This year is an election year here in Minnesota and it is time to elect a new Governor, and boy do we need one. The Forum included 2 candidates that call themselves independents (Tom Horner (ex-R) & Rob Hahn) and the 3 Democratic-Farm-Labor (Matt Entenza, Mark Dayton and Margaret Anderson Kelliher) The Republican candidate was invited but did not come to the event.
The crowd was small, I didn’t even know they were having this debate until I showed up at the expo to walk around and talk to the venders. They most have been expecting a lot more people they had seating for around 2000 but at the most there was 300 at any one time. They had seating on the deist for six people but as I said before only five came to the event. They each had 1 and a half minutes to make an opening statement and then there was to be 5 per vetted questions from state business groups.
The opening statements were what you would expect from a politician, vague and full of nothing. On my checklist the winner of the opening statement was hands down Matt Entenza, he was strong on environment issues and he had numbers and a plan. The first question was what goals and standards would the candidate set for recycling and waste reductions. Question one went to Mark Dayton, he talked about the role that government has to play in setting strong standards and penalties for corporate America to reduce and to give Americans the correct mind set for the future. On this question Rob Hahn used the phrase that would come to dominate most of his answers, “People need to take personal responsibility, and the government should not be telling people how to live their lives”.
Question two was about a new poll that came out that said 73% of Minnesotans support putting money into clean energy, and what would your administration do to support clean energy and what types do you think would be the best? The first candidate to answer this question was Rob Hahn and his answer made most of the audience gasp, his answer was that we needed to build one or two nuclear plants here in Minnesota, by the time he was done speaking most of the crowd had written him off. Entenza and Dayton did have some good ideas here but this round went to Margaret Anderson Kelliher, her plan includes that the state government should be carbon neutral by 2030 and she linked he clean energy bill to her jobs proposal. At this point Kelliher had to leave the debate for another event, unfortunate I was looking forward to finding out about her plans.
Question three, in 2008 we voted in the state of Minnesota to add a new tax so that the ”extra” money raised would go to protect wildlife and wilderness areas, but because of the budget short falls Pawlenty cut the money for the DNR and used only the money raised from the new tax. That was not the way the money was to be used, so what would you do about that money raised? Both Matt Entenza and Mark Dayton said that the voter’s intension was that the money was to enhance the DNR money and not replace it so they would keep their hands off it, but Mark Dayton went one step further and talked about where his priorities were and that our wildlife and wilderness need to be protected at all cost.
Question four was about good farming practices and what the candidate’s administration would do about pollutions run-off into our water ways from farms? Matt Entenza wins this one, with once again having a plan ready, easements, state standards and working with communities on permitting of big farms.
Question five, was on Bio-Fuels, mainly ethanol, what would you do to make Minnesota first in Bio-Fuels? Mark Dayton hit this one out of the park for me, he talked about how ethanol from corn was just a first step, but we need to also be working towards fuel from grasses instead and we need to be working towards electric and hybrid cars. I will give Rob Hahn and also Tom Horner credit for saying that they didn’t like ethanol as a fuel and that we should be looking elsewhere.
Question five ended the pre-screened part of the debate; the candidate’s now had to think on their feet for the next set of questions.
First Unscreened question was, what would your administration do to protect and cleanup the pollution in Lake Superior? Both Dayton and Entenza would set strong standards and enforce the regulations that are in place. Rob Hahn once again gave us Personal responsibility.
Question two was what are we going to do with the nuclear waste that is being stored and the Prairie Island Plant? Matt Entenza and Mark Dayton were on top of this one, but it goes to Dayton who while he was in the Senate he worked on the Yucca Mountain debacle, and said Nuclear is off the table.
Question Three; How will you insure that chemicals do not end up in our toys? Matt Entenza and Mark Dayton would both work with the FDA and the EPA, but Dayton made to case that this is where government’s role is.
Question Four; what was the candidate’s thought about allowing mining in the Boundary waters? Once again Matt Entenza and Mark Dayton were at the head of the field, saying the permits need to be reviewed and that they should not go forward.
Question five, and I’m very happy they got to this one; what is your plan on public transportation? This one was a homerun for Entenza, he has a plan to bring rail to the whole state, not just to Minneapolis or Saint Paul.
So where do we stand for the overall debate; it was close but I would give the win to Matt Entenza with Mark Dayton coming in a very close second. Margaret Anderson Kelliher comes in third even though she left after the second question, but Tom Horner and Rob Hahn were just that bad.
