Bluestem Prairie

More anger, no glitter: Bachmann disciplines local Iowa station for question about ex-gay clinic

Those progressives who chide Minnesota's glitter-bombing gay barbarian horde as "not helpful" in focusing media attention on the harmful, tax-funded "pray away the gay" therapy offered at Bachmann & Associates clinic might need to think that through a bit.

Or at least not take their cues from the Right.

When the Right--like GOProud or Glenn Beck--weighs in with advice that a strategy isn't "helpful," that unsolicited advice from the other side of the aisle is a sign that the action is effective.

Any time the Right--like Glenn Beck or True North-- trots out an absurd argument that claims if those in an action did something else, other than what actually happened, they'd be dangerous, that tactic is working. 

It's clear from latest news that the Bachmann campaign doesn't want to answer to barbarians or to the traditional media, but to shove this issue back into the closet.  TPM reports that the Bachmann campaign is aggressively acting to stifle any scrutiny of the clinic, in which the presidential candidate is a co-owner, by the traditional media.

The Minnesota Independent reported that the Christian counseling clinic has taken in $137,000 in Medicaid payments over the last several years.

Bachmann campaign snubs questions in Iowa

At TPM, Igor Volsky reports in Bachmann Campaign Takes Retribution Against Local Iowa Station That Asked About Ex-Gay Clinics:

Earlier this month, after an undercover investigation confirmed that Marcus Bachmann’s Christian counseling clinics performed ex-gay therapy, Michele Bachmann was asked about the practice by Iowa’s WQAD, a local ABC affiliate. The Congresswoman refused to comment on the matter, saying only that she is “very proud of our business” and “proud of all job creators in the United States.”

During the interview, Bachmann’s advisers reportedly “threatened WQAD producers that they would cut off the feed if Rae Chelle [the anchor] repeated the question.”

The TPM report cites WQAD's most recent and more troubling report, Bachmann walks away from WQAD:

Michele Bachmann made a visit to the Quad Cities last night to speak with supporters and give interviews to the local television media, that is, with one exception. Despite promises to WQAD for a one-on-one interview the Congresswoman's managers openly, and aggressively denied News 8 access to the Iowa Republican front-runner.

At the end of last night's event the Bachmann campaign said the snubbing was based on interview questions News 8's Rae Chelle Davis asked the Congresswoman during a satellite interview two weeks ago. . . .

. . .Voters wanted to know if the story [about gay reparation therapy at the Bachmann & Associates clinic] was true and to hear what Michele Bachmann had to say about it.

But the Bachmann campaign isn't just snubbing one station. It's actively and aggressively stifling all questions  from the  media about the clinic's controversial practice. The WQAD report continues:

Then the same man came over and said I could have my interview outside," said Chuck McClurg a veteran News 8 photojournalist.

McClurg continued to shoot the event. Afterwards, he walked with the Congresswoman and her team down the stairs and out the door.

"I followed them outside hoping to get the interview I was promised," said McClurg

McClurg began rolling his camera as another local Quad Cities news station started asking their questions.

"I started to tape something off of that interview and a staffer pushed me aside and stood in front of my camera and said that this was for the other station only."

The reporter asked a question about Bachmann's clinic and her husband. At that point, McClurg says the staffer took the microphone off of Bachmann, tossed it to the reporter and said their interview was over.

That's the treatment a second reporter, from another station, received at the hands of the Bachmann campaign.

And this isn't the first issue over which Bachmann's campaign mishandled the press corps. Earlier, the Washington Post reported Michele Bachmann’s handlers get rough with reporter over a question about the candidate's migraines. Those questions emerged following a hit piece in the conservative Daily Caller, Stress-related condition ‘incapacitates’ Bachmann; heavy pill use alleged.

Why the clinic questions matter

Why do these questions matter? After the first WQAD interview, in Michele Bachmann Clinic: Where You Can Pray Away the Gay?, ABC News  asked the American Psychological Association about "reparative" therapy:

The controversial practice of trying to change someone's sexual orientation was roundly discredited by the American Psychological Association in 2009 as ineffective and potentially harmful. The first-hand accounts and video evidence surfacing Monday have rekindled questions about the Bachmann family business.

Clinton Anderson, who heads the association's Office on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Concerns, told ABC News that his organization did an exhaustive review and found no evidence that efforts to convert someone from gay to straight could succeed.

"The harm is that when people are already in distress, and feeling conflict about their religion and their sexuality, to tell them they can change if they work hard enough, when in fact they can't do that … just makes their distress and their shame -- their depression -- even worse," Anderson said.

Enter the barbarians

So what is to be done when a candidate's campaign literally disconnects from reporters' questions? The question about the clinic's offerings are a matter of public concern on several levels. First, taxpayer dollars are going toward the operation of the clinic, and the public has a right to know whether its money is being spent wisely.

Second, the therapy is harmful. It hurts real people who come to the clinic seeking help.

But when a campaign dodges questions and seeks to shove questions back into a closet, it becomes fair game for publicity stunts. These stunts are common enough, regardless of the motivation:  from the College Republican who dresses like an ear of corn to support ethanol after a candidate flubs an answer about E85 to an alt-journo crank yanker's style "Koch Brother" phone call to Governor Walker.

And in LGBT politics, there's a long history of civil disobedience and street theater that paralleled the activism of the more respectful and respectable organizations like the HRC. Witness ACT-UP's strategies during the AIDS crisis.

Now, Get Equal is helping the glitterati,  LGBT activists and allies who recently took Marcus Bachmann's barbarian remarks quite literally and decided to dress the part while visiting Bachmann & Associates to demand the discipline that Marcus Bachmann prescribed for them. Failing to receive the discipline they craved, they acted like joyous barbarians, dancing and throwing glitter over their heads.

The Youtube went viral, from organizer Nick Espinosa's "Robert Erickson" facebook page to the Washington Post. A story that might have been a blip in the news cycle--easily swept into the closet by the Bachmann campaign--enjoyed a glittery second act.

Not Helpful: GOProud,Glenn Beck and Bill Prendergast react

The reaction to that second act from the right was predictable, the cable equivalent of the neighbor stomping out the fire on the go-bang-go bag on his doorstep. The Daily Caller posted a video, GOProud: Glitter bombing the “stupidest thing I’ve seen in politics”. 

The now out-foxed Glenn Beck threw a rhetoric bomb in Glenn Beck on 'Gay Barbarian Horde' Glitters Bachmann Clinic, breathing pretty hard when he imagined a frightened clinic receptionist, but not before noting the "violent" protest "wasn't helpful."  Locally, and more hilariously, a conceptual-challenged right-wing blogger sounded the alarm about glitter bombers ramping up.  The glitterati throw glitter; indeed, in the latest action, they throw it above themselves. Only in the blogger's fecund imagination is anything other than glitter flying. She should stick to critiquing office design.

Let me repeat two universally acknowledged facts about strategy and tactics:

Anytime the Right weighs in with advice that a strategy isn't "helpful," that unsolicited advice from the other side of the aisle is a sign that the action is effective (as the hit count on the Youtube also suggests).

Anytime the Right trots out an argument that claims if those in an action did something else, they'd be dangerous, that tactic is working. For the truth is, the gay barbarian horde threw glitter. Nor has anything other than glitter been thrown with each additional action. But, Beck's own rhetoric and suggestions for countering glitterbombing is, on other hand, getting more charged, with thinly veiled threats that security officers might cap a gay barbarian.

Bluestem agrees with the need for calling the fashion police that's implied in Wonkette's headline, Mismatched Youths Attempt to Glitter Bomb Marcus Bachmann. BSP fears these barbarians will wear white to their after-Labor Day actions, so perhaps a past wardrobe designer for Xena could stage an intervention.

But Wonkette Burke's hipster summary of the strategy/tactic is dead on:

But it is 2011 now, and young activists require tactics that not only prove a point, but provide really hilarious videos to post to the YouTube. This is why we now have “glitter bombing!” The young people love to do the glitter bombing, because they get to throw stuff on hate-mongering anti-gay wack jobs and gain Internet celebrity while also participating in the democratic process.

And singing, dancing and laughing while they do it. The right provides its own chuckles as they pass out over the WMD potential of glitter, while simultaneously sniffing at the ineffectiveness of the protests. (Of course they want it both ways). Both the action and the reaction kept the story in the news cycle that Bachmann owns a clinic that practices a discredited and harmful therapy.

But since the Right criticized the tactic as not "helpful" for recognition of equality, as well as scary, the knee-jerk section of the progressive movement instantly surrendered, as is so often the case in American politics. Witness Bill Prendergast at the Minnesota Progressive Project, yelling at those kids to get off his turf because they couldn't possibly know what they're doing.

And now, back to the news

What did the glittery gay barbarians accomplish? Several more days of the story in the news cycle, and hundreds of thousands of more people knowing that there's a story here at all.

And so, with  as new reports  surface about the Bachmann campaign's attempt to suppress news inquiry about the clinic's practices, those folks have a glimmer of what this story is about. 

Screenshots: Chuck McClurg, WQAD photojournalist (above); Mismatched gay barbarian horde (below). Video (below) via WQAD.

The Pogemiller prophecy; or, Senator Al DeKruif's secret history of the MN government shutdown

Last week when updating Emo senator, part 3: Mike Parry collecting paycheck and per diem during shutdown, a post about legislative pay, Bluestem noticed a peculiar answer in the Mankato Free Press from Senator Al DeKruif to a question about legislative pay. 

DeKruif was tying his decision to take a paycheck during the shutdown to do whatever Larry Pogemiller would do.

Here's the exchange in State shutdown: Q&A with local legislators,, published on July 2 by the Free Press:

Will you collect any pay or per diem, now or later, for the period that state government is shut down? . . .

DeKruif: “I will not take per diem that’s related to the shutdown. I’ve said I will tie my pay to whether (DFL Sen.) Larry Pogemiller takes his pay.

And I’m still working; the people who aren’t getting paid aren’t working.”

This was mysterious stuff for Bluestem, since  while Senator Pogemiller served as the Majority Leader, with the changing hands of control in the chamber, Tom Bakk became head of the DFL caucus. Pogemiller does not serve as Minority Leader (well, maybe on Planet DeKruif).

DeKruif explained more in a comment on Locally Grown Northfield, a community news site in his district. LGN editor and proprietor Griff Wigley posted Many legislators collecting paychecks during shutdown. Among them: Sen. Al DeKruif and Rep. Kelby Woodard on Sunday morning, cordially inviting both freshman legislators to explain their decision to take a check:

An article in today’s Strib lists our Northfield-area legislators, Sen. Al DeKruif and Rep. Kelby Woodard, as among the 139 who are collecting paychecks during MN gov’t shutdown.

Maybe I’m missing it but I don’t see anything about their rationale for doing so.

Wigley noted where he had looked for statements about the situation--official site, campaign site, twitter, Facebook--then wrote:

I’ll invite them to comment here.

Both Woodword and DeKruif replied.  The freshman senator weighed in, after deploring Governor Dayton's ability to roll over on Republican demands, with an explanation of why the DFL sought a shutdown.

Bluestem has never stumbled across anyone else advancing this narrative of the shutdown. Here's Senator DeKruif's secret history of his own private shutdown:

My belief is that the state shutdown should never have happened and would not have been unnecessary had the Governor came to the table to negotiate with the Majority Party before the shutdown. After the shutdown it became very clear to me that this shutdown was planned by Governor Dayton and the DFL leadership in the House and Senate for months.

 Look at who lost the most power; I would say the former Majority Leader in the State Senate, Larry Pogemiller who lost the majority in the senate during his watch. The DFL held the majority in the State Senate for 38 years and losing it was a major blow to the DFL and Senator Pogemiller. There are direct ties between Governor Dayton and the Senator through Michele Kelm-Helgen who is the Governor’s Deputy Chief of Staff and is very involved in day to day negotiations on the budget. Michele was the former Majority Leader Pogemiller’s Chief of Staff. I come to the conclusion that Senator Pogemiller has more to gain and more to do with the state government being shut down than I do so; I have stated publicly that during the state shutdown, and even though I am still working, I will refuse to take per diem and will base whether or not I receive my salary during this time on whether Senator Larry Pogemiller takes his. I have sent this reply to the Secretary of the Senate so my position will go into effect automatically if Pogemiller chooses to not take his pay.

So there you have it: the conspiracy is exposed and we now know the real power behind the shutdown: Larry Pogemiller, down in Room 15, in the bowels of the State Office Building, plotting to overthrow the government, via his cat's paw in the Governor's office, Michele Kelm-Helgen.

Perhaps it is a testament to the acumen of the capitol press corps that no one noticed this.

Or perhaps there's something in the water down in Madison Lake. Too bad the Senate is shut down, because those papers on file with the Secretary might indeed make an interesting data practice request.

Call it the Pogemiller Prophecy.

Update: Loyal Bluestem readers may recall that in late June Senate Majority Leader Michael Brodkorb allowed DeKruif out on a play date in Fergus Falls with Mike Parry and Gretchen Hoffman. Read about it in Tales of Hoffman: Scenes from the ideological struggle in Fergus Fall, Minnesota. 

Photo: Senator Al Dekruif. Bluestem is not making this up. Dekruif is.

Ghost of Willie Horton: Pawlenty pardon Jeremy Giefer and Bachmann pal Vennes in news

What with all the madness of the end of the session, it's easy to forget that Tim Pawlenty is running for president.

Fortunately, Politico is watching the presidential race and reports in Horton's ghost haunts GOP field:

It’s still early in the presidential race, so the opposition research dumps haven’t really begun. But when the skeletons in the closets of 2012 GOP hopefuls begin to be revealed, the unique shape of the field — which will almost certainly feature a handful of current or former governors — makes it a good bet that someone is going to have a Willie Horton problem.

That’s code for a violent or deranged felon run amok on their watch — a reference to the notorious convict who went AWOL during a furlough from a Massachusetts prison, committed more crimes and ultimately became the subject of a devastating ad that helped seal the fortunes of1988 Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis.

With former Govs. Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, Jon Huntsman and Mitch Daniels in the 2012 mix — and a few other current and former chief executives perhaps in the wings — the issue of pardons and furloughs is one that could play an unexpected and damaging role for some campaigns.

Before he departed from the race, Mike Huckabee, who issued more than 1,000 sentence reductions and pardons as Arkansas governor, was widely viewed as having the most exposure. While no one in the current field has anything close to that in the oppo files, Romney and Pawlenty might be haunted by a few cons who could undermine their law-and-order credentials.

Pawlenty’s pardon problem involves Jeremy Geifer, who had been convicted in a statutory rape case involving a 14-year-old girl he later married. Geifer had been described by everyone in his life as a model of reform, which eventually led to a 2008 pardon by a three-person board led by Pawlenty.

But late last year, Geifer was accused of sexually assaulting another underage girl more than 250 times. Pawlenty moved swiftly, asking for a probe into whether Geifer lied on his pardon application and pushing to close down a day care run by his wife.

While finishing his term as Minnesota’s governor last year, Pawlenty said he never would have made that decision had such information been known at the time. And he pointed out that Geifer had finished his prison stint well before the pardon was granted – a mitigating factor that could lessen any of his rivals’ blows.

Yet there is also the case of Dru Sjodin, a college student who was murdered in 2003, early in Pawlenty’s administration, by a repeat sex offender who had only recently been released from prison. That case became national cable TV fodder, as the tragic search for the pretty blonde gripped viewers.

A Pawlenty aide referred to the governor’s book, “Courage to Stand,” in which he wrote that people played politics with the case and often had the facts wrong, and that Pawlenty was “horrified” by the man’s release.

The governor later proposed stiffer sentences for sex offenders, including doubling their jail time.

Romney is at an apparent advantage over Pawlenty — in his lone term in office, the former Massachusetts governor never issued a single pardon or commutation. But that doesn’t mean he’s in the clear. . . .

Readers may recall that the Giefer story first broke on Bluestem Prairie,  but was taken up by the City Pages relentless auburn wolverine, Nick Pinto. Pinto's reporting on the Giefer case is now up for two well-deserved Page One awards from the Society of Professional Journalists' Minnesota Chapter.

And Bachmann? There's that matter that Karl Bremer at Ripple in Stillwater dogged like no other--except perhaps Dump Bachmann. Politico reports:

Though it’s typically pardon-empowered governors who must fret about their felons in the closet, legislators can also have some cause for worry. Case in point: Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, who might need to explain her support for a pardon for a donor named Frank Vennes.

Vennes was convicted in 1988 on money-laundering charges, and pleaded no-contest to illegally selling a gun and aiding in a cocaine sale. He claimed he discovered religion while in prison, and went on to become a well-known donor -- in fact, he was a top giver to Bachmann’s 2006 congressional campaign.

She reportedly wrote in a pardon letter to then-President George W. Bush in 2007, “Mr. Vennes is truly a unique man in that he is not asking for a pardon that he may achieve personal success. By the grace of God, this has been done. Mr. Vennes is seeking a pardon so that he may be further used to help others.”

Well, that depends on the meaning of helping others — in 2008, the feds raided Vennes’ home as part of a probe into a massive Ponzi scheme.

In response, Bachmann wrote another letter to the White House -- this time saying she “too hastily accepted” Vennes’ claims that he was a new man, and withdrawing her earlier letter.

Vennes was indicted on new fraud and money-laundering charges a few weeks ago. . .

Bremer, also nominated for a Page One Award in one of the same categories for which Pinto is up for (though about different Bachmann scandal, the Bobby Thompson scam), also has the dogged quality that makes for an strong investigative writer.

Images: The Giefers.

Finding Mankato: a lazy conservative blogger's inability to read maps II

Usually Bluestem reserves its satiric spleen over lazy reporting for the rocking chair media. Indeed, I weighed the merit of chastizing MinnPost for its recent discovery of rural electrification in the miasmatic jungles of Redwood County--along with stumbling over interactive teevee classrooms at a MNSCU campus--but will wait until the  grant-plump staff marvels over the fact of plumbing in Rock County.

No, today's laurels are conferred on a certain rightie blogger who writes about the redistricting plan:

• It cuts Tim Walz’ mushy-left stronghold Mankato out of the 1st CD, putting it into John Kline’s solidly-conservative 2nd District.  This means the 1st CD’s fundamentally conservative, rural nature can be maintained.  It’ll be interesting to see how the DFL rationalizes pushing back against this, while fighting to keep the 5th and 6th districts uncorruptedly institutional-blue.
• Other than adding Mankato, the 2nd CD stays pretty solid.

Well, no.

Mankato is in Blue Earth County, and Blue Earth County remains in the First. And while much of the district is rural in terms of acreage, the turf includes Rochester. The blogger should try visiting the Med City. It's now the third largest city in Minnesota and at over 100,000, contains a significant percentage of the district.

This isn't the first time the blogger has gotten confused about Southern Minnesota. One of Bluestem's friends at I Don't Hate America noted back in January 2008 in A (lazy) conservative blogger’s inability to read maps:

Maybe I’m just being a nit here, but it really bugs me when bloggers on either side of the ideological spectrum purport to be experts/pundits on political issues and can’t even get simple facts straight when presenting an analysis.

Case in point: Shot in the Dark’s Mitch Berg on the Senate District 25 special election, won by DFLer Kevin Dahle. On Tuesday, not only did Mitch give the incorrect date for the election (claimed it was Wednesday when it was really Thursday), but claimed the district was “in the heart of Tim Walz’s district.”

Berg, who also plays radio talk show host every Saturday on 1280 AM “the Patriot,” explained the error with the date by stating he had meant to upload the post the following day (plausible, we’re all human, mistakes happen). He explained his error in identifying which Congressional District the SD was in by saying “SD25 is in CD2? Who knew?”

The latter is simply lazy “reporting.”

Who knew? Well, I would like to say everyone blogging about the subject, but I guess I was wrong.

As if publicly being wrong once on this very easy geographic fact was enough, today on Berg’s radio show he claimed SD 25 was in “the greater…uh…somethin’…the West Metro!”

West? Maybe south-southwest at an angle of 10 degrees…maybe. Metro? That’s funny.

This time, though,  posts the  redrawn map for his readers' pleasure. Is it safe to say that he simply doesn't know where Mankato is located? Nor how big Rochester is?

Or does he think redistricting involves relocating populations, rather than mere re-drawing of lines?

Another example of Bachmannian geography?

Image: SITD's map of new districts.

Cold comfort tea party: someone needs a weatherman to tell him which way the wind blows

Earlier today, Politics in Minnesota's Morning Report "Best of the Blogs" recommended Apparently the GLBT movement is dead, too, a post at the site kept by Michael Brodkorb's pet blogger. The entertaining piece illustrates the writer's rhetorical virtues as clearly as anything he's written of late.

Indeed, the short entry pulls together most of the blogger's stylistic graces. Read this post at Shot in the Dark, and you probably never need read another word the radio and social media personality commits to the ether.

The post compares Saturday's tea party rally with the OutFront Minnesota rally on Thursday.

First, it describes Saturday's event. Both the blogger and the press center on the excuses for a poorly-attended rally. Fox News 9's St. Paul Tea Party Rally Draws Smaller Crowd, describes the crowd as a "vocal group of dozens." As the screenshot above shows, the station named the lack of a keynote speaker and the weather as dampening attendance.

About that weather? The sunshine patriot writes:

It was 33 degrees at noon, when I spoke, and there was snow on the ground, and a cold wet wind was howling from the north giving wind chills in the teens.  Not prime rallying weather.  More like Valley Forge. 

That's the writer in the screenshot to the right, bundled up against the snow on the ground behind him (larger, long shot of Saturday's rally itself in the top screenshot).

Given the blogger's heroic prose, it's surprising that the dozens gathered weren't building little huts and drilling with their own Baron von Steuben.

Weather Underground's historical records for Saturday show that the high temperature was 42 degrees, the low 31, and the mean 37. The wind averaged 13 mph. A total of .02 inches of precipitation fell.

The impetus for the blogger's hyperbole and self-pity is a Star Tribune article, Attendance down at Capitol Tax Day rally. He doesn't link to the article, which also touches on rallies elsewhere in the country. Reading the Strib piece, one wonders what purpose the umbrage at the reporter serves, save to set up the hit on another rally earlier in the week, for GLBT equality.

Weather Underground's records for Thursday, the day of the earlier rally, show that high temperature was 48, the low 35, and the mean 42. The wind averaged 12 mph. A trace of rain fell (it was mixed sleet and snow at times during the rally).  In short, Saturday was five-to-six degrees colder than Thursday, but both were well below the average high for this time in April, the mid-fifties.

But in the creative nonfiction at Shot in the Dark, Thursday was one of those average April days:

By the way, an observer at the Capitol told me that attendance at the annual LGBT rally with Governor Dayton was “way down” from previous years.

Is it because the gay rights movement is dead?

Or is it because it’s an off-year, and the weather was  in the fifties and “wind-swept?”

The blogger shares an unnamed observer's thought that attendance at the OutFront Rally was "way down."

How big was the  weekday crowd? Dozens, like that on the weekend? Fox News 9 doesn't have a clip up of Thursday's rally that I could find, but a short article on the station's website puts attendance at "about 1000."

In Soldier's father, Gov. Dayton rally for gay equality, KARE-11 reported on Friday:

Gov. Mark Dayton Thursday became the first sitting Minnesota governor to speak at Outfront Minnesota's annual gay equality rally.  The event, for gay persons and their straight supporters, drew nearly 1,000 persons to the Capitol on a cold and blustery day.

The Star Tribune's item, in the Hot Dish blog, reported the same crowd numbers: about 1000. No online article for Outfront!

I attended Thursday's rally, and the numbers seem about right, though I was taping speeches and didn't do my own count. I haven't been at earlier rallies, so I don't know if the turnout is "way down" from earlier efforts. Last year, the Minnesota Independent reported "several hundred" rallied.

The conservative blogger's crowd estimate, much like his assessment of the weather on both days, shows a certain poetic flourish. Indeed, had the Tea Party Tax Day rally attendance only been that "way down" (to 1000) on Saturday, I suspect that his description of the weather would have prompted comparisons with the winter of 1941 or 1942 during the Siege of Leningrad rather than the sojourn at Valley Forge during a moderate Pennyslvania winter.

But Berg may be right. Weather might explain it all. Our own long cruel winter may have thinned the Tea Party ranks in Minnesota, and though that faction may have turned down government aid to make it through, certainly they are as resourceful as those Russians were once the cats and dogs were gone.

Selfishness is, after all, a virtue.

On the other hand, perhaps if the St. Paul Tax Day Tea Party had cancelled their rally like the fair-weather patriots in Rochester, the Twin Cities media could have devoted feature after feature to the non-event, following the lead of the Post Bulletin, which published three articles about the group after it was a no-show because of a little rain. Perhaps the metro Tea Party can learn from their experience.

Update: Fibonacci Blue, who photographs nearly every protest action in the Cities, left an interesting comment contrast the Tea Party Tax Day event with a February union action on the same spot in February:

Here are some similar thoughts about crowd sizes and weather with some pictures.

http://fibonacciblue.tumblr.com/post/4672654524/the-ups-and-downs-of-crowds-in-public-activism

There was a pro-union rally in February where a larger crowd fought through unshoveled steps and snowbanks to see the speakers. If people are motivated, weather is less of a factor.

Related post: Out-foxed: Rochester Post Bulletin wins Stickster Award for ultimate pander to Tea Party

Failed burrito baron and party boss Tony Sutton stiffs counties, looks to MNGOP to stuff tortilla

Yesterday, the Minnesota Progressive Project wrote that failed burrito baron Tony Sutton's Republican Party hadn't paid its bill to Olmsted County. Today, the Mankato Free Press reports that it's also still in hock to Nicollet County.

In Nicollet County to GOP: pay your bill, Southern Minnesota readers learn about the use of ALL CAPS to plead for an overdue bill:

After five attempts to get the Republican Party of Minnesota to pay its outstanding bill, Nicollet County Auditor Bridgette Kennedy resorted to capital letters and a threat on the latest invoice she mailed last week.

“FINAL BILL,” the invoice for more than $1,300 warned. “IF PAYMENT IS NOT RECEIVED, THIS BILL WILL BE TURNED OVER TO THE NICOLLET COUNTY ATTORNEY’S OFFICE.”

The bill is for labor and copying costs related to more than 3,000 pages of election-related documents demanded by the party in the wake of the narrow victory by Democrat Mark Dayton over Republican Tom Emmer on Nov. 2. The party put out similar requests to the rest of Minnesota’s 87 counties and many of those are also waiting to be paid five months later.

And what does Sutton say to this?

Republican Party Chairman Tony Sutton said Wednesday that the party is working steadily toward getting the bills paid and that all counties will eventually be reimbursed.

“ The hold-up is we don’t have the money, and we’ve been paying them off as we get the money,” Sutton said. “Everybody will get paid.”

Sutton, who said the party is about halfway through the list of unpaid counties, glanced at the list and noted recent or impending checks for Sibley and Martin counties.

“I don’t even see Nicollet on the list here,” Sutton said. “Hold on, that means we haven’t gotten any kind of invoice from them.”

Moments later, he said he’d need to check with the party’s finance director to verify why the county wasn’t listed. And he said, again, that all counties will be paid.

“I appreciate their patience and understanding,” Sutton said.

This is fascinating stuff, since the Star Tribune reports that Sutton is looking to get himself paid if he is re-elected as party boss. In Did state GOP chief offer to jump fence on gaming?, readers discovered:

Sutton, who has not been paid as party chairman for the past two years, said he may seek compensation if he wins reelection as expected this week.

"I've gotten a lot of encouragement from activists and donors," Sutton said. "They think I'm crazy that I've been doing it full time with no compensation."

If the party job comes with a paycheck, Sutton said, he may let his wife take control of Winning Strategies.

"I may have to mothball or maybe it's something Bridget can do, I don't know." Sutton said. "I'm really debating what do I do. I only have so many hours in the day to work. And right now I spend probably 95 percent of my time on the party. So from a practical matter, that's where I'm spending my time."

Goodness gracious. Seems like his wife is looking for work as well:

Lethert and Bridget Sutton exchanged e-mails earlier this year. In one of the e-mails, which were reviewed by the Star Tribune, she discussed the family's need to "replace lost income." In another she asked Lethert to help her find a job.

Tony Sutton did not dispute the authenticity of the e-mails, which were supplied by Lethert and which do not address the alleged racino proposal.

It must be tough, losing a business partnership like the one they had with TCF executive Bill Cooper.

Related posts: Mower County to Tony Sutton: Send us the $2,242 MNGOP owes for recount

New Madrid Fault moves north; or, Tony Sutton shakes it up in the Rochester Post Bulletin

"A lot of problems going on": Republican Party of Minnesota led way in letters from FEC

Google is not your friend; or, another winning strategy from MNGOP chair Tony Sutton

Career opportunities: Bridget Sutton is "no longer with" Baja Sol

Star Tribune finally notes Sutton-Baja split; Bluestem Prairie reported story March 7

Glenn gone wild: Gruenhagen gets public health crisis that leaves Bachmann stammering

Over at the City Pages, Jessica Lussenhop reports in a Blotter post, Michele Bachmann unsure if being gay is a public health crisis, Bachmann refused to answer the question and asked for another.

But Glenn Gruenhagen, the Minnesota Legislature's current resident crusader against the all-powerful and destructive undisciplined male sex drive--harmful even when directed toward the ladies, but exponentially tsunamic when paired with another dude--has the answer. Yes.

And the panic's not just for gays anymore.

Gruenhagen bemoaned the health risk of dudes kissing as early as 2004, in ’Til death do us 'impart' describes gay vows, a letter to the McLeod County Chronicle. He was quite certain about that "risky" threat--and was an equal-opportunity missionary against variety. Naughty straights are on the highway to hell as well.

He writes:

’Til Death Do Us “Impart”

The above title is my suggestion for gay marriage vows. In the Netherlands, where gay marriage is legal, the average gay marriage lasts 1.5 years. During that time, the average married homosexual has eight additional sexual partners per year, greatly increasing their risk of contracting deadly STDs and “imparting death” to their partner.

. ..First, the practice of sodomy is an addictive, sexual perversion that spreads sickness, disease, pain, suffering and death — whether practiced by heterosexuals or homosexuals. The public health laws in our country have always prohibited sodomy because of the medical consequences. It is an historical fact that all 13 colonies had laws against sodomy, even for married heterosexuals.

Gruenhagen has argued that alcoholism isn't a disease. Sodomy, though, is an addictive perversion with a health care agenda:

Second, what the gay rights activists really want is for the government to legalize homosexual marriages and for the rest of Americans to pick up the billions of dollars of health care costs to pay for the practice of their perversions.

. . .This is a wakeup call to Americans who still believe in our Constitution. Our Constitution has never guaranteed individuals the right to practice sexually perverted behaviors that spread disease and death to other individuals.

"Throwing condoms" at the problem is wrong, Gruenhagen asserts:

Currently the CDC estimates 8,000 teen-agers per day contract STDs (socially transmitted diseases) in our country and the liberals’ answer is to throw more latex condoms at the problem.

Perhpas Glenn just needs a lesson about condom use for something other than water balloons. I don't recall throwing them at a "problem."

Be that as it may, boys and girls, The Gruenators's in the House now to protect us against the consequences of our dirty, naughty passions:

...The compassionate political position is to help individuals who practice sexual perversions to stop that behavior before they destroy themselves and threaten the economic and social welfare of this nation. Remember, strong families equal a strong nation.

Oh, behave!

Image: Tild interprets the prescription for the public health risk of the male sex drive and sodomy. "She had the experience of an older woman, the morals of a liberal, and all of the intertubes for her wanton playground."

Look who's not talking: Newman stonewalls Minnpost on "I hate nonprofits" bill

Back on April 5, Bluestem posted about S.F. 1096 in What's Scott Newman got against non-profits? I wrote:

One has to wonder what problem this bill is aimed at solving. Are private non-profit colleges somehow less worthy of funding than a local MNSCU institution or the nearby jingle-singing mall outlet of a for-profit diploma mill charging jacked-up prices? Or are mental health services provided by the local hospital here in Hutchinson--a recently privatized non-profit--somehow less deserving than therapy at the regional treatment center in St. Peter or a private psychologist? 

If I recall correctly, Newman brought this up during the campaign and I was puzzled then about precisely what the problem is. It seems like a solution looking for a problem--and one that would cut out qualified service providers from bidding on projects or applying for grants. Does this create jobs? Does it save money? Just what purpose does this restriction serve?

Given that Bluestem and my state senator have--how shall I put this--a "history" since the story about mysterious emails denying meetings triggered an ethics investigation--I didn't expect an answer.

But it's not just Bluestem or people who live in his district. At Minnpost--which wins awards and has more money than you can shake a foundation stick at-- Cynthia Boyd reports in Proposed legislation stuns Minnesota's non-profits:

Every gathering of the Legislature has its share of goofy bills, but this one is a real head-scratcher.

State Sen. Scott Newman, a Republican from Hutchinson, has proposed legislation that would likely ban almost all state grants from going to nonprofit organizations. Officials from Minnesota's nonprofits are trying to figure out what he could be thinking. And so am I.

What gives? Newman isn't talking.

About that not talking to Boyd:

Newman initially stonewalled a media clamoring for explanations, later denied the existence of such a policy and then blamed the mistake on a staffer. The incident resulted in an ethics complaint against him, which was dismissed by a bipartisan Senate panel.

You have to wonder: Is this more stonewalling?

I started trying to contact him Thursday with phone calls and email messages.  

I asked for five minutes of his time. His staff said Thursday his day was heavily scheduled. They told me Friday he had headed home to meet with his constituents.

Does he have a cell phone, I asked.

He's been given the message you called, I was told, and was referred to the Republican media contact.

By Friday, Chris Van Guilder, the media's conduit to GOP senators, called back to say he had "not been able to contact or hear back from Senator Newman.''

"I'll let you know as soon as I know more,'' Van Guilder told me in a voice messge.

Haven't heard back.

Welcome to my district, Ms. Boyd.

Newman's office failed to schedule a request by the Minnesota Farmers Union for a meeting county presidents during our Day on the Hill earlier in the session. Instead, MFU members and I had a great meeting with Ron Shimanski.

At least we know it's not just writers in his district Newman doesn't talk to. It is to his credit that he did, however, meet with nurses from his district during their day on the hill, after the dust settled from the ethics investigation.

UPDATE:  A very clever friend recommended that Bluestem form a PAC, contribute to Scott Newman's campaign, and then he'd talk to us. Are you with me?

Northwestern Minnesota labor guy documents solidarity road trip

My friend Ted Fiskevold, a member of the National Writers Union, UAW Local 1981, Twin Cities Chapter 13, and a fine photographer, took a solidarity road trip with Mark Froemke, president of the Western and Red River Valley Area Labor Council of the AFL/CIO,  across the Midwest to document union action across the region. He's put together a photo blog of their trip. which readers should go check out. TedF captured some great images.

The trip received a write-up on the DL-Online, Local man attends big labor rallies in Wisconsin, Indiana. He reflects on the rallies:

“It really is pretty simple,” he said. “The haves have more and the have-nots have less — there really is class war going on in this country and people are getting angry about it.”

The rally on Saturday was the biggest in a month of protests and rallies in Madison, and the capitol grounds were full, Fiskevold said.

“It was like walking at WE Fest after the Saturday night show and trying to get out of the concert bowl — it was like that all around the capitol area,” he said.

With his permission, here's a tease, the first three paragraphs of the last entry, Full Circle to Hudson, Wisconsin:

 

Mark Froemke and I wheeled into the Park and Ride lot near the bridge over I-94 in Hudson, Wis. a little after 3 p.m.  A visibility picket was just winding down and Candace Lund, Minnesota AFL-CIO Mobilizing and Organizing Director was busy wrapping things up.

Candace, a woman with a lot of ‘zing in her title who puts a lot of zing into her job, told us the picketers encountered “Even greater reception that the first few Hudson rallies.”  That was not surprising since the polls had not been kind to Wis. Gov. Walker or his Republican allies in the legislature in regards to his view on collective bargaining and his association with the Koch Brothers.

The visibility picket message was mainly on the recall to keep people stirred up about Walker, but more importantly, to aid in the recall efforts on Republican Senator Sheila Harsdorf.  Harsdorf’s district includes Hudson, bucks right up to the Minnesota border, and requires 15,744 petition signatures in order to recall her.  A goal that was not too lofty, Candace told Jerry Ockerenfels, Froemke and me.

Go check it out. On Monday, TedF will be posting an entry about use of the photos by others.

Photos: People stand together in Madison (above); Candace Lund, (middle); cows march on Madison (below). Photos by Ted Fiskevold, National Writers Union, UAW Local 1981, Twin Cities Chapter 13, AFL-CIO.

"A lot of problems going on": Republican Party of Minnesota led way in letters from FEC

This week's public meltdown by MNGOP Chair and failed burrito baron Tony Sutton on the pages of the Post Bulletin lends added irony to a another unrelated story published earlier in the week by Roll Call.

Sutton stamped his little foot,  accused a Mower county official of tryong to "blackmail" him  and whined to PB reporter Kay Fate, saying:

"It's hard to raise money. It's a recession; it's the winter-time, and we're doing the best we can. They're going to get paid, that's going to happen."

On Monday, Roll Call reported in FEC Has Many Queries for Members:

A handful of Members of Congress have among them received hundreds of complaints from the Federal Election Commission about inaccuracies in their campaign finance reports over the past several years, far beyond the average of most campaigns. . . .

. . .It is not just individual campaigns that receive questions from the FEC. Including political action committees, joint fundraising committees and other campaign entities, the commission has sent out 48,000 requests for clarification in the past seven years.

“That is an alarming number,” said Craig Holman, a lobbyist for Public Citizen who monitors campaign finance laws. “When there are that many letters, it also strongly suggests that there are a lot of problems going on.”

Leading the way was the Republican Party of Minnesota with 153 letters since 2003.

“We went through a couple different accounting people and they frankly made mistakes in our reports,” state party Chairman Tony Sutton said. “It was kind of a headache to go through all of that but we fixed those mistakes and hopefully it is all behind us.”

Sutton's involvement with party finances during these years is chronicled by MNObserver here at the Cucking Stool. and his wizardry at running Baja Sol into the ground isreviewed by Phoenix Woman in a series of posts at FDL, including the classic, Tough Times at Tony Sutton’s Turkey Farm.

It's so hard to get good help these days.

Related: Read MNPublius's take on the Mower County episode here.

 

MN-03's secret congressman: who is U.S. Representative Jeff Paulson?

Matthew Abe appears to be a reputable conservative blogger in Minnesota. At North Star Liberty, his profile notes his credentials:

Observer of education policy and partisan politics, from the western suburbs of the Twin Cities, Minnesota. Co-founder and contributor to True North, a Minnesota-based conservative group blog.

Residing in "the western suburbs of the Twin Cities" would put Abe in Minnesota's Third Congressional District.

True North is a big deal, the smartly-designed rightward community blog in Minnesota that aggregates posts from across the state's conservative online ecosystem.

Thus, I wondered who Jeff Paulson was, since Abe is an authority and writes in a new entry crossposted at North Star Liberty and True North on Saturday:

Third District Congressman Jeff Paulson noted "what a difference two years makes," while noting that Democrats are already busy organizing and targeting him with protests.

Since MN-03 is represented by Erik Paulsen (no relation to Jeff Paulson), and Abe is a reputable blogger, I can think of only two explanations for this reporting.

The first is a clever ruse to throw off the crack team at the DCCC by making Erik Paulsen's movements in his district undetected by the bots that create Google Alerts.

Or Paulsen has been so lackluster in his congressional service that even his most ardent and competent champions can't remember his first and last name.

The error has been up on both sites for nearly two days and no one seems to have noticed enough to correct it.

Screen shots: North Star Liberty's "Jeff Paulson" post (above); True North's "Jeff Paulson" crosspost (below).

 

The breathless news: blogger succumbs to slow loris syndrome, hyperventilates over placement of Dayton office furniture

Pity the poor slow loris. Like their metabolic kindred, the sloth, slow lorises (lori?) don't move very fast, making them vulnerable to poachers, predators and a chronic inability to Google information. In short,  constitutional and congenital roadkill on the information superhighway.

The slow loris is the obvious totem animal for True North blogger Nancy LaRoche, who developed major fantods over a bit of gossip she--a veteran communications manager at a local purpose-driven marketing firm--heard in a movie lobby:

Last night, I bumped into a State Senator at the movies. . . .One of the most remarkable comments the Senator made was how Governor Mark Dayton has transformed his office. He installed cubicles into his office space for staff, and moved his office into... a closet. My first reaction was, "that sounds like a panic room." . . . This office space raised my concerns for his handling of leadership, and the location sounds like a physical way to insulate himself. The State Senator is also wondering about the state of Dayton's mental state. . . .

I felt the need to report this, as this would likely not be covered by mainstream media. True North will be following this closely to report all sides of the issue. I've sent an inquiry to the Governor and will follow up with his response.

Pity poor Nancy LaRoche, the latest victim of slow loris syndrome, both thinking it clever to engage in a pathetic fallacy, while breathlessly reporting idle chatter from a senator in Michael Brodkorb's caucus as breaking news.

Too bad  a Slow Loris Syndrom mental state prevented her from knowing that Google is Your Friend. What LaRoche and her fellow rightie bloggers clutch their pearls over this morning was news.

Over a month ago.

In Bigwig chooses tiny digs, the Star Tribune's Rachel Stassen Berger reported on January 15:

The new governor has taken the reins of state, but he's letting go of the some of the trappings. When visitors come into the ornate, spacious corner office traditionally reserved for Minnesota's head of state, they will find three staffers.

Dayton will work out of a closet-sized room nearby. A minimalist by nature, Dayton says his new Spartan space suits him: Just enough room for a desk, a computer and a phone. Two people could not stand side by side without being closer than Minnesotans like to stand.

"This place isn't going to change around in my lifetime," he said of the governor's office space. "So we had to change to it."

A reporter joked that Dayton's new office may put an end to any press corps complaints about their notoriously cramped, dingy Capitol basement digs. Dayton, however, noted his advantage: "I have a window."

Pity poor LaRoche. When it comes to ginning up a meme in the politics of personal destruction, she's a little slow.

Photo: A slow loris, totem animal of True North blogger Nancy LaRoche.

Eat It; or, swallowing Minnesota's partisan nostalgia

Today's Politics in Minnesota "Best of the Blogs" list provoked bucksnorts at this headline from a conservative St. Cloud blogger: Why Is the DFL Hearkening Back to the 80′s?

The opening was even better

During his SOS speech, Gov. Dayton hearkened back to the Perpich administration’s golden years. I didn’t think of it at the time but this op-ed by Sen. Amy Koch and Sen. Geoff Michel triggered an original argument. Here’s what they said that triggered my question:

Raising taxes is bad business, especially when our competitor states are doing just the opposite. Our neighbors in Wisconsin are lowering taxes and aggressively competing at our border.

Because every state wants to be just like Wisconsin right now. CBS Minnesota (formerly WCCO) was even moved to ask Could Minnesota See Similar Union Fights As Wisconsin? and allow Steve Drazkowski to pit workers against workers, without fact-checking his stereotyped opinions about public workers.

But I digress. As good for laughs as the Draz is, Gross's condemnation of the state's DFLers for looking back to the 1980s for political models wins the Last Blogger Standing comedy contest. Let Freedom Ring and its fellow MOB members are only now finishing their post-coital smokes from their public Ronald Reagan 100th Birthday Orgy. Gross even used Reagan's speeches as bath water.

That baring of souls before the idol of the Great Communicator was as stylized as anything ever ripped from the creative genius of a Pasolini.

And yet-and yet--as so many have pointed out, the Reagan at whose feet Minnesota's conservatives worship is not the actual man of the 1980s, however often the MNGOP and its minions hearkened back to the 1980s this month.

And those contemporary legislative figureheads Gross quotes? Hamline political scientist David Schultz's takes a good look at Detached Reality and Altered States: The GOP Response to the Dayton Budget at Schultz's Take:

Job killing and detached from reality. This is the core argument of the GOP against the Dayton budget. Yet behind the name calling one looks in desperation for the Republican alternative and it has yet to emerge. Just last week Dayton vetoed the $1 billion in cuts the GOP had already suggested. Yet that $1 billion was more than $5 billion short of what is needed, and they GOP has yet to propose how they plan to find the additional money.

The truth is they do not have a solution. Yes they will rant and rave about tax hurting the state economy (little evidence that is true), that there is waste and fraud (little evidence that is true), and that the budget is a job killer (even less evidence that is true). However, they do not have a solution and are afraid to offer one. Why? Two reasons.

Go to Schultz's Take to learn what those two reasons are.

But enough seriousness. Yesterday, Glenn Gruenhagen sent out an email to constituents in which he wrote that reality completes escapes the governor. Considering the source, that one would make a cat giggle.

Title reference: the 1980s were a special time. Nothing illustrates the decade's exceptionalism better than this classic music video.

Eleven-year-old Jason Thormodson on politics: "it could get crazy"

On Tuesday, I went to St. Paul with a group of Minnesota Farmer's Union members to meet with our state legislators, Attorney General Lori Swanson, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie and Governor Dayton. Though a lot of work, it was interesting: watching a committee hearing on Green Acres and listening to the concerns of family farmers from across the state.

The group's star grassroots citizen lobbyist was eleven-year-old Jason Thormodson, from the Madelia area in Watonwan County. After spending a few minutes talking to Thormodson in front of the MFU delegation, Governor Dayton asked if he could mention him in the next day's State of the State speech. The quietly confident boy immediately agreed.

And the governor followed through in yesterday's speech, saying:

I want to thank Jason Thormodson, an 11 year-old future farmer and mechanic from Madelia, for reminding me yesterday how very important agriculture is to our state.

This attention has put the media spotlight on young Thormodson. The Mankato Free Press reports in Madelia boy gets governor’s attention:

Jason Thormodson is a fifth-grader from rural Madelia who has more interest in tractors, combines and electric cars than he does political machines.

Even after the 11-year-old quizzed Gov. Mark Dayton on Tuesday, got a mention in the new governor’s State of the State address on Wednesday and received statewide media coverage Wednesday and today, Jason said he has no interest in a long-term stay in the political limelight.

“Mmm, uh-uh,” Jason said of a potential career as an elected official. “Because it could get crazy, and I just kind of want a quiet life, like being a mechanic.”

Pascal himself would be proud of the young man's natural prairie understanding of diversion. The kid is staying pretty calm. The Free Press story was prompted by the speech and an MPR story, An 11-year-old may have worked his way into Dayton's speech:

Jason Thormodson is going to get his name in the history books. The 11-year-old from Madelia is more than likely going to get mentioned in Gov. Dayton's State of the State. The reason: Thormodson was one of the many Minnesota Farmer's Union members who visited with Dayton on Tuesday.

"Are you going to talk about farming in your State of the State address?" Thormodson asked Dayton.

Dayton said yes. He then added "What do you think I should say?"

A stunned Thormodson was speechless at first. Sensing Thormodson's hesitation, Dayton asked Thormodson what he thinks is important about agriculture.

He then asked his spokeswoman, Katharine Tinucci if she was taking notes. "I'm going to put this in (his speech)," Dayton said.

Thormodson mentioned farming, the seeds and the ability to feed the world through farming.

"What kind of farming does your family do?" Dayton then asked Thormodson.

Thormodson told him his family farm deals with cattle, soybeans and corn. . . .

On one level, it's a cute, spontaneous story; on another, it's a bedrock illustration of a state where politicians and other leaders are usually not too far removed from the ordinary citizen. The Free Press reports that Thormodson first chatted up Dayton at Farmfest during last year's campaign, and that the kid was willing to hold the governor accountable:

He was comfortable enough with Dayton on Tuesday to put him on the spot about why he hadn’t answered the letters his fifth-grade class had recently sent. Dayton admitted he was running behind on responding to his correspondence and pledged to get moving on the responses to the Madelia fifth grade.

This give and take made all of us smile in the governor's reception room on Tuesday. Another meeting took place that also reinforced the notion of civility: with several other MFU members, including the president of the Meeker County chapter, as McLeod County MFU president, I met with Representative Ron Shimanski, R-Silver Lake.

Although I had criticized Representative Shimanski on this blog for co-sponsoring last session's HF3830, a copycat version of Arizona's notorious SB1070 law, his office set up the meeting without hesitation, and he was very engaged and courteous during the talk. This response paralleled our interaction last year when we disagreed via email; from my observations, Shimanski always remains respectful and accessible, regardless of whether or not the constituent agrees with him.

In this case we agreed. We mostly found a lot of common ground on agriculture issues, especially his understanding of the need for small, "micro-farms" that can be used intensively, profitably and sustainably in growing crops for sale at local farmers' markets. Such small farms are often the entry point into agriculture for new farmers, especially immigrants.

Of course, state policy needs to be flexible to accommodate a wide range of farms, producing at different scale--such diversity is welcomed in the ranks of the MFU--but it's good to know there's at least one legislator in the majority party who gets it. Earlier in the day in committee, Shimanski had unsuccessfully tried to move forward an amendment to the state's Green Acres statutes so that micro-acreage farmers could have the same tool to use as larger-scale farmers.

It was a great meeting, and I look forward to talking more about ag with Representive Shimanski, who farms and grows apples.

Two episodes the next day underscored Tuesday's lessons, including young Thormodson's understanding that politics "could get crazy."  One was already mentioned: Dayton's speech, a powerful example of a leader showing the way without showing anyone the door.

The other was the ethics hearing on the complaint against Senator Newman, who represents me in the legislature.  One can watch the hearing (hours and hours of it) at the Uptake; Bluestem, which first published the offending email sent out by Newman's LA, is mentioned. Over at Cucking Stool, Aaron Klemz produced my favorite reaction to the hearing and the subcommittee's decision not to move forward with the ethics complaint, in  "Who's Kidding Who?":

Everybody in the room deplored this email. They regarded it as "uncomfortable," an act that would exact a "political price" of Sen. Newman, who has "already paid the price." Newman, for his part, seemed contrite. So much so his lawyer, Fritz Knaak, stated that he was "surprised he's not blue in the face" from apologizing. In the end, the committee regarded his testimony that he had no knowledge of the email or policy against meeting with political opponents as "truthful and credible" and decided that there was no probable cause that he had violated Senate rules.

So that's that! And no harm done!

But on the path to that verdict, Newman (and former Coleman) lawyer Knaak held forth on the nature of the Minnesota Legislature. And boy, it's not a pretty picture. It's a world where everybody knows that access to legislators is for sale, and we should stop kidding ourselves. In his view, there's simply no rule that prohibits lawmakers from refusing to meet with political opponents. As Knaak put it, "while what happened is unfortunate, it is not a violation of the Senate rules." "If you look at past practice, and you look at history, something that is suggested in that particular email certainly was the case once upon at time if it isn't anymore."

Or, as he succinctly put it; "who's kidding who?"

Go read the whole post and watch a Youtube of Knaak's closing remarks at the Stool. Watching the hearing and reading the reaction in the blogsosphere made me understand the cynicism mentioned in the complaint, a sad rejoinder to the wonderful interaction with constitutional officers and state legislators I had enjoyed just the day before.

On Tuesday, one incident marred my visit. The Minnesota Farmers Union had requested a meeting for constituents with Senator Newman for our Day on the Hill. The office had asked for the names of those who would be attending, which the MFU cheerfully and dutifully provided.

No word came back from Senator Newman's office, and so we didn't meet with him. Was the lack of response due to his hapless aide? A decision on his part? No one knows. But readers might forgive me if I conclude that Newman is no Ron Shimanski or Mark Dayton when it comes to these sorts of things.

Or Jason Thormodson.

Photos: Jason Thormodson and SOS Mark Ritchie, photo by Sally Jo Sorensen (above); Ron Schimanski (middle); Scott Newman (below).

Southwest Metro Tea Party sponsors Bradlee Dean & Jake "McMillian" MacAulay movie night

Tonight, the Southwest Metro Tea Party emerges from its social conservative closet--discretely tucked a page down on its website--by screening a movie at the Chanhassen Cinema:

This Month's Movie, January 31st:

"My War"

The Testimony of Bradlee Dean

With Special Guests: Bradlee Dean & Jake McMillian

Son's of Liberty Radio (Saturdays 3-5pm on am1280 The Patriot)

This will be a night for the entire family!
"My War" is an all-encompassing look at the country today.
This documentary will give you insight into topics such as:
* Our Founding Fathers * The Constitution *
* What kids are being taught in public schools *
* The myth of alcoholism * Drug abuse *
* Hollywood and the moral decline of our nation *
* The spiritual heritage and foundation of the United States *
* The lies in the media * & much more *

HELP SPREAD THE WORD
& Be Sure To **BRING A FRIEND**
Trust Us -- You will not want to miss this Showing!

As Andy Birkey at Minnesota Independent, Karl Bremer at Ripple in Stillwater, and Ken Avidor at Dump Bachman have reported on an ongoing basis, Bradlee Dean ( birth name, Bradley Dean Smith) and Jacob "MacMillian" MacAulay run the homophobic "You Can Run But You Can't Hide" youth ministry from rural Annandale, out here in my neck of the woods (my state senate district, at least).

The Awl previewed the film itself last fall in My War': Bradlee Dean's Popular Struggle Against Those Criminal, Child-Molesting Gays.

Politico, like the mainstream media in general, may say that in the popular mind the Tea Party "movement draws on populist sentiments and pushes an agenda focused on reducing taxes, government spending and the national debt." In 2010, for instance, the New York Times reported that the Tea Party Avoids Divisive Social Issues. Other stories have suggested a Tea Party/social conservative split.

A recent poll found that Americans want Republicans to listen to the Tea Party, and given the earlier reportage about the Tea Party and social conservative ideas, those polled might readily be forgiven for assuming those ideas aren't a socially conservative agenda.

But the pollsters didn't actually define what Tea Party ideas are, so the coast is clear for the SW Metro Tea Party to fill in the blanks.

Southwest Metro Tea Party has other ideas indeed about what its ideas or "principles" are (scroll down a bit here), in a clear contrast with the agenda Politico outlines.  Sure, there's the frontpage short version: "fiscal responsibility, constitutionally limited government, free markets/free enterprise, [and] personal freedoms." But step deeper into the website for the self-described "longer version," and they align with the theocratic clap-trap espoused by Dean and MacAulay, as well as by the Republicans who love and support their ministry.

The group supports the principle of "personal liberty:"

No interference in private life, business, health, assembly, speech or possessions.

That "personal liberty" only goes so far, and certainly not to include a woman's right to make decisions about her own health or treating queer folk as equals. One principle is traditional marriage:

The union between a man and a woman, has been the foundation of every civilization in human history. It is incorporated into the fabric of our culture and civic life.  It is the platform on which children, families and communities are nurtured.  The institution of marriage is far too precious to surrender to the whims of a handful of unelected, activist judges.  Males and females are born with profoundly sacred and contrasting, yet complementary characteristics and responsibilities.

So much for the notion of "private life." Not to mention butch and femme. Read all of the Principles of the Southwest Metro Tea Party here in all their glorious pretzel logic.

But such paradoxes seem easily bridged by this set and their fellow travelers. Most recently, Bremer reported about YCRBYCH's commitment to the fiscal responsibility that the SW Metro Tea Party endorses.

Bremer writes in You Can Run But You Cannot Hide was evicted from Plymouth offices in 2007 :

Bradley Dean Smith, aka “Bradlee Dean,” and his Annandale-based anti-gay hate “ministry” found out that you can run, but you cannot hide—from the landlord. In 2007, Smith’s Old Paths Church Ministries, dba You Can Run But You Cannot Hide, was evicted under court order from its offices in the Bass Lake Business Centre II in Plymouth for nonpayment of rent.

The eviction was the result of a complaint filed against Old Paths Church Ministries in Hennepin County Housing Court on June 7, 2007, by its landlord, Bass Lake Realty LLC of Minneapolis. . . .

Read the rest at RIS.

Given the road conditions out here today on the wind-swept prairie, I'll have to forgo the splendors of Dean's cinematic masterpiece in Chanhassen--surely a case of weather-induced cultural deprivation second only to missing a Katherine Kersten-led tour of Yale Sex Week.

Image: A promo for Dean's war.

Blogs you should read: Come Saturday Morning and Renaissance Post on the grown-up governor

While her identity remains shrouded in mystery, blogger Phoenix Woman is no stranger to those who want their political commentary served with style and sass. In today's Come Saturday Morning: Governor Grownup Shows Us How It’s Done, over at FireDoglake, she writes:

Now Pawlenty is gone, free to pursue his presidential pipe dream for which he nearly wrecked the state by putting the whims of hard-right GOP presidential primary voters above the welfare of the people he was elected to govern. The nationwide Republican wave succeeded in tipping both state legislative houses back into official GOP control, but even it couldn’t get the virulent teabagger Tom Emmer into the Governor’s Mansion, and for the first time since my early adulthood, Minnesota now has a Democratic governor, Mark Dayton.

In this day and age, it’s a common thing for Democratic executive-branch leaders, be they governors or presidents, to cower at the sight of Republicans — and this is doubly true when the Republicans actually have official control of one or houses of a state or Federal legislature. Which is why it’s so refreshing to see Governor Dayton, politely yet fearlessly, go toe-to-toe with Republicans and their patrons.

Go over and read the rest of it there. In noting the strength of Dayton's pick for Department of Natural Resources commissioner--Tom Landwehr, the dream candidate for outdoors enthusiasts and conservationists--the post draws from commentary by Neil Haugerud, now writing at Renaissance Post.

Bookmark Renaissance Post. Haugerud delivers nuggets like these:

Landwehr’s appointment terminates an unhappy period in resource management direction in the Land of Sky Blue Waters. Neither the Boy Governor, nor his Wrasslin’ predecessor could see the need to go beyond cronyism in their natural resources appointments. Those administrations seemed to think that companionship in the blind or duck boat (duties amply served by competent Labrador retrievers) was sufficient qualification for a Natural Resources Commissioner. Dayton rightfully recognizes the value that Minnesotans place on their wildlands and outdoor recreation, and his appointment reflects the challenge and gravity of resource management.

Emphasis on the sentence that induced envy here in Hutch, and an appreciation for a Governor who can respect both a good dog and good government, while possessing the wisdom to know the difference.

A larger-than-life figure in Fillmore County, Haugerud:

has been — among other things — a carpenter, a farmer, a Sunday school teacher, a Marine, an interrogator of accused criminals (who got his subjects to talk with kindness, not waterboarding), a deputy sheriff and sheriff, a real estate and insurance agent, a prominent state legislator, the chair of the Upper Mississippi River Basin Commission, a small-town newspaper columnist, a mediator and consultant in conflict management, and a loving husband, father, and grandfather.

Some readers may remember his commentary in the Star Tribune, We're creating police who are quick to shoot, published shortly after the 2009 police killing of Tyler Heilman in Kasota. It's good to hear from another progressive voice in rural Minnesota.

Photo: Governor Mark Dayton.

Conservative sisterhood is powerful: VOICESPAC director throws Twila Brase under the bus after anti-Dayton protest fiasco

Earlier today, Bluestem reviewed how the rocking-chair media neglected one of the basic "5 Ws" of journalism by failing to identify Jake Macmillian/MacAulay as more than "citizen" in yesterday's coverage of Governor Dayton's press conference.

If that omission is neglect, then VOICES of Conservative Women director Jennifer DeJournett should be charged with depraved indifference to the facts in her treatment of Citizens' Council For Health Freedom President Twila Brase in the former's True North post, Dayton Press Conference sponsored by the Lifetime Movie Network.

The legacy press failed to identify Citizen Jake's activism and ministry; the conservative blogger went a step more by failing to use Brase's name at all.

She wrote:

To the amazement of Minnesota press, activists watching online, and, probably, the protesters in the room, Governor Dayton invited his detractors to the podium.   The protestors spoke with passion but were clearly unprepared for this important political moment.   There were no prepared talking points, no storytelling, and no clear action item to their message.  Watching from home, I wondered: where was one leader in the group who could concisely sum up the message in 2 minutes, with an action item for the people at home watching?  Why wasn’t this person speaking on behalf of the cause?   On this day, there was no coherent message.  As a result, our side lost the moment because we were not prepared, not because we were wrong about the matter at hand.  Their incoherent message detracted from the prepared remarks of our elected leaders who planned a concise message regarding the economic damage that Dayton’s signature would yield.

DeJournett could thus lament the quality of the conservative response to Dayton's move to expand Medicare in Minnesota, decrying the lack of leadership, without having to note--by name--the blistering failure of a well-known conservative woman who is an acknowledged leader in the health care debate. Moreover, DeJournett could also beat her hobby horse of the need of conservatives to recruit more women leaders.

This may be enough to hoodwink the North Star state's sleep-walking press corps, who will no doubt repeat the talking point that the Tea Party reception for Governor Dayton was grassroots and leaderless. Perhaps they might want to review the many tapes of the event, in which Brase clearly indentified herself.

DeJournett implies that the naifs at the podium--so generously offered in the spirit of free speech by Governor Dayton--were simply not prepared in the face of Dayton's lifelong preparation for singular, defining moment of his career.

Seriously?

While DeJournett sees Dayton as a master political actor, she must have missed the Star Tribune profile last year noting Brase's own mad skills:

Among insiders, she is an acknowledged master of political theater, turning out raucous crowds for hearings and staging publicity stunts such as a recent "Obamacare" shredding party in the Capitol rotunda. She said she solicited no votes for Modern Healthcare magazine's 2009 list of "100 Most Powerful People in Healthcare."

And--unless she has a very short memory or really bad reception from where she was watching at home--Dejournett must know who Brase is. After all, they shared the stage at last April 15's St. Paul Tax Day Tea Party at the Capitol. As a matter of fact, Brase had third billing in the events, while Dejournett fell considerably further down the list.

Brase has been trotted out by Minnesota conservatives at nearly every debate and discussion of health care reform and "Obamacare" in the past few years.

Take a look at her credentials from a pdf on the Citizens Council for Health Freedom

In August 2009, Modern Healthcare magazine named her as #75 on the “100 Most PowerfulPeople in Healthcare” list. In May 2010, the Star Tribune profiled her on the front page: “Twila Brase: Health care power or health care pain?” In 2000, the Minnesota Physician magazine selected her as one of “Minnesota’s 100 Most Influential Health Care Leaders.” . . .

Ms. Brase provides daily radio commentary through the “Health Freedom Minute” (AM 1280 - The Patriot), provides testimony at the legislature, meets with members of Congress, and speaks around the country. For example, she has presented on topics such as:
• The intrusive wellness and prevention initiatives in ObamaCare (Washington, D.C.)
• Patient privacy and need for consent (Congressional staff briefings; NM legislative committee)
• Danger of “evidence-based medicine”(EBM) (Washington Policy Center (Seattle))
• Proposed health care reform ( Kentucky business forum/Minnesota Tea Party rallies)
• Evidence-Based Medicine (State Policy Network forum in Miami; Physician forum Ohio)

She also testified against imposing a national patient identification number before a federal committee in Chicago. Her article “Blame Congress for HMOs” has been placed into the Congressional Record of the U.S. House of Representatives. She is regularly invited to join with other health care experts in a 2-day summit hosted by The Cato Institute.

Ms. Brase’s media interviews include: CNN, Fox News, KARE-TV (NBC), KTLK, Minnesota Public Radio, NBC Nightly News, NBC TODAY SHOW, NPR, New York Public Radio and WCCO-TV. She has been quoted in The Associated Press, Dallas Morning News, Medical Economics, Minneapolis Star Tribune, Modern Healthcare, St. Paul Pioneer Press, TIME, TheWall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Washington Times, UPI, WORLD, andWORLDNETDAILY, to name a few.

This is not a newbie. This is a person quite practiced in speaking about health care issues. This is a person who can condense a message to a “Health Freedom Minute” on AM 1280 - The Patriot.

Leadership? This is a spokester who appeared on Glenn Beck's show with no less than Tom Emmer himself on April 24, 2009. (The Emmer channel is gone--but the clip can be seen here).

This is a person Minnesota Majority gave second billing only to Michele Bachmann herself at a rally last March, as the Minnesota Progressive Project reported.

This is a person who barnstormed across Southern Minnesota with Allen Quist, scolding Congressman Walz about health care reform.

Now, having been at one of the events staged by Quist at the Happy Chef in North Mankato, I can say from personal experience that I found Brase's notions to be close to barking mad. However, her presentation skills were acceptable.

And yet DeJournett has erased the name of this leader--who organized Wednesday's protest--as surely as a Stalin-era photojournalist in the old Soviet Union following a purge. What's up with that?

Photo: Twila Brase.

GIYF: a note on Governor Dayton's civility, Citizen Jake, and rocking chair media sloth

Welcome, Minnpost readers:

Brian Lambert uses the time-tested MSM gambit for critics of the media.

First, label their analysis as emotionaL, or "worked up."

Second, deny or belittle the claim. Unfortunately for Lambert, when he writes  "TPT might have flubbed it, but MacMillian/McAulay was ID’d as an “activist” by others, if not a leader of the anti-gay “ministry”/radio show “You Can Run But You Can Not Hide[,]” he fails to identify those traditional news sources which did identify MacMillian/MaAulay's ministry (and they were, other than Andy Birkey at MNIndy,whom exactly?)--or to explain why "activist" furthers public understanding.

But then, what might one expect from a post in which my last name is spelled incorrectly? Circle the wagons and clutch your Calvins, gentlemen and women of the press, but get facts  and names right.

My original post:

Governor Dayton is earning high marks for his civility to friend and foe alike at yesterday's event, but the legacy media's wan performance in identifying those who sought to disrupt the bully pulpit is another matter.

It's provocative for a citizen to call for government to get out of health care, and let the churches provide for the poor. And that young man has a right to speak, as Governor Dayton honorably and quietly pointed out to the press and assembled public alike.

It's approaching journalistic malfeasance for the press to lack the curiosity to ask a simple "five W" question about "who" that young man at the podium might be.  It's their duty to ask such questions, a responsibility implied in the freedom of the press.

In short, in this age of civility, please realise that Google Is Your Friend (GIYF), Minnesota Public Television et al. With Mark Dayton serving as Governor and providing a model of decorous and gracious behavior, I promise not to use the potty mouth version of the acronym.

In return, I ask you to do your jobs and indentify those who insert themselves into the public discourse. Indeed, developing the slight amount of curosity in the Internet age might help you better understand the material you craft into "news." Almanac identified Jake MacMillian as "citizen" in the screenshot above. But he's much more than that, and informing viewers and readers about that identity serves the public interest.

After all, this "ministry" is no stranger to the political storyline that led to Dayton's election; Jake MacMillian/ McAulay's fellow "minister" Bradlee Dean played a strong supporting role last year. Dean's radio approval of kindred spirits in murderous homophobia was a key piece in the "Target supports an anti-gay politician" narrative that led many to boycott the retailer.

Fortunately, the not-so-rocking-chair media is online to help. Ripple in Stillwater asks some key questions about what Jake's own church might be doing for the poor in Punk anti-gay 'minister' tells Governor Dayton churches should provide health care for the poor. Answer: not much.

MacAulay raises some interesting points—especially considering he’s supposedly a paid ordained minister in a church himself. So as long as he’s asking, where is MacAulay’s “church” in all this?

I’ve spent a lot of time in the past few weeks looking into MacAulay’s mysterious “church” and have found virtually nothing about what it does or who it serves—other than the tens of thousands of dollars in grants it has received from its sister “ministry” YCR, and the $360,000 Annandale property it once owned that’s the home of Bradley Dean Smith, aka Bradlee Dean.

MacAulay is listed as the “agent” and “incorporator” of Old Paths Church, Inc. and YCR in filings with the State of Minnesota. The mission of Old Paths Church, its Articles of Incorporation state, “is to proclaim the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, to develop Christian leadership, to perform charitable work and to otherwise function as a church.” Nothing about providing medical help for the poor, as he so eloquently demanded of his fellow church brethren.

There are no expenses reported for indigent medical services—or any other kind of medical services—in the tax filings, state filings or an independent audit of You Can Run But You Cannot Hide International. Nor are there any other expenses listed that could conceivably be related to medical services. No tax records are available for Old Paths Church, which shares the same Annandale address as YCR.

RIS blogger Karl Bremer suggests that Jake should share his own ministry for the poor--a move that would also make his identity easily discoverable by the legacy press:

The next time “Pastor” MacAulay decides to take the podium and preach about what churches should be doing for the poor, perhaps he should stick around to enlighten his congregation as to what his own Old Paths Church is doing in that capacity. Or what it’s doing in any capacity, other than trying to shelter its income from the government.

At Dump Bachmann, Ken Avidor--another discipline of this arcane "Google" tool--looks at reportage from the opposing side in Bradlee Dean's Ministry Posts Video of "Son of Liberty" Crashing Governor's Press Conference.

One thing curious readers learn from Avidor's post--if they didn't know this already--Jake and his partner in crime Bradlee Dean also have a radio show. So Citizen Jake is not only a minister, but media himself, though apparently not bound by any ethical constraints to identify himself as a radio host. The curious might wish to listen on Saturday.

Avidor also points out that Jake didn't pop his protest cherry in Dayton's reception room:

This isn't the first time Jake has disrupted a political gathering - Jake crashed a DFL meet & greet in Cokato months ago and "confronted" gubernatorial candidate John Marty on his support for marriage equality (video here).

A curious narrative arc indeed, but not one the public will find on the pages of the credentialled press, save for MnIndy's sharp-eyed Birkey.

Related post:  Conservative sisterhood is powerful: VOICESPAC director throws Twila Brase under the bus after anti-Dayton protest fiasco

Screenshots: TPT identifies Jake MacMillian as "Citizen." (via Dump Bachmann, above); Minnpost's commentary about this post--because there's no finer way to belittle a post about the "who" in the five Ws than to spell the critic's name wrong (below).

On closing the barn door: a note about FEC reports and Minnesota's Eighth CD

 Bluestem rarely comments on Minnesota's Eighth Congressional District, since Duluth and the Range enjoy a history and heritage my beloved prairie simply doesn't share. However,Why Did Cravaack Hide Ties To Mining And Metals Industry?, a recent post on the Minnesota Progressive Project, does raise some interesting questions about due diligence research by bloggers and political campaigns--and these are questions that aren't grounded in geography.

First off, the MPP post is slightly inaccurate about the candidate's brother. John Cravaack is on the board of the Cincinnati chapter of the MSCI, not on the board of directors for the national MSCI. The blogger at MPP did not provide a link to document that information in her post at MPP; it's found here. Here's the list of names of the national  board of directors.

Perhaps an equally interesting question as "Why did Cravaack Hide Ties To Mining and Metals Industry?" is "Why didn't anyone in the DCCC, Oberstar campaign,the CD8 DFL, Environment Minnesota, or social media ask questions about missing information on Chip Cravaack's FEC reports BEFORE the election?"

As in, when this information (that the candidate's  brother sits on the board of a local chapter of the MSCI) might have in some  way swayed voter opinion?  The information about John Cravaack cited by the MPP blogger, as well as his two 2008 campaign contributions to John McCain and to McCain Victory Ohio, both of which disclosed his occupation -- was readily available online. I'm surprised no one looked and wrote about this during the campaign.

Based on the information in the FEC report the MPP blogger provides, the first 2010 contribution by the new congressman's metal-industry-employed brother was made on January 11,  2010. This contribution was first disclosed to the public in a report filed April 15, 2010 and can be viewed online.

To adopt the language of the MPP blogger, it looks like the Cravaack campaign was "deliberately hiding" the employer/financial information of most of his contributors in that quarterly report.

Why didn't anyone raise the point at the time? By then, Cravaack had received his party's endorsement.

I don't raise this question to score an idle rhetorical point. Reading Randy Demmer's FEC report last summer in the not-yet-hot but targeted CD1 race, I noticed a lot  of  missing information from Demmer's report and posted about the omissions, in a blog entry that supplied the missing information. That post got a great deal of traffic in the district--and generated some very interesting reader tips from ordinary citizens.

Candidates and campaigns may or may not be deliberately concealing information about contributors--but Minnesota's progressive bloggers might use this episode to conduct thorough reviews of FEC reports at the time they are released.

After all, the information in Oberstar's FEC reports was spun to Jim's disadvantage. How unfortunate --whatever the complacency of the DCCC, the congressman's campaign, and partisan bloggers who cover CD8 and who regularly review campaign finance reports, that no one thought to do the same--or assumed  that the information about John Cravaack was important. 

Was there a reason no one brought this readily-researched information about the candidate's brother forward before the election? Is it thought to be more damning now that Chip Cravaack is in office? Or is it the absence of the infromation--and that about other contributors as well--that is a problem? If so, why wasn't that an issue during the election?

Related posts from July:

Bluestem Prairie offers Walz opponent a helping hand with repairing FEC reporting

Demmer names campaign chair; move should help identify contributor Vin Weber's job

Bleg: Like Bluestem's investigative blogging? Drop some coin in the tip jar

Not long at Bluestem started in mid-July 2006, the blog drew national attention to Tim Walz’s triumph over then-Representative Gil Gutknecht at their first head-to-head debate. A writer at Daily Kos used the coverage to explore why local blogging matters.

Since then, story after story has first appeared here, as well as commentary about news from Greater Minnesota that often pushes rural life and politics toward a broader audience.

Think for a moment about items that first appeared on the little blog on the prairie. Emmer’s mortgages. Buesgens' home foreclosure. Quist’s political resurrection. The NRCC’s lifting of a slogan for an anti-depressant in a much-ridiculed attempt at re-branding. Randy Demmer’s abuse of the per diem system while attending NRCC candidates' school in DC. 

Story after story has broken at Bluestem, which runs on my own dime and tips from individual readers. Since the breaking of the Giefer pardon story on Sunday, November 28, people have been asking how they might help with the investigative work Bluestem provides for progressive causes in Minnesota.

The answer is simple: leave a holiday tip for Bluestem Prairie.

Want more research and blogging from this site? Contribute via Bluestem’s tip jar. All contributions will go toward keeping Bluestem going by paying the expenses for the site and  for research projects.  I enjoy a frugal life in rural Minnesota, and will use each dollar carefully as I pursue leads and story ideas.

Can you spare a few dollars to help fund the best little blog on the prairie? Not comfortable with the tip jar? Email me for an address where contributions can be sent.

Thank you,

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P.S. I continue to appreciate news tips as well; the Giefer pardon research started with a reader's tip.