Recently my good friend Hal over at Blue Man in a Red District was reading the tea leaves and came to the conclusion that we will once again see Elwyn Tinklenberg run against Michele Bachmann in 2010.
Reading the tea leaves, it's pretty obvious that Elwyn Tinklenberg is going to take another shot at Congresswoman Bachmann.
I like Elwyn personally and supported him once he received the DFL nomination. However, there is little reason to believe that he can defeat Bachmann. He ran a weak kneed campaign with little presence in the areas of the district that needed him most. In fact, from talking to union friends who were even stronger supporters than I it was clear that even though Tink was asking "Where is Michele?" these Tink supporters were asking, more importantly, WHERE IS TINK?
Given that Bachmann received less than 50% in the '08 election she is beatable. However, it can only happen when members of the DFL and Independence Parties work in unison. That means more than an empty cross endorsement. It means an all out diplomatic effort from the leadership in both parties to run a unity candidate. DFLers may need to realize that this unity candidate might mean stepping aside to allow this person to run as an Independence candidate. The reason I say this is because there remains a large enough group of people in this district who do not like Bachmann but will NEVER vote for a DFL candidate that it makes winning nearly impossible.
Blue Man suggests Representative Larry Hosch and I couldn't agree more. Unfortunately, I don't know that it is very likely as Hosch appears to enjoy his family life too much to jump into a stressful district campaign. Yet, Blue Man also makes this cryptic statement:
Given that Bachmann received less than 50% in the '08 election she is beatable. However, it can only happen when members of the DFL and Independence Parties work in unison. That means more than an empty cross endorsement. It means an all out diplomatic effort from the leadership in both parties to run a unity candidate. DFLers may need to realize that this unity candidate might mean stepping aside to allow this person to run as an Independence candidate. The reason I say this is because there remains a large enough group of people in this district who do not like Bachmann but will NEVER vote for a DFL candidate that it makes winning nearly impossible.
Blue Man suggests Representative Larry Hosch and I couldn't agree more. Unfortunately, I don't know that it is very likely as Hosch appears to enjoy his family life too much to jump into a stressful district campaign. Yet, Blue Man also makes this cryptic statement:
I know of one dark horse at this time, someone not on our collective radar's who might take a shot at this...and I could definitely support him/her.
Who is this dark horse? Hopefully he/she will be powerful enough to go toe to toe with one of the most adept campaigners we have in the state.
All right, I know of whom Blue Man speaks and we will see how it works out...
All right, I know of whom Blue Man speaks and we will see how it works out...
1 Response to "On Tink And 2010..."
Eric, Do you think that person is Tarryl? Obviously, she isn't a below-the-radar type but people haven't given her much thought for this because most thought she'd either run for re-election or she'd run for governor.