Remember Minnesota?

Pawlenty leaves office and the mess behind, much as Mitt Romney did in Massachusetts.

The state shuts down, article here:

Minnesota Shutdown 2011: State Government Shuts Down

Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton (D) and top Republican state lawmakers failed to reach a budget deal to avert a government shutdown ahead of a midnight (CST) deadline.

"I really believe I've done everything I possibly could and offered everything I could possibly think of," said Dayton addressing the state of the negotiations from his office on Thursday night. "This is a night of deep sorrow for me because I don't want to see this shutdown occur."

The Democratic governor and state GOP lawmakers had been engaged in contentious talks to close the state's $5 billion budget gap -- much of it left behind by GOP presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty, who declined to seek a third term in the 2010 election.


And now, in an amazing display, the folly of a sports stadium?

Dayton wants Vikings special session by Thanksgiving
Article by: MIKE KASZUBA , Star Tribune

Gov. Mark Dayton said he wants a special session of the Legislature just before Thanksgiving to reach a final verdict on whether the Minnesota Vikings get a new, publicly subsidized stadium.

Raising the stakes on a long-running, divisive issue, the DFL governor gave Minnesota's political, civic and business leaders five weeks to determine where the project should be built, whether voters facing a sales tax increase should have a referendum and how the state's $300 million toward the stadium should be financed. Dayton said the stadium deal could still be a work in progress when legislators begin meeting, a move that could make a special session a politically explosive drama.

"Most of what I hear is what everyone's against. ... It has to be what people are for," said Dayton, after meeting with legislative leaders Monday. He again left open the possibility that the $1.1 billion project could be built in Minneapolis, where the team has played since 1982, rather than Ramsey County's Arden Hills, the Vikings' owners' clear choice for the new home.


What an interesting display of fiscal responsibility!