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Tuesday, August 20, 2024

Tom Emmer video-tweets. He brays, so credit him with being that end of a horse.

“Tim Walz is a left-wing radical who has turned Minnesota into a liberal wasteland.”

So says Emmer. As if fit to judge his betters.

https://x.com/tomemmer/status/1821986862241837535 

First, Walz is a moderate, leaning conservative. Second, Minnesota is not a wasteland. Liberal or otherwise. 

Third, Emmer got his Congressional seat when incumbent Republican Michele Bachmann declined to run again. With that, he was an upgrade, but with Bachmann the comparison, it says nothing. Lipstick on a pig is still a pig. While Emmer is not bat-shit  crazy, as is Bachmann, he is an ultra-conservative Catholic against women's freedom and physician-patient privacy; a/k/a he is anti-abortion. Like Matt Birk. Like JD Vance, both also Catholic. 

The difference between Vance and Emmer? Vance is smart. Vance had Trump pegged before ambition changed his tune. Emmer? He trusted those SBF guardrails against fraud. Praising them. Before the fan loaded up. And, yeah. Front end of the horse. He can tie his shoes.

UPDATE: "Wasteland" was a particularly concerning word for Emmer to use. He avidly supports copper-nickel sulfide mining in northern waters of Minnesota, which, under mining greed and global history of copper sulfide mining disasters, puts the BWCA and the entire Rainy River watershed at "wasteland" risk, if it ever is done instead of stymied by Democrats. Stauber, his district, wants it. Emmer, neighboring Stauber's district, he wants it. Trump had it fast-tracked. Biden put on the brakes.

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From here, it looks as if there is no better Harris-Walz reason, plenty of reasons but none better, than that split on the toxic mining ambitions of foreign nations' mining giants.

Republicans want the risk. Money to be made, local short-term jobs in a GOP district. Long term disaster looming, and Dems want caution. The Minnesota legislature still has to pass "prove it safe first" legislation - the Dem majority failed on that last session, but we know a Republican sell-out when we see it. 

For Crabgrass, a bottom line. Don't sell out climate. Don't sell out the environment. Don't sell out to Trump-Vance. Vote smart. Harris-Walz is not perfect. Lesser evil still rules the nation's politics. But greater-evil has nothing going for it, and that is how it is. Was. Will be. Electing Harris-Walz will even free Vance from "Great Again," and the inconvenient truth that Trump's never dared to define, "Great When?"  Figure that one out.