Posted on 06/09/2007 6:55:29 AM PDT by Kaslin
November 8th 2006 was a pretty depressing day to be a Republican, no matter where you lived.
In Minnesota, though, the news was especially gloomy. In just 4 years the Republicans had managed to turn a huge political windfall—82 seats held in the 134-seat Minnesota House, a near tie in the Minnesota State Senate, and retaking the Governor’s chair after a 4-year hiatus caused by the peculiar victory of Jesse Ventura—into near total electoral disaster.
When the dust cleared the morning of November 8th, Minnesota Democrats (known here as the Democrat-Farmer-Labor Party, or DFL) held 85 seats in the Minnesota House and 44 in the Minnesota Senate—nearly 2/3rds of each body’s members.
And Tim Pawlenty, once seen as a rising star in the Republican Party barely squeaked back into office against one of the most profoundly flawed and disliked DFLers in the state. Pawlenty survived, but appeared mortally wounded to many political observers around the state. As the sole Republican survivor (Republicans lost control of the Secretary of State and the State Auditor’s seats, as well as control of the House), Pawlenty’s future seemed tied to accommodating the new Democrat reality in Minnesota.
What a difference a few months makes! Governor Pawlenty is riding high, the seemingly invincible DFL majorities are in disarray, and rumors abound about significant leadership changes in both the House and Senate Caucuses.
What made the difference? Two things: the near suicidal arrogance of the DFL majorities in trying to push their agenda through, and the ability of Governor Pawlenty to veto DFL bills while rallying his dispirited troops to stand behind him.
The Democrats did much of the heavy lifting for Governor Pawlenty. They not only proposed a radical agenda ripe for vetoes, they did so while breaking just about every promise they made during the campaign. After promising a modest agenda with few or no new tax increases, the DFLers proposed over $5.5 billion in new taxes, including a proposal to impose the highest tax rate in the nation.
Spending went up even faster under their proposals—not only were they going to gobble up all that new tax revenue, but they were proposing maxing out the state’s credit card with a huge bonding bill filled with pork projects for their members.
Add to these policies the insult of trying to roll back key elements of welfare reform, extend the vote to non-citizens, and provide in-state tuition to illegal aliens.
In short, opposing the DFL agenda was not tough going politically. Even where you think the Democrats might trump the Governor, on issues such as increasing education spending, it turned out that they couldn’t compete. Spending pressures by liberal interest groups were so great that the final DFL education proposal actually increased general education revenues by only 3/8ths of what the Governor had proposed! Not exactly the huge boost in spending for a starved system they had promised.
The genius of Governor Pawlenty’s strategy was based upon its simplicity and nearly failsafe nature: let the Democrats propose what they really want, carefully articulate his own position, and wait for the Democrats to pass their legislation.
Then: veto, veto, veto.
The very simplicity of the approach stunned the DFL majorities. They had believed that their majorities assured legislative victories and their inattention the Constitutional powers of the Governor cost them every major legislative battle during the legislative session.
By the time the session was over, the State Budget that passed actually grew more slowly than Pawlenty had proposed. The Republicans were united, Conservatives energized and even optimistic, and the Democrat majorities were left in a shambles surrounded by angry activist groups who had been promised government largesse.
There is a lesson to be learned here: Republicans succeeded despite their huge legislative defeats because they united behind their principles, stood up to the Democrats and their crazy liberal agenda, and had the courage to say NO!
When the final compromises had to be made, Pawlenty and the Republicans were able to do so from a position of strength, not weakness.
All because they had the courage to stand up for principle. That is the formula for success.
Gosh. Send this story to the Republicans in Congress, the White House, and at the RNC.
Bottom line is the formula for victory is called "LEADERSHIP"
National political leadership in the GOP is virtually non existent and I don't expect that to change anytime soon.
Leadership starts at the top
Can we have everyone send this particular sentence to their GOP congresscritters? Like, NOW???
Gee I guess we will just ignore the fact that it was leadership from Republican Senators that killed the Immigration Bill this week. Guess it is just so much easier to just cling to the dogmas screamed by the Talk Radio guys mouths then to bother to think
Gee. Too bad it took a near-hanging party to get most of them to do the right thing.
So if I follow your reasoning, they (the GOP senators) would have killed that immigration abomination out of their own accord, if we hadn’t made them see the error of their ways...
Well, you have me convinced! When can I buy that New Mexico beachfront property you’re offering?
What? More guns and butter? Sooner or later you have to give one of them up. Preferrably both. The nation simply cannot continue to spend the way it did under 6 years of 'conservative' leadership. Not to mention the same leadership that would have legalized 20 million illegal aliens if no one would have spoken up. I still expect that travesty to get through in the dead of night
Course it won't be any better under a Democratic leadership but Republicans seem to find their 'limited government' bone when they're not in control.
The way to show the voters why they need to vote FOR you, is to display the courage of your convictions and the better value of your ideas.
Up till the recent immigration fiasco (and even through it,) too many GOP congresscritters were trying to play nice with the Dims. It took a roused-up base to have them (the congresscritters) realize that maybe, just maybe, they should be trying to please the base, and not the Dims.
I have no faith in the thought that they would have killed the immigration fiasco without our ANGER.
On this you are right. We need to give positive feedback to those who made the right moves. Who are the heroes?
That was my 1st thought too....thankfully the MN governor did not not have the genius of Rove or the compassion of Bush to contend with.
An excellent point.
Of course, it assumes that one has principles. ("Getting re-elected no matter what" does not count as a principle.)
Well, if you call the minor peasant revolt that flooded DC that forced them to actually pay attention to us, if you call that "leadership", go right ahead and keep updating your dictionary.
...to just cling to the dogmas screamed by the Talk Radio guys mouths then to bother to think
I might suggest that you engage your thinking abilities yourself since you are clinging to the delusion what is coming out of DC remotely resembles conservative leadership, especially the WH
As for talk radio guys, that is strictly for the daily meme for mass consumption for people who fail to understand it is entertainment to make them profitable
There! Fixed it for you!
Now stop whining and go to work!
"Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did, and it never will. Find out just what a people will submit to, and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them; and these will continue until they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress."
Frederick Douglass August 4, 1857
What made the difference? Two things: the near suicidal arrogance of the DFL majorities in trying to push their agenda through, and the ability of Governor Pawlenty to veto DFL bills while rallying his dispirited troops to stand behind him.
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Too bad we don’t have a president that believes in his own party’s principles and is willing to stand up for them.. it would make a huge difference.
Good story from Minn./Pawlenty. Backbone rallies the troops and wins back the people.
1) Stop acting like democrats.
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