It isn’t May and there’s a lot of budget work left to do, but the gay marriage debate has begun at the Capitol. Tim Pugmire’s MPR story says: “A Minnesota House panel listened this morning to passionate public testimony for and against a bill that would legalize same-sex marriage, and a vote is expected by the end of the day. … Former Republican state Rep. Lynne Osterman, a supporter of the bill, said she has long regretted her vote to put the Defense of Marriage Act into state law. She urged current lawmakers to avoid similar regret. ‘Voting no today this session might seem politically expedient,’ Osterman said.‘But I can tell you from experience that you will have to live knowing that a no vote is not fair, it's not respectful and it's not equal.’… DFL leaders have said floor votes won't come until later in the session when budget bills are completed.”
The editorial board of the Duluth News Tribune says we the people should vote on gay marriage:“The marriage amendment wasn’t a constitutional issue. No matter how any voter felt about gay marriage, the way the amendment proposal was treating our constitution was reason enough for rejection. Another reason was the prospect that a yes vote would have pretty much ended the conversation about same-sex marriage in Minnesota. Anyone with an open mind can agree it’s a conversation that should just be beginning. And it’s a conversation that demands to be had beyond St. Paul and the Legislature’s committee meetings. The issue demands a thorough statewide conversation — followed by a statewide vote this fall. Let the people decide. All the people. Not just an elected majority of politicians. Then whatever the people decide can be more easily accepted, whether done so while cheering or screaming.” … And with that "conversation" comes another bonanza of heavy advertising.
Frankly, I don’t know what’s more NSFW about this next item … the explicit references or the very weird intermingling of repression, bad science and personal morality. At City Pages, Aaron Rupar says: “As anybody who has covered government before can attest, public hearings on controversial issues can quickly spiral out of control. Case in point is the anti-gay marriage testimony offered up this morning by Mike Frey, a ‘concerned Minnesotan father and husband’ who took it upon himself to explain anal sex to a committee of legislators in uncomfortably hilarious detail. … ‘When ejaculation occurs inside of a colon it is a highly absorbent material, the cells do not have a barrier for the sperm and those enzymes to enter into the bloodflow. When the enzymes enter into the bloodflow and a continued, prolonged, um, environment to that happens these enzymes into bloodflow it causes what we know as AIDS … in Los Angeles County, California, where among the gay community a rash almost like boils, and a very raw skin broke out on the hands, feet, butt, mouth of these gay communities and they couldn't find a cure for it for a long time. Their doctors called the Centers for Disease Control and they couldn't find this cure for it. The cure they found, a very extrenuous [sic] antibiotic, was Zyvox. It cost $2,400 for one course of use.”
And that pay hike for top state officials?The AP says: “A decision about pay raises for top Minnesota officials, including state lawmakers, now rests with the Legislature. The appointed Compensation Council voted Monday night for a package of proposed pay hikes for the governor, legislators, judges and state agency heads.”
Over at WCCO-TV, Pat Kessler says: “Even without a pay hike, Minnesota lawmakers are at the high end of legislatures in the Upper Midwest: lower than Wisconsin, but higher than Iowa and the Dakotas. None of these numbers include per diem — those daily expense payments lawmakers get that can add up into the thousands of dollars every year. Last year, in a short legislative session, per diem averaged $11,000 per member. Many business executives with comparable responsibilities would be paid 5 to ten times higher. If you average that $11,000 a year in expense payments on top of their salaries, it is still less than the $43,043 it would be with inflation — and less than the $56,954 that Gov. Dayton says it should be.”
The cranky caucus will be sinking its teeth into this one. Jessica Mador’s MPR story says: “The city of Minneapolis has voted unanimously to support the development of an interstate bike trail, called the Mississippi River Trail. Plans call for the interstate bike trail to run through Minneapolis. The route would be a part of a much larger interstate bike trail stretching from the headwaters of the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico. The Minneapolis section of ‘U.S. Bike Route 45’ will follow existing on-street and off-street bikeways along both sides of the river. The project is being led and funded in part by the Minnesota Department of Transportation, which has asked local governments adopt resolutions in support of the effort.”
Speaking of infuriating the cranks, the AP says:“Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie wants to increase the number of townships than can use all-mail balloting during elections. It's one of the changes to the state election law that Ritchie promoted during a swing through Brainerd Monday, March 12. About 530 of Minnesota's 1,800 townships use all-mail balloting which is available to communities with less than 400 registered voters, Ritchie said. Proposed legislation would increase that to 1,000 voters.”
Following the debate over what to do with sex offenders, Don Davis of the Forum papers writes: “[A] federal judge says the system Minnesota uses is so close to the throw-away-the-key philosophy that it violates the U.S. Constitution. He threatens to take action if Minnesota leaders do not fix the system. If that change does not come in the legislative session that ends May 20, the judge could order the state to make expensive changes and order state officials to release offenders. A Senate committee Monday night unanimously approved legislators’ first step to meet the judge’s demands. The bill that was passed on to another committee requires the state to find ‘an adequate number of facilities’ around the state to treat sex offenders who have completed their prison terms instead of the current system that sends serious offenders to state hospitals in Moose Lake and St. Peter.”
Ball … on tee.The AP reports: “[A]buse of alcohol in Wisconsin costs the state an estimated $6.8 billion a year in health care, lost productivity, crime and premature death. The study by the non-profit organization Health First Wisconsin says excessive drinking burdens the state's businesses, health care system, law enforcement and criminal justice systems. And taxpayers are picking up more than 40 percent of the price tag.” And we’re building a giant bridge to make it easier for them to come over here!