Category Archives: Polling

Reality Check Needed In GOP Debate Venues

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GOP_debate_audience_-_Google_SearchIf I were a political party chair, I would make one simple adjustment to make my party more competitive. I would only allow general election swing voters to attend candidate debates.

In general elections, history tells us that the Republican nominee is going to win most Republican voters and lose most Democratic voters. Therefore, their fate is usually going to be determined by their relative ability to attract the roughly one-third of the electorate who are undecided and/or don’t have predictable partisan voting patterns.

If only these type of “swing voters” were sitting in the audience of the debates, candidates would get the kind of reality check that they just don’t get when speaking at partisan debates, rallies, fundraisers, and interest group endorsement interviews.

For instance, when billionaire Donald Trump demeans women, Hispanics, immigrants, and other large voting blocks, he wouldn’t hear the roar of approval he hears from his loyal supporters. He would hear the groans of a broader group of Americans, 59% of whom now have an unfavorable opinion of Mr. Trump, by far the worst of all Republican candidates.

When Dr. Ben Carson says the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is the worst thing since slavery, he wouldn’t be rewarded with the hoots and hollers he gets at gatherings of extreme conservatives. Instead, he would hear disapproval from Independent voters, a plurality of whom want the ACA either maintained or expanded (only 30% want it repealed).

When Senator Marco Rubio brags about his legislation opposing Affordable Care Act funding of birth control, he won’t hear the “amens” he gets at gatherings of his anti-abortion supporters.   He’ll hear boos from the 69% of Americans, and 77% of women, who support that ACA birth control benefit.

When Jeb Bush describes his predictable plan to further cut taxes for the wealthiest Americans, he won’t get the cheers he gets from the GOP establishment. He’ll hear boos from the 66% of Independent voters who want to increase income taxes on people earning over $250,000 per year.

When Senator Ted Cruz, Senator Rick Santorum, Governor Bobby Jindal and Dr. Carson all tout their support for a constitutional amendment banning same sex couples from getting married, an audience of swing voters would not react nearly as positively as conservative audiences do.   After all, a solid majority (61%) of Independents now favor same sex marriages.

To save their party, Republican candidates desperately need a reality check to prevent them from taking extreme positions that sell well with extreme right wing activists, but harm them in general elections, when they need to win a majority of middle-of-the-road voters. Removing the conservative hallelujah chorus from presidential debate audiences would be one good way to begin to inject such a reality check.

BLM Protests Are Starting to Spotlight Disruption More Than Discrimination

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I want what the Black Lives Matters (BLM) movement wants.

Police body cameras? Yep.   Punishment and removal of police officers who are abusive and/or are engaged in racial profiling? It’s about time. Prosecution of police offers who break the law? Yes.   More diverse police forces? Definitely. Better training in deescalation techniques for police officers? Badly needed. Less draconian drug laws? Amen.  More white awareness of examples of disgraceful racially based abuses in the law enforcement system? Absolutely.

Black Lives Matters is on the right track, and I’m with them.

But when it comes to disruption of community events that have nothing to do with racial discrimination in the law enforcement system, BLM loses me and a lot of other sympathetic citizens.  Legal authorities can determine the extent to which such disruption is permissible, but my question is whether it is persuasive.

Protesting at the scene of an incident of police abuse is persuasive, because it shines a light squarely on an example of abuse.  Just as sit-ins at segregated diners forced white America to open their eyes to the injustice of Jim Crow laws, shining a light directly on undeniable examples of police abuse is having a profound effect on white opinions.

Americans__Satisfaction_With_Way_Blacks_Treated_TumblesFor instance, between 2013 and 2015, Gallup finds a 14-point increase in the number of white Americans who are not satisfied with the way blacks are being treated. Another poll finds that an overwhelming 89% now support the use of police body cameras.

Black Lives Matters is starting to win, and that’s very good for our country.

But disrupting community activities that have nothing to do with police abuse – fairs, commutes, and sporting events — effectively is spotlighting disruption more than discrimination.  Because the disruptions are unpopular, I worry that the tactic will result in fewer allies for police abuse reforms. If the ultimate goal of BLM is to change the law enforcement system so that it better protects black lives, rather than to simply get on the news, disrupting non-discriminatory community gatherings strikes me as self-defeating.

The Saint Paul BLM chapter apparently is planning to disrupt this weekend’s Twin Cities Marathon, an uplifitng community event that is not the least bit connected to the issue of racial bias in the law enforcement system.   This is of particular interest to me, because my son has been training for months to run his first marathon that day, and I’ve been looking forward to a 10-mile run.  The protest could change all of that.

To be clear, I am keeping this in perspective. Seeing my son have his dream of completing a marathon taken from him is obviously nothing compared to black parents seeing their children have their dignity, dreams and lives taken from them due to our discriminatory law enforcement system.  I get that.  But such disruptions of community events do feel unfair, unnecessary and unfocused to a lot of citizens, and I fear public resentment of the tactic will inadvertently set back a very important cause.

DFL Shouldn’t Politicize Makeout-gate

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news_conference_microphones_-_Google_SearchThe messenger is the message. If a professor delivers a message, it tends to sound objective, studied and evidence-based. If an elder statesman delivers a message, it tends to sound thoughtful, even-handed and rational. If a reporter of a credible news outlet delivers a message, it tends to sound legitimate, consequential, and relevant.

And if a political party leader delivers a message, it tends to sound one-sided, hyperbolic, manipulative and, obviously, political.

Maybe that is not always fair, but the messenger delivering the argument profoundly shapes how the audience processes the messages that are presented.

This is hardly a novel observation, yet it seems completely lost on Minnesota’s major party leaders. Often when political party leaders weigh in on an emerging issue, they inadvertently leave a slimy residue behind.  The message becomes “this is a political game being played, not a legitimate issue.”  At a time when survey research shows that a strong majority of Americans have an unfavorable view of both major political parties, pointing the spotlight to a partisan messenger can be the PR kiss of death.

Take the issue of whether or not two Minnesota state legislators should apologize to a suburban law enforcement officer.   The legislators initially called the officer a liar when the officer reported that the legislators were doing something in a suburban park that was a bit more intimate than the claimed “exchanging documents.”  The teen term of art “makeout” was used in the officer’s report, and, to the delight of the incurable gossips who inhabit the State Capitol campus, more racy details were included.

Subsequent news accounts reported that the officer documented the salacious details of the incident via email in near real time. Faced with this new reporting, the legislators in question reversed course.  As the Associated Press reported:

Two Republican lawmakers whom a park ranger cited for making out in a public park apologized Monday for accusing that ranger of lying and stepped down from a Minnesota House ethics panel in an apparent effort to head off a complaint from Democrats.

But that wasn’t good enough for DFL party officials.  Two days after the legislators had already apologized and resigned from the House Ethics Committee, the DFL called a news conference to ask the legislators to, I don’t know, issue a new and improved apology.

With reporters and law enforcement officials exposing the truth, and reporters continually seeking legislators’ reaction to each new revelation, why do DFL PR people feel the need pile on with self-righteous sermons? I’m sure partisan warriors surrounding DFL leaders were giving them high fives for continuing to criticize the Republicans, but their partisan finger wagging is starting to make the whole issue look like just another partisan pissing match, which many Minnesotans are conditioned to tune out.

In public relations, as in health care, the guiding credo should be primum non nocere, Latin for “first, do no harm.”  Party messengers especially need to realize the harm that their tainted voices can do.  Or as the country music classic put it, sometimes “you say it best when you say nothing at all.”

Dear DFLers: This is Minnesota, Not MinneSweden

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These are very heady times for Minnesota DFLers. Governor Mark Dayton and DFL legislators had the courage to raise taxes, increase long-term investments, and raise the minimum wage.  In the process, Minnesota Republicans were proven wrong, because the economic sky did not fall as they predicted it would.   In fact, liberally governed Minnesota, with an unemployment rate of just 3.7 percent, has one of the stronger economies in the nation.

And the subsequent coverage from the liberal echo chamber has been positively intoxicating for DFLers:

“This Billionaire Governor Taxed the Rich and Increased the Minimum Wage — Now, His State’s Economy Is One of the Best in the Country” (Huffington Post)

“The Unnatural: How Mark Dayton Bested Scott Walker—and Became the Most Successful Governor in the Country”  (Mother Jones)

“What happens when you tax the rich and raise the minimum wage? Meet one of USA’s best economies” (Daily Kos)

Comparative_Economic_Systems__SwedenHigh as a kite from these clippings and the vindication they represent, DFLers run the risk of over-stepping, of pushing Minnesotans further than it they are comfortable going. As much as DFL politicians fantasize about bringing the social welfare model of a Scandinavian nation to a state populated with so many Scandinavian immigrants, a recent survey in the Star Tribune provides a harsh reminder that Minnesota, politically speaking, is not MinneSweden.

In the wake of a $2 billion budget surplus, only one out of five (19 percent) Minnesotans wants to “spend most to improve services.” Among the Independent voters that DFLers need to persuade in order to win elections and legislative power, only one out of four (24 percent) supports spending the entire surplus.

At the same time, two times as many Minnesotans support the predictable Republican proposal to “refund most to taxpayers” (38 percent support). Their refund proposal is also the most popular option among the Independent voters that Republicans need to win over in order to have electoral success in 2016.

The Star Tribune also reported that their survey found that Minnesotans are not too wild about the gas tax increase the DFLers propose.  A slim majority (52 percent) oppose “Governor Dayton’s proposal to raise the wholesale tax on gasoline to increase spending on road and bridge projects?”  A healthier majority (62 percent) of Minnesota’s’s Independents oppose the gas tax increase.

I happen to agree with the DFL on the merits.  Minnesota has a lot of hard work to do in order to remain competitive into the future, so I personally support investing almost all of the budget surplus, with a healthy amount for the rainy day fund, and a gas tax increase. However at the same time, I’m enough of a realist to recognize that sustainable progressive change won’t happen if Daily Kos-drunk DFLers overstep and lose the confidence of swing voters in the process.

DFLers who want to win back the trust of a majority of the Minnesota electorate would be wise to enact a mix of sensibly targeted investments, a resilient rainy day fund and targeted tax relief.  That kind of pragmatic, balanced approach won’t turn into St. Paul into Stockholm, but it might just put more DFLers in power, so that the DFL can ensure Republicans don’t turn Minnesota into South Dakota or Wisconsin.

Dirty Job Dayton Dusts Himself Off

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Dayton_dirty_2Governor Mark Dayton is Minnesota’s political version of Mike Rowe, the star of the Discovery Channel television show “Dirty Jobs.” Rowe’s show is all about him taking on difficult, disrespected and grotesque jobs that others avoid, such as being a sewer inspector, road kill scavenger, worm dung farmer, shark repellent tester, maggot farmer, and sea lamprey exterminator.  Who knew that worm dung needed farming?

Dirty Job Dayton

Governor Mark Dayton may not be farming worm dung, but consider just a few of the filthy tasks Dirty Job Dayton has already embraced in his five year’s in office.

Taxing Most Powerful Minnesotans.  Before Dayton, non-partisan analyses were showing that the wealthiest Minnesotans were not paying their fair share of taxes.  So Dayton ran for Governor unabashedly championing tax increases on the state’s most wealthy citizens, which earned him some very powerful enemies. At the time, progressive political consultants considered advocating almost any kind of tax increase political suicide for candidates. But Dayton ran on a platform of large tax increases, won a razar thin victory at the polls, and then promptly passed the tax increases into law as promised.

Implementing Unpopular Obamacare.  Dayton wasn’t done there. One of his very first acts of Governor was to champion Obamacare, which many politicians were extremely nervous about at the time. In contrast to his fellow Governors in neighboring Wisconsin, Iowa and South Dakota, Dayton embraced Obamacare’s Medicare expansion to cover 35,000 of the most vulnerable Minnesotans.   The Governor had Obamacare protesters shouting him down in his announcement news conference, but he let them have their say and stuck to his principles without looking back.  As a result of taking on a number of controversial Obamacare implementation tasks, Minnesota now has the second best rate of health insurance coverage of any state (95%).

Resolving Vikings Stadium Quagmire.  Then there was the Vikings Stadium debate that had been festering for almost a decade before Dayton came to office. Despite polls showing that subsidizing the stadium was unpopular, Dayton provided active backing for legislation to publicly subsidize the Vikings Stadium.  While noting that he is “not one to defend the economics of the NFL,” he plugged his nose and embraced a job he didn’t welcome, but felt was necessary to keep the Vikings in Minnesota and boost a then-suffering construction sector.

Cutting Coveted Social Safety Net.  Early in Dayton’s tenure as Governor, he even made significant cuts in state safety net programs, which is one of the very worst jobs any progressive can ever get.  Faced with a large budget shortfall, he proposed cutting $950 million in planned spending, told agencies to cut their budgets by up to 10 percent, and cut the state workforce by 6 percent.  That work had to leave even Dirty Job Dayton feeing grimy.

Love these positions or hate them — and Dayton himself didn’t relish many of them — no one can accuse Dayton of political timidity.

Dirtiest Job Yet

But this winter, Dirty Job Dayton finally met his Waterloo. With no political allies in sight, he attempted to push through salary increases for state agency commissioners, who are making less than their peers in many other states.   Dayton said he “knew there would be negative reaction,” but, as is his habit, he plugged his nose and pushed forward anyway.

How did that go for him?  Well, in the last few weeks Dayton learned that attempting to raise bureaucrats’ pay makes shark repellent testing look like a walk in the park.

Fresh off that experience, one might expect that Dayton would now stick to clean, safe, and easy jobs for the remainder of his time in office.  But if you believe that, you obviously don’t know Dirty Job Dayton very well.

Next Up:  Slinging Asphalt

After the salary increase shellacking Dayton endured, he has already found a new thankless task to champion – fixing Minnesota’s deteriorating roads and bridges.  While Republicans want a modest short-term fix funded out of the current budget surplus, that would be much too easy for Dirty Job Dayton. Dayton is attempting to put in place an ambitious decade-long $11 billion solution. Such a long-term fix necessitates a 16 cent per gallon (at current prices) increase in the gas tax. Not surprisingly, the polls are looking a little rough at the moment.

But Dirty Job Dayton doesn’t care. Like Mike Rowe, if the assignment stinks, scares, or stings, he’s in!

Americans Support An Actual “Government Takeover of Health Care,” And I Don’t Mean Obamacare

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Government_takeover_of_health_careOn the heels of the closing of the second year of open enrollment for Obamacare coverage, expect to hear a lot of “government takeover of health care” ranting from conservatives.

That phrase is heavily used by anti-Obamacare zealots, and that is no accident.  In 2009, Republican political consultant and celebrated wordsmith Frank Luntz advised his conservative clients to portray the proposed Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, as “a government takeover of health care.”

Conservatives did as they were told. If you Google those words, you’ll see that the usage of that phrase, and close variations, has been widespread among conservatives ever since.

In a 28-page strategy memo, Luntz explained why stressing a Washington “takeover” was so important:

“Takeovers are like coups.  They both lead to dictators and a loss of freedom.”

In other words, the Affordable Care Act shouldn’t be talked about as it were a legislative proposal in a representative democracy.  Instead, it should be talked about as if it were a Stalin-esque freedom grab.

There are two problems with conservatives parroting the Luntz-recommended phrase “government takeover of health care” to make Americans fearful about health care reform: First, It’s demonstrably false.  Second, It doesn’t scare most Americans.

False.  I’m not going to go into detail about why it is false, because it’s pretty self-evident.  But suffice it to say that ‘government takeover of health care” as a descriptor for the Affordable Care Act was named by the non-partisan editors of Politifact as their 2010 “Lie of the Year.”   In a lie-intensive election year, “government takeover of healthcare” was named by both editors and readers as the Pants on Fire of all Pants’s on Fire.  Politifact notes the obvious:

“It is inaccurate to call the plan a government takeover because it relies largely on the existing system of health coverage provided by employers.

It’s true that the law does significantly increase government regulation of health insurers. But it is, at its heart, a system that relies on private companies and the free market.”

Not Scary.  But beyond being false, the more surprising thing to me is that “government takeover of health care” is not all that scary to a  majority of Americans.

While Obamacare is not remotely close to a government takeover of health care, putting Americans into the government-run Medicare program would be exactly that.  And you know what? Most Americans are just fine with even that level of government takeover of health care.

Medicare_for_All

A January 2015 GBA Strategies survey asked Americans if they support enactment of “a national health plan in which all Americans would get their insurance through an expanded, universal form of Medicare.” By a 15-point margin, a majority of Americans (51% support, 36% oppose) supported that kind of government takeover of health care.

The same survey then asked Americans about giving people the option of having government take over their health care.   Specifically, the survey asked if respondents would support giving “all Americans the choice of buying health insurance through Medicare or private insurers, which would provide competition for insurance companies and more options for consumers.” An amazing 71% of Americans support having the option of a government takeover their health care, including 63% of Republican respondents.

So it turns out that, after six years of intensive Luntz-led vilification of “government takeover of health care,” backed by hundreds of millions of dollars of political advertising and public relations efforts, there are very few issues in America today with as much public support as there is for the federal government taking over American health care.

– Loveland

Note:  This post was republished on MinnPost.

Progressives Should Be Proud To Protect Outstanding Young Teachers

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young_teacherAnybody who has followed my lunatic rantings knows that I’m an unabashed wealth redistributin’, Wall Street regulatin’, minority rightsin’, carbon tradin’, Keynesian spendin’, Medicare-for-Allin’, tree-huggin’, consumer protectin’, Pentagon cuttin’, infrastructure rebuildin’, union supportin’, monopoly bustin’, education investin’ liberal.

But the moment I support allowing younger teachers to have their classroom achievements considered as one factor in firing decisions – the same position supported by more than 90% of Minnesotans, the liberal Obama Administration and two-thirds of younger Minnesota teachers with less than 20 years experience — you’d think I’m the second incarnation of Michele Bachmann.   “Teacher basher!!!”

LIFO_teacher_seniority_firing_mapA talented young teacher who is successfully improving kids’ learning automatically should be mandated to be the first to be fired? That’s putting kids first? That’s pro-teacher? That’s pro-education? That’s respecting the teaching profession?  That’s helping struggling low-income school districts, who have a disproportionate share of younger teachers?  That’s liberal?

I’ve listened. I really have. But on this issue, the teacher’s union, for all the good it does, is simply wrong.  Any progressive should be proud to fight for the rights of outstanding young teachers and the kids benefiting from them.

MN GOP Beware:  Biking and Pedestrian Improvements Have Broad Appeal

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rura_bikingMinnesota Republicans captured control of the Minnesota House of Representatives in part by fueling urban versus rural resentment:  “Those metro-centric DFLers give everything to Minneapolis and St. Paul.”  The truth is, turnout trends associated with non-presidential year elections were a much bigger reason why the DFL lost control of the Minnesota House. But this “core cities versus the rest of us” theme was definitely a big part of the  Minnesota GOP’s 2014 campaign, and a lot of analysts are convinced that is why Republicans won.  For instance, MinnPost’s excellent reporter Briana Bierschbach noted:

“…Republicans had a potent message, too, and it was a simple one: Rural Democrats had left their constituents behind by voting with their Minneapolis and St. Paul leadership.”

Exhibit A in the Republican’s rural victimization case was funding for pedestrian and bike infrastructure, something Republican’s often characterize as “metrocentric.”  In other words, they maintain it isn’t of interest to suburban, exurban or rural citizens.  For instance, GOP gubernatorial candidate Jeff Johnson tried to appeal to non-urban votes with this riff:

“We have spent billions of dollars on trains, trollies, bike paths, and sidewalks, but not nearly enough on the basic infrastructure most Minnesotans use every day: our roads and bridges.”

Beyond the campaign trail, that theme also has sometimes been a battle cry during Met Council transportation planning discussions.  Finance and Commerce reports that:

“The suburban counties argue that the Met Council’s transportation investment plan emphasizes urban transit, bike and pedestrian options at the expense of highways, which they say could cause further congestion and safety issues.”

However, a survey released today calls the Republicans’ assumption into question. The poll found majority support in every region of the state for additional funding for pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure.  The random sample of 1,000 Minnesotans sponsored by the Minnesotans for Healthy Kids Coalition found that the strongest support was in St. Paul and Minneapolis (71% support).  However, there was roughly the same high level of support in the suburbs, which are key political battlegrounds because that’s where population is growing most rapidly:

  • Western metro suburbs:  69% support.
  • East metro suburbs:  70% support.

Even in rural areas, a strong majority support funding bike and pedestrian infrastructure improvements:

  • Central Minnesota:  64% support.
  • Southern Minnesota:   57% support.
  • Northern Minnesota:  56% support.

In other words, if a politician mentions the DFL’s support of bike and pedestrian infrastructure funding in rural Minnesota they’re more likely to help the DFLer than hurt them.

The moral of the story is that the appeal of pedestrian and biking infrastructure improvements is hardly limited to the hipsters and fitness freaks in the core cities.  Politicians who campaign or govern based on that false assumption may have a rude awakening.

– Loveland

Note:  This also was published on streets.mn, Twin Cities Daily Planet, and MinnPost.

Are SD’s Pressler Voters — Thinking They Are Voting for Clean Politics — Helping Elect The Most Corrupt Politician in SD History?

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In perhaps the most interesting U.S. Senate race in the nation this year, South Dakota Republican U.S. Senate candidate Mike Rounds could actually win on Tuesday, even though he is currently so overwhelmingly unpopular in South Dakota that he probably cannot piece together 40% of the vote.

Mr. Rounds, a former Governor, may win, even though he is so deeply intertwined in the state’s EB-5 scandal that he could face charges that would not allow him to serve out his term in the U.S. Senate.

How could South Dakotans allow the scandal-ridden Rounds to win and drag the state through such an embarassing scenario?

Larry_PresslerHere’s how:  About 18% of South Dakotans who currently say they will vote for former Republican U.S. Senator Larry Pressler are making it impossible for second place Democrat Rick Weiland to get enough of the anti-Rounds votes to defeat Rounds.  Even though polls consistently show Pressler is running a distant third,  some swing voters have been attracted to Pressler, in part because he has promoted himself as the only member of Congress who was cleared during the 1978 ABSCAM sting operation. In the minds of many Pressler supporters, their vote for Pressler is a vote for a cleaner brand of politics.

But in an odd twist, votes for third place Pressler are giving scandal-tainted Rounds a chance to win despite the scandal.  Polls show that Pressler supporters’ second choice is Weiland, not Rounds, by an overwhelming 3-to-1 margin.    Weiland has earned the respect of many Pressler supporters by stressing the need to get big money out of politics, outworking his opponents on a tour of all 311 of South Dakota’s towns, and showing independence from his own party’s leaders.

If the roughly 18% of South Dakotans who currently support Pressler give their vote to someone who will be a distant third place finisher, it looks like they will effectively allow Rounds to win.   But if some Pressler supporters reconsider between now and Tuesday, and give their votes to second place Weiland instead of third place Pressler, the anti-Rounds vote could be consolidated enough to defeat Rounds.

Think about that for a minute.  How ironic would it be if Pressler supporters, who are convinced they are standing up against corrupt politics, end up inadvertently assuring the election of someone who could go down as the most corrupt politician in South Dakota history?

Conservative Pressler Would Ban Abortions, While 68% of South Dakotans Support Keeping Them Legal

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In an increasingly interesting and competitive U.S. Senate campaign in South Dakota, former Republican U.S. Senator Larry Pressler, now running as an Independent, is consistently portrayed by the news reporters as a “moderate.”

It’s ludicrous to characterize Pressler as a “moderate.” After all, his most recent votes in the U.S. Senate were 100% against women, teachers, students, gays and workers, he has voted for cuts in Social Security and Medicare, and he stilll speaks out about wanting to cut those programs even more in the future.

Pressler_Would_Overturn_Roe_Vs_Wade_-_YouTubePressler has also said in no uncertain terms during this current campaign that he would make abortion illegal.
Not regulated, mind you.  Not scaled back.  Illegal.  He would overturn the Roe v. Wade decision that has kept abortion a legal option since 1972.

After Pressler banned abortions, he would allow states to make abortion legal again if they choose, but we all know that many states would keep abortion illegal, and make millions of women into criminals and victims of botched back alley abortions.

Even in a red state like South Dakota, banning abortion is not a mainstream position.  In the most recent polling I could find on this issue, a Sioux Falls Argus Leader survey, only 25% of South Dakotans say that abortion should be illegal.

Instead, an overwhelming 68% of South Dakotans want to keep abortion legal, either “legal and the decision to have an abortion should be made by the woman without government interference (34%),” or “legal but restricted to very specific circumstances, such as rape, incest or to save the life of the mother (34%).”

This idea that the news media mindlessly calls anyone who camouflages themselves with an “Independent” label a “moderate” shows just how shallow political reporting has gotten.  Politicians who make abortion illegal, cut Social Security and Medicare and vote 100% against women, teachers gays, students and workers are hardly “moderate.” They are, by any reasonable definition, on the far right.

– Loveland

New Poll Shows Secret of GOP Candidate Jeff Johnson’s Early Political Strength

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A new survey released today finds that Minnesota Republican gubernatorial nominee Jeff Johnson now trails incumbent DFL Governor Mark Dayton by just nine points, 39% to 48%.  Johnson, a Hennepin County Commissioner, has never won a statewide race before.

Map_of_popular_surnamesWhile the findings are a surprise to some veteran political observers, a closer look provides a clue why the relative political newcomer may be showing so strongly.  About 78 percent of likely Minnesota voters who say they are supporting Johnson believe that he is either their co-worker (26 percent), neighbor (21 percent), business associate (17 percent), or relative (14 percent).

According to U.S. Census data, Johnson is the most common surname in Minnesota, surpassing the ubiquitous Andersons, Olsons, Petersons, and Nelsons in Minnesota’s top five.

Asked of 800 likely Minnesota voters, the survey’s margin of error is minus or plus 3.9 percent.

Note:  This post is satirical, false, and not-to-believed, but somehow also feels plausible.

True Confession: I Miss The GOP-Controlled Legislature

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When it comes to the 2014 legislative elections, I have divided loyalties.

One the one hand, the current DFL-controlled Legislature has delivered a lot of very good things for ordinary Minnesotans.  Compared to the previous GOP-controlled Legislature, the DFL-controlled Legislature has delivered a healthier economy, budget surpluses, more tax fairness, marriage equality, job-creating infrastructure improvement projects, paid back schools, all-day kindergarten, early education scholarships and a long overdue increase in the minimum wage, among other things.

In the most recently concluded session, they even had the earliest adjournment in thirty years, a mark of impressive democratic efficiency. I look at that record and conclude that the DFL Legislature and Governor deserve to be rehired in the upcoming elections.

clown_carOn the other hand, as a blogger interested in the absurd side of politics, I’m pulled mightily in the opposite direction.  Because when it comes to generating a steady stream of blog-worthy absurdity, nothing beats the modern Tea Party-backed Republican Party.  After all, the last time the Republicans controlled the Minnesota Legislature they:

  • No Separation Between Church and Hate.  Found a way to make even the daily ecumenical prayer controversial and divisive;
  • Dehumanizing Kids.  Warned that supplying food stamps to Minnesota’s most vulnerable children is just as inadvisable as feeding wild animals; and

I get tears of joy just thinking about it. I was never in need of blog topics in those days.  Minnesota’s last GOP-controlled Legislature gave us the golden age of political comedy, and I will forever be grateful to them for that.   Memories, misty water-colored memories.

While a historically low 17% of Minnesotans approved of the GOP-controlled Legislature that was drummed out of office in 2012, Wry Wing Politics has sorely missed having the likes Mary Fransen, Steve Drazkowski,  Mark Buesgens, Tom Emmer, Curt Bills, Kurt Zellers, Dave Thompson, Amy Koch and others in positions of authority, where they had more opportunities to say and do ridiculous things.

The topic-hungry blogger in me pines for the hot mess of a Legislature that Teapublicans  built.  But deep down the responsible citizen in me knows that I need to vote to bring back the DFL’s brand of colorless competence.  Sigh.

– Loveland

Note:  This post was featured as a “best of the best” in MinnPost’s Blog Cabin.

Campaign Finance Reform En Vogue…Better Get This Marty Started

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Democratic Pollster Stan Greenberg thinks one way for Democrats to mitigate their traditional midterm election setbacks is to stump for limits on the influence of big money on politics and policymaking.

In the wake of a couple of unpopular Supreme Court decisions that greatly increased the power of über-wealthy donors in elections, a recent Greenberg poll finds that campaign financing reform is very popular.  Greenberg tested support for the Government By The People Act (GBP), which would encourage small in-state contributions by establishing a capped 6-to-1 public financing matching program, and giving a tax credit to small donors.

Among the Democratic base that progressive candidates desperately need to turn out in 2012, this proposal is supported by a nearly 5-to-1 margin.  Among the Independent swing voters Democrats need to sway in the 2014 election, it enjoys a 3-to-1 supportive margin.

campaign_financing_poll_supportThanks to Senator John Marty (DFL-Roseville) and others, Minnesota has better campaign financing laws than most states.    But Minnesota’s campaign finance system could be improved, and this research shows this is an opportune time to propose improvements.

It’s too late for DFLers to pass campaign financing law improvements in 2013, but it’s not too late to inject the issue into the 2014 election debate.  This would be a great time for Marty to propose GBP-type rewards for small donors, and for DFL candidates to embrace them.  It’s the right thing to do substantively, and politically.

– Loveland

Billionaire Purchases Naming Rights To Uninsured South Dakotans

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Sioux Falls, South Dakota — South Dakota billionaire banker and philanthropist T. Denny Sanford announced today that he will fund free health coverage for 48,000 uninsured, low-income South Dakotans.  The announcement comes in the wake of Republican Governor Dennis Daugaard’s continued refusal to accept $224 million in federal funding to cover the same group of citizens.

In recent years, Sanford has been lauded for donating large amounts of money to South Dakota health facilities, sports complexes, and other popular projects.   The high interest banker often has his projects named after him, such as Sanford Health™, Sanford Children’s™, Sanford Heart™,  Sanford Medical School™, Sanford Pentagon™, Sanford Sports Complex™, and Denny Sanford Premier Center™.

Sanford’s latest donation comes in the midst of a bitter political debate that has been intensifying in South Dakota for several years.

As part of the federal Affordable Care Act (ACA), sometimes called Obamacare, about 48,000 low income South Dakotans are eligible for Medicaid coverage.  By the year 2020, South Dakota was to have received a massive influx of $224 million due to this expansion of coverage.

Medicaid_ExpansionHowever Governor Daugaard has refused the $224 million to cover uninsured poor people, citing his  personal opposition to Obamacare and the cost of the expansion that would be paid by South Dakota.  The federal government is paying 100 percent of the total costs through 2016, and 90 percent after that.

The neighboring states of Iowa, North Dakota, and Minnesota are all expanding Medicaid coverage to uninsured citizens, while Nebraska, Montana and Wyoming are not.  States that are opting out of the program will leave over 5 million of the poorest Americans without basic health benefits, or shifting their health care costs to other citizens.

Under pressure from South Dakota physicians and 63% of South Dakotans who support the Medicaid expansion, Daugaard recently asked the federal government to cover a little over half of the eligible citizens, but deny coverage to the rest of eligible citizens. The federal government rejected Daugaard’s proposal, leaving all 48,000 South Dakotans without coverage.  The Legislature  refused to allow the Medicaid expansion question to be posed to South Dakota voters at the ballot box.

But Sanford stepped into the fray today, announcing that he is creating a new Medicaid-like health plan, which he is calling SanfordCare™.  Any South Dakota citizen who would have been eligible for the Obamacare expansion would be eligible for the free SandfordCare™ coverage, provided they agree to legally change their surnames to Sanford™.  Any children born while under the health coverage would also have to adopt the first name Denny™ or Denita™.

Note:  This post is, to the best of our knowledge, satire.  There is no SanfordCare proposal, but there are 48,000 South Dakotans being denied health coverage.

Franken Opponent McFadden Refuses To Confirm Own Existence

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invisible_manSaint Paul, Minnesota — Minnesota U.S.  Senate candidate Mike McFadden held a news conference today to announce that he would be announcing nothing.

“Minnesota is great, and I’ll do lots of great stuff in the Senate to make it even greater,” said McFadden, to roaring applause from his supporters.  “Beyond that, I promise that I will not do wasteful ungreat things that keep Minnesota from becoming greater.”

Under questioning from reporters, the wealthy businessman running to replace U.S. Senator Al Franken refused to provide positions  on the national policy issues that are debated in the U.S. Senate.   For example, McFadden declined to state his position on the minimum wage, the Paycheck Fairness Act and a “personhood” anti-birth control measure.

MinnPost reporter Eric Black recently attempted to profile the stealth Senate candidate, but struggled to find anything to profile beyond the over $2 million the former businessman has raised from enthusiastic conservative donors.  Black characterized the McFadden record like this:

I’m not sure what the record is for seeking a seat in the U.S. Senate without disclosing issue positions, but McFadden, who declared his candidacy nine months ago, may be giving it a run.

There is no “issues” section on his campaign website. He skipped the first three opportunities to debate his Republican opponents for the nomination.  On Monday, he appeared at the fourth debate, but that one was closed to the press and public.

The McFadden campaign maintains that the candidate has taken many position stands, such as his desire to “name way more awesome things after Ronald Reagan” and “repeal and replace” the federal Affordable Care Act (ACA).

When pressed for details about what he would replace the ACA with, McFadden said that announcement would need to wait until he begins his six-year term in office.

“We will help, not hurt Americans,” McFadden  explained.

The campaign did release a 12-page single spaced list of things McFadden would rename after Ronald Reagan.

When asked to name political role models McFadden listed Ronald Reagan, several Reagan impersonators and Chauncey Gardiner.

“By standing for no one, and Mike is appealing to everyone,” said Saul Loes, a conservative political consultant advising the McFadden campaign. “He just might be the most brilliant politician of our generation, if he exists, which we are neither confirming nor denying.”

Note:  This post is satire.

What Does Ortman Really Think About Palin Endorsement?

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Barack Obama’s favorable ratings have seen better days.  An average of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics (RCP) shows that an underwhelming 47% of Americans have a favorable view of the President.

This presents a challenge for incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator Al Franken, because Franken has been a supporter of the President’s efforts on health care reform, job creation packages, a minimum wage increase, ending the Middle East wars and other Obama initiatives.

So who does State Senator Julianne Ortman partner with to make her case to replace Franken?  Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, whose abysmal 37% favorability rating (RCP average of  recent polls) makes President Obama look like a rock star in comparison.

Palin, one of the Tea Party’s wackiest voices, laid it on thick for Senator Ortman:

“Let’s give voters a contrast this fall: a clown vs. a Mama Grizzly, an Obama 100 Percenter vs. a Blue Star Mom, a talker vs. a doer, and a liberal Obama rubber stamp legislator vs. a proven conservative fighter.”

While Senator Ortman said positive things about the Palin endorsement, her body language perhaps exposes more ambivalence.  This photo was featured on Governor Palin’s Facebook page.Palin_Ortman_birdFor the Republican primary, the Palin endorsement definitely helps Senator Ortman.  For the general election, the Palin endorsement is good news for Franken, not Ortman, because it frames the largely unknown Ortman up as a Palin-esque Tea Partier.

So, while I’m sure Senator Ortman’s bird escaped accidentally in this photo, you could hardly blame her if it didn’t.

MN Congressional Candidates Take Note: 6 of 10 Americans Want To Keep Obamacare

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The reporting on Obamacare public opinion research has been consistently shallow, as I’ve noted for years.  Despite the many simplistic “Public Opposes Obamacare” stories and punditifications, a deeper dive into the polls shows that an overwhelming majority of Americans want to either keep the Affordable Care Act (ACA) as is, or improve it.

The latest Kaiser Family Health Foundation Tracking Poll, which was fielded prior to this week’s positive publicity about ACA insurance exchanges targets being met, finds that this trend is continuing.  Even after a pre-deadline deluge of anti-Obamacare advertising, Americans still oppose repealing the Affordable Care Act, by a huge 29% to 59% margin.  Independent voters, who will be so important in the upcoming mid-term elections, also overwhelmingly oppose the GOP’s repeal calls, by a 32% to 52% margin.

Survey__59_pct_want_to_keep_acaSo, nervous DFL congressional candidates, improvements to the ACA — a better exhange website, a more robust exchange call center, more exchange “navigators,” stronger enrollment incentives for young adults,  and/or a public insurance option — would be welcomed by voters.  But let your Republican opponents blather on about “repeal and replace” all they want, because it simply is not selling.

– Loveland

Note:  This post was featured in Politics in Minnesota’s Best of the Blogs.

SD Senate Challenger Shows How Obama Should Have Led On Health Care Reform

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rick_weiland_head_shot-2President Obama and his supporters have struggled mightily to market the byzantine Affordable Care Act (ACA) reforms to the public.  But by uttering three simple words – “Medicare for all” –  U.S. Senate candidate Rick Weiland in neighboring South Dakota is showing President Obama how it should have been done way back in 2008.

The “Medicare For All” approach that Weiland proposed last week is much easier to sell than the ACA.  The Associated Press reports:

Weiland has proposed that citizens of any age be allowed to buy into Medicare, which now is generally open only to people 65 and older, as an alternative to private health insurance plans.

“People understand Medicare,” Weiland told The Argus Leader. “It works, it’s efficient, and all this other stuff that they’re having now to focus on is extremely complicated, and they don’t understand it.”

Clear.  Concise.  Compelling.  The same can’t be said about most ACA-related rhetoric.

Obama Framed Up The Wrong Comparison

In the book Predictably Irrational,  Dan Ariely, a psychology and behavioral economics professor, examines how we make choices.  One of the phenomena Ariely describes is research showing that humans tend to judge their environment in relation to things that are comparable.

For instance, let’s say you give newlyweds the choice of three honeymoon options – Paris with free breakfast included, Rome with free breakfast included, and Rome with no breakfast included.  Because the two Rome options are comparable, most will gravitate away from the single Paris option.  We are attracted to comparability.

The Comparability Obama Offered.  With that research in mind, consider what President Obama and congressional Democrats did on health reform in 2008.  He believed that Americans needed to have a system that was comparable with what they were familiar with, our American system of private insurers and private health care providers.  So, from 2008 to 2010, Obama framed the health care reform debate as the choice of two comparable things:

Private-centered status quo model.  The pre-2010 status quo system of private insurers and private health care providers.

vs.

Private-centered model, coupled with reforms..  The status quo system of private insurers and health care providers coupled with complicated reforms.

Affordable_Care_Act_infographic-2The ACA reforms were enormously complex, mostly because the underlying pre-2010 status quo health care system was so decentralized and entangled.  Obama’s reforms were narrowly enacted in 2010, primarily because the status quo was so overwhelmingly unpopular.

The Comparability Obama Should Have Offered.  But what if Obama had framed up  a different kind of comparable choice for the American people?  While it’s true that Americans are familiar with private health insurance, they are also familiar with Medicare.  So why didn’t Obama frame the debate up as a choice between these two comparable things:

Medicare for some.  A status quo system where Medicare is available only to seniors.

vs.

Medicare for all.  A new system where Medicare is available to everyone who wants it.

The Political Advantages of Medicare for All

Obama didn’t go with Medicare For All, presumably because he was afraid that Republicans would castigate it as “government run health care” and “socialism.”

As it turned out, the Republican spin machine was determined to characterize anything Obama proposed as “government run health care” and “socialism.” After all, it uses those terms to describe the ACA, which is  absurd, because the ACA relies on private insurers and private caregivers without permitting a single government-run option in the mix.

President Obama was never going to avoid this “government run health care” political attack , so there was no good reason to allow it to shape the proposal.

Moreover, Medicare happens to be “government run health care” that Americans really like.  About 56 percent of Medicare recipients give it a rating of 9 or 10 on a 0-10 scale, while only about 40 percent of Americans enrolled in private health insurance gave their plans such a high rating. An amazing 70% of Medicare recipients say they always get access to needed health care, while only 51% of people with private insurance say that.

A 2007 Associated Press/Yahoo survey showed that about two-thirds of Americans (65%) agreed that “the United States should adopt a universal health insurance program in which everyone is covered under a program like Medicare that is run by the government and financed by taxpayers.”

So demonizing the specific (“Medicare”) would have been much more politically difficult for Republicans than demonizing the abstract (“government run health care” or “socialism”).

Could Obama have passed a “Medicare For All” bill?  Expanding the nation’s most popular health plan was certainly possible.   After all, knowing that two-thirds of Americans support Medicare for All, what politician of either party would want to take to the stump arguing:

“For your parents, grandparents, neighbors, and friends, Medicare is terrific.   I’ll fight to the death to protect it for them.  But for the rest of you,  I am blocking you from accessing  Medicare.  Medicare for YOU would be radical socialism that would lead to horrific health problems.”

Huh?  That would be a head-spinning political argument to sell.

Still, because the insurance lobby is so strong, maybe Congress would have rejected Medicare for All, against the wishes of two-thirds of their constituents.  But if Obama had made  Medicare for All the starting point for the debate, the compromise at the end of the process may have been more progressive, such as a private-dominated marketplace with a Medicare-like public option impacting market competition.

Incumbents who voted for the ACA in 2010 need to defend that confusing law in the 2014 mid-term elections, and the ACA is certainly a vast improvement over the pre-ACA status quo that Republicans have effectively embraced by not offering alternatives for reducing the rate of uninsurance and outlawing preexisting condition bans.  The ACA, for all its warts, is the most significant health care reform since the creation of Medicare.

But even in a neon red state like South Dakota, challengers like Mr. Weiland are wise to adopt the clear, concise and compelling “Medicare for All” rallying call, just as Obama and congressional Democrats should have done back in  2008.

Loveland

Note:  This post was featured in MinnPost’s Blog Cabin.

MNsure Ads: 10,000 Reasons We Already Know About

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paul_bunyan_mnsure_tree-2For about five months now, MNsure ads have repeatedly told us:  “Minnesota is the land of 10,000 reasons to get health insurance.”  To educate us of this fact, the ads have portrayed a variety of health calamidies befalling Minnesota icon Paul Bunyan.  Incidents involving crushed private parts are particularly popular.

MNsure’s ad agency seems convinced that as soon as Minnesotans understand that they could face Bunyan-esque health problems without health insurance, they will surf on over to mnsure.com.  But at this stage of the game, that message isn’t sufficient.  Repeatedly telling Minnesotans that  coverage brings treatments is like telling us that parkas bring warmth.  We get that.  If Minnesotans somehow didn’t know that self-evident fact before the MNsure ads, they darn sure do five months into the multi-million dollar campaign.

So how about we share some motivating information that many DON’T know?

Sharing New News About MNsure

For example, the ads could tell Minnesotans that if they don’t get coverage by March 31st, they have to pay a large government penalty.   That would seem to be a pretty motivating piece of information, and research shows that about a third of the population doesn’t know about the penalty, and 8 out of 10 don’t know about the deadline.

Or the ads could explain how health coverage has never been more affordable for thousands of Minnesotans.  That also would seem to be a pretty motivating fact, yet research shows that a whopping 69% of Americans don’t know about new premium tax credits and other financial assistance.  Among the young  people who are so key to making the Obamacare risk pools stable, awareness about financial assistance is even lower.

Minnesota has a particularly good story to tell on the affordability front, because MNsure is offering the lowest premiums in the nation.  So, why isn’t MNsure telling that story?

“Newly affordable” and “mandatory a few weeks from now” are messages that are motivating and new news.  And as far as I can tell, they are missing from MNsure’s current ads.

Bye Bye Bunyan

So it’s time to retire the sophomoric Paul Bunyan hilarity.  As MNsure enters the home stretch toward the March 31st deadline, it should switch to  a much more utilitarian message.  Rough example:

Young adult:

Why did I use MnSURE to get health coverage?   Not because I think buying insurance is fun.  It’s no more fun than buying car insurance, which I also have to do.

No, I did it to avoid  a double hit.

First I did it to avoid a looming government penalty.  If you haven’t heard, there is a big penalty that kicks in March 31 for anyone who isn’t covered.  And it gets bigger over time.

Second, I did it to avoid the crippling medical bills that can come from being uninsured.

And the good news is, getting coverage on MNsure was more affordable than I expected.   Minnesota’s MNsure site offers the lowest average premiums of any state, and over two-thirds of the uninsured are eligible for help to make coverage more affordable.

So, no missed deadline.  No penalty.  No medical bankruptcy.  And more affordable than I expected. www.mnsure.com

I’m not an ad copy writer, so someone can write a much better ad than this.  But you get the general idea.

When the MNsure ads launched in September 2013, the light approach maybe made sense.  Five months later, WE GET THE JOKE ALREADY.  Now it’s time for MNsure to tell Minnesotans some things they don’t already know.

– Loveland

Note:  This post was also featured in Politics in Minnesota’s Best of the Blogs.