After Liberal in the Land of Conservative broke the news two days ago that Maureen Reed will enter the race to take on Michele Bachmann in the 6th District, the news has trickled across the internet. Reed made the news officially official with a press release today.
“We are living through the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, with staggering numbers of people unemployed, health care out of the reach of many folks, and thousands of Minnesotans losing their businesses and homes,” said Dr. Reed. “While these problems are tough, I’m running for Congress because I know two things are true. First, Americans can solve tough problems. Second, a bright future is not accidental. We create a bright future when we put rhetoric aside, focus on the real problems, and work hard together. This is exactly what I’ve done all my life. The future I see is one of business expansion, job growth, home ownership and lower health care costs.”
Along with many of these stories has been a healthy dose of analysis on what it is the DFL, or the Independence Party for that matter, can win in the 6th District. Some of these "plans" are realistic while others border on the deceptive. With all due respect to Mr. Immelman, it is a virtual impossibility to organize enough people to cross over and defeat Bachmann in a Republican Primary. In addition to that, I refuse to participate in something which at its very core is deceptive. If we are reduced to interfering in the primaries of the other party rather than defeating them in a contest of ideas then we don't really deserve to win.
A couple of items caught my eye and really should be the driving force of our campaign to win the 6th Congressional District of Minnesota. The first comes from the comments of "Taxpaying Liberal":
1. The 1st thing the Dems have to do is quit blaming every loss on the Independent candidate. Bachmann‘s margin of victory was 3 points less than in 06 against a much better funded candidate in 06. Tink gained 2 plus points over the 2nd Wetterling race. Anderson gained 3 plus points over Binkowski. The only person who lost points to the IP candidate was Bachmann and trust me, most of those people will NEVER vote for a democrat. You would have to assume that 71% of the people who voted IP would have voted for Tink in order to be correct that the IP had something to do with the Bachman victory.
2. If you are going to ignore the central part of the district and settle for less than 40% of the vote in Wright, Sherburne and Benton counties then you are going to have to get Mpls type of numbers out of the rest of the district. You simply have to put more boots on the ground in these areas. If you are going to put offices in St. Cloud , Stillwater, Blaine then you also need headquarters in Buffalo, Big Lake, Ham Lake etc..
I am as guilty as the next person for trying to pin last year's loss on the spoiler candidate but the reality is that if 10% of voters were willing to vote for someone who did little more than file for a place on the ballot then that is a failure of the challenger to get their message out. Additionally, I would wager to bet that most of those IP voters would have held their nose and voted Bachmann if only given two options.
The other bit of advice that should be heeded by candidates comes from a post written today by Blue Man. The whole thing is a must read but one part stands out:
The other bit of advice that should be heeded by candidates comes from a post written today by Blue Man. The whole thing is a must read but one part stands out:
So here's an idea...perhaps even a bold one.
So instead of posting photo shopped pictures and edited You Tube videos putting orgy and government wads together, why don't we actually work in a grassroots effort to organize our communities.
Again, I have been known to put together edited youtube videos. However, this cannot be the crux of our strategy to defeat Bachmann!
Seriously, I'm I the only one who looked at the Bachmann tax day video and noticed that orgy/government wad portion of said video was spliced together like a 3 year old playing Operation?
Mocking Michele Bachmann gets us nowhere.
EXACTLY! I have been driven from some sectors of the anti-Bachmann world for not being willing to automatically call her a "nut, liar, bigot". It is entirely unhelpful to continue using this inflammatory language. If the entire basis of our argument is these three words, we lose.
Running an "anyone but Bachmann campaign" gets us nowhere.
Attacking the "soccer mom" gets us nowhere.
It only gets us 2 more years of Bachmann.
Bachmann will continue to do damage to herself in the mainstream media.
While we should ensure that her insane comments are disseminated, we have no need to doctor them to make them even more "juicy". She does that well enough.
We should talk about Bachmann's voting record and how her values are not congruent with her rhetoric.
Last but not least, leadership needs to get off its ass. I caught this wonderful quote earlier in the week.The district is the most Republican in the state and will be an extremely difficult race for any Democrat. But Schumaker believes Tinklenberg would have won in 2008 if not for the presence of another (non-endorsed) IP candidate on the ballot, Bob Anderson, who garnered 10 percent of the vote. “For whatever reason the information was not put out there that El Tinklenberg was endorsed by both parties,” she says."For whatever reason..."
Really? WTF?
Tinklenberg was endorsed by the IP on June 22, 2009. You mean to tell me that neither Tinklenberg nor the 6th CD DFL took the time over the remaining 4 1/2 months from the IP endorsement to stress the endorsement.
"For whatever reason...?"
Maybe if...now this is a big maybe...they hadn't spent the waning weeks of the campaign still introducing Tinklenberg to voters, they would have known he was endorsed by BOTH the DFL and the IP.
Going back through the Blueman history of Tinklenberg campaign ads, none of the ads I found had any mention of Tinklenberg's cross endorsement of the DFL and IP.
So, stop blaming the IP for Tinklenberg losing in 2008.
We lost because we gambled and lost. We ran shitty campaigns in Wright and Sherburne Counties and could not capitalize on the cash cow caused by the pandemic known as the Bachmann 2008 virus.
I couldn't have said it any better myself. If we are going to win the 6th District, then we better start organizing in EVERY part of the district to show that OUR ideas are better...
21 responses to "Election 2010 Begins..."
Political Muse: Could you please clarify the source of the following?
"With all due respect to Mr. Immelman, it is a virtual impossibility to organize enough people to cross over and defeat Bachmann in a Republican Primary. In addition to that, I refuse to participate in something which at its very core is deceptive."
The reason I ask is because my sole purpose is to defeat Bachmann and anyone who undermines my efforts to do so, but I want to be careful to target only those parties who knowingly step into the line of fire.
Two comments:
First, it's not "a virtual impossibility to organize enough people to cross over and defeat Bachmann in a Republican Primary."
I need only 20,000 of the 437,000 registered 6th District voters to topple Bachmann.
I've been working hard for the better part of a year (and thousands of dollars of my own money) to get that message out to voters. So, I will work as hard as I've been working against Bachmann to defeat any candidate whose campaign cynically spreads the message that Bachmann cannot be defeated in the Republican primary.
Second, regarding the comment "I refuse to participate in something which at its very core is deceptive."
There's nothing deceptive about voting for a candidate of your choice (irrespective of your own or the candidate's party-political identification). Moreover, there is nothing deceptive about voting against the candidate you least want to represent you in Congress. It's simply common sense.
As you know, we don't have registered Democrats or Republicans in Minnesota. All I'm asking is for citizens who usually vote for Democrats to join me in defeating Rep. Bachmann on Sept. 14 next year, for the greater good of 6th District residents and in the national interest of the United States of America.
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Political Muse, I enjoyed your post. I must say it is refreshing to read taxpayer liberals assessment of the last election. I have been blamed over and over for Tinklenbergs loss. I ran because I felt as an independent conservative, I would have a chance to attract independents, conservatives, and moderate Dems. I feel the 6th district is more favorable to a conservative than a Democrat. I would never have thought I would have a chance if Bachmann did not have so many negatives. She is a very strong candidate but has a bad habit of shooting herself in the foot. I thought she was capable of beating herself and she almost did. I feel Elwyn has too much baggage with the lobby issues and cronyism. I still think if a candidate needs the endorsement of two parties they are not strong enough to win. We live in a Democracy and there should be room for at least three choices on the ballot. Elwyn is a good guy but he was on the wrong side of the issues for this district.
Aubrey: The comments are my own...
"The reason I ask is because my sole purpose is to defeat Bachmann and anyone who undermines my efforts to do so, but I want to be careful to target only those parties who knowingly step into the line of fire."
I respect your efforts and would never question your integrity. However, on this particular plan I cannot support you. My point is that the "primary plan" you have laid out feels highly dishonest. I realize that it is not illegal and I realize that people can vote in whichever primary they choose, but it seems to be the same dirty politics that people are so tired of. We saw the same dirty politics in the '08 primaries with the so called operation chaos created by Rush Limbaugh. I, for one, refuse to do anything that puts me in the same league as Limbaugh.
If democrats could organize 20,000 individuals from across the district, then we should be able to organize enough to defeat her in a general election.
Again, I understand your desire to defeat Bachmann and I will work every bit as hard as you to defeat her but I want it done in the battle of ideas and not in a sabotage strategy. If we cannot defeat her on those terms, I will live with that...
I’d also bet that there will be a governors primary and maybe for both parties. So a dem crossing over would need to give up their voice on the Governor’s race.
Clever though.
Bob Anderson,
Let’s move back into reality for a little while.I know thats hard for you to do.
Issues had nothing to do with the votes you got. How many hits did you website get? 40,000?
If you’re not going to raise money or campaign or even print a brochure you can hardly claim issues was the problem for someone.
You paid the filing fee and that got you your 15 min of fame.
I respect Benkowski because he ran a real campaign. He went to county fairs and traveled all over and had some staff and did himself proud. That’s not the case with you.
Hell your issue was mental health parity and that was voted on before you had your 1st debate. What are you going to say is your issue this time?
I was at the IP convention. I heard your speech. I looked at your web site and I worked with the IP.
Issues had nothing to do with any votes you got. You were the “Mickey Mouse” because we all know Mickey would get at least 5% in almost any congressional race in the country if you gave voters the option.
If you’re going to run, then the least you owe this country is an honest effort. What you did was make a mockery of our democracy.
I have no doubt you’ll do it again. If you do it the same way then shame on you, because too many good men and women have died for our democracy for you to make a joke out of it.
But please don’t lecture us on why you got the votes or offer us your political insights.
You don’t know because you didn’t spend any time doing the hard work guys like EL and Aubrey and even Michele did.
The lowliest DFL republican or IP volunteer spent more time on this election and talked to more voters than you did.
You paid the filing fee but you didn't earn the votes
Tax paying liberal, I am sorry you feel this way, but that is your opinion.I participated in 10 forums and answered and participated in every way I was allowed. I recieved 10% and did not waste anyones hard earned money like the 3 you mentioned.I took a different approach and I wish others would follow my lead.I feel spending less and getting more % than Aubrey and Binkowski is a good thing. I feel that money is the problem and if you think that money and fancy websites are what makes a good candidate, I respect your opinion but I could not disagree more with you. I was encouraged to run after the convention and many are dissatisfied with the parties cross-endorsing practices.I encourage you to run if you think it is so easy,you will find out differently and at least you can speak from experience. I would enjoy meeting with you and I will answer any questions you want to ask me or accuse me of to my face. I look forward to meeting you. I just want to assure you Mental Health Parity was just one issue that got me involved in fighting for issues. I was not a one issue candidate.
Muse, you were not driven from Dump Bachmann because you refused to use the "nut, liar, bigot" language, rather, you decided to quit. Please be accurate.
Also, on Dump Bachmann, we tend to post the complete video/audio, and let people make their own conclusions.
Yes, Bill Prendergast, and I have both stated that Michele Bachmann is a nut, a liar, and a bigot - and that the blog demonstrates examples of each of those.
I was unimpressed by Dusty Trice's edited video with the material about the orgy - because orgy has more than one meaning, and Bachmann clearly meant a "spending orgy." I think it was fair to point out that her behavior - calling talk show host Chris Baker - one "big hunk of man" - was undignified behavior for a 52 year old congresswoman.
So I appreciated Trice's unedited videos at the tax rally, plus the pieces of his edited video that showed the signs carried at the event.
"Muse, you were not driven from Dump Bachmann because you refused to use the "nut, liar, bigot" language, rather, you decided to quit. Please be accurate."
Eva, I assume Eva, you are right to say that I was not explicitly driven from Dump Bachmann by either yourself or Avidor for refusing to use this language.
Perhaps I should have been more clear. I was continually made to feel unwelcome at Dump Bachmann by a certain individual who found it necessary to tell me my language was not strong enough. Thus, I felt as though I was driven away by this certain individual for not using "nut, liar, bigot" in each of my posts.
I respect you (Eva?) and Avidor for your eternal vigilance in covering Bachmann even though I don't always agree with your phrasing. More than anything else it is the arrogance of certain individuals that drove me to quit posting at your site...
Again, I apologize for not being more clear...
Muse, There are definitely strong personalities at Dump Bachmann - and contributors have not always agreed on everything - and no one contributor speaks for the whole blog.
I would encourage you to give the particular person you are upset with your feedback directly - rather than trashing all the DB community here in your post and comments.
Bob,
Was this the other issue you were talking about?
From your website;
“Two poor decisions that I feel were made concerning public education were the removal of God and Discipline out of the structure. That aside, the more successes we achieve in educating our children, the better off society will be. I feel we are spending enough money on education.”
Thats well thought out. The better we educate our kids the better off we are as long as we don't have to spend any money doing it because it's not that important. Moneys. expensive but prayer is free.
I’ve help managed 1 st house race, 2 congressional races and a Senate race the latest being Dean Barkley’s. I don’t think it’s easy nor do I think it should be easy.
In each of these the candidates routinely put in 16 hour days 6 days a week or more. Of course they were actually running for real. They believed in what they stood for enough to actually fight hard for it.
Once again from your website under the official campaign photos of the candidates;
“Does ego or a contemptous demeanor show through a photo? What's a forced smile? What does a real human look like? If you were the Men in Black, which of the three would you check out last?”
You call yourself a real candidate then print this on your website. You accuse you opponents of not being human and imply or believe in “men in black” therefore you must believe that there are aliens living amongst us and your opponents are or may be aliens.
“I participated in 10 forums and answered and participated in every way I was allowed”
That sounds like a normal campaign day for everyone I worked for. With little restriction you are allowed to campaign any way you want. Nobody allows you to campaign. You are free to try to get volunteers to spread your message about Bachmann and Tinklenberg being aliens. You shouldn’t be surprised that the main stream media may need more convincing to put you on the air to state these claims.
So one of the reasons you ran was because you didn’t like cross endorsements. Yet the very 1st and last IP meeting you ever attended was the endorsing convention where without any preparation or even talking to the delegates before hand, you expected the convention to endorse you based on a short ad lib speech and a brief Q and A. Of course nobody had heard of you because you had no background in politics or even spent one day campaigning for anyone that we knew of.
If you want to change the IP’s rules won’t you go to at least one meeting? Trust me, they could use the help. Maybe take some time off from that busy campaign schedule of 10 forums over a 5 month period to go to a meeting of your own party.
You say that you did it for some type of party principal but what did you accomplish? Did you help build the party? Are there some names of IP supporters that you can pass on to help the next candidate? Do you support the party platform? Do you even know what it is?
That’s what real candidates do and know.
You just wanted to prove that the endorsement process was a joke and went further to prove that Mickey Mouse could get 10%. All that for $300 bucks. Money well spent.
It’s about more than money. It’s about getting out and listening to people. A good candidate (and I’ve had the privilege of working with several) like meeting people and hearing their stories. That helps them to become qualified to represent them. Hell, Barkley didn’t have any money and slim chance of winning. But he and I put about 10,000 miles on my truck driving anywhere we could and just making up any reason to get a few people together to talk and listen.
Like I said; a lot of men and women died and right now today, they put themselves in harm’s way so we can have elections. It’s sacred to me. If you want it, earn it. Until then you’re just Mickey Mouse.
Bob Anderson - In personal email I have praised your courage in bucking the Tinklenberg-IP crony net in running Binkowski in 2006 to harm Wetterling's effort; and then pulling the Elwyn love-in crap, when he's a dead-fish loser and an offensive lobbyist to boot.
The DFL lost by running the guy, and you, Bob Anderson stepped up to the plate and said, "It stinks."
BRAVO. It was an act of conscience, something too often absent in MN 6 where expediency and crony ties too often trump conscience.
Please, do it again if you must.
The district needs better than a choice between the likes of Michele Bachmann and Elwyn Tinklenberg.
Aubrey Immelman, same message.
Conscience is needed, and Immelman and Anderson showed that.
As for toxic waste, aka lobbying baggage, Minnesota's IP people not only have Tinklenberg as a lobbying poster child, but try this Google, and then look at the man's only having said, "I've been a bus driver." The IP has a very serious crony problem, and credibility gap; and it appears the smaller people who went there to the insiders' "endorsed choices" last cycle either wore blinders to that reality, were deluded, or did not care.
Taxpaying Liberal, You forgot to answer the only question I asked you,do you want to meet in person so you can listen and learn to what I have to tell you about the 6th district race I was part of. I can give you first hand information of why it turned out the way it did. I would think if you are this passionate about the process you would want to get all the feedback you can get. I would enjoy sharing my thoughts with you and meeting the man behind the taxpaying liberal name. I will leave it up to you.
Bob,
The way I find out about why people vote the way they do is by actually working at public and private events and talking to voters.
It’s also where most of us meet candidates and discuss issues.
For example; the last election I spent at least 1 day working almost every county fair in the district and every day at the State fair. Did you have a booth or campaign at any of these events to listen to the people of whom you were asking for their vote?
I don’t have to talk to you to find out why people voted for you. If fact, I’ve read your posts about why you think people voted for you and I think you a suffering from delusions of grandeur. You were given a surname by your father that allowed you to get more votes than Benkowski. The District identifies almost 40% independent. In fact you underperformed by over 30%.
Bachmann had an 8t drop off from those who voted for McCain. Tink out preformed Obama by 3t points. In the end you had no effect on the race. The outcome would have been the same with you or without you.
So from a political point of view, I don’t care if you ran or not or if you’re going to run again. You most likely will take more votes from Bachmann than Tink because if anybody bothered to actually look at what you “stand for” they will find out you are just like her.
The difference is that she works at campaigning and you just flop down $300 and see where that takes you.
If you want to meet me Bob, just show up at almost any political event in the district you want to represent and there’s a good chance we will run into each other. Somehow, base on you past history I doubt I’ll see you.
And while we are at it. You didn’t answer any of my questions.
Those going to a lot of county fairs should be given a gold star, a pat on the head, an atta-boy word of encouragement.
Revolving door lobbyists, on the other hand, should be shunned, put down, and defeated. Two were.
Voters made sound choices that way, and it is unfortunate DFL party bosses did not. Perhaps will not, deja vu over again.
Same offering, same result. Same deja. Same vu.
Tinklenber was well known in Anoka County. Tinklenberg did better in the west end of the district.
Go figure. Those knowing more of him reflected that in the percentages, it's there to be seen and deliberated.
You still haven’t answered any of my questions Bob.
Bob Anderson,
You still have not answered my questions.
So Dean Barkley is a revolving door lobbyist?
Well if he is then he’s a damn poor one.
We got a lot of chuckles out of that one while we were driving around the state, eating lobster and using Champaign to wash our cars on our way to the secret cabal IP meetings.
Our plan worked out brilliantly as we are now rich beyond our wildest dreams.
They are right blue man. The Wright county campaign worked, the bottom of the ticket hurt the top of the ticket, Franken would have won by 18% if Barkley wasn’t in the race and Tink would have won by 8% if Anderson wasn’t in the race because all the IP votes were really Democrats that were just confused.
By now we would have donuts that induce weight loss, 4th graders would be getting masters degrees, coal plants would smell like lilacs and world peace would have been accomplished.
Muse writes: "Perhaps I should have been more clear. I was continually made to feel unwelcome at Dump Bachmann by a certain individual who found it necessary to tell me my language was not strong enough. Thus, I felt as though I was driven away by this certain individual for not using "nut, liar, bigot" in each of my posts."
And *who* exactly, was that "certain individual" who you *feel* drove you away "for not using "nut, liar, and bigot" in each of your posts?"
I only stumbled across this discussion because .
Muse--I was your political ally and colleague on Dump Bachman and you didn't have the courage to tell *me* that I'd done something to upset you. Instead you slunk away with hurt feelings and delusions and now you're telling people a version of events that simply isn't true and simply didn't happen.
People don't get "excluded" from Dump Bachmann because they won't call a "nut, bigot and liar," it's childish and dishonest of Muse to tell people that here on his blog.
The reason that Muse left was explained to me after he left. It wasn't because I was "pressuring him to call Bachmann a nut, bigot and liar--it was because I thought he missed the point of a news item he posted on, and I "topped his post"--putting my own post "on top of his" on the blog. I didn't know that Muse was that fragile, I didn't know that he thought I was "continually trying to make him feel unwelcome" (I'd often *complimented* his work for the blog via comments and email, maybe I didn't compliment him as much as he needed to be complimented.)
I had no idea that Muse was going to take the topping of one of his post as a "mortal offense"--
--and months later, twist it into this delusional story about how he was "driven off" the Dump Bachmann blog for "refusing to call her names." Jesus Christ. With political allies like this, who needs enemies?
Muse--the next time you try to work with anyone on an important project: please take Eva's advice, and speak to the person you think is "persecuting you" before you walk away from the project and make up stories about how you were treated so unfairly. If you had asked me for an explantion at the the time, I could have given you one or apologized (as I have been known to go.) Walking away from political work because someone topped your post is ridiculous, as is fictionalizing reality to build your own self-esteem.
And please take my advice, too-- don't circulate lies about people who've put years into fighting and reporting on Bachmann. It makes you look "bad," "untrustworthy."
On the primary situation, I think so far Dayton and Entenza have said they will run for governor in a primary. That quells cross-over.
Reed, not said. Clark will abide by the endorsement, and should win it handily. There could be a Congressional primary in CD 6.
The GOP - who knows what they'll do. They seem to have discipline in not bucking the party, probably because they get mean to anyone who does, witness the Pawlenty veto override and the shabby way the six GOP votes were handled by that vindictive cabal atop the GOP.
So, if they hold rank, the cross-over mischief will likely be the other way.
As to DumpBachman, I at one point posted there, I learned Blogger that way and Eva was helpful and her ongoing effort led me to start my own blog.
Eva has been the glue to keeping the DB blog going for years. She has the right to make ultimate decisions there and the unhappy task of balancing her goals for the blog against having a team of help, each with unique ideas, and she's by default the cop that polices interrelated personalities of individuals.
They have the overriding aim to "Dump Bachmann." I had extremely serious problems with the Tinklenberg candicacy, so well after ceasing to post at DB I had a different agenda. People there were probably unhappy about that, but not critical.
That said, we are in August 2009, looking to November 2010. Perhaps venting and cross-finger-pointing is best done now, if at all, and not later.
Hal Kimball and Christopher Truscott last cycle chose Barkley. That should not lessen friendships and respect. Avidor and I do not share identical views on mass transport, but I respect his accomplishment and ongoing support of Eva and her team effort.
If everyone agreed about things, we'd have no courts, as there'd be no need.
Bob Anderson - I bet you'll have an IP primary, the opponent being one with experience in the healthcare field who by then may be defining herself on that and other issues.