« KTLK INTERVIEW TONIGHT FROM 4:30 TO 5:00 P.M. | Home | DEJA VU: STAR TRIBUNE REPORTS AGAIN THAT WALZ HAS TAKEN NO POSITION ON OBERSTAR’S PROPOSAL TO RAISE THE GAS TAX »
LIVE-BLOGGING DFL SENATE CANDIDATES DEBATE
By Michael B. Brodkorb | September 5, 2007
10:59 p.m.: While I wasn't the only blogger at tonight's debate, I think I was the only blogger who live-blogged the debate.
###
9:28 p.m.: The debate has ended – I'll have more later tonight.
9:25 p.m.: Franken is started his closing remarks. He's talking about his grassroots organization and addressing the fact that he is a celebrity. He also said he has been endorsed by 38 legislators. I thought the number was 36, but I'll check his website.
9:22 p.m.: Ciresi, Nelson-Pallmeyer have finished speaking. Cohen is encouraging people to look at what the candidates have done. (My questions is what has Franken done?)
9:17 p.m.: Closing remarks have started. Ciresi said he thinks debates are important and he looks forward to more give-and-take in debates. He also thanked his spouse and the spouses of the other candidates.
9:13 p.m.: The next question is about the candidates being all being white males and how will they represent minorities and women. Franken said he doesn't consider himself a white male.
9:09 p.m.: The candidates are now being asked a series of "lightning round" questions. The first question is on subprime loans and predatory lending.
9:06 p.m.: One of Franken's suggestions to address global warming is to encourage people to bike like they do in Europe. That's a keeper.
9:03 p.m.: I must comment about the energy in the room: There is none! The crowd doesn't seem to be engaged.
9:00 p.m.: The next question about global warming.
8:49 p.m.: Ciresi said money will not be an option in this race. Ciresi said he and Franken have raised enough money for the DFL endorsement. Ciresi is trailing Franken in money raised, so he needs to make this point.
8:45 p.m.: Nelson-Pallmeyer agrees that we need public financing of elections.
8:40 p.m.: The next questions is about changing the "system." – the moderator read a quote from Wellstone. Franken answered that we need public financing of campaigns. Franken is spinning his fundraising figures. Franken took another shot at Coleman, saying that he's not sure that anyone likes Coleman. This was apparently a joke. I don't think most people here took it as a joke.
8:34 p.m.: Franken said that when he gets to the U.S. Senate, someone will have to explain to him what an "unfunded mandate" is.
8:30 p.m.: Cohen said America has created terrorism – we're responsible.
8:27 p.m.: Franken said he agrees with Nelson-Pallmeyer that terrorism should be treated like a crime problem.
8:23 p.m.: The next question is about terrorism. Nelson-Pallmeyer said we should treat terrorism like a crime problem.
8:19 p.m.: Franken has started to give his answer to the question about Iraq. Franken gave another angry response. He even said Republicans have called him angry.
8:17 p.m.: Ciresi said we should meet with "all powers in the Middle East." Another interesting quote. Ciresi took a subtle jab at Franken for supporting the war in Iraq.
8:15 p.m.: Cohen said he must meet with "all of our adversaries" in Iraq. Interesting quote.
8:13 p.m.: The questions have started: The first question is about Iraq and Coleman's desire to bring some troops home from Iraq.
8:09 p.m.: JD, who used to blog at MN Publius, and who now works for Franken's campaign is here tonight. He's taking pictures of Ciresi while he's speaking. He's also filming the debate.
8:06 p.m.: Mike Ciresi has started to give opening remarks. He said he would like to actually have a debate tonight, not to allow candidates to attack each other, but because this race is so very important.
7:59 p.m.: Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer has started his opening remarks.
7:58 p.m.: I haven't heard Cohen speak in person before. He gave a feisty speech – reminded me of Wellstone.
7:55 p.m.: Cohen just said he father was a tobacco and potato farmer. I wonder what Ciresi think about tobacco farmers?
7:51 p.m.: Jim Cohem has started his opening remarks.
7:49 p.m.: Franken has started his attacks on Senator Coleman. He sounds angry.
7:48 p.m.: This is Franken's standard stump speech – I'm not trying to knock it, but it's his standard stump speech.
7:44 p.m.: Al Franken has started to give his opening remarks.
7:41 p.m.: I forgot to list the candidates in attendance tonight: Al Franken, Jim Cohen, Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, and Mike Ciresi.
7:40 p.m.: Candidates have been given 7 minutes for opening statements.
7:35 p.m.: DNC member Jackie Stevenson was listed as a moderator of tonight's debate, but since she has endorsed a candidate for the U.S. Senate (I think Ciresi), she will not moderate the debate.
7:32 p.m.: Franken was late, but he has taken his seat.
7:30 p.m.: Franken has arrived, but he hasn't taken his seat yet.
7:27 p.m.: The debate is about to start and Franken is not here yet.
7:25 p.m.: I haven't seen Franken yet – is he coming to tonight's debate?
7:20 p.m.: Mike Ciresi's campaign has a good amount of volunteers at tonight's debate. Ciresi's campaign listed tonight's debate on their website. It appears that Al Franken's campaign doesn't list tonight's debate on their website.
7:16 p.m.: I'm at Golden Valley City Hall to live-blog tonight's debate between the DFL candidates for the U.S. Senate. The debate is scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m. so please check back to Minnesota Democrats Exposed for more updates.
Topics: Uncategorized | 28 Comments »
28 Responses to “LIVE-BLOGGING DFL SENATE CANDIDATES DEBATE”
Comments
You must be logged in to post a comment.
September 5th, 2007 at 10:22 pm
I would like to admonish Al Franken not seven times, but seventy times seven. First things first: I can say one thing about Franken. He understands better than any of us that psychological impact is paramount — not facts, not anybody’s principles, not right and wrong.
I’m not suggesting that we behave likewise. I’m suggesting only that if you read Franken’s writings while mentally out of focus, you may get the sense that vigilantism is a noble goal. But if you read his writings while mentally in focus and weigh each point carefully, it’s clear that if he gets his way, we will soon be engulfed in a Dark Age of incendiarism and indescribable horror.
That’s why I’m telling you that those of us who are too lazy or disinterested to address the legitimate anger, fear, and alienation of people who have been mobilized by Franken because they saw no other options for change have no right to complain when he and his spokesmen muster enough force to engage in the trafficking of human beings.
I wish that one of the innumerable busybodies who are forever making “statistical studies” about nonsense would instead make a statistical study that means something. For example, I’d like to see a statistical study of Franken’s capacity to learn the obvious. Also worthwhile would be a statistical study of how many irrational blowhards realize that someone once said to me, “I leave open the question of the extent to which this discussion could be applied to rash cadgers.” This phrase struck me so forcefully that I have often used it since.
Regardless of the theoretical beauty of the notion that the issues surrounding feudalism are more complex and embedded than Franken will admit, there is the opposing fact that I have a hard time trying to reason with people who remain calm when they see Franken deface a social fabric that was already deteriorating. He is known for publishing what is easily identifiable as opinion under the guise of fact, pure and simple.
If anything, I wouldn’t want to promote group-think attitudes over individual insights. I would, on the other hand, love to embark on a new path towards change. But, hey, I’m already doing that with this letter. While I don’t question Franken’s motives, and I certainly understand the frustrations of his fans, my cause is to present a noble vision of who we were, who we are, and who we can potentially be.
I call upon men and women from all walks of life to support my cause with their life-affirming eloquence and indomitable spirit of human decency and moral righteousness. Only then will the world realize that any rational argument must acknowledge this.
Franken’s nerdy philippics, naturally, do not.
September 5th, 2007 at 10:54 pm
I was at this forum, was told this blog was being
created live, and thought I’d check it out. The
several comments about Al Franken being angry and
the Republicans calling him angry seem quite out of context. What he said was more like “I’ve been to Iraq four times and have great respect for the courage and work of our troops. When they don’t get the equipment support they need
over there, and they don’t get the treatment support they need when they come back, that makes me angry. If Republicans say I’m angry, I say,
‘What will it take for you to get angry enough to
do something about this’.” As a veteran involved with several efforts to help soldiers returning home, I’d agree and say, “What will it take for all of us to focus and channel our anger to finally really support the troops — from the still too many homeless and suicidal Vietnam era
Vets to those coming home now from Iraq?”
September 6th, 2007 at 1:21 am
Good assessment, Larry. WOW!!!
September 6th, 2007 at 5:49 am
“Still too many homeless…” All the still too many can be blamed on the Democrat’s 1975 vote cutting off all funding and military supplies and equipment for South Vietnam. All the still too many can be blamed on the anti-war,”Let’s lose this on too” crowd who spit on soldiers as baby killers, but don’t you dare interfere at the abortion clinics with a womyn’s right to kill her baby you right wing blowhards. All it will take is a refocusing of the anger blaming the President for any and everything from perturbations in the earth’s rotations on its axis to gravity surges pulling coffee cups off of flat surfaces, into blaming Jimmy Carter for failing to stand up to the Iranians in 1979, Bill Clinton’s failure to visit the site of the first World Trade Center bombing and the failure of the press to report factually since Nixon’s resignation in 1973, when every aspiring journalist since then had trod the path of, “Let’s make our careers and destroy public figures with innuendo and slander, except for our guys”. And perhaps stop at every home of every veteran on one’s way back to sanity, and apologize for smearing their character.
Other than that, I can’t think of a single remedy. By the way, “Hey Larry!”, said Mr. Howard, have you read Stolen Honor?
September 6th, 2007 at 6:23 am
Yeah, and lets not blame the Clinton Administration for gutting the present day military and not funding them properly.
This is one vet (of many) who think the Democrats are whacked out of their minds, and Franken is one of the crazier ones.
September 6th, 2007 at 7:29 am
Yeah, good point Larry. Now got tell that to Al Franken, who is advocating that we cut off all funding for the soldiers.
September 6th, 2007 at 8:13 am
Do we have some paid supporters of Al’s here posting now?
September 6th, 2007 at 8:56 am
Glad to see you here, Kathy. But answer the question I posed a few days ago and you ignored:
If you are “as conservative as they come” on marriage…what’s your position on Gay Marriage, huh? You throw stones at Coleman about his marriage…and you claim to be Mrs. Conservative on that issue.
Pony-up your answer.
September 6th, 2007 at 9:55 am
In many ways, kathy’s got some conservative streaks. She’s a true liberal though, because she’s more than willing to bend and disregard her values to support what’s convenient and feels good.
September 6th, 2007 at 10:43 am
Kerry, actually the homeless vets are not a result of cutting funding to the corrupt former government of South Vietnam. They are the result of poor planning and underfunding of our Veterans’ healthcare, something which are veering very close to doing once again.
If Halliburton would give back the billions they stole from our country, we probably could have a stellar healthcare system for our vets.
September 6th, 2007 at 11:01 am
That’s probably a good point Tats… but it never helped when soldiers came home to liberals spitting on them, calling them murderers and discriminating against.
As for Halliburton… put down the talking points. Slowly… yes, that’s it… you can do it… now wipe the drool from your mouth… and take shower, you smell like piss.
September 6th, 2007 at 11:15 am
“…The amount of funds that Halliburton has looted from the DoD is nearly equivalent to the $1.5 billion in funds that the Bush Administration had denied the Veterans Administration for vitally needed medical services to the sick and wounded veterans and troops. The public anger over the White House shortchanging the VA was so huge, that the Republicans subsequently signed on to a Democratic amendment to pass legislation giving an additional $1.5 billion to the VA.”
War profiteers smell like greed and piss to me.
September 6th, 2007 at 11:35 am
Tats, we know your party under Clinton had used Halliburton due to the fact there really is no one else who can do what they do.
So just who would have you used smartass? There will always be those who profit from a war, but they still hold no light to those in our local government who waste MUCH, MUCH more than 1.5 Billion.
I believe there has been more waste at the K-12 education system in just oe year than will be wasted for the whole war! Then how much in extra taxes are paid so our govenment employee’s can have union representation?
The war will prove to be a drop in the bucket for waste compared to what democrats try to waste on pork projects year after year.
Tats i would guess you will be posting about democRat wasteful spending if you truely are concerned about wasteful spending? My guess would be not! You are just another whining liberal spitting out old talking points of the Anti-American left.
September 6th, 2007 at 11:49 am
[...] By Michael B. Brodkorb | September 6, 2007 I attended last evening's debate between the DFL candidates for the U.S. Senate last evening. But I noticed something before the debate started. As you can see from this screen capture from Franken's website, his campaign didn't advertise last night's debate on the event section of their website. [...]
September 6th, 2007 at 11:53 am
So you think it’s okay to excuse Halliburton stealing 1.5 billion? I guess that’s Republican logic for you.
If thinking a company ripped off American tax-payers for 1.5 billion during a war is Anti-American, I have to wonder what your definition of Pro-American is.
September 6th, 2007 at 11:57 am
[...] FRANKEN’S CAMPAIGN DIDN’T LIST LAST EVENING’S DEBATE ON CAMPAIGN WEBSITE; CIRESI DID ADVERTISE DEBATE Published September 6th, 2007 in Uncategorized. I attended last evening's debate between the DFL candidates for the U.S. Senate last evening. But I noticed something before the debate started. As you can see from this screen capture from Franken's website, his campaign didn't advertise last night's debate on the event section of their website. [...]
September 6th, 2007 at 12:05 pm
Haliburton has nothing to do with under funding vet’s health care. There has been less and less going to the VA Health care for 20 years or more – during the time when it was a Democratic President and a Congress that was a majority Democrats for 40 years. So the under funding is nothing new.
To claim that Haliburton is the cause is just plain assinine. It’s also assinine to claim we don’t care about theft just because we point out Haliburton has nothing to do with the under funding.
September 6th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
No, what is anti-American is the constant drum beat of how we are losing from your side dipshit, but then again you already know that and just try to twist things so your lack of understanding is not exposed.
If you are truely worried about folks who steal from the government, then how do you feel about tons of democRat pork spending and the horrible waste of funds at the schools?
What I have pointed out tats is that you are nothing more than a leftist whiner who will point at thing that you think you can blame Republicans for but give a free pass to the stealing democrats every time.
You are nothing more than jst another mis-informed liberal who only knows what they are told by the left’s machine.
September 6th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
“Franken said he doesn’t consider himself a white male. ”
I agree with him on something. I always considered him a unisex child mentally.
September 6th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
way to go MDE. mnpubluis has nothing on this event which means i end up coming here for the coverage. by the way, is it conventional blogging style to have the live blog updates posted from latest to earliest comments? i end up having to read the post from bottom up. i am asking out of blogging etiquette curiosity.
September 6th, 2007 at 2:24 pm
BK you are the one who is misinformed if you believe that war profiteering is not happening, it is and if that’s not un-American I don’t know what is.
I agree pork politics exist in both parties, but this is outright stealing, unlike a debate about the merits of an individual project (like the bridge to nowhere). What angers me is the lack of willpower to investigate and prosecute these companies and individuals who are supposed to be providing vital material to our troops.
What is amusing though is the Republican’s holier then thou attitude in regards to morality, the military and wasteful spending. In the last 7 years the GOP has shown by their own actions that talk is very cheap.
September 6th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
What I find amuzing is the democRats holier than thou attitude in regards to morality, the military and wasful spending. In the last 37 years the democRats have shown by their own actions that talk is very cheap!
Boy tats you sure showed us all.
You provide no facts, no numbers I guess we are all to just take you at your word which has been proven to be less than gunuine you asshat.
We get it Tats, you hate Republicans and they are all bad and wasteful according to you.
Funny thing is what you are complaining about is EXACTLY what the democRats and the leftist liberals are guilty of!!
Everyone KNOWS which party is the tax and spend party and reknown for their wasteful social programs.
I suggest you go find out more about government waste before you go off the handle too far.
I would also guess being the financial watchdog you are you will be posting your thoughts about how many Democrats give pork projects to their firends businesses? i mean you are a watchdog right and party does not matter?
I take it some liberal has had some extra money to get some lefty’s to post as I am seeing more post from wacky lefty liberals.
Than agin looking at Charles posts maybe it is some liberal school’s project to get much minded students to go out and post on conservative blogs?
September 6th, 2007 at 3:20 pm
$1.5 billion… that’s nothing. There’s at least that much hidden between Jack Murtha’s couch cussions.
September 6th, 2007 at 3:28 pm
I don’t hate Republicans, I hate their hypocrisy. The Democratic Party is not immune to it, but it is the Republican Party of today that takes it to new heights.
The pork projects you speak about do indeed cross party lines, but my point is what is defined as “pork” is subjective in many instances, but is generally defined as unnecessary spending. For example you probably thought the bridge to nowhere would have been a great idea, I on the other thought different.
However, when our government pays millions and billions of dollars under contract for certain goods and services to be provided to our soldiers in Iraq and they are not received that is fraud and theft.
September 6th, 2007 at 5:15 pm
Tats, I thought the bridge to nowhere was stupid. But that pales in comparision when it comes to Oberstars millions of dollars each year to bike paths!
Now prove that goods and services that were paid for were not delivered. And I do mean empirical proof from a reliable source, not some far left rag.
September 6th, 2007 at 7:05 pm
I’m not quite sure what Charles H. was trying to promote. I’m a simple common sense guy…try a Ross Perot approach in your writing style and perhaps I’ll understand. This isn’t an attack on you….just keep it simple to understand.
September 6th, 2007 at 7:14 pm
Tats, start with the hundreds of millions that go to Jack Murtha’s financiers. What do they deliver? Besides cash to Murtha?
September 7th, 2007 at 12:05 pm
Honeydog needs history/civics lesson:
“Haliburton has nothing to do with under funding vet’s health care. There has been less and less going to the VA Health care for 20 years or more -during the time when it was a Democratic President – during the time when it was a Democratic President and a Congress that was a majority Democrats for 40 years. So the under funding is nothing new.
”
First, as to Halliburton – just because they steal money out of one pocket does not mean it has no affect how much money we have to spend out of the other.
As to your ‘blame it on the Democrats’ by ‘revising’ history approach:
Since 1981:
1981-83………Reagan (GOP)
1983-85………Reagan (GOP)
1985-87………Reagan (GOP)
1987-89………Reagan (GOP)
1989-91………Bush I (GOP)
1991-93………Bush I (GOP)
1993-95………Clinton (Dems)
1995-97………Clinton (Dems)
1997-99………Clinton (Dems)
1999-01………Clinton (Dems)
2001-03………Bush II (GOP)
2003-05………Bush II (GOP)
2005-07………Bush II (GOP)
2007- ……….Bush II (GOP)
During this same time the Senate has been held by the GOP for a greater amount of time than it was held by the Democrats.
During this same time the House has been held by Democrats for only a bit over 4 years more than the GOP – not much of an advantage.
http://www4.gvsu.edu/dendulkk/pls304/party_in_govt.htm
While you are ranting about the liberal govmint not supporting our troops, try to remember who was at the wheel during this time.
And as for current funding of veterans programs, maybe you should be asking your ranking GOP member of the Veterans Affairs Committee.
Oh, that’s right, that spot is temporarily vacant because he intends to resign (at least last we heard.) http://veterans.senate.gov/public/