Tim Pawlenty, (R-MN), currently governor of the big blue state of MN (blue as in lips, fingers and exposed flesh here as December turns to January) is out testing the Presidential waters. He's announced he's not running for a 3rd term (so the 2010 governor's race is an open seat). He has visited Iowa to say nice things about Iowans, thereby showing he is abandoning MN politics (you don't win in MN by being publicly nice to Iowans). He's lately visited New Hampshire to take in the waters (noting the Granite State's lakes are as frozen solid like, uh, granite, just like MN's lakes.)
He wants to be seen as some sort of dark horse, sane alternative to Sarah the Pale. Yesterday a MN court put a major crack in this facade.
Before Tim hit the presidential trail he had to deal with that messy GOVERNING stuff. Not the "open the state fair" stuff, or the "I present you with this imitation gold-plated whistle, Governor. The streets of Faber are yours!" stuff. No, the real nitty-gritty, deciderer stuff that doesn't generate pretty pictures but affects real people's lives.
MN's legislature is controlled by the Democrats but not in a 2/3 veto-override sort of way. The state economist's office came out late last winter with a projection that the state would be in the financial hole over fiscal year 2010 and 2011 (which started July 1, 2009) by $2.7 billion. The legislature got to work producing a budget to fill the gap, making a bunch of cuts and also---- (Glenn Beck weeping moment) proposing to raise taxes/enhance revenues! And not just on everyone, but only on the rich who have the money!
Weeping Lexus/Bentley owners, sobbing matrons of granite-counter-topped (New Hampshire granite?) McMansions along "the Lake", and the set-faced Armani-clad were seen visiting the Governor's mansion. The "base" of Palinista Bachmaniacs who KNOW in the marrow of their bones that all taxes are evil and that the existence of government is in itself evidence of the Fall and the presence of Original Sin howled, "Stop this, O mighty Tim, or forget about the White House!"
Pawlenty vetoed damn near everything back in May and then went public complaining government was stuck/broken/log-jammed. Then, starting July 1 with the new fiscal year, Tim began UN-ALLOTMENTS.
Under MN law a governor is allowed to jigger the state budgetary items in order to respond to nasty surprises. If a massive forest fire breaks out that covers 1/10th of the state and needs 40,000 workers to fight it, well this is how you pay for food, water, shelter etc. for the fire-fighters. You UN-allocate money that was set aside for snow plow repairs in August & September to pay for the fire fighters. Then, when the fires are out, you might replenish the snow plow tune-up funds with federal disaster relief money, tap the state reserves, or see if the state legislature will pass a bill to raise some money to cover the short fall.
The process is supposed to be used for these sort of un-forseen, emergency situations. Instead, Pawlenty has been using the process on his own to make cuts to Local Government Aid, K-12 school funding, etc., all so he can campaign saying "I don't raise taxes and contribute to Original Sin."
Yesterday a district judge in St. Paul (Kathleen Gearin, a member of last year's state canvassing board recounting a certain Senate race) issued a Temporary Restraining Order. Not for the whole thing, only $5.3 million out of $1.2 billion (0.44%) of a program that provides special foods to certain members of the poor who have medical conditions that require them to be on special diets.
But the way Judge Gearin did it may poke a fair hole in the hull of the S.S. Pawlenty. She ruled (further hearings scheduled for March 1) T-Paw stepped over the line of "separation of powers." From the ruling:
The governor used unallotment rather that calling a special session of the legislature or vetoing the appropriations bill to balance the budget. He did this after signing numerous spending bills which taken together, he knew would not balance the budget unless revenues were raised. He used the unallotment statue to address a situation that was neither unknown nor unanticipated when the appropriations bills became law.
Furthermore (Pioneer Press)
"The authority of the governor to unallot is an authority intended to save the state in times of a previously unforeseen budget crisis," Gearin wrote. "It is not meant to be used as a weapon by the executive branch to break a stalemate in budget negotiations with the Legislature or to rewrite the appropriations bill."
Finally, when the governor's attorneys had argued the case in front of Gearin they had raised a specter (not Arlen) of a shrouded warning to the court. Judge Gearin hustled over like Federer and unleashed a crushing backhand down the line:
"...the undersigned stated that "the judicial branch should tread lightly when dealing with 'separation of powers issues'. Is is just as important that the legislative branch tread lightly when dealing with separation of powers issues. It is equally important that the Governor tread lightly when dealing with separation of powers issues."
Because the court framed this on constitutional grounds, lots of people think a new day of reckoning is in the offing for the Gov and Lege.
BUT it could also mean the Pawlenty Presidential Plan for Picking Up Palin Primary voters has just hit a snag. Read more here:
http://www.minnpost.com/...
And THAT is a good thing for progressives everywhere. Listen more here:
http://the-uptake.groups.theuptake.o...
Thats some of the latest from yust southeast of lake Wobegon.
Shalom.