Today would be a great day for me to link bait some nonsense about Northern Minnesota’s 8th Congressional District race, the new attacks on the Medicare votes of Rep. Chip Cravaack (R-MN8), or the strange collection of fascinating Democrats you’ve never heard of who are going to run against him.
I just wanted to write a little note saying that I’m not doing that.
Or did I just do that?
In all seriousness, I expect this race to firm up around the edges into the summer and I’ll spend the requisite amount of time to cover it then. I’ve had some informal conversations with potential DFL candidates and will be doing formal interviews here at MinnesotaBrown when the field is set. I hope to secure an interview with Rep. Cravaack as well, if he’s game.
If my delay is frustrating to political junkies, please understand that I’m trying to make this blog more independent minded in editorial direction and that I refuse to play booster for a political party, even though my outside affiliations (depicted, as always, in the “Blog Notes” on the sidebar) would indicate my personal sympathies. I’d like this to be the only 8th-district based blog offering honest debate between all sides on the topic of who should represent us in Congress. It’ll probably kill me, but we’ll try anyway.
Hard to see anyone on the DFL side the stature of Rick Nolan. His almost certain entry caught me off guard and I don’t see anyone on the DFL list who should be able to go toe to toe with him.
I think a Cravaack-Nolan race looks tough for Cravaack. He got an excellent margin in Crow Wing and Morrison Counties and its hard to see him doing that against Nolan. Or at least it won’t be easy.
Nolan being 68 years old might have more than a little trouble connecting with the younger voters.
I doubt if he owns an iPad, iphone, laptop, desktop or cell phone. He might not even have his drivers license. BUT…he is a DFL’er.
That said, I wouldn’t count this old codger out…but I’d enjoy Chip taking him apart like a woodchipper out of Fargo.
Anybody runs and is truthful will get beat up here. The plain truth of our country and region is the “free train” is stopping. We as a people can’t stand to hear the truth, well here it is: I will have to be dependent on myself because all the safety nets government has set up over the past 50 years are not sustainable. When you take away the bottle the baby cries.
The 8th district will elect whoever tells them things will remain the same and even get better with smarter and more govt intervention. It’s called kicking the can down the road….. a Range tradition.