Jay Reding.com

Like 2006, this is a Democratic year. The GOP brand is more damaged than in has been in ages. President Bush has the approval rating usually reserved for moldy liverwurst. The economy is doing poorly.

But at least one Republican has reason to cheer. The Minnesota DFL has nominated Al Franken to be their candidate for the U.S. Senate. That is good news for Republican incumbent Norm Coleman.

Franken, the unfunny comedian “satirist” is the sort of person who will do quite well in the ideologically homogenous bastions of Twin Cities leftism, but will go over like a fart in church elsewhere. Minnesota already made a mockery of the political process once—and at least Gov. Ventura had some executive experience as mayor of a Twin Cities suburb. Franken cannot even claim that. We don’t need a “satirist” in the Senate—in truth it’s already a joke—what we need is a responsible adult to represent the interests of Minnesota.

Sen. Coleman is not a conservative ideologue by any means, and some conservatives dislike him for that. However, he has the right instincts, he has shown a willingness to engage in unpopular but necessary political battles such as UN reform, and he has demonstrated an appropriately Senatorial level of intellectual curiosity. I had the chance to hear him speak before an intimate audience a few months ago, and even some of my liberal friends (one of whom asked him a rather tough question that he answered forthrightly) came away impressed.

This may be a Democratic year, but it is not so Democratic that the DFL can put just anyone into consideration. Against a moderate, thoughtful Republican like Sen. Coleman, the thin resume and ideological extremism of Al Franken will quickly become grating. That doesn’t mean that the Senator doesn’t have a fight on his hands, but it is a fight that can be won.

The State of Minnesota has announced a $935 million dollar budget deficit, which will balloon up to nearly $2 billion over the next few years. More worrisome, there is a prediction that individual income tax receipts will decline, reducing the main source of the state’s income.

Of course, the typical reaction from the left has been to raise taxes and spend billions more. Apparently the simple logic of cause and effect stymies those in St. Paul who see government as the solution to all our problems. Undoubtedly the reaction to this dire budgetary news will be more calls to do what Democrats do best—raise taxes.

Of course, the Democrats claim that they simply had to raise gas taxes due to the outpouring of support for such a measure—despite the fact that poll data says quite the opposite. A majority of Minnesotans rejected the idea of a gas tax, a majority supports spending cuts, and a majority wants to see more fiscal discipline out of St. Paul.

There is one form of cause and effect politicians understand—do something wildly unpopular, and lose elections. Let us hope that the good people of Minnesota have the common sense to give out Legislature such a lesson this fall.

Not surprisingly, the DFL managed to get enough wobbly Republicans to override Gov. Pawlenty’s veto of their pork-stuffed transportation bill. Contrary to the typically childish arguments of some, the choice at stake here was not between fixing the problems with Minnesota’s transportation system, but not spending additional money for boondoggles we don’t need.

Every day, families across this state have to make decisions because they are feeling more and more financially squeezed. They have to make choice like whether they can afford to send their kids to camp or get the car fixed, whether they can afford a family vacation or health care. The fundamental arrogance of the DFL and the Democratic Party in general is that they want to demand that we make sacrifices, but when it comes to their pet projects they can always demand more and more of us. Minnesota’s families don’t have the choice to take money for their kids to buy that new plasma TV. Minnesota’s government shouldn’t be shaking down working families with a 5 cent/gallon gas tax increase so that they can spend another $1.1 billion on metro-area transit projects that only give a marginal benefit for the few.

We have to make sacrifices in order to live within our fiscal means. Government should have to do the same. The Democrats tried to paint this as a choice between fixing transportation or doing nothing—this was really a choice about setting priorities and ensuring that our taxpayer dollars went to responsible tasks rather than wasteful spending. The DFL, as always, chose poorly.

For all the talk about how it’s the Republicans that are supposedly “the party of the rich” the Democrats act as though they’ve never had to balance a budget or even think of making sacrifices in order to make ends meet. That’s part of being a responsible adult in today’s society—and once again we have a state government that is acting like spoiled children with their hands in the cookie jar.

I’m at my local caucus site, and GOP turnout is high–even I’m surprised at how many people are here. No clue as to which candidates are ahead, but Ron Paul and Mitt Romney have the most presence here tonight. No overt support for McCain that I’ve seen yet. If my connection works, I’ll have more as things develop.

UPDATE: The precinct was packed! I’ve never seen turnout like this. The votes are being counted now. Results when they come in.

UPDATE: Looks like Romney is cleaning up. Romney 48, McCain 15, Paul 6, Huckabee 6.

UPDATE: Romney may have done well in my precinct, but nationally he’s getting creamed. He’s said that he will fight on, but it seems quite unlikely that he’ll have a path to the nomination after tonight.

The Caucus was absolutely packed. There were 75 people in my small precinct, and the auditorium with the general assembly was filled, and an equal number of people were waiting outside. American democracy is alive and well. The demographics were all over the place—young voters and old voters, men and women alike.

UPDATE: Ed Morrisey liveblogged the caucus…

As a side note, did Bill Richardson suddenly grow a beard or is it his twin from the mirror universe?

For the record, I voted for McCain. I’ll explain that later.

UPDATE: The Democratic race is as close as everyone thought it would be. I have a feeling that this could be leading to a brokered convention—which has to have Howard Dean screaming a “YEARGH!” of pain at the moment.

UPDATE: Minnesota has been called for Romney. Obama has also won convincingly against Clinton, with Obama taking 66% and Clinton 33% with 51% of the vote in. That’s a much bigger spread than I would have guessed.

UPDATE: 10:52PM CST: It’s looking more and more like Clinton will win California—but the results aren’t in yet. It’s also looking like McCain will win both Missouri (narrowly) and California (by a large margin). For once this election cycle, the pundits seem to be on track. McCain has a convincing lead with the Republicans, and Clinton is narrowly ahead of Obama.

McCain has a lot of work ahead of him in reassuring skittish conservatives. Appearing at CPAC is a good idea—but what McCain needs to do is be honest about points of disagreement and be prepared to talk about a shared conservative agenda. That means being much more reassuring about the sort of judicial appointments he’d make and standing strongly for an enforcement-first border policy. McCain needs the help of conservatives to win, and he’s got a lot of ground to cover.

The TaxProf blog notes that using Princeton Review data, the University of St. Thomas in their list of the top 50 law schools in the country. No other Minnesota schools made the top 50 compilation.

It’s interesting to compare the Princeton Review data with the US News list, in which St. Thomas is in the third tier. The compilation combines scores on academic experience,
admissions selectivity, career preparation and having both accessible and interesting professors. These list inevitably come down to whatever subjective criteria that the reviewers feel is most important, but it is interesting to compare the results between the two ranking systems.

Those thinking about law school ultimately should make the choice based not on someone else’s subjective rankings, but their own personal experience. There’s no substitute for visiting a campus, sitting in on a class and experiencing the school’s climate firsthand.

UPDATE: Just to clarify, this isn’t a formal ranking, but a relative weighting of factors performed not by the Princeton Review, but by the TaxProf blog. The Princeton Review did not perform a full ranking based on all their separate criteria. I apologize for not catching my mistake earlier.