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Dave Eischens

Lent Township, Minnesota
Commenter for
2 years 14 weeks

Recent Comments

Posted on 09/19/12 at 12:48 pm in response to New My Ballot site offers 'one-stop shopping' for Minnesota voters

The My Ballot tool on the SOS website is a good thing. Info access was easy, understandable and non-partisan. Plus there are links to see if you're registered, and where to vote. Overall I'd say this is a job well done by our elected representatives to make voting more clear and encourage a more involved citizenry.

For the proposed amendments you have to drill a bit deeper than the glossy prose on the ballots, but you can see the full text as well as SOS statement of impact. At...

Posted on 08/29/12 at 05:33 pm in response to Amendments likely to face more political and legal hurdles even if they pass

Unlike the other examples listed.

For many people like yourself, it would not be much of a hardship to get an ID card. For others it can be really difficult. That's called disenfranchisement.

Posted on 08/27/12 at 09:04 pm in response to Why today's seniors should object to the dissolution of Medicare

Our society provides a huge subsidy to private insurers by relieving them of insuring those over 65. With Medicare Advantage they were given an opportunity to skim the cream even from that population. But let's state reality: without Medicare, we'd have seniors in continual bankruptcy, probably homeless, and denied care left and right. In plain words, a lot more of our grandparents dying earlier and with less dignity.

Seems to me even the Libertarian contributors to this site must...

Posted on 08/11/12 at 10:56 am in response to Mitt Romney chooses Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan as running mate

is why it was announced at this time in the news cycle. Perhaps the Sunday shows needed some material? But then again I'm not sure how many viewers actually watch those anymore.

Even though the comment-writing crowd is arguably more likely to notice than the general population, it will be telling in the comments to this short article/announcement how many people are paying attention.

Posted on 08/11/12 at 07:19 pm in response to Pre-primary primer lays out MN education facts

$4,601 increase to $5,224 is pretty clear as shown in MN legislative doc page 10 :

http://www.house.leg.state.mn.us/hrd/pubs/mnschfin.pdf

As I understand it, that is the base State contribution to per pupil funding. Assuming the rest is handled through property taxes, special ed funding and etc.

But it seems the term inflation can have a...

Posted on 07/27/12 at 09:00 am in response to Obama nominating Ramaswamy to arts council; 5 music festivals coming up

I know it probably doesn't cause as many readers to comment as in the more political columns but it IS greatly appreciated. Keep 'em coming!

Posted on 07/23/12 at 11:22 pm in response to Neiman Marcus to leave Minneapolis

M Bachmann is looking more and more like a modern day Abigail Williams and sadly some fearful people are following her lead. History repeats itself. Monty Python gets more material. Major networks rejoice over another controversy. The markets plunge because, well, it's really just gambling after all.

Wonder if he'll get the dunking or burning test?

Posted on 07/18/12 at 09:17 pm in response to Franken’s torture smackdown

I can agree that Bradbury didn't authorize anything but merely authored a legal opinion. And as with most legal opinions it starts with the end in mind to justify the means. That's how our legal system works. Of course time has proven once again the end was never achieved and the commanders of the means have scurried like bugs hiding from the light of day.

Still, torture is defined not in a war-profiteering US political vacuum but in world opinion and law. Just because the US...

Posted on 07/18/12 at 08:29 pm in response to GOP evasiveness on voter photo ID leads to MN court challenge

One of the interesting aspects of our media-drunk society is that the distillation of news, knowledge, political platforms, etc. into tasty little soundbites or bumper stickers necessarily glosses over detail that may be in complete opposition to real world effects.

This is further exacerbated when politicians take cookie cutter marching orders and templates from an unelected entity such as ALEC that is attempting to bend societal rules to an oligarchic agenda. I think we can safely...

Posted on 07/19/12 at 06:40 pm in response to GOP evasiveness on voter photo ID leads to MN court challenge

Then maybe they'd actually have gotten Single-Payer/Medicare-for-all enacted. Maybe also tossed the Bush tax cuts for wealthy people in a dustbin some time ago.