Bluestem Prairie: news about Tim Walz (MN-1)

Jackson County Pilot publishes urban legend--with a twist

We were reading the papers today and came across a letter published in the Jackson County Pilot over the signature of  Les Opheim of  that fair southern Minnesota city.  Labeled Food for Thought, here it is:

To the Editor:

About the time our original 13 states adopted their new Constitution in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier:

“A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority will always vote for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years.

During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the following sequence:

1. From bondage to spiritual faith (pilgrims);
2. From spiritual faith to great courage;
3. From courage to liberty;
4. From liberty to abundance;
5. From abundance to complacency;
6. From complacency to apathy;
7. From apathy to dependence (here now);
8. From dependence back into bondage.”

Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University’s School of Law in St. Paul points out some interesting facts concerning the 2000 presidential election:

- Number of states won by Gore: 19; Bush: 29
- Square miles of land won by Gore: 580,000; Bush: 2,427,000
- Population of counties won by Gore: 127 million; Bush: 143 million
- Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by Gore: 13.2; Bush: 2.1

Olson adds: “In aggregate, the map of the territory Bush won was mostly the land owned by the taxpaying citizens of this great country. Gore’s territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off various forms of government welfare.”

Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the “complacency” and “apathy” phases of Tyler’s definition of democracy, with some 40 percent of the nation’s population already having reached the “government dependency” phase.

If Congress grants amnesty and citizenship to 20 million criminal invaders called illegals and they vote, then we can say good-bye to the U.S.A. in fewer than five years.

Les Opheim
Jackson, Minn.

Most of that looked pretty familiar, so we went online and sure enough, it isn't original. With the expection of the final paragraph about illegal immigrants, it's an urban legend, according to a page at Snopes' Urban Legend Reference site.

What makes it an urban legend?  According to the Snopes site:

1. The population of the counties and square miles of area won by each Bush and Gore appear to be accurate. They are consistent with the election-result map published by USA Today on 20 November 2000.

2. The number of states won by each candidate is wrong, but the numbers given (29 and 19) imply this piece was written before the results of the Florida and New Mexico vote-counts were determined. The final tallies were 30 states for Bush and 20 for Gore.

3. The quote from "Alexander Tyler" is very likely fictitious. His name was actually "Lord Woodhouselee, Alexander Fraser Tytler," and he was a Scottish historian/professor who wrote several books in the late 1700s and early 1800s.

However, there is no record of The Fall of the Athenian Republic or The Decline and Fall of the Athenian Republic in the Library of Congress, which has several other titles by Tytler. This quote has also been cited as being from Tytler's Universal History or from his Elements of General History, Ancient and Modern, books that do exist. These books seem the most likely source of the quote, as they contain extensive discussions of the political systems in historic civilizations, including Athens. Universal History was published after, and based upon, Elements of General History, which was a collection of Professor Tytler's lecture notes.

Tytler's book, Universal history, from the creation of the world to the beginning of the eighteenth century, is available for viewing and searching on-line. The complete text was searched for each of the following phrases:

• Athenian Republic
• democracy
• generous gifts
• public treasury
• loose fiscal
• fiscal
• bondage
• 200 years
• two hundred years
• spiritual faith

In no case was text identified that was remotely similar in words or intent to the alleged Tytler quote.

4. Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University is not the source of any of the statistics or the text attributed to him. Professor Olson was contacted (by me) via e-mail, and he confirmed that he had no authorship or involvement in this matter. And, as Fayette Citizen editor Dave Hamrick wrote back in January 2001:

I really enjoyed one recent message that was circulated extremely widely, at least among conservatives. It gave several interesting "facts" supposedly compiled by statisticians and political scientists about the counties across the nation that voted for George Bush and the ones that voted for Al Gore in the recent election.

Supposedly, the people in the counties for Bush had more education, more income, ad infinitum, than the counties for Gore.

I didn't have time to check them all out, but I was curious about one item in particular... the contention that the murder rate in the Gore counties was about a billion times higher than in the Bush counties.

This was attributed to a Professor Joseph Olson at the Hamline University School of Law. I never heard of such a university, but went online and found it. And Prof. Olson does exist.

"Now I'm getting somewhere," I thought.

But in response to my e-mail, Olson said the "research" was attributed to him erroneously. He said it came from a Sheriff Jay Printz in Montana. I e-mailed Sheriff Printz, and guess what? He didn't do the research either, and didn't remember who had e-mailed it to him.

In other words, he got the same legend e-mailed to him and passed it on to Olson without checking it out, and when Olson passed it on, someone thought it sounded better if a law professor had done the research, and so it grew.

Who knows where it originally came from, but it's just not true.

5. The county-by-county murder-rate comparison presented in this piece is wrong.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ), in the year 2000 the national murder rate was about 5.5 per 100,000 residents. Homicide data by county for 1999 and 2000 can be downloaded from the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NAJCD), and the counties won by Gore and Bush can be identified using the county-by-county election results made available by CNN. (The NACJD provides not only the number of reported murders for each county, but also the population for each.) The average murder rate in the counties won by Gore vs. the rate in the counties won by Bush can be determined from this data.

By calculating the murder rate for each county and then taking the averages, we find a murder rate (defined as number of murders per 100,000 residents) of about 5.2 for the "average" Gore county and 3.3 for the average Bush county. But since people, rather than counties, commit murders, a more appropriate approach is to calculate the total number of murders in the counties won by each candidate and divide that figure by the total number of residents in those counties. This more appropriate method yields the following average murder rates in counties won by each candidate:

Gore: 6.5

Bush: 4.1

There is a distinct difference between these two numbers, but it is nowhere near as large as the quoted e-mail message states (i.e., 13.2 for Gore vs. 2.1 for Bush). Note that the average of these two figures is 5.3, which, as expected, is very close to the reported national murder rate of 5.5.

Last updated:   3 April 2008

As readers may remember from early April, the publisher of the Redwood Falls Gazette recently published a passed--along-email that is often attributed to Andy Rooney, who disavowed the contents as hateful and contrary to everything America stands for. The column, published on April 1, was not a joke.

Now we find a local Jacksonian passing another urban legend off as his own letter.  Presumeably the editors simply trusted the words to be original to the author. The final paragraph strays from the version at the urban legend reference site, though it, too, is not original, as a Google search turns up this blog post and other hits. Just the current version being spread around.

It's certainly an interesting trend: conservatives circulating urban legends in their search for The Truthiness.  We're guessing Opheim will probably use the same defense as the publisher--who cares about facts, when the sentiment is "true."   As the contemporary Ameircan philosopher Stephen Colbert said:

"We're not talking about truth, we're talking about something that seems like truth—the truth we want to exist."

Who knew that the Snopes site--intended for checking up on facts--would become the lending library for the forces of Truthiness in Minnesota?

Early evening digest: no news item left behind edition

Education Week reporter David Hoff notes Walz's letter in NCLB: Act II: Lawmakers on Left and Right Criticize Pilot Project:

The response to the "differentiated accountability" project shows one truth about NCLB: It's hard to please everybody. Looking at reaction from the left and the right on Capitol Hill, you see tepid endorsements for the plan, followed by criticism of the law itself. . . .

. . .From the left, Rep. Tim Walz, D-Minn., calls the plan a "long overdue step" in a letter to Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, who announced the plan last week. But Walz indicates that the announcement won't change his stance on the law: "NCLB is a deeply flawed mandate that is badly in need of significant reform and overhaul," he writes. . . .

These reactions will mean little in the implementation of the latest pilot project. But they show how difficult it will be to gather the votes for NCLB reauthorization—whether it happens this year or next.

P.S. A letter to the editor of The New York Times gave a headline writer the chance to create the latest word play on the NCLB name: No Cynic Left Behind

WIZM Radio reports Minnesota Congressman Tim Walz Discusses Future US Role In Iraq.

In the netroots, Minnesota Central looks at franking privileges in How much is that Prebate Check Worth ? and contrasts between two Minnesota freshman representatives in NBL Walz –vs- OOS Bachmann on Freedom.  Bachmann's in favor of the Light Bulb Freedom of Choice Act, while Walz is meeting with veterans and other constituents.

Down in Southwestern Minnesota, the Corner House Comments tells an ICE tale:

In a recent conversation with a friend and coworker of mine I found out that “targeting specific individuals” must mean that if you don’t look like you just came off the farm and are not saying ” you betcha” a lot, it must mean that you are undocumented. He had went to pick up some items from a local retail store and was leaving the store when two men approached him and asked for his identification. Being a good union brother that respects but likes to challenge authority, he asked them who the hell they were and did not produce any ID. They replied that they were with Immigration, Customs and Enforcement (ICE) and again asked for his identification. He asked for identification from them and they finally produced it. After verifying their id’s my friend offered them his driver’s license. The ICE agents apparently were not satisfied with that and asked to see his Green Card. Well, after telling them that he did not have a Green Card because he is a citizen, they took his drivers license to a van where they have all their secret Homeland Security electronic gizmo’s and checked it out. Returning a few minutes later they told him he was free to go. Before leaving he asked why he was stopped and was told ” he didn’t need to know”.

I often hear people say that if you are here legally that you do not have anything to fear from the government. Fortunately for my coworker, the verification process worked this time. If their data was inaccurate or incomplete what would have happened? What is disturbing is that he was chosen at random because he did not fit the profile of a SW Minnesota native. ICE officials say they do not randomly pick up people. Apparently the agents in the field did not get the memo.

In the Albert Lea Tribune, editor Tim Engstrom writes about how Economic policies only making things worse. Definitely worth a click and a read.

 

Making a movie of themselves: Minnesota Majority and MinnSIR unite

Loyal readers know that we frequently hold our nose and dive into a Yahoo group where Ruthie Hendrycks posts in her role as President of Minnesotans Seeking Immigration Reform (MinnSIR), an unincorporated association that's a subchapter of the Minnesota Coalition for Immigration Reduction (also small and unincorporated).

We've learned that MinnSIR is teaming up with Minnesota Majority to make a video and it's top secret, according to this post by Ms. Hendrycks:

MINNESOTA MEMBERS

As you know, a video is being planned and scheduled concerning the negative impacts of

illegal immigration on Minnesotans. MINNSIR in coordination with Minnesota Majority

will be filming all those and their stories who choose to participate.

 

So many times - we hear the other side of this issue in video's and the media.

It is time that our fellow citizens and those elected to serve the residents of Minnesota -

HEAR OUR THOUGHTS!!!!!!

 

We do have several individuals already - who have agreed to participate and this email

will be going out to them again separately to arrange a time for filming.

ONLY THOSE WHO CONTACT RUTHIE - will be advised of location and filming date.

This is to ensure those moles subscribed to MINNSIR do not deter our mission.

Filming will take place shortly and should be completed by early April.

 

I am sending this request out to see if there are more that would like to be involved.

Your identity can be shadowed, but we prefer that not all opt for this option.

 

Issues of how illegal immigration has impacted you can range from but not limited to:

Economics

Job and Employment Issues

Crime

Health Issues

Language Barriers

School and Education Issues

Etc.

 

Exactly what we are looking for is YOUR STORIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you know of others that may consider being involved - please contact them

and have them contact Ruthie. Ask only those you trust.

Material used will be at the desegregation of MnMajority and MINNSIR

Ruthie will be the primary interviewer - please contact [email address redacted by editor] to discuss your participation or with questions.

 

Again

Happy Easter

Ruthie

So MinnSIR and Majority will be making a video about the negative effects of immigration. Let's take a look at the production' sponsors.

First, MinnSIR.  Beginning with the email itself, we the self-pity in the message puzzling. For instance, the media frequently give Ms. Hendrycks a platform for her views, as she is trotted out to represent the "anti" position in the debate on comprehensive immigration review. indeed, the group and a rally (which drew fewer than 100 people) was deemed newsworthy by the Strib barely a month after Hendrycks founded it in 2006.

Not once have we seen evidence that the mainstream media has asked the group to provide membership numbers or a balance sheet.  Since the group has no paid staff and revenues under $25,000, it's not required to provide any public transparency.   

A headline on the front page of the group's website now touts Ruthie's bid for Congress (though the fine print reveals she's in a bid for the open seat in Minnesota House District 21B). Since the group isn't large enough to report to anyone and hasn't voluntarily opened it's books, it's impossible to tell if this in-kind contribution to a candidate is worth over $100, at which point the group would have to register  with the state Campaign Finance and Disclosure board.

While the group claims to be only against illegal immigration and to support "sensible" immigration reform, Ruthie approvingly distributes emails decrying the presence of Liberian refugees in Minnesota, opposing a state bill to allow a private service club to honor Mexican-American veterans (it passed this month in the Minnesota House by a 121-5 vote) and other such matters.

Minnesota Majority is another kettle of fish entirely. Launched last summer by social conservative Jeff Davis and friends, the group promotes "traditional values" and more. The group is a non-profit 501(c) 4, an organization that can engage in lobbying or political campaigning. Donations are not tax deductible.

And cultural flashpoints over "traditional values" are indeed a war for these folks: 

Our country is in the midst of a fierce civil war between those who cherish our nation’s traditional values and those who want to radically remake America into a secular progressive country.

Minnesota Majority's web page about immigration (or illegal aliens, MM's preferred descriptor) is here. Some fascinating links from the Minn Majority page to interesting people and organizations.

The group generated a fair amount of controversy when a statement attributing longer lifespans to "racial purity" in the populations of Japan and Sweden was on the group's page about health care. As a firestorm of criticism hit, the statement was first defended, then scrubbed from the site. (See several posts at Lloydletta ,  Democracy at Work, Minnesota 2020 [Mn 2020 fellow John Hecke's column here] and MnPublius for a review of the fracas).

For a glimpse of past Minnesota Majority video projects, check out the group's YouTube page. We eagerly await the release of the organization's joint production with the brain trust at MinnSIR.

Saturday news digest: a new Easter basket at Tim Walz's campaign website

Economy Boosts Food Program Numbers KAAL-TV says. More people are using the WIC program as the economy sours.

Those who missed last night's Almanac appearance by Dick Day and Randy Demmer can watch the segment here. Select March 2008, then March 21, 2008 from the menu.  You can watch the whole show or just the segment on First District Republicans.

The Austin Daily News reports Walz to host vets forum:

Congressman Tim Walz has announced he will host a veterans forum at 1 p.m. Friday, March 28 at the American Legion in Austin. Walz will review veterans legislation passed by the Congress in 2007 and will discuss veterans initiatives he plans to push for in 2008.

During his first year in Congress, Walz has been a leader on veterans issues, fighting for the largest increase in funding for the Veterans Administration in the 77-year history of the VA, and working to ease the transition between active duty and veterans’ status.

The veterans forum is free and open to the public and press. No RSVP is necessary. The Legion is located at 809 12th St. S.W.

This will be Walz’s final veterans forum of March. He held forums earlier this month in Mankato, Waseca, New Ulm and Rochester.

An Immigration expert to speak at WSU on Tuesday, the Winona Daily News reports:

A University of Minnesota immigration expert will speak Tuesday at Winona State University.

The American Democracy Project welcomes Ryan Allen, assistant professor of community and economic development at the Humphrey Institute of Public Policy at the University of Minnesota.

                        The lecture is titled “Immigration in the Heartland: Latinos in Minnesota.”

It’s planned for 3:30 p.m. Tuesday at Somsen Auditorium and is open to the public. . . .

Looks to us like the Easter Bunny visited Tim Walz's campaign website and left a goodie-filled new basket. We like the caucus photos the best. The new site is more user friendly, interactive, and done up in a lovely blue palette. Plenty of eye candy for Walz's peeps.

We have to hop down the bunnytrail ourselves, but will return later in the day with more news and analysis.

 

Immigration news from the Worthington Globe: a tale of two stories

We're struck this morning by the reception met by two stories in today's Worthington Globe. One tale is probably old hat for most of our readers by now: ICE releases arrest numbers. But it's unlikely readers have learned much about the other article, Oberloh speaks on immigration panel.   

The lead to the first story.

"A spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced Monday that 36 people from Worthington, Pipestone and Sioux Falls, S.D. were arrested and taken into custody late last week.

The three-day operation ended Thursday and resulted in 19 arrests in Worthington, four in Pipestone and 13 in Sioux Falls. Of the 36 arrested, 13 were fugitive aliens, and the other 23 were immigration violators encountered by the ICE Fugitive Operations Teams during the targeted arrests. Six of those arrested have criminal convictions in addition to their administrative immigration violations.

The majority of those arrested are from Guatemala, with two from Mexico, two from El Salvador and one from Honduras. Eight are women.

Those targeted in the operation had been ordered deported. . . ."

This is the story that's been picked up by the Associated Press and discussed in the blogosphere, both on the rights and the left. Some, like this blogger, are connecting the arrests with the tragic bus accident and a certain member of congress's calls for action by Immigration and Customs enforcement:

Do you think it was the public anger over an illegal criminal alien killing four children, then more trouble with identification, and most likely fraud? Or do you think the catalyst was Michele Bachmann cracking the whip?

How unfortunate for that blogger that editors at WCCO, and many of the other media outlet running the story didn't get to read the full version of the story in the Worthington Globe. Find out why connecting the raids with the crash is a post hoc fallacy below the fold.

Evening news digest: counting small-boned bodies edition

The Pioneer Press reports that Robert Bly is state's first poet laureate. We take our title tonight from one of his most famous poems, from the Vietnam War era.

It's the Festival of Owls this weekend in Houston, according to the Winona Daily News.

The Albert Lea Tribune's acting publisher writes that Knocking down snowmen is no funny matter. We agree.

The New Ulm Journal praises The Transportation 6, while the Owatonna People's Press gives Senator Day Kudos to his decision to skip the endorsement and go straight to the primary. The editorial board scolds the GOP:

. . . But what southern Minnesota's Republicans are doing and what they ought to do are two very different things. They ought to recruit and support candidates who have the best chance of representing their views in office. Instead, they are throwing a political tantrum because one candidate had the audacity to suggest that voters, not just a few party insiders, should have a say in an election. . . .

The Rochester Post Bulletin reported on a meeting where Flood victims try to get answers. Walz staff members were there.

In a letter to the Cottonwood County Citizen, Richard Peterson writes that Hamilton's transportation vote took courage. A DFLer, Peterson opposed Hamilton in the race for House 22B in 2004 and 2006.

Transportation of another mode is an issue on the Mississippi River, according to the Winona Daily News in Delta Queen future still in balance; Walz puts support behind exemption.

The Worthington Daily Globe reports ICE pays Worthington another visit.  This time it's a search for specific individuals, rather than a sweep through the Swift hog plant..

Finally, a YouTube of  Tim Walz and George Miller discussing textbook prices on the House floor earlier this month. The amendnment under debate was part of the College Opportunity & Affordability Act.

Opinion in the First: fear and anger shouldn't drive debates

Newsweek's look at Scare Tactics gets a write up at the Post Bulletin's Political Party blog today in the post Fear-mongering in the 1st District. The judgement?:

"If you've seen the ads, you might agree with Walz's press secretary that they're fear-mongering cheap shots, trivializing an issue on which patriotic people on both sides of the issue can reasonably disagree."

The Mankato Free Press editorial board decides Immigration not the issue in bus crash, rejecting attempts to use emotional appeals to sway the debate on immigration:

It was an unfortunate contribution to an already awful tragedy when it was revealed that the driver of a vehicle that slammed into a school bus, resulting in the deaths of four children, is an apparent illegal alien.

Added to the grief was anger, fanning an already divisive immigration debate. . .

. . .As for the woman in the center of the storm, she is now a reference point for those who argue she represents a more compelling argument for the state to seek a more aggressive solution to the illegal immigration problem. The bus incident does serve to remind us that undocumented aliens pose a variety of risks. How many drive without licenses? How do we measure the impact on communities as illegals resort, essentially, to living underground — avoiding contact with authorities, mistrusting them and many of their neighbors to hide their illegal status?

Most do their best to fit in and become valued members of the towns they live in. But as some among them avoid the responsibilities of citizenship (continually aware that they are not, after all, citizens), how do they increase the chance that an incident of the type that occurred near Cottonwood last week, can occur?

These are hard issues to quantify.

Perhaps we should refrain from even attempting to tie the bus-van accident to immigration issues at all. There are enough bad drivers in this state for us to know that they come in all shapes, sizes, nationalities, legal status and levels of sobriety. Bad driving is no respecter of persons, on either the giving or receiving end — as we were reminded again last week.

Read the entire editorial at the Free Press.

Sadly, there are people living in the district who began to tie the bus crash firmly to the debate over immigration policy rather rapidly. Take Ruthie Hendrycks,  the leader of Minnesotans Seeking Immigration Reform, an incorporated association that's a subchapter of the Minnesota Coalition for Immigration Reduction.

Before the children were mourned and laid to rest, Hendrycks, a candidate for the GOP endorsement in Minnesota House District 21B,  was already working to organize a rally exploiting the tragedy. From a posting on Saturday, February 23:

NEVER FORGET THE COTTONWOOD FOUR

Members - MINNSIR will be taking a leading role in educating the public to the  "Human Costs"  of illegal immigration and this tragedy. We are also working with other organizations on this horrific, PREVENTABLE and senseless crime.

In rememberance.............

Hunter Javens, Jessie Javens, Emilee Olson, Reed Stevens

A rally in the wake of this tragedy is being planned.

MINNSIR will be working in coordination with another group on this rally and information will be provided when all details are arranged. - Please plan to attend!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We can only hope that Republican activists in HD 21B have the good hearts and good sense to reject this style of "leadership."

UPDATE: At the Minnesota Monitor, Steve Perry listens to The sound of two jaws flapping: Bachmann and O'Reilly on the scourge of criminal aliens.  The article concludes with the notice of an interesting study:

Bachmann and O'Reilly's fevered vision of marauding illegals committing crimes and endangering public safety all across the country stands in stark contrast to the findings of a study released this week by the Public Policy Institute of California. In culling through arrest and incarceration statistics from the state, the authors found that immigrants were far less likely to commit crimes than native-born residents.

"For example," they write in the study abstract, "among men ages 18-40 - the age group most likely to commit crime - the U.S.-born are 10 times more likely than the foreign-born to be in jail or prison. Even among noncitizen men from Mexico ages 18-40 - a group disproportionately likely to have entered the United States illegally - the authors find very low rates of institutionalization. Such findings suggest that longstanding fears of immigration as a threat to public safety are unjustified."

Read the PPIC study.

Read reactions to the PPIC study (Reuters). 

Tuesday morning news digest: Exile from GOPville edition

The Rochester Post Bulletin editorial board opines Republican disunity can only help Walz. Not true: bloggers are rejoicing over the promise of great material from the GOP wannabe candidates. We have a lot to look forward to. The board writes:

"The end result is that, instead of a GOP candidate setting his sights on Walz on March 30, the 1st District will get to watch two Republicans spend the next five months vying against each other until the Sept. 9 primary."

And speaking for ourselves at BSP, we're grateful for the month remaining until the First Congressional District convention.  We'll miss either Demmer or Davis.

The Owatonna People's Press reports Day exiled from GOP for skipping endorsement.  The article repeats in its sister paper, the Waseca County News. Rumors elsewhere that state GOP chair Ron Carey has called the tip line at ICE to see if Day can be deported are entirely false.

The Spring Grove Herald reports Minnesota Guard troops working to keep peace in Kosovo. Around 400 Minnesota Guard members are deployed to Kosovo.

From the looks of this stub of an article in the Hanska Herald, Ruthie Hendrycks has stopped mentioning her degree from diploma mill LaCrosse University. We also understand that she never did send her "thesis" to the Wege, as promised in the comments here, either.

Pity. We wanted to read Hendrycks' “Domestic Violence and The Mediation Process - Pros and Cons."  We had thought that domestic violence was a crime, not a private matter, since the 1970s at the very least. Looks like we'll never be enlightened now. She has, however, found time to post an article from the John Birch Society's magazine to an online group.

We have discovered that Ruthie might be as confused about Bluestem Prairie as she was about the accreditation of colleges.  She believes that we are Tim Walz's website:

Please note: Mark Meyer has dropped out of Cong District 1 race - this leaves four candidates. MINNSIR supports Brian Davis or Dick Day for this seat. A clarification of one candidate is forthcoming early next year following an upcoming survey to find out exactly where they stand and to allow you to make your choice.  However, note Tim Walz has this trash posted on his website.

(see links directly below)

Please

http://www.bluestemprairie.com/a_bluestem_prairie/2007/12/morillo-alicea.html 

http://www.bluestemprairie.com/a_bluestem_prairie/2007/12/pb-editorial-do.html 

Bluestem Prairie is an independent blog that is not part of Congressman Walz's campaign or congressional office. She can find Tim Walz's congressional site here and his campaign site here.  We hope she will share the facts of her confusion with her membership.

Her confusion is only matched by California Minuteman Ron Branstner's belief that more that one person writes our posts, given our annoying use of the editorial first person "we."  Our readers can sleep soundly at night knowing that all posts over the blog de plume "Ollie Ox" are written by one person.

Hendrycks might also share this news with the Brown County GOP Convention on Saturday, where she will be promoting her candidacy for the State House. GOP Congressional contenders Davis, Day, and Demmer will be there, as well as State Senator Dennis Frederickson, who had the decency to vote for the transportation bill. Should be a lively gathering.

Those scolding Denny won't get any help from the New Ulm Journal editorial board which believes Legislature did the right thing for state roads.

Meanwhile, down in Worthington, the Globe reports Farmers await new Farm Bill.  And many of the very small towns with straight pipe sewer problems are in Southern Minnesota, the Star Tribune reports in Archaic sewage lines tainting lakes, rivers.

Discussion of the Defense of Democracy ad was all over the netroots. Phoenix Woman took a look in Pounding The Table. Open Left looks at Democratic board members' resignations in The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. The Muckraker at TPM examined the FDD's press release in   Group Launches Ads Pressuring Dems on Surveillance Bill.

The Blue Mass Group looked at the New England version of the ad in Tag Team: Right Wing & Telecomms Take on Congress?

Sure enough, we found that the National Association of Manufacturers had blogged about Today's Surveillance Developments... and over at the conservative National Review Corner, the FDD's ace debater mocked Tim Walz for serving 24 years in the Coast Guard in More Palaver from House Obstructionists on Intelligence Reform. Perhaps First District national security maven Tom Maertens will take on this tool.

 Our friend McPherson Hall at Minnesota Central asks  A Question for John Kline :Are Comic Books Pork Barrel Spending ? He finds a Bush earmark for comic books about Iraqi security forces. 

If only Captain America were still alive! The private sector could underwrite the expense, and NRO shills for the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies could go back to scolding Marvel Comics for endangering America's national security.

On the legal status of Minnesota's immigration reduction groups (and why it might matter)

A month ago, the Rochester Post Bulletin ran Anti-immigration group challenges Welcome Center's goal, an article about the Minnesota Coalition for Immigration Reduction's request to go through the books of Austin's Welcome Center. The full article is no longer on the Post Bulletin's site, but we've retrieved a copy from an immigration "reform" group's forum.

The immigration reduction group wanted to look at the Center's operations and finance:

It won't be the group's first visit to the center, according to member Dean Dykeman, who said that during the previous visit, the group asked several questions about the motives of the center.

"I'm open to everybody," said Silvestry. "We are an open book. We don't have anything to cover."

The Welcome Center, founded in 2000, provides programs and services to newcomers that promote self-sufficiency and multicultural understanding among the increasingly diverse population in the area.

According to Silvestry, about 6 percent of the Welcome Center's $256,000 annual budget comes from the city. The rest is funded mostly through grants and donations.

However, many MCFIR members said they believe the Welcome Center is a "placement agency" for illegal immigrants that is "funded by the taxpayers of Austin."

Paul Westrum, founder of MCFIR, suggested at the group's monthly meeting Tuesday that some members meet with Silvestry to discuss operations, including the center's funding formula. . . .

The inquiries were not out of order. After all, the Welcome Center is an non-profit, duly registered with the Minnesota Secretary of State and with the Charities Division of the Minnesota Attorney General's office. As a non-profit corporation and charity, the Welcome Center exchanges privacy for tax exemption and public scrutiny.

Indeed, this nonprofit status is something it shares with many of the members of AFFIRM, the broad coalition of groups seeking comprehensive immigration reform in the state. The Welcome Center, however, has a different mission than advocating policy; it serves newcomers to Austin.

The article made us wonder about the legal status of the two Minnesota-based immigration reduction (or reform) advocacy groups most often cited in the press, the Minnesota Coalition for Immigration Reduction (MCFIR) and its sub-chapter, Minnesotans Seeking Immigration Reform (MinnSIR).

Find out what our research turned up below the fold.

Tuesday afternoon news digest: Kosovo, economy and a new kid in the District

Congratulations to Jennifer and David on the birth of Sage Elizabeth, 6 lbs, 10.5 oz. May she grow to be as good-looking, bright, strong, and courageous as both her parents, as kind as her grandmother Darlene, and as dedicated to community and country as her late grandfather Steve.

Iraq and Afghanistan aren't the only place where Americans serve. About 400 Minnesota National Guard members are helping to keep the peace in the newly-independent nation of Kosovo. The Albert Lea Tribune tells the story from the perspective of guard members stationed in Vitina. A very interesting read; the soldiers are highly regarded by local people:

NATO soldiers met with local officials prior to the declaration on the importance of keeping Kosovo peaceful when in the world spotlight.

Overall, he said, the presence of the troops have been well-received in Kosovo. He said the soldiers are “well-respected” by the Serbians and “much more well-respected, even revered” by the ethnic Albanians.

He said when the independence was declared the soldiers made sure Serbs were protected while Albanians celebrated.

The Mankato Free Press reports Local troops calm Kosovo tensions.

Congressman Walz worked hard last March to make sure the Guard in Kosovo kept receiving imminent danger pay.

In Fighting to improve US economy, a column published in today's Winona Daily News, Walz concludes:

In the past seven years, Bush has added an incredible $4 trillion to our national debt. I’m pleased that Congress, under its new leadership, has started to get a handle on spending by passing pay-as-you-go budget rules that require new government spending to be paid for. This is a good start, but more needs to be done.

With the passage of this stimulus package, it seems that Congress and Bush have begun to realize that we’re all in this together. The stimulus package is one example of the good things that can happen when Congress and the president work together, but we can’t stop there.

Next, we need to build on that accomplishment, set aside our differences and take some hard steps to balance the budget and reduce our national debt. It won’t be easy, but the work we do now will have a lasting impact on the economy and the types of economic opportunities our children have available to them.

The Owatonna People's Press looks at the economic and politics of ethanol in two stories: Corn prices tied to the crude oil rollercoaster and Ethanol's environmental impact under debate.

Walz, Betty McCollum, and Colin Peterson are among 52 Members of Congress [who] Press Secretary of State To Challenge Azerbaijan's Threats of Renewed Aggression:

More than 50 Members of the U.S. House of Representatives called upon Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Friday to challenge Azerbaijan's threats of renewed war against Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh, and to take concrete action to hold leaders in Baku accountable for actions that directly undermine the Administration's policy of fostering peace and stability in the South Caucasus region, reported the Armenian National Committee of America.

The letter, initiated by Congressional Armenian Caucus Co-Chairmen Joe Knollenberg (R-MI) and Frank Pallone (D-NJ), cited specific recent threats by Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev and stressed that, "these fear tactics and threats of war go directly against the United States' goal of peace and stability in the South Caucasus region. Azerbaijan has been threatening war with Armenia for years. However, these recent public comments made by high-ranking government officials prove that their rhetoric has turned into a very real and dangerous threat."

The Winona Human Rights Commission extends A diversity training invitation for Drazkowski, as well as offering a civics lesson:

Drazkowski expressed his concerns in an opinion column Feb. 6 about the budget difficulties in our courts. As our representative in the Legislature, he should have that concern.

He is also concerned about the high cost of administrative services within the court system. This is a legitimate concern. Among these costs is the cost of interpreters for those who don’t speak English or do not speak English well.

Drazkowski seems to be proposing that non-English speakers no longer receive the assistance of an interpreter within the state court system unless they bear the cost of interpretation themselves.

The Winona Human Rights Commission is concerned about such a proposal because it stands in direct contravention of existing law, specifically the United States Civil Rights Act, a law that requires an interpreter be provided in this setting.

Title VI of the Civil Rights Act is the “Prohibition Against National Origin Discrimination Affecting Limited English Proficient Persons.” For guidance, see www.hhs.gov/ocr/lep/revised lep.html.

The Waseca Historical Society presented a program about Waseca's Black History remembered. Interesting snapshots from history; we find the story of the three African-American baseball players on the town's 1900 state championship town to be especially ironic in light of the knuckleheaded racist remarks former Twins owner Calvin Griffith made to the Waseca Lions Club in 1978..

The Owatonna People's Press reports that his late grandfather's need for blood transfusions has inspired  Joe Gibson to work to for change in  Blooming Prairie teen behind bill to lower state's blood donor age to 16.

He had contacted state Rep. Patty Fritz with a petition and just expected to have his idea turned down. Instead, Fritz met with him to work on the bill's language. Both Fritz and Gibson expect it to pass.  More in the Rochester Post Bulletin story, Teen on quest to lower blood-donor age to 16. Kids these days!