Who Won? My two cents

Only the Republicans even have such debates out in the open, recriminations some might call them.  The GOP Legislative leadership crafted the $34 billion (General Fund) budget almost from the start, and that's about where we ended up.  But many Republicans feel betrayed, the actual number or percentage hard to quantify.  They wanted actual spending cuts, a budget of at most $32 billion, plus other items like voter id, what they supposedly ran on in 2010.  There are even a few Republicans who say if anything, the DFL won.

Intellectually, even politically, it's a fine debate, even if it is largely hindsight now.  Had we started at $32 billion, would we have wound up at $34 billion anyway?  With or without the extra one time spending in the final deal?  Could we have held out for more on the theory that Governor Mark Dayton was on the ropes, his shutdown strategy clearly not playing out as he thought.  We've seen some fine articles in the blogosphere addressing these and other questions, and all focused on clear problem of unsustainable growth in state spending.  I again must call your attention to The Late Debate with Jack and Ben whose many quality interviews provided some of the best coverage of all.

There is a ragged edge, though, criticisms of GOP party leadership, DFL party leadership, and the media coverage.  On the latter, I say guilty as charged.  I'm old enough to remember the first $1 billion budget and I cannot recall a similar statewide issue where so many media outlets, most notably the Minneapolis Star Tribune, got so many black and white facts wrong, and always in the DFL's favor.  The DFL leadership can have their own debates, in private as usual.  Mostly they must be asking whether they gave too large a proxy to the Governor, leaving them irrelevant as in unnoticed by news crews.

Some in the GOP leadership drew criticism based on the above, some of it excessive in my opinion.  A common theme readily embraced by the DFL friendly media was that our leaders were inexperienced, overmatched for such a momentous battle.  Conveniently forgotten is how experienced leadership got us into this mess in the first place, as Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch pointed out early in the session.  There were some lapses in communications, like House Majority Leader's confusing explanations of General Fund vs All Funds accounting on the Davis & Emmer radio program recently.  Let me quickly add that Matt Dean was brilliant on the House floor during the Special Session.  Speaker of the House Kurt Zellers had a rough start, but now speaks quite effectively, as we saw again on Almanac tonight (7/22).  Personally, I'm now very happy with and very proud of Koch, Zellers, and Dean.

So again: who won?  I emphatically say that we the Republicans (and Minnesota) did, as well expressed in Dan McGrath's summary.  The dollars wound up about where they would have regardless of initial strategy.  And while we didn't get voter id yet, our leaders took good advantage of Dayton's clear lack of preparation and sudden motivation to end his shutdown to get many good reforms through.  Such reforms were unthinkable a year ago, when few gave any thought to taking over the Senate.  More should come in 2012, like ending what we now understand to be an almost silly system of state permits and inspections.  And at long last, voter id, by Amendment if necessary.

The battle was won.

Comments

[Hiram]

"Only the Republicans even have such debates out in the open,"

Possibly because Republicans thought of these things in terms of winning and losing. The answer to the question of who won is of course no one. The question as to who lost is just as easy to answer, the people of Minnesota.

"Had we started at $32 billion, would we have wound up at $34 billion anyway?"

To begin with, we didn't end up at 34 billion. We ended up at something like 35.5 billion. I didn't hear the number 32 billion tossed around a lot. Some Republicans, I believe, advocated limiting spending to 30.2 billion, the amount of general fund spending in the last biennium. But that was never the public position of the GOP leadership.

"I cannot recall a similar statewide issue where so many media outlets, most notably the Minneapolis Star Tribune, got so many black and white facts wrong, and always in the DFL's favor."

I don't recall that the Strib got many black and white figures wrong. The beat reporters are usually pretty good with these things, and I have relied on their reporting a lot. The Pioneer Press editorials screwed up a lot but that was generally because they relied on Republican Party talking points without fully understanding them, instead of their excellent beat reporter Bill Salisbury.

"A common theme readily embraced by the DFL friendly media was that our leaders were inexperienced, overmatched for such a momentous battle."

Some in the media would occasionally report that the figures at the negotiation table were inexperienced, but I don't recall that they wee reporting that anyone was overstretched. I thought that was a fair comment, and true for both sides. From what I read, I was struck by how both parties made specifically negotiation mistakes; that they would make offers not fully thought out, that they would try to accept offers individually without understanding that all offers are contingent on agreement to an overall deal. Also, reporters often speak in code. One thing they were saying to you when they said the negotiators were inexperienced was that far more experienced negotiators were excluded.

[Hiram]

"The DFL leadership can have their own debates, in private as usual. Mostly they must be asking whether they gave too large a proxy to the Governor, leaving them irrelevant as in unnoticed by news crews."

I am not sure who the "DFL leadership" is who is being referred to here. Dayton? The party leaders like Ken Martin? The DFL legislative leadership? But the fact is, none of these people had any influence with Dayton, and none of them had a proxy to give him.

The fact is Dayton is very much his own man within the DFL. He has rarely won party endorsement in his races, and he wasn't the endorsed candidate this time. The legislative leaders mostly supported Margaret. Because DFL legislators were in the minority, they had no impact at all in the conduct of legislative business. They were simply bystanders. In the final negotiations between the governor and the Republican legislators, they were mostly excluded.

"And while we didn't get voter id yet, our leaders took good advantage of Dayton's clear lack of preparation and sudden motivation to end his shutdown to get many good reforms through. "

First I have heard of a lack of preparation. The feeling generally on my side of things that the governor did a remarkable job in excluding a lot of objectionable policy from the final bills. That, to me, suggests that he was very well prepared indeed.

[Hiram]

I was actually on the floor of the house of representatives when the governor gave his state of the state speech. Kind of a thrill for a political junkie like me. When the governor got to the passage in his speech asking legislators not to shut down the government, DFLer's leapt immediately to their feet, giving the governor a standing ovation. For long, long moments, the Republicans stayed in their chairs, silent, until it dawned on them how badly that would look on Almanac. Then, grudgingly, and by no means all of them, rose slowly to their feet and joined the DFL with lukewarm applause. There has never been any doubt in my mind as to who wanted this shutdown, and who didn't.

[Skip]

Just the perception that Dayton gave up and the GOP won may be worth a great deal in weaking the Governor's hand in future battles. One can only hope.

[Jeff Rosenberg]

So sorry, but general fund spending was actually $35.7 billion. It's only $34.3 billion if you classify our $1.4 in borrowing as a "savings," which makes sense for cash-flow accounting, but not for reality.

The fact is, the GOP gave in on spending, gave in on social programs, and gave in on anti-unionism. There was only one single principle they absolutely refused to bend on -- protecting millionaires.

[Hiram]

Here is a sentence from the McGrath piece that shows how people go wrong when they don't quote intricate Republican talking points verbatim:

"Here, they were not as successful, ultimately agreeing to a budget that increases state general fund spending to $34 billion, 12% above the prior biennium."

The key words of art here are "state general fund spending". Brodkorb uses this important term correctly, but when McGrath employes it, he goes off the rails. General Fund Spending for the last biennium was 34 billion dollars. There was little or no increase between the proposed Republican spending for this biennium over the last biennium, certainly not 12%. What did increase by 12%, 13% actually, was state revenue. McGrath makes the mistake common among Republicans of confusing revenue with spending numbers. Beat reporters rarely made this kind of mistake, but it was often picked up by the editorial pages, the Pioneer Press in particular.

As Jeff points out, actual spending is going up 1.4 billion dollars, a figure Republicans ignore, ostensibly because they don't count money borrowed and spent, as many they spend, but in reality because they want to conceal from their supporters that they actually did compromise with the governor to increase state spending.

[NV]

1. The Republicans were elected to reduce government spending in the landmark 2010 election.
2. The Republicans then raised spending to 35.7 billion.
3. The Republicans WON!! -- because they will get re-elected AND can spend more money to stay elected. This is the true nature of the modern Republican.
4. The People of Minnesota lost -- they were tricked into voting for the Republicans, and now have to go back out to the cotton fields and increase their quotas for the next central planning activity.

[Hiram]

But Republicans were also elected to increase state funding for their local schools, both public and charter. To some extent, they were also elected to gore somebody else's ox (let's really stick it to those city and suburban slickers), but that was purely a secondary consideration.

The Republican challenge in the next election cycle is clear enough. They will want to explain that yes we protected funding for your local schools. Yes, we did it in a way that's hard to identify on any tax bill you might receive. Yes, we protected high income earners from paying additional taxes, not that anyone in their district is likely to be such a high income earner. What they won't want to talk about is that all this was done at the expense of the poor and the middle class.

[Speed Gibson]

Dayton's lack of preparation was apparent in many ways. He had only detailed revenue proposals, seldom anything substantive beyond totals on the spending side. That's why the gag orders on his people and why his people weren't keeping him up to date. Good people don't do that unless it's pointless. And he was clearly unprepared on the shutdown, didn't understand at all what would happen.

[Speed Gibson]

Neither side wanted the shutdown, a clash of visions played out in the theater of divided government. Either would have graciously received news that the other side gave in. Dayton was perhaps oversold on the efficacy of shutdown as a tactic, and to his credit, reversed his error in light of reality. And some good may yet come of this, from a better understanding of how over-involved our state government is in our day to day affairs.

[Hiram]

"He had only detailed revenue proposals, seldom anything substantive beyond totals on the spending side."

I think we should avoid the mistake of thinking that just because Dayton didn't present detailed proposals, that he didn't have them. As governor, Dayton had far more access to state departments who could provide him with such detailed analysis than the legislature, and I am sure they did. It simply wasn't in his interest as a negotiator to show all his cards at once. Nor was it in his interest to give the Republicans access to his commissioners. They take their policy direction from the governor, not from the legislature, and it's important for the executive department to speak with one voice.

[Speed Gibson]

You're too generous with your benefits of the doubt, too oblivious to a long standing, repeated history of avoiding hard work. The unprepared leader always tries to delay or blunt the process. He couldn't have his Commissioners trying to explain why they as yet had no firm direction from the Governor. Yes, he wants more spending but on what programs, in what amounts? No answer. We saw the same thing in 2005 when Dean Johnson hurriedly adjourned the Senate early, leaving his Committee chairs still negotiating unaware and embarrassed.

I'm no fan of Pawlenty, but both he and his Commissioners were prepared and engaged. Another point: Pawlenty called the last special session immediately, allowing public debate. Dayton had to keep the Capitol dark, again to help conceal his lack of preparation.

[Wolverine]

I'm getting tired of the bloggers trying to tell me that we won and that Dayton and the DFL lost. I'm also really tired of politicians telling me "you don't understand the intricacies of this or that in the budget" and "we got some really good reforms out of the deal".
Dayton and the DFL may not have gotten the $38 billion they wanted, but they got more than the GOP campaigned on ($30.2 - $32 billion) and some of it is from money we will borrow against money we may never see (tobacco funds). The GOP is nothing but a bunch of losers in my opinion.
As for us common folk not understand the intricacies of the budget, we are smarter than you think GOP and we will remember this come 2012. We put you in power and we can take you out of power just as fast.
Finally, all these so called reforms can be wiped out in on DFL control legislature so they really mean nothing. If you are going for reforms, the GOP should have insisted on Voter ID being passed this session so it could be used to stop voter fraud in 2012. With the way it was left, voter ID won't come into being until after the 2012 elections if at all and by then it is too late.

[Hiram]

I'm no fan of Pawlenty, but both he and his Commissioners were prepared and engaged.

Pawlenty was a very disengaged guy, notoriously so. It used to drive legislators crazy. That was one of the procedural things that Dayton was determined to remedy, and he did.

"he wants more spending but on what programs, in what amounts? No answer."

Since Republicans were opposed to additional spending, what would have been the point of giving them details of spending, they would have opposed in any case? The Republican budget was driven by spending limits not policy.

"Dayton and the DFL may not have gotten the $38 billion they wanted, but they got more than the GOP campaigned on ($30.2 - $32 billion) and some of it is from money we will borrow against money we may never see (tobacco funds)."

At this point, it's unclear that Dayton and the DFL ever wanted the 39 billion. Remember, that number didn't come from the DFL, it came from the Pawlenty administration, and it's the budget Gov. Pawlenty signed off on. I don't recall the GOP ever campaigned on a specific budgetary number. What Republicans generally say is that we should "live within our means", "spend only what's in the state's checkbook". What that is generally taken to mean is that revenue should limit expenditures. So when 34 billion was forecast as state revenue, the Republican leadership position at least became that we should spend 34 billion dollars. GOP leaders presumably didn't want to go lower than that because it would have meant cuts for their, as opposed to someone else's constituents. Republicans wanted that 1.4 billion dollars in additional revenue. They just didn't want the visible responsibility of paying for it. Other people, other layers of government will have to assume that responsibility.

[The Big Stink]

Perception is reality. The perception is the governor caved. Whether the state won or not is yet to be determined. Either way, the gridlock of having a DFL governor and a GOP house locking horns for two years is far preferable to the doomsday scenario of Governor Dipstick with a rubber stamp group of sycophant lackies. Sometimes a "draw" is the best you're gonna get.

[Hiram]

"Perception is reality."

Sorkin says "Politics is perception." It may be reality to but not all of reality.

"The perception is the governor caved."

Some people perceive that. But it's also true that Republicans agreed 1.4 billion dollars in additional spending, violating their ironclad commitment to "live within our means", and "spend only what's in the state's checkbook". They were successful in protecting the state's wealthiest citizens from a tax increase, but that only means the rest of us will have to pick up the tab for the GOP's end of session spending spree.