Bombs now in the lobby — State Terrorism Alert: Pawlenty to destroy safety & services one day very, very soon

We have heard that Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty will announce his 'unallotment' cuts entirely on one day in the next few weeks, in a plan to manipulate perceptions by attempting to contain the bad news into one news cycle. With little publicity, this day will arrive suddenly, it is hoped, denying his opponents a basis to organize against.

The bad news will begin on this day — good people will die, in particular because of Pawlenty's planned cut to Local Government Aid of at least $400,000,000, possibly much more. The beginning of Fiscal Year 2010 is July 1st, 2009. Before then, Pawlenty will cut off funding to everything in a way that will assuredly pander to national GOP primary voters. Our state and its still-strong social welfare net (as well as previously "equalized" statewide local government funding) will be the test lab for a sinister, hardcore GOP austerity agenda that may serve as the foundation of an authoritarian-rightwing populist electoral message in future years. The Shock Doctrine will get practiced against the cities and towns, first of all, by ripping apart the "Minnesota Miracle" funding streams that financed strong statewide local education (and services) since the 1970s.

Higher education tuition rates and health services will also get damaged, worsening the quality of life for the middle class (let alone other classes). Hennepin County Medical Center and Regions Hospital, to begin with, will start slashing services because of the GAMC Fiscal Year 2011 veto (which technically starts next July 1st). 

It's not a game, but for Pawlenty it always is. When the local governments have to hike property taxes or abandon everything, the statewide media will refuse to connect Pawlenty to it. More depressing to see are political reporters concur that the public perception that Pawlenty hiked the taxes "won't stick." They won't push any context.

That's what's coming up. It seems like Pawlenty's great day of state terrorism should be really unpleasant in order to cut the coverup down to size. It'd be a great day for a general strike, or just a time to stop and reflect on what authoritarian prairie fascism looks like. It's your preview of class warfare for the 2012 election.

*****

Greasing over the torching of the state is the goal of his PR strategy, yet it still seems he's abandoned hope of re-election in 2010. Arson is on his mind — and this is yet another mark against the whole idea of "homeland security" and "public safety." It seems the media will likely fall for Pawlenty's "one day" strategy just like they've fallen for the synthetic terrorism cases generated by FBI informants around here — they are apparently powerless to report properly about federal false-flag incident strategy, or the GOP arson of the public sphere.

Yet again, this proves that the "public safety" law enforcement squads supposed to protect assets of "Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources Sectors" are powerless pawns. It's just like at the RNC, when police intelligence couldn't determine that elite fraudsters in attendance were actually a greater threat to the public that even the most raucous dissenters there, for example. [Who destroyed billions, if not trillions, of dollars in wealth? Invisible criminals, not hyper-visualized window smashers. The media and the police can't get their heads around this central fact.]

We're supposed to accept police spying on dissidents, and prosecuting politically-linked property damage as terrorism, yet criminals like the bankers, and ethically crippled corporate hacks like Pawlenty, can destroy as much of the public commons as they want. Elite deviance and institutionalized corruption — and next up, the controlled demolition of all our cities — is far more damage against all of us than all the violent terrorists and miscreants in the world could ever destroy.

The media is the message: any 'terrorism' or property destruction only really exists in its socially mediated context, and the inverse, Pawlenty's torching of the state during one news cycle, is also a gambit at a coverup for his arson through the media. By the rules of the game, if the arson only stings him directly for a day, then he gets away with it, yet again.

*****

Earlier — What happened at the Capitol: The Democrats attempted to offer a tax hike on high-income earners, alcohol and a usury tax on high-interest credit cards. However they failed to try to sell their plan earlier, and the limited power of the legislative session & the DFL's agenda only needed to run out of time before getting kicked off the rails by the continuously powerful executive branch.

WTF is unallotment: The unallotment power was designed for emergencies from revenue shortfalls during the latter part of the year. People across the state got furious at GOP Governor Al Quie for unalloting small amounts in the 1980s. Unfortunately, it was not designed to permit the Legislature to defend local governments from an arsonist governor. Just a few short years ago, it was widely assumed in this state that governors would behave as statesmen, rather than terrorists.

Minneapolis, in particular, as well as medium-sized cities, will take the brunt of the LGA cuts. Cities with less than 1000 residents will likely get spared. Publicizing the level of budget reserves is another likely fork of the governor's PR plan. See this list of December 2008 local government cuts for the earlier unallotment pattern (PDF).  The League of Minnesota Cities has setup Thank LGA to explain what LGA is.

LGA is part of the economic engine of the state, by supporting more densely populated areas that really generate the most jobs. Much like all other "Chicago School" austerity schemes, real, sustainable economic growth for all classes won't come from the governor's new authoritarian redistribution of resources.

Despite the numerous transgressions of the DFL mayors (in particular in the area of intolerable police abuses & subservience to corporate development schemes), now they are trying lead the defense of LGA, as their citizens are about to get screwed, permanently, much worse than from any possible terrorist attack. 

--Fly On The Wall