Minnesota Passes historically bad legislation
We are already over taxed and passing this legislation was a huge mistake for Minnesota. Why doesn’t the pioneer press report the facts of the legislation instead of the touchy feely environmental crap, shouldn’t the loto dollars already be going to this? And I love the arts, theater, etc, but the government should not be passing a sales tax to support it.
Not only does it raise our taxes it also amends the Minnesota constitution in a move that says “let’s take two completely unrelated things and make people vote on them like they are one thing”. And this amendment gives a dissenting voice to those who chose to have no voice at all.
It does make me wonder if this amendment had already been in place if this bill would still have passed. Should they subject it to it’s own scrutiny?
This is a message to Pawlenty and the Minnesota Legislature, STOP TAXING! STOP NEEDLESS SPENDING! Let’s fix some bridges and potholes and do the things that the government supposed to do.
-Josh
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06 Nov 2008 9:57 am
The “STOP NEEDLESS SPENDING!” mantra is easy to cry out, and I would definitely agree with you.
The problem comes in when we are forced to look at the actual budget, and to cut spending in a real way. Would you like to keep drivable roads, or have a functional penal system? We could probably rebuild all the crumbling bridges in the state, but end up with zero art and music teachers in the schools. You might cut spending for environmental initiatives, but I would cut the trucking subsidies that were keeping them solvent when the price of oil was high. I wonder, do you consider public education a necessity, or would you privatize that entire section of the state budget?
I know that you are specifically nihilistic about the environment, but the lesson from our current 100-year experiment is that letting people and businesses run rampant is a recipe for disaster. We are short-sighted animals by nature. We have a very hard time looking at time-scales any larger than our own lives, and even when we do we usually trade long-term benefits for immediate satisfaction.
As far as I’m concerned this legislation is some of the most important stuff to get passed in the state. It is, in my mind, nowhere near enough, but a good start. It signals that people are willing to shave a tiny bit off their pie in order to try and halt the decline of our natural areas. We need concerted effort to fix these things, if we wait until the problem is so bad that our culture can’t function until we fix it, then we will end up spending a lot more effort and energy getting it right again, if we ever do.
07 Nov 2008 6:52 pm
Sorry, I’m a little out of the loop… but what in the world are you talking about????
08 Nov 2008 9:37 pm
a sales tax presented as Air and Water preservation that is actually going to fund the arts.
it’s total malarkey.
09 Nov 2008 2:30 pm
Sorry I didn’t notice your comment Adam, it got caught by Akismet.
I think we might have already discussed this at Monday night dinner, and I’m sure that you can tell but this blog was little more than a frustrated rant that wasn’t particularly well though out
You’re right though, we do need public funds for environmental protection. I am nihilistic about global warming, however I love being outside and when I have children I want them to be able to swim in a lake and canoe in a river. However, there are public funds in the lotto that should be doing just that! Instead those funds have been legislated back into the pockets of the people who run the lotto. Colorado has done an amazing job of preserving open spaces and the environment and it is done entirely with lotto money.
What I said to my sister there is true, it’s a sales tax presented as air and water preservation that is actually going to fund the arts. There should already be money in place for these things, however the Minnesota legislature can’t seem to legislate their way out of a wet paper sack so some yahoo with a mission gets this on the public ballot and runs commercials that present the bill using out-and-out lies.
Not to mention the constitutional amendment that gives a voice to those who do not want one… my main problem with this is that it’s pointless and stupid legislation.
-Josh
10 Nov 2008 10:01 am
I checked into the actual lottery statistics, it looks like less than 10% of the income from the lottery actually goes to environmental programs, about half goes to paying out winnings, and another quarter goes to administration and vendor commission. So you are exactly right, the lottery is broken. (http://www.mnlottery.com/moneygo.html)
In my view, however, this is an acceptable way to get around it. Instead of simply tacking on a tax without asking, or reapportioning some of the state budget, they actually asked us Minnesotans what we’d like to do, and we told them to go for it.
I’m not sure what you mean about the amendment that gives a voice to those who do not want one…