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July 4th Parade & Celebrations
Please join us for the 2008 Edina Parade and Senate District 41 Picnic
Date: Friday July 4th
Place: Edina Community Center
5701 Normandale Road,
Edina, MN, 55424
(please park on the East or South side of the building)
- Bring family and house guests
- Children are welcome
- Wear red, white, and blue!
- There is no cost for this fun event
- Please RSVP so we know how many are planning to attend
To RSVP please call 952-848-4272 or email sd41gop@hotmail.com
Schedule of Events:
7:30 - 9:15am Continental Breakfast and help decorate the float
(Enter doors 5/6 for float decorating and pre-parade festivities)
9:15 am Line up for Edina Parade
(Frontage Road next to the Edina Community Center)
10:00 am Start of Parade (1.5 miles or about 45 minutes)
11:30 am BBQ Picnic at the Edina Community Center
(Enter at Door 3 (North) Main Foyer and Courtyard for BBQ and post parade activities)
Brian Sullivan, National Committeeman For Republican National Committee to speak at May 27th Full Committee Dinner Meeting
Brian Sullivan, Republican National Committeeman from Minnesota, will be the guest speaker at the next Senate District 41 Republican Dinner on May 27 at Calvary Lutheran Church, located at 6817 Antrim Road in Edina.
Brian has been an active Republican and in previous years he has been a candidate for Governor of Minnesota, Delegate to the Republican National Convention, Chairman of Senator Rod Grams’ Finance Committee and Chairman of the Platform Committee for the Republican Party of Minnesota. Mr. Sullivan will bring us inside information on the State Convention and the National Convention coming up in Minnesota and what we should expect to happen.
Currently Brian is the Chairman and CEO of SterilMed, Inc., a Maple Grove based health care service company that repairs and reprocesses medical devices and equipment for 1,500 hospitals across the country. He also serves as an outside director for Entegris, Inc. and The R.L. Winston Rod Company.
Brian has also served on the board of numerous non-profits over the past ten years, including a number of organizations dedicated to helping inner-city children and adults attain the education they need to fulfill their potential. This should be a very interesting and educational meeting for everybody.
Please make your Reservation.
The evening social hour begins at 6:00 p.m., dinner at 6:30 p.m with an $8 dinner donation for adults and $4 for students. District announcements will be made at 7:00 p.m. with Brian Sullivan introduced at 7:30 p.m.
Please call the SD41 Republican Office at 952.848.4272 or email sd41gop@hotmail.com to place your dinner reservation by Saturday, May 24.
A Caucus Message from Party Chair, Ron Carey
Tuesday night was an exhilarating and encouraging night for our Republican Party and our conservative cause. In all corners of the state, thousands of new Republican activists came onto the playing field to get more intimately involved in promoting our Republican principles of less government, lower taxes, strong families, and a strong national defense. We smashed our all-time caucus turnout record by having 63,000 Republicans take part in their neighborhood caucus.
While the extraordinary turnout was welcomed, I know that extra strain was placed upon our thousands of volunteers who convened our 4122 caucus locations, set up extra chairs, directed people to their proper caucus room, and did whatever was necessary to make the caucus experience a success. Please pass on this message of sincere thanks to each of those people who went above and beyond the ordinary to make the logistics of the evening the best they could be in each location. Thank you as well for the diligent job done in collecting and reporting your presidential preference ballot results in a timely manner. I was with our staff until 1 AM gathering and reporting the data you provided that resulted in only 117 out of our 4122 precincts not being reported by the end of the evening. Great job!
Some may be a bit discouraged by the large turnout at DFL caucuses. Please keep two important points in mind to maintain perspective. First, the party holding the White House has had lower caucus/primary turnout in 9 of the last 10 presidential years; the exception was 1980 for the Carter/Kennedy primary battle. Despite having higher Democrat turnout during the nomination process, Republicans went on to win the White House in 1972, 1980, 1984, 1988, 2004, and soon to be 2008. Caucus or primary turnout is historically not an accurate indicator of who will win in November.
Second, the DFL did not hold a true caucus. The DFL chair has spent the last two weeks on radio and TV with me telling DFLers that they could simply sign in, cast their ballot for president, and leave all in one minute if they wished at anytime between 6:30 and 8:00 PM. Reports are that hordes of DFLers did just that: vote and leave. At my own caucus over 90% of the attendees were new from the 2006 caucus. I was anxious to see how many people would bolt for the door once they had voted. I was thrilled that not one of the forty-six people in my caucus left after voting. Our participation represents people who actually caucused and want to be more intimately involved; the DFL conducted a quasi-primary under the broad umbrella of the word "caucus". Their "quantity" is no match for our "quality" of participation.
Again, thank you for your strong local leadership that is the backbone of our party's success. Without the hard work and dedication you have provided, caucus night would not have achieved our objectives as well as it did. Come November, we will look back at February 5 as the launch of an election season that will be filled with great success for our Republican team!
From Black Sheep to Shepherd
Minnesota GOP Treasurer Tony Sutton talks about 2006, 2008 and everything in-between with Senate District 41
“It's always great to come out to Senate District 41,” said Minnesota Republican State Party Treasurer Tony Sutton of “one of the best organized Senate Districts in the state” as he spoke before a packed crowd of nearly 100 Edina and West Bloomington Republicans. Amazed at the turnout of activists, Sutton  commented on his own early involvement with the Republican Party in the Iron Range town of Hibbing. “I don't think there were this many Republicans in the entire city when I did lit drops for Ronald Reagan in 1984,” he half-joked. Sutton was even outnumbered in his own household growing up, being the “black sheep” as the family's only Republican. “But,” Sutton told his audience, “before my father past away in Florida, I had managed to convince him to switch his voter registration...from Democrat to Republican.”
The Sutton Family's former “black sheep” continues to try and herd more Minnesotans into the Republican ranks as he shepherds the GOP's finances as the State Party's Treasurer, a post Sutton has held since 2005. And since acquiring his new post, the former Hibbing Reagan activist has seen his job become only more daunting. “I love the party, I love what we stand for, but we face challenges as a party in 2008,” Sutton commented. Part of overcoming those challenges, Sutton believes, is understanding what led to setbacks in 2006.
“[2006] wasn't a repudiation of Republican ideology but governance,” Sutton said. In Sutton's opinion, the electorate “didn't just turn liberal” but rather reacted to the party of fiscal responsibility suddenly “spending money like drunken sailors.” “The one thing that unites Republicans,” Sutton firmly believes, “is that we're all fiscally conservative.” And with the Democrat-controlled Congress increasingly looking to raising taxes, Sutton sees what otherwise might be a “tough year” as an opportunity to recapture fiscally minded voters. “Democrats are our best allies in running,” Sutton laughed.
The prospective Democrat ticket in Minnesota for President and U.S. Senate also has Sutton feeling optimistic about 2008. “Hillary [Clinton] is one of the most polarizing political figures in the country, maybe in history,” Sutton commented. Likewise, with radio talk-show host and “comedian” Al Franken making a strong bid for the DFL endorsement for U.S. Senate, Sutton believes many swing voters could be turned to vote Republican between Clinton's historical baggage and Franken's history of making crude and outrageous remarks. Such an election could have ramifications further down the ballot. “We don't operate in a vacuum,” Sutton remarked, noting that in the current political environment, Republican need to work more on voter persuasion than voter turnout. “We can't affect the economy, we can't affect the war, but we can affect the mechanics.”
Sutton believes the signs of a positive year are already popping up. After a difficult fundraising year in 2006 among small donors – the “canary in the coal mine” that 2006 would be a bad year, Sutton believed – small donors are back and fundraising is “off to a flying start,” well ahead of earlier projections. Such early but hopeful signs have Sutton working to rally the GOP base, reminding them that after November 2008, no one wants to be playing games of “woulda, shoulda, coulda” with the party's effort.
Education, Healthcare, and Budget
Minority Leader Marty Seifert’s Republican View
Speaking at the September Full Committee Dinner Meeting, Rep. Marty Seifert, minority leader of the Minnesota House of Representatives, set Republican priorities and how Republicans would approach them. All Minnesotans are alike, whether Republican or Democrat, on concern for two issues facing us today, Education and Healthcare. Republic ans would add Budget to that list as well.
Rep. Seifert spelled out the issues, as a former teacher and now party leader, facing our education system in Minnesota. As the only state in the union that does not have an academic calendar minimum, Minnesota’s average number of school days has dropped from 177.3 in 1972 down to 171 today, during a period when the amount of material to be learned has increased significantly. He pointed out that taxpayers want our kids to learn and to have a quality education, neither of which is being served by today’s shorter schedule and shorter school days. His view? “Every kid should reach their God given potential.”
On healthcare, Marty admitted that Republicans are not very good at getting their message out on this important issue. “The real problem is cost,” he said. That cost can be addressed by five initiatives:
- Competition – Today, four healthcare insurers dominate the Minnesota marketplace. That needs to change. More competition will lower costs, both for insurance and healthcare procedures. He held up invoices for one procedure performed at a local hospital for $2600 and the same procedure performed at a private clinic for $946.
- Eliminate Taxes – the 2% healthcare tax needs to be eliminated.
- Reform Welfare – Today, 4000 to 6000 people per year move to Minnesota in order to apply for welfare benefits that are competitively out of sync with neighboring states. A waiting period and work requirements need to be instituted in Minnesota.
- Reform the Tort System – In his home district, Marty quotes an OB/GYN doctor as saying that $1200 of the cost of each baby he delivers is to cover malpractice insurance premiums.
- Remove Mandates – Currently, Minnesota has 65 mandates in place that restrict action on the part of healthcare providers and insurers.
Finally, the Minnesota State budget is a priority for Republicans. Rep. Seifert pointed out that in the 1970’s the largest employers in the State of Minnesota were companies like 3M, CDC, Dayton-Hudson, and Northwest Airlines. Today, the three largest employers in order of size are the State of Minnesota, the Federal Government, and the University system.
He wants everyone to know that Democrats want to tax those that create jobs and increase the welfare system. In doing so, they potentially increase their voter base as well.
He wrapped up the evening’s discussion with he own view of the Presidential election in 2008 and its importance to this country. Judges are the key. The difference between judges that will be appointed by Hillary Clinton versus those appointed by a Republican will be striking. The effects could be felt for generations. 
For additional information on these and other issues Marty invites everyone to visit the GOP House Caucus website at www.mnhousegop.com.
Senator Geoff Michel Named
“Legislative Champion”
Dennis Schulstad (left) and Margaret Carlson (right) present
a “Legislative Champion” award to Senator Geoff Michel from the
University of Minnesota Alumni for his work supporting the university.
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Senate District 41!
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