klein at WND.com and Clare Lopez at RadicalIslam.org — and information developed by congressional investigators, the mystery is beginning to unravel with regard to what happened that night and the reason for the subsequent, clumsy official cover-up now known as Benghazigate.
The evidence suggests that the Obama administration has not simply been engaging, legitimating, enriching and emboldening Islamists who have taken over or are ascendant in much of the Middle East. Starting in March 2011, when American diplomat J. Christopher Stevens was designated the liaison to the “opposition” in Libya, the Obama administration has been arming them, including jihadists like Abdelhakim Belhadj, leader of the al Qaeda franchise known as the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.
Once Moammar Gadhafi was overthrown, Stevens was appointed ambassador to the new Libya run by Mr. Belhadj and his friends. Not surprisingly, one of the most important priorities for someone in that position would be to try to find and secure the immense amount of armaments that had been cached by the dictator around the country and systematically looted during and after the revolution.
One of the places in Libya most awash with such weapons in the most dangerous of hands is Benghazi. It now appears that Stevens was there — on a particularly risky day, with no security to speak of and despite now copiously documented concerns about his own safety and that of his subordinates — for another priority mission: sending arms recovered from the former regime’s stocks to the “opposition” in Syria. As in Libya, the insurgents are known to include al Qaeda and other Shariah-supremacist groups, including none other than Abdelhakim Belhadj.
Fox News has chronicled how the Al Entisar, a Libyan-flagged vessel carrying 400 tons of cargo, docked on Sept. 6 in the Turkish port of Iskenderun. It reportedly supplied both humanitarian assistance and arms — including deadly SA-7 man-portable surface-to-air missiles — apparently destined for Islamists, again including al Qaeda elements, in Syria.
What cries out for further investigation — and debate in the remaining days of this presidential election — is whether this shipment was part of a larger covert Obama effort to transfer weapons to our enemies that could make the Iran-Contra scandal, to say nothing of Operation Fast and Furious, pale by comparison.
Investigative journalist Aaron Klein has reported that the “consulate in Benghazi” actually was no such thing. He observes that although administration officials have done nothing to correct that oft-repeated characterization of the facility where the murderous attack on Stevens and his colleagues was launched, they call it a “mission.” What Mr. Klein describes as a “shabby, nondescript building” that lacked any “major public security presence” was, according to an unnamed Middle Eastern security official, “routinely used by Stevens and others to coordinate with the Turkish, Saudi and Qatari governments on supporting the insurgencies in the Middle East, most prominently the rebels opposing Assad’s regime in Syria.”
We know that Stevens‘ last official act was to hold such a meeting with an unidentified “Turkish diplomat.” Presumably, the conversation involved additional arms shipments to al Qaeda and its allies in Syria. It also may have involved getting more jihadi fighters there. After all, Mr. Klein reported last month that, according to sources in Egyptian security, our ambassador was playing a “central role in recruiting jihadists to fight Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria.”
It gets worse. Last week, Center for Security Policy senior fellow and former career CIA officer Clare Lopez observed that there were two large warehouse-type buildings associated with the so-called “consulate” whose purpose has yet to be disclosed. As their contents were raided in the course of the attack, we may never know for sure whether they housed — and were known by the local jihadis to house — arms, perhaps administered by the two former Navy SEALs killed along with Stevens.
What we do know is that the New York Times — one of the most slavishly pro-Obama publications in the country — reported in an Oct. 14 article, “Most of the arms shipped at the behest of Saudi Arabia and Qatar to supply Syrian rebel groups fighting the government of Bashar Assad are going to hard-line Islamic jihadists, and not the more secular opposition groups that the West wants to bolster.”
In short, it seems President Obama has been engaged in gun-walking on a massive scale. The effect has been to equip America’s enemies to wage jihad not only against regimes it once claimed were our friends, but inevitably against us and our allies as well. That would explain his administration’s desperate and now failing bid to mislead the voters through the serial deflections of Benghazigate.
Frank J. Gaffney Jr. is president of the Center for Security Policy (SecureFreedom.org), a columnist for The Washington Times and host of Secure Freedom Radio on WRC-AM (1260).

Read more: GAFFNEY: The real reason behind Benghazigate - Washington Times http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/oct/22/the-real-reason-behind-benghazigate/#ixzz2ADXnW9C9
Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter

Cravaack Legislation to Return Mille Lacs Lake to Minnesotans

There Are Two Paths

Documents: Sen. Klobuchar took Ponzi schemer’s campaign contributions, didn’t prosecute

Documents obtained by The Daily Caller show that U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar helped keep a multibillion-dollar Ponzi schemer out of prison in the late 1990s when she was the County Attorney in Hennepin County, Minnesota.
That financial criminal, Tom Petters, presided over companies whose employees gave Klobuchar $8,500 for her re-election campaign, and would later contribute more than $120,000 toward her U.S. Senate run.
One of those companies’ vice presidents was Ted Mondale, a former state senator and son of former U.S. Vice President Walter Mondale. Before taking office as Hennepin County Attorney, Klobuchar was a partner at the Minneapolis law firm of Dorsey & Whitney, where Walter Mondale has practiced law since 1987.
Perhaps because of the lure of Petters’ campaign cash or his deep connection to Minnesota Democratic politics, Klobuchar used the power of her office in 1999 to ensure Petters was not charged with financial crimes. And despite significant evidence against him, she cleared the way for Petters to build his multibillion-dollar illegal empire by prosecuting only his early co-conspirators.
One of those co-conspirators, Richard Hettler, told The Daily Caller that Klobuchar was aware of what Petters was doing, yet willingly accepted campaign donations from Petters’ company and its employees.
“She took Ponzi money to get elected,” he insisted.
Years later, after Klobuchar won a seat in the U.S. Senate and left Minnesota, a federal prosecutor would win convictions against Petters for 10 counts of wire fraud, three counts of mail fraud, five counts of money laundering, and one count each of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/10/19/documents-sen-klobuchar-took-ponzi-schemers-campaign-contributions-didnt-prosecute/#ixzz2A424cp5I

Fluke pushes early voting in Reno

Sandra Fluke, the woman at the center of a media firestorm earlier this year after Rush Limbaugh called her a “slut,” spoke Saturday in front of about 10 people at the Sak ‘N Save in north Reno.
The speech was part of a daylong effort by Democrats to get Northern Nevadans to the polls on the first day of early voting.
“I’m trying to do everything I can for an election that I feel is very important. I have a unique opportunity for how I get to do that,” said Fluke, who is coming off recent campaign trips to Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire and Florida as a surrogate for Democratic President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign.
Fluke emerged on the national spotlight in February when she was denied to speak before the U.S. House committee on Oversight and Government Reform on whether insurance plans should have a mandate to cover contraceptives. She eventually spoke to House Democrats.
Rush Limbaugh called her a “slut” and “prostitute” on his show based on her comments on contraception for women. He later apologized, saying it was an “attempt to be humorous.”
Fluke doesn’t take the jabs too seriously. When asked about her previous year and how people have treated her in the press, Fluke smiled and laughed.
“It’s been not quite the 2012 that I’ve expected,” she said.
Fluke has embraced the spotlight, though. She spoke at the Democratic National Convention in North Carolina and has enjoyed talks with people on the campaign trail — especially those concerning women’s issues.
“A lot of women come to me and tell me stories individually about their lives about what access to healthcare has meant to them; what the Affordable Care Act is going to mean to them,” she said. “A lot of young people tell me how important it was to stay on their parents plan until they were 26. Folks tell me what a difference it made to be able to rely on Planned Parenthood when they needed it and what it would mean if Mr. Romney gets his way to defund Planned Parenthood.”
Fluke also spoke in Carson City on Saturday.

 http://www.rgj.com/article/20121020/NEWS19/310200053/Fluke-takes-center-stage-Reno

What I HAve Been Afraid To Blog About, Part 5

Hollywood Republicans feeling more comfortable expressing their political views, insiders say By Hollie McKay Pop Tarts Published October 17, 2012 FoxNews.com

LOS ANGELES –  Who said Hollywood is a liberal's paradise?
Last week, Lindsay Lohan and Stacy Dash surprisingly came out in support of Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney, joining an “out and proud” group GOP-leaning Hollywood players like Scott Baio, Jon Voight, Clint Eastwood, Jerry Bruckheimer, Kelsey Grammer, Adam Sandler, Gary Sinise, Patricia Heaton, Bruce Willis, Gene Simmons, Stephen Baldwin, Joe Perry, James Caan and Arnold Schwarzenegger, to more than a few.
“A large number of celebrities are coming forward and declaring their support for a new administration,” publicist Angie Meyer told FOX411’s Pop Tarts column. “For the first time in a long time, conservatives in Hollywood are resisting the bullying from the left. They are ready to speak their minds.”
OpenSecrets.org lists Romney campaign donations coming from the likes of Lionsgate Vice Chairman Michael Burns, country singer John Rich, and former Metro Goldwyn Mayer studio chief Harry Sloan, while the candidate's victory fund has been upped by Jerry Bruckheimer and Scott Baio.
Three Romney fund raisers have also taken place in the Hollywood vicinity this election cycle, compared to zero Hollywood fund raisers in 2008 for GOP candidate John McCain.
Registered Republican Scott Baio (you may know him as Chachi), said the GOP community isn’t as small as many assume it to be.
“The people who believe are much quieter about it,” Baio told us in an interview last week.
Except for Kelsey Grammer.
In 2008, Grammer told us in an interview for his film “Swing Vote” that while he has his own devout “political views,” he didn’t think “it was important to share.” Cut to four years later and the “Boss” star is all about sharing his stance. “Romney would make a terrific president. I think he’d be very good at it,” he enthused in a recent interview. “He’s a clear thinker. He’s a kind man, and he makes a lot of sense.”
The Hollywood Congress of Republicans, a grass-roots organization affiliated with the California Republican Party, was formed in 2001. It boasts a website promoting regular meetings and mixers with the “intent on bringing people together socially and professionally to help transform the political landscape of the entertainment industry in Hollywood.” The site also features an extensive list of “recommended” Hollywood personalities listed as being “right” including Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Jessica Simpson, Marie Osmond, Robert Duvall, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Sammy Hagar and Jean-Claude Van Damme, among many others.
“It seems that more conservatives in Hollywood are ‘coming out.’ Whether it is ‘more acceptable’ (to be a conservative in Hollywood) remains to be seen. There is a real threat of losing work in the conservative Hollywood community,” explained the organization's president Mell Flynn. “The ever tolerant Hollywood left isn't really too tolerant at all. I personally think politics should be left out of the work place. If I am on set and others start speaking negatively about conservatives, I will jump in and defend them. I refuse to let the left get away with their spin and lies. More conservatives in Hollywood need to come out, there is power in numbers.”
Yet as Flynn pointed out, the consequences of standing up for Republicans in Hollywood can sting. Most recently, Stacey Dash’s tweet expressing her Romney voting intention became fodder for extremely intense press coverage, debate and backlash, including vicious, racially-charged attacks from Obama supporters.
“I have even more respect for Stacey’s brave statement supporting Romney. Given the outrageously cruel reaction to her tweet, I don’t expect many more celebrity endorsements. That’s very sad indeed,” noted Los Angeles-based comedian and radio host Moxie Cathedra. “An admission of being a conservative or libertarian is not quite career suicide, but you are guaranteed to lose some so-called friends who will be far less likely to bring you into their projects.”
Cathedra said a very successful friend of hers in the film and television business, who at some point had “liked” Chick-fil-A on Facebook, came under fire when it was revealed that the owner of the fast food chain made donations to anti-gay marriage groups. “[My Friend] was harassed by liberal Hollywood industry colleagues until he removed that ‘like,’ but he did add that he still eats there and loves the food,” she said.
Film producer and marketing expert Mark Joseph, a self-proclaimed registered independent, says that despite more Republicans' increased ease expressing their political views, the majority of Tinseltown conservatives still prefer to keep their lips sealed.
“Liberals feel the freedom to be more outspoken about their beliefs whereas conservatives tend to keep their beliefs to themselves for fear of backlash," Joseph said. "My general rule in any election year is that I can tell who the conservatives are because they’re the ones who aren’t saying anything about either candidate. With each person who steps out for the GOP, whether it’s Clint Eastwood or Stacey Dash or Lindsay Lohan, whatever stigma there is, is lessoned.”

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2012/10/17/lohan-effect-hollywood-conservatives-feeling-more-comfortable-expressing-their/?intcmp=features#ixzz29Yig3100

Bow To Nobody.

Doesn't this sum up quite a bit?

What if?

What I Have Been Afraid To Blog About, Part 4

Voices Without A Vote

So very impressed.............yet so unimpressed.

Last night the "League of Woman Voters" hosted a candidate forum in North Branch.  Senate 32, House 32B, County Commissioner and School Board.  Here is how I sum up the evening.

1. First group, Commissioner Candidates, was a mix of candidates from 3 different districts.  Trulson vs. Walker.  Smisson vs. Robinson and George McMahon flying solo.  We can rule out McMahon from the beginning.  All though he comes across as a nice guy,  he did not add much to the content and was uncontested at the event.
Smisson did well, he gave some indication of what he would like to implement and change.  No specifics but, time did not allow for that.  He does appear to have a plan.  Robinson, easily the most entertaining of the group. Rough around the edges, not much of a public speaker.  His humor may have been a displacement of his being uncomfortable.  He seems very genuine of his intent for the county but, essentially it is the same plan as the last 10 years.  The edge goes to Smisson.  A vision of a fresh plan and doing it in a short term is refreshing and not the norm within the Commissioner group traditionally.
Walker came accross as disinterested.  Although her message was not much different  than Robinson, her delvery was much weaker.  Nothing new with her.  She was very hard to hear and sometime hard to comprehend.  Trulson however was quite the opposite.  His delivery was very much that of a politician, clear, confident and direct.  His primary focus was on inclusion and working with other.  He presented himself the best. 

I place the candidates in this order: Trulson, Smisson, Robinson, McMahon and Walker.  (If you do not agree reply, if you didn't go you do not have an opinion)

I rate the questions: C+

2.  The second group included both the Senate and House Candidates.  The entire group recieved the same questions.  Barrett vs. Olseen. Nienow vs.Noordergraf.
This one is very easy to sum up.  Rather than compare each of the races lets cut to the chase.  Noordergraf has no place on a stage with people who are educated in the affairs of politics.  Her understanding of any of the issues is weak, at best.  Her delivery is one that creates an uncertainty of her abilities.  While she may be a great "horse person"  she has aboslutely no place in public service.  Her inablility to complete a thought or to articulate clealyr would greatly concern me in a role to fight for our Senate District.  The DFL really missed the mark with this endorsement.  A bad as she was, Nienow was on the oposite side of the planet.  If our President was present to witness, he would have been happy to be facing Romney last week.  The fact that it was not a debate may have saved her from further embarrasssment.  Nienow does owe some credit to his partner in the House.  Barrett did a fantastic job lobbing the ball for Nienow to hit out of the part.  What a fantastic and unique relationship Chisago resisdents benefit from.  Barrett's answers were only hurt by the poor layout of the program.  His ability to paint a picture (with facts) really allows his constituants to get an understanding of the work he does in St Paul.  The League seriously needs to reconsider this format in future programs.  Olseen, more of the same.  I did this,  I did that.  Nothing really telling what he could or could not do considering his past experiences.  He was also lucky it was not a debate.  Trying to take credit for "JOBZ" when he voted to defund it was laughable and easy pickings if Barrett had been allowed.

I place the candidates in this order: Nienow, Barrett, Olssen and Noordergraf

I rate the questions: B- ( however, the format is wrong)

3. School board, boy oh boy.  I will be as nice as possible.  The questions were plain terrible.  It did not allow for the audiance to a get a real feel for the candidates.  It actually may have been a disservice to them.  I heard the words "Ambassador and Proud" more than I ever hope to again in my entire life.  Several of the people on stage turned it into a teacher posterior kissing party.  Yikes, those folks hopefully do not get elected.  The school board is the decision making body representing the public/taxpayer not one's to make the teachers feel warm and fuzzy.  As difficult as the program was  I will give a rating.

I place the candidates in this order: MacMillan, Salo, Orf and Bernier ( I would only vote for the last two based on responses, the first two articulated themselves well although I disagreed with them often)

I rate the questions: F-

While I will admit I am biased, I will give credit where it is due.  I place myself in the "lucky" category to be a supporter of the clear winners in the forum.  Had they not been the leaders last night this would have been a much harder entry to write.  I guess I can take a breath now!

Bernie Marcus

Lockheed: Sure, we’ll keep our workers in the dark about layoffs posted at 8:41 am on October 2, 2012 by Ed Morrissey

To quote Glenn Reynolds, they told me if I voted for John McCain that the corporations would conspire with the government to keep the working class in the dark — and they were right! Normally, Democrats would demand that companies considering layoffs tell their employees about it.  In fact, Democrats passed a law requiring corporations to do so, the WARN Act of 1988, which they passed with veto-proof majorities and which became law without then-President Ronald Reagan’s signature.
These days, they’re pressuring companies to keep quiet about layoffs that will occur when sequestration kicks in, and Lockheed has buckled:

Defense contractor Lockheed Martin heeded a request from the White House today – one with political overtones – and announced it will not issue layoff notices to thousands of employees just days before the November presidential election.
Lockheed, one of the biggest employers in the key battleground state of Virginia, previously warned it would have to issue notices to employees, required by law, due to looming defense cuts set to begin to take effect after Jan. 2 because of the failure of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction – the so-called Super-committee, which was created to find a way to cut $1.5 trillion from the federal deficit over the next decade.

The law requires any company with 100 or more employees to provide a 60-day warning ahead of planned layoffs.  However, both the Department of Labor and OMB insisted that it didn’t apply to the sequestration issue, because no one really believes that Congress will allow the automatic cuts to go through.  That can be said about other kinds of layoffs as well, including those that don’t hinge on the whim of elections and politicians.
The kicker for Lockheed came when the Obama administration indemnified corporations for keeping workers in the dark:

So the Office of Management and Budget went a step further in guidance issued late Friday afternoon. If an agency terminates or modifies a contract, and the contractor must close a plant or lay off workers en masse, the company could treat employee compensation costs for WARN Act liability, attorneys’ fees and other litigation costs as allowable costs to be covered by the contracting agency—so long as the contractor has followed a course of action consistent with the Labor Department’s guidance. The legal fees would be covered regardless of the outcome of the litigation, according to the OMB guidance issued by Daniel Werfel, controller of the Office of Federal Financial Management, and Joseph Jordan, the Administrator for Federal Procurement Policy.

Democrats have now gone from demanding the WARN Act to paying companies to violate it.  I guess the working class is only valuable when they serve as a talking point, eh?  They told me that if I voted for John McCain, the working man would get screwed by Washington and the board room, and … well, you know.

Moving

What I have Been Afraid To Blog About, Part 3

A well needed laugh!

Romney and Obama go on a fishing trip

The Presidential election 2012 was too close to call.
Neither Mitt Romney nor Barack Obama had enough votes to win. There was
much talk about ballot recounting, court challenges, etc., but it was
decided that there should be an ice-fishing contest between the two
candidates to determine the winner. A week-long ice-fishing competition
seemed to be a sportsmanlike way to settle things, and the candidate
that caught the most fish at the end of the week would win the election.

After much back and forth discussion, it was decided that the contest
would take place on a remote frozen lake in northern Minnesota. There
were to be no observers present, and both men were to be
sent out separately on this isolated lake and return at 5 P.M. with
their catch for the day to be counted and verified by a team of neutral parties.

At the end of the first day, Romney returned to the starting line and
he had 10 fish. Soon, Obama returned and had no fish. Well, everyone
assumed he was just having a bad day or something and hopefully, he
would catch up the next day.

At the end of the 2nd day Romney came in with 20 fish and Obama came
in again with none.

That evening, the Democrats got together secretly and said to Obama,
“We think Mitt Romney is a low-life, cheatin' son-of-a-gun.Tomorrow,
don't even bother fishing. Just spy on him and see just how he is
cheating.”

The next night (after Romney returns with 50 more fish), the Democrats got
together for the report of how the Republicans were cheating and
trying to steal the election.

Obama shook his head in disgust and said, "You're not going to
believe this... Romney is a terrible cheat... he's cutting holes in the ice!!!"

Reagan Warned Us About Obama

Yikes!!!!!!

Household income down 8.2 percent since Obama took office, study shows

Median household incomes have fallen 8.2 percent since President Obama took office and continue to drop despite the official end of the  recession, a new study shows.
Data compiled by Sentier Research found that since the economic recovery technically began in June 2009, median household income has dropped 5.7 percent. As of August, that median income was $50,678 -- also down 1.1 percent from the month prior.
And since Obama took office in January 2009, the median income has fallen 8.2 percent, from $55,198 to its present figure.
"The August decline in real median annual household income is indicative of a struggling economy," Sentier said in its report.
"Even though we are technically in an economic recovery, real median annual household income is having a difficult time maintaining its present level, much less 'recovering.'"
The figures continue to paint a dim portrait of the nation's post-recession economic rebound, and are sure to factor into the robust economic debate on the campaign trail.
At a rally in Westerville, Ohio, on Wednesday, Mitt Romney challenged protesters at the site, asking them if they really wanted "four more years" of trillion-dollar deficits and declining take-home pay.
Obama continues to hold onto a lead in several swing state polls, though. A poll Wednesday from Quinnipiac University/CBS News/New York Times showed Obama leading in Ohio by 10 points even as roughly half the voters surveyed listed the economy as their most important issue.
The nation's unemployment rate has dropped from its peak at more than 10 percent to 8.1 percent in August.
But the drop belies persistent problems in the economy. Many are leaving the workforce or settling for part-time work -- the latter of which helps explain why unemployment rates are going down while median income falls. Sentier noted in its study that changes in hourly earnings and hours worked affects the household income level.
According to the study, the average number of hours per week worked in August was 34.4 -- slightly below the 34.6 hour average in December 2007.
The income figures, which are based on Census data, follow a Census report showing the poverty rate in 2011 at 15 percent. The number of people in poverty last year was 46.2 million, up from 37.3 million in 2007 before the start of the recession. The poverty line for a family of four was defined by the Census in 2011 as a household salary of just over $23,000.
The household income level has not been declining every month. Sentier's report showed several monthly increases in late 2011, followed by another drop at the beginning of 2012.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/26/household-income-down-82-percent-since-obama-took-office-study-shows/#ixzz27bmZ4uTY