A glossy mailer - apparently the Minnesota Republican Party has a lot of money to throw around on this sort of thing - purports to inform the unsuspecting voter out here that our State Rep. Aaron Peterson "voted against providing you a 9 percent rebate on your property tax bills."
In point of fact, Peterson voted against the governor's 2003 budget - the same budget that caused property-tax and fee increases to rise by more than $1 billion and that cut services in our region of Minnesota. Last year's GOP rebate plan, no more than a partisan gimmick, went nowhere in the legislature because cooler, more responsible observers were concerned about what passage would do to drain the state's cash-flow account. Bond houses look at a state's financial situation and note how much a state has in reserve. Too little lowers the bond rating. One immediate consequence is that the state must pay higher interest rates on bonded projects.
Peterson thinks, and I emphatically agree, that a far more sensible way to fund property-tax relief, schools, and nursing homes would be to close the off-shore corporate tax loophole. How many businesses in this county have off-shore tax havens to help them avoid paying taxes - unpaid taxes that the rest of us, who are not wealthy, have to make up out of our own pockets?
I think it's safe to say that's the last thing the Republican Party in St. Paul and its corporate sponsors want us to be talking about. No wonder they and their glossy mailers are trying so hard to change the subject.
Jerome Clark
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Canby
