Well the House DFL is leaving little to the imagination of what it looks like inside the mind of a utopian. That is, what does the agenda look like from someone who has no basis of using practical real world cause and effect and instead relies entirely on feelings to govern.

Its always a good indicator that a policy is flawed when, in order to get enough support to pass legislation, you have to insert exclusions for special interests who would be harmed upon implementation…. (emphasis mine)

The Minnesota House and Senate have agreed to an energy bill that includes a 1.5 percent solar energy standard for investor-owned utilities.

[...]

The conference committee working out differences between the two bills decided on a 1.5 percent solar energy standard that will take effect sooner. Investor-owned utilities, such as Xcel Energy, must meet the standard by the end of 2020. Iron mining facilities and paper mills are exempt, as are electricity co-ops and municipal utilities.

Here’s a response from House Republicans on the issue.

St. Paul- Reps. Tim O’Driscoll (R-Sartell) and Pat Garofalo (R-Farmington) issued the following statements upon passage of the conference committee report for the Jobs, Commerce, Housing, and Energy Omnibus bill. HF 729 passed by a vote of 73-59 and the conference committee report now heads to the Senate for final passage.

“I was disappointed to find excessive wasteful spending for inefficient government programs in this bill which is inaccurately titled a ‘jobs’ bill. HF 729 is a hodgepodge of state programs and initiatives that will spend millions in taxpayer dollars and only kill jobs or drive them elsewhere through higher taxes, fees and energy rates. The special interests that benefit from this bill will result in others losing out, including a special group of employees that will receive much higher unemployment benefits than the average Minnesotan,” said Rep. O’Driscoll.

“Democrats passed energy mandates tonight that will result in higher energy costs for hardworking Minnesotans. Democrats are forcing consumers to use energy that nobody wants, everyone will pay for, and no one can afford,” added Rep. Garofalo.

Meanwhile, on the real energy crisis that affects Minnesotans TODAY….

Prices around the metro and across Minnesota jumped well above $4 a gallon Wednesday. Prices at some stations around the metro were listed at $4.19 a gallon, while other stations were reported to be slightly higher.

According to AAA, the highest average price on record for the state is $3.98, that was in 2008. Minnesota, Wisconsin, North Dakota, Michigan, Illinois and the West Coast are holding the highest gas prices in the country right now.

AAA says higher crude oil prices are partly to blame for the price hike, but refinery maintenance both planned and unplanned in the Midwest and West Coast caused those prices to go up.

AAA says we might not get relief at the pump until July 4.

This is not on the list of things the DFL is worried about. In fact, they are proposing a gas tax increase as well as driving related fee increases to pad their special interest slush funds and bailout packages.

Is this what you voted for Minnesota?

My state Rep recorded a video update about what is (or rather isn’t) happening at the State Capital under the DFL’s leadership.

From Governor Dayton’s press conference yesterday. He was asked if he raises taxes on businesses, won’t middle class Minnesotans (and lower btw) be forced to pay more for goods and services.

There is no free lunch folks. The taxes, fees, and regulatory burdens the DFL are going to pass will end up being paid by every single Minnesotan.

Tick Tock…..

And let’s not forget how the DFL sounded 2 years ago when the shoe was on the other foot.

From May 22, 2011 REUTERS by: David Bailey

Protesters supporting and opposing the amendment could be heard demonstrating outside the House chambers for days and anti-amendment chants were audible after the vote.

The amendment is “a real ill-advised attempt to use our constitution to place an important question out of reach of the elected officials and to impose our will in the year 2011 on future generations 100, 200, 300 or more years from now,” Democratic Representative Steve Simon said.

Democrats questioned the drive for the constitutional amendment with the state budget still unresolved. They also said they were concerned it would lead to a divisive political campaign over the next 18 months to the election.

“Millions and millions of dollars will be poured into this state on both sides and the pain and agony that I have witnessed in this chamber this evening will be all over Minnesota,” Democratic Representative Kerry Gauthier said.

Meanwhile, the private behind closed doors negotiating meetings between DFL Governor Dayton & the DFL Majority Leadership teams has been unable to produce a budget.

Following the 90 minute meeting, Bakk told reporters that they’re still trying to agree on a global number on new tax revenue. He said that number is needed to set the spending targets for each piece of the budget.

Tax first, figure out if the spending even makes sense never….

Bakk said they’re also still discussing the Senate’s sales tax expansion, which neither the House nor the governor supported.

There’s a clear sense of ‘urgency’ in the DFL Senate  membership to sock it to lower and middle class Minnesotans to expand State Government. They are holding the budget hostage for one of there pet projects.

Heck with under 2 weeks to go, there is not even agreement amongst DFLers about even the budget targets.

House Speaker Paul Thissen, DFL-Minneapolis, said they’ve been talking about the budget in very broad terms. Thissen said he’s hoping for an agreement on budget targets as soon as possible.

Maybe if they weren’t so distracted with their own divisive agenda Minnesotans wouldn’t be facing yet another Dayton shutdown.

Clearly Mark Dayton is incapable of leading.

Has he given the order for his Cabinet to begin preparing for a shutdown since the DFL uni-partisan Governing team seems to be at an impasse?

Governor Mark Dayton, the DFL Party, and their allies campaigned against Republicans in 2012 on the platform that they put divisive social issues ahead of the State Budget. They hammered that issue home in the hearts and minds of Minnesota voters (and I’m sure a few of them twice not to mention some ineligible voters – ). The message was based on poll testing not truth, but the voters still bought what the DFL was selling and they won both majorities giving them unchecked power and the inability to blame Republicans for any delay or impediment of their left wing agenda.

Was solving the state’s budget woes the first item on the DFL’s Legislative agenda? Nope? Second? Nope. Third, fourth, fifth, etc? Nope.

Here we are just 2 weeks from the end of the session:

In addition, the Legislature may not meet in regular session after the first Monday following the third Saturday in May of any year (Source)

Up to this point, the DFL majorities have introduced left wing agenda platform plank after plank to appease or or strengthen their allies and special interests to secure their support in the 2014 election and beyond. They ran against pushing divisive social issues, legislation crafted towards specific interests, and shirking the primary purpose for the odd year scission AKA passing a balanced budget to avoid a shut down.

A couple of great examples of the DFL’s campaign saying one thing, but win power and do the opposite are:

Voter ID: The DFL told voters to vote no and send the bill back to the Legislature to get it right. What have they done? They are pushing for early voting, less transparent election operations, and ignored actual examples of voter fraud. They’ve gone to the opposite “extreme” if you will.

Gay Marriage: The DFL railed against the Republicans for putting the Marriage Amendment on the ballot. They claimed it was dividing Minnesotans. The Amendment was narrowly defeated. So what does the DFL do? They make it a priority to Legalize Gay Marriage.

Guns: Urban DFLers have a long history of hating guns and wanting to ban the use and ownership of them. Over the years, the urban DFLers have been able to get their Caucuses to avoid the the issue to avoid losing seats in areas outside the 694/494 beltway where talk of gun restriction is political suicide for DFLers. Several radical knee jerk measures were brought forward, but for lack of support, they were all pulled from the light of day due to lack of DFL votes.

Sure the DFL has spent a lot of time and effort on increasing spending, regulation, and taxes, but with just 2 weeks left in the session they still have yet to release their actual budget. The price tag for unchecked left wing socialism has yet to be released. Considering the campaign DFLers used to win the majorities, its a shame that we still haven’t seen any example of what they would do differently than a Republican Majority?

They’ve wasted months of this session pushing divisive social issues, ramping up regulations, taxes, mandates, and catering to their special interests.

I got a couple of comments and emails about my last post:

Winkler & DFL Massive Minimum Wage Hike And Union Kickback?

The responses were that the 282,000 people Rep. Winkler said were going to get a pay increase above and beyond the 93,000 that get the minimum wage are people currently making less than the proposed minimum wage who would see a bump.

I was told the DFL commissioned a study that these numbers were derived from.

So let’s look at the actual cost of the payroll increases the DFL is proposing in terms of employers bearing the cost. The second line of 375,000 is the number of workers Winkler claimed would see a pay raise. I approximated the $1.86 as half of the full $3.35 pay hike as an average.

The contention among many people is that the DFL’s desire to pass massive minimum wage hike is that its just a union kickback. Many union contracts are tied to the minimum wage. It may be as many as 282,000 union employees have their contracts tied to minimum wage. Its something that is hard to research, but I may have just found a clue.  (See end of this post!)

Let’s start off with the simple facts first.

According to the MN Department of Labor and Industry only 93,000 Minnesotans actually get paid the minimum wage. There are some interesting tables in that link that show the demographic breakdowns of who is really being paid minimum wage in Minnesota.

DFL Rep. Ryan Winkler is the chief proponent of the massive minimum wage hike coming to the House floor on Friday.

The bill HF92  broadens the definition of a large employer (Currently: Gross receipts of over $625,000. Revision: Down to $500,000 a yr.). That means more employers are going to be hit with higher cost of doing business but not because of business growth. Its because a politician wanted them to. The DFL House bill would require some employers to pay more even if their business didn’t grow. Basically, Winkler is just moving the goal posts.

Winkler’s rate increases are staggering. They will be increasing as much as 62% on some employers in just 3 years and after it hits the proposed auto-pilot in 2016, it could skyrocket.  (Currently $6.15 for large employers & $5.25 for small employers.)

I made this handy chart to compare the changes being proposed by Rep. Winkler.

Note: Starting in 2016, the Minimum wage rate would go on autopilot. Every year that rate is required to be “adjusted” by Winkler which means there is no telling how high it could go.

Here is a news story on the Winkler bill where the DFLer may have tipped his hand at why he is seeking such a massive increase in the minimum wage.

Minimum-wage legislation headed for the House floor

By ECM on April 30, 2013 at 2:28 pm - by Howard Lestrud - ECM Political Editor

It is expected that minimum wage legislation approved on a voice vote by the House Ways and Means Committee on Monday will be brought up on the House floor on Friday.

The committee advanced a bill that will give 375,000 Minnesotans a pay increase, said House chief author Rep. Ryan Winkler, DFL-Golden Valley.

375,000 Minnesotans would receive a pay increase due to the minimum wage rates going up according to Rep. Winkler?

The Department of Labor & Industry only reports 93,000 Minnesotans receiving the minimum wage. Who are the 282,000 other people Winkler claims will receive a pay increase?

Could they be the union employees who have their contracts tied to the minimum wage?

Could this be another kickback or sweatheart deal for the unions who worked so hard to get the DFL majorities and elect Governor Mark Dayton?

Its quite disappointing for those of us who volunteer for the conservative cause to see so many people undermine our values and all our hard work for what appears to be the big paycheck.

You have to wonder if this:

Minnesota GOP should back same-sex marriage

• Article by: BRIAN MCCLUNG

May have more to do with this:

American Unity Fund Pushes Republicans To Back Gay Marriage

Than some grand demographic shift.

Another well known name is also mentioned in this story who has a record of selling his or her principles.

Its important to remember that even in the Liberty Coalition dominated 2012 MNGOP convention that traditional marriage remained in the Party Platform.

Beware of the people who are deemed smart and thought leaders, they may be simply lobbying on behalf of a their paycheck, not their principles.

Scott Honour announced yesterday that he will be running for Governor as a Republican.

His website is HonourforGovernor.com

You will probably be seeing a lot about him as he has already assembled a top notch staff including many formidable Republican operatives. I will be interviewing him some time soon for the blog when my schedule permits.

And true to his mudslinging form, Mark Dayton is using the propaganda arm of his campaign to launch the first, albeit oh so hypocritical and glass house-esque, attacks.

Source MPR:

Gov. Dayton has said he intends to run for re-election.

Honour’s announcement drew a quick response from the Alliance for a Better Minnesota, an outside group that works to elect Democrats. The group criticized Honour’s background.

“Surprise, surprise the first GOP candidate for MN Governor is a corporate CEO with mega-millions,” ABM wrote on its Facebook page. “He lives in a mansion on Lake Minnetonka. Not surprising: He’s wrong for Minnesota.”

DFL Governor Mark Dayton is worth hundreds of millions so that his campaign would launch this attack is rather bizarre. Also bizarre is that the DFL is firmly behind another multi-million DFLer in the 6th District in Jim Graves who is running against Congresswoman Michele Bachmann.

Let’s also not forget that ABM, the Dayton family slush fund, is an astroturf organization funded largely by a handful of millionaires and left leaning special interests. They with the help of other Democrat candidates have spent upwards of $40 or $50 million in the last 2 election cycles to elect Dayton, the DFL majorities in the Legislature, as well as defeat 8th District Congressman Chip Cravaack.

Its also quite juicy that they released such an attack on the day the DFL House & Senate passed their onslaught of billions in new taxes and fees that hit every single Minnesotans, regardless of income bracket.

If you needed further proof that the DFL doesn’t understand business, they are now pushing to ban employers from requiring a disclosure of criminal history on job applications. That’s right, the same people who don’t think anyone should own guns and if you dare demand the ability to pass one, would have to have your full mental history probed as well as submit to an intensive background check before you can buy one. But they want businesses to stop asking people who would have access to money, private data, and resources if they have been convicted of a felony.

Because you know, businesses have nothing of value that could be stolen or something….. Not to mention many businesses are prohibited by laws to employ felons…. but let’s not get bogged down in the details.

The Senate is so out of touch with reality the 2016 Republican Senate campaign could easily win if they made staggering the Senate terms (not to mention term limits) their corner stone message.