Bluestem Prairie: The Best Blog in Minnesota

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Wednesday July 16, 2014 · 8:46 PM PDT

2014/07/16 · 20:46

Another day, another prominent story in the reality-based community whose origins came from a blog in Greater Minnesota called Bluestem Prairie:

Following the publication of Cyndy Brucato's MinnPost profileof HD47A Republican primary candidate and Glenn Gruenhagen campaign chair Bob Frey earlier this week, Bluestem decided to take another look at Frey's views. We'd first posted about his views in March 2014.

Now yes, Bluestem Prairie does talk about Bob Frey's odd views concerning dinosaurs, but also discusses something else that might be important:

Bluestem has discovered that Frey's campaign resume apparently omits a very short career in the residential loan and mortgage modification industry that appears to have occupied at least some of his attention in 2009 and 2010.

Our exclusive and original research has discovered that Frey appears to have worked as a loan and mortgage originator or modification consultant with at least three firms: defunct Michigan-based Save My Home USA Inc; Lewis Hunt Enterprises (D.B.A as Interactive Financial Corp); and the least documented of the three, the Mortgage Indepentent Loan Originator (MILO) Network.

Why would Frey leave his mortgage-modification experience out of his CV? Bluestem would like to know, and probably will someday.

Follow me past the curlicue for more stories you may have heard of that have their origins with BSP.

There are a number of stories Bluestem's been instrumental in breaking (a recent example being the one about Tom Emmer's bizarre TV commercial/campaign ad), but the story I think will ensure BSP a place in Heaven is this one:

Remember when ALEC and its movement Republican allies were pushing voter suppression bills and constitutional amendments everywhere one looked?

Remember when that drive suffered its first major defeat in November 2012, when their pet amendment got shot down at the ballot box despite polling at 80 percent in May of 2011?

Bluestem Prairie played a key part in that defeat.

When the conventional wisdom among many Twin Cities bloggers with ties to the DFL (the local name for the Democratic Party) and its institutional allies and money folk was to give up on this fight, Bluestem's proprietress, Sally Jo Sorensen, and her allies in such groups as the League of Women Voters the League of Rural Voters, were listening instead to the dismayed voices of county elections personnel, decrying the horrific unfunded mandates that the proposed amendment to Minnesota's constitution would dump on them.

By September of 2012,support for the amendment had dropped dramatically, to 52 percent -- and as an amendment put onto the November ballot, it needed at least 50 percent to be ratified. Persons who were unmoved (or perhaps pleased) by the fact that the amendment would make it harder for nonwhites to vote were horrified to find out just how heavy a financial burden it would put on Minnesota's county and local governments. Republicans tried to counter with a bogus paper claiming that the costs really wouldn't be all that bad, but Gustavus Adolphus professor and elections expert ~~Mark~~ Max Halperin easily dispensed with that paper.

Once support for the amendment dipped to near 50%, the institutional money on the left started to invest in radio and TV ads attacking the amendment. The Republicans belatedly tried to counterattack, but it was too late: The amendment failed to clear the 50 percent threshold, and so failed.

Go check out BSP, and donate if you're so moved. Help keep the best blogger in Minnesota going.

Thu Jul 17, 2014 at 10:16 AM PT: 7/17/14: Sally Jo just wrote to remind me that Professor H.'s name is MAX Hailperin. Here's his homepage: https://gustavus.edu/...

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