Minnesota, like the rest of the states in our glorious union, must begin to look very closely at its economic condition.

As more and more Minnesotans struggle to pay their bills today and to plan for whatever foreseeable impact the nationwide and global financial collapse may have and their individual families, the time has come for government at every level to reevaluate policies and shift direction.

In Minnesota, the income tax rate for many families is just over 7%.  Sales tax in Minnesota has become a very complicated issue- the taxes vary greatly. In Minneapolis, for example, the taxes on a meal at a restaurant where there is no live entertainment is 7.15%. The taxes at a bar in Downtown Minneapolis where there is live entertainment may be as high as 15.65%.  Click on the link to read the examples of how to compute the tax and you will see that the system is as easily navigable as rapids via pontoon.  MN corporate tax rates are 9.8%. This is one of the highest tax rates in the country. (Actually the world...)

MN is probably about to lose one of its large employers- Northwest Airlines. We Minnesotans have bailed this company out repeatedly over the years. In 1992, NWA and the Metropolitan Airports Commission came to an agreement that would require NWA to maintain its headquarters in MN, operate a hub in MN and retain employees at the 1992 level in exchange for the MAC issuance of $275 million in bonds.  Now, Delta must decide whether to play ball in MN or pay up to the bondholders. Click here for Strib editorial. 

If you were Delta executives, what would be the benefits of staying and what would be the benefits of leaving.  The maximum individual tax rate in Georgia is 6%. The maximum sales tax rate in Georgia is 7%. The corporate tax rate in Georgia is 6%.  It is a possibility that Delta may decide that lower taxes at every level offer plenty of incentives to pull much of its infrastructure out of MN. MN is not negotiating from a position of strength.

More companies in MN will look to our neighbors, like South Dakota, for similar reasons. South Dakota has a sales tax of 4%. South Dakota is considered to be one of the most pro-business states in the country: SD Income tax and Corporate tax rates remain a steady 0%. 

As of the most recent publications of state by state unemployment rates, South Dakota ranked #1 with a rate of 3.2%.  Minnesota found itself ranked #31 with a rate of 5.9%. While Georgia ranked worse at #37 with a rate of 6.5%, Georgians may have something to look forward to very soon- more jobs in the airline industry.

When politicians begin to think about financial problems and declining revenue, some of them immediately think- "Raise taxes" as though that will solve the problem. As more and more companies shift jobs away from Minnesota, there will be fewer taxpayers at both a corporate and individual level. 

Minnesota must immediately reexamine its tax policies to ensure that our laws not only invite business expansion but encourage business retention. Our tax laws must also encourage compliance. We must examine issues like why there remains a large illegal alien population in Minnesota. Many of the people in this country and our state illegally work under the table so employers and workers avoid taxation. Taxpayer tolerance for tax avoiders will have one of two results: increasing anger towards those who do not pay and/or an increasing willingness of former taxpayers to become tax avoiders. Neither scenario bodes well for state coffers.

Governor Pawlenty has recently launched the "Green Jobs Investment Initiative" and now has toured the state promoting the plan. It is great to offer incentives for green jobs and we should all hope the program is an unquestionable success. While it is possible the program will lead to an increase in jobs in Minnesota, it would be a welcome surprise if the program served to "ignite job growth and investment" over the next several years. 

The truth is the state must focus on retaining as many jobs as possible, green or not green. As long as the DFL continues to ignore and even dispute the fact that MN's exceptionally high tax rates are a contributing factor to the state's increasing economic difficulty Pawlenty and Republican leaders must not retreat from demands for tax cuts.

We can not tax ourselves out of this situation and we can not borrow our way to a better economy. The Republican Party nationally, in Minnesota and across the country must reclaim the message and the behavior of past leaders. 

Fiscal responsibility and allegiance to our founding principles is the only place the leadership can start if they are to earn the respect they need to succeed.

Bailouts and more bailouts... Stop the madness!

Back to reality-it is not going to stop.

So- if the government is going to bailout the auto industry, or any other industry, there should be some rules:

First, there should be no bonuses for executives at ANY company that receives a bailout from the federal government. (Remember, please, that the federal government has no money. This money is coming from the pockets of Americans who are increasingly worried about their own jobs, their own children and their own financial future.) Any executive of a failing company who expects a bonus is irresponsible and unethical. These executives should publicly refuse any bonus offered.

Second, executives across industries seeking bailouts should have their salaries chopped. These failing  industries do not have the revenue to justify the $1 million dollar, $2 million, $10 million salaries to which their CEOs have become accustomed.  Let the market work- as more Harvard MBAs are looking for work, the salaries should come down. If these failed CEOs can get a better deal somewhere else let them go.

Next, to the UAW and to employees of any other troubled industry- wages must be lowered. Union or no union, it is ridiculous that people working for a failing industry do not accept the fact that their wages are now too high. Would a person rather be employed at $40,000 per year or even $30,000 per year or unemployed because the company couldn't afford the $57,000 plus benefits in the union negotiated salary. (See UAW website for figures.) The world is changing quickly. Pouring money into failing industries is only delaying the inevitable. 

Again, if these UAWs or others in troubled industries can get a job anywhere else for the money they are making with their skill set then let them go looking. They will find that their wages have been artificially high and have contributed to the financial disaster facing their companies. They will not find any other job at the pay they think they deserve. That should tell them something.

The same can be said for people in the airline industry, the banking industry and every other industry in financial trouble.

These bailouts must stop or they will not end until there is nothing left to give. Now its the auto industry, next it will be the airlines, then the hospitality industry, then the manufacturers and so on.

These bailouts are an expansion of the welfare system. Instead of paying unemployment or welfare to people who lose their jobs in the economic downturn, we will pay them to keep working in jobs the market would otherwise eliminate.  And we will pay them far more than they would receive through unemployment or welfare payments.  

Click on this link to the Economic Policy Institute to use a calculator to determine approximate unemployment benefit payments.  People should be glad they have a job and stop complaining about a lowered wage.

Finally, maybe before the government bails out American Express or Citibank or any other bank or credit card lender it should first put some regulations into effect.  How about requiring credit companies seeking government aid to lower interest rates from 29% or even 30% to 10%.  (Any bank or credit provider not seeking government aid should be left alone.) These banks can now borrow money for next to nothing- if interest rates get any lower the money will be free. While banks get sweetheart deals they continue to charge consumers exorbitant rates. 

Is it at least possible that many people now defaulting on their debt payments are defaulting not because they want to but because they can no longer afford the interest payments? Is it possible that fewer people would default on credit cards if their interest rates were slashed? Maybe some of these people with more cash in their pockets might then have the ability to make their mortgage payments... 

Maybe the consumer credit industry has reached a tipping point at which the combination of high interest rates and late payment fees now discourage repayment. 

Maybe if the credit industry thought there would be no bailout it would be more interested in working with the debtors to renegotiate terms that would be mutually beneficial.

I do not believe the government should be in the bailout business.

If we are on a train that can't be stopped and it is inevitable that the government bailout has just begun, then maybe the government is fixing the wrong problems first.  The trillions of dollars flowing to corporations are not trickling down to consumers, who still have no ability to get out from under their debt.  Maybe the government ought to attach strings to any bailout program and those strings should require fiscal responsibility and an effort to work with debtors first.

Again, NO to anymore bailouts. The only way to save the baby is to make sure the cradle falls before it gets any higher. Let the bough break. NOW.

When I returned home, frustrated by the voting behavior of my fellow Americans, I found my daughter watching the John Adams series created by HBO.

I concede my daughter, a mere 12 years old, may not be representative of the typical child of her age.  I must also admit it makes me proud to be able to say she chose to watch John Adams rather than turn on some ridiculous cable program. While not all pre-teenagers would choose to watch a series chronicling centuries-old events, she gives me hope.

If my 12 year old can appreciate the lessons found in the history of John Adams and the other Founding Fathers than so can other 12 year olds. Maybe we, the people of voting age should all spend some time thinking about why our first leaders built a system that so uniquely intertwined natural law, the will of the people and a series of checks and balances that would serve to protect the people from arbitrary rule of the government.  The authors of our founding documents clearly understood that any government system with unchecked power was destined to expand its own power and usurp the freedoms of the very people who elected its members.

Perhaps the lessons taught through the retelling of the struggles faced by the men who penned the founding principles should be enough.  But it is not enough to learn the lessons. We see now that we must also live the lessons. The people who built this country were a hearty bunch- they understood that freedom is costly and that no sacrifice is too great when the result ensures that future generations will enjoy those blessings of liberty so appreciated and cherished. 

Perhaps too many of today's Americans lead lives absent of true struggle. Perhaps too many of us have taken our liberty for granted. Maybe the notion that people appreciate what they work for and neglect what they are given holds more true today than ever before. 

The amazing generations of people who helped conceive and then mold our nation into existence survived more difficulty in a week than most of us can imagine over the course of years. As we sit on overstuffed furniture in homes heated and cooled with the turn of a dial, it has become too easy to take our countless gifts for granted. As we complain that we can't find the cable remote or that the battery on our cell phone died, we remain oblivious to the challenges men like John Adams and women like Abigail Adams faced with a steadfast faith and, I am sure, abundant good humor and an optimistic outlook. 

The men who penned the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Federalist Papers and the people who contributed writings that captured the zeitgeist of their age were among the most brilliant of their day.  It would not be a stretch to assert those who argued in Independence Hall could stand toe to toe with any of the great thinkers peppered throughout history and with those who spout their rhetoric today.  I would also assert it would be very difficult to pull together a cast of modern day politicians capable of engaging the intellect of those men.

If we could bring the Founders here today, they would most likely shake their heads with a keen awareness that this result is the consequence of the people living with the very freedoms for which they yearned and fought so long ago.  Our comfort has led us to an unrealistic and short-sighted belief that our lives and our liberty are secure from the tyranny of ignorance.

Maybe more of we, the people of the United States need to experience some measure of the intense struggle required to form our country. Maybe the evolution, or devolution, of our political system is necessary to force the citizenry to examine our fortunes and recognize all that may be lost.  

The United States of America is the greatest nation on earth. We cannot be afraid to proclaim this. While we must not shirk from recognizing our missteps and our failings, we must remember that never before has such an incredible experiment succeeded.  Any political leader that allows our towering tree of democracy to be severed from its constitutional roots, will be held accountable for the consequences.  

As Thomas Jefferson noted in 1820: "The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave."

Now, my fellow Constitution-loving Americans, we must persevere as this current wave crests and then diligently begin rowing in unison to build an even stronger United States of America. 

Interesting news on the first day after the election:

1) NYC Mayor Bloomberg announces both deep spending cuts and large tax increases...

Did he only find out today that this was necessary or did he sit on the news for political reasons?

2) Russia announces it is putting missiles on EU border...

3) Democratic Senator Schumer compared conservative talk radio to porn as a justification for supporting the Fairness Doctrine...

4) The stock market that was supposed to stabilize as soon as the election was decided dropped more than it had ever dropped after an election ...

5) Palestinians (or some other Islamic group) in Gaza fired 40 rockets into Israel which led to Israel launching an airstrike into Gaza...

Just the first day in post-election jubilation. To mimic a Drudge phrase: Developing...