By Request: Tim Pawlenty

I got a rare in-person request on Saturday from a dude who introduced himself to me at a glasses store to write something about Tim Pawlenty, since he seems to be a leading McCain VP candidate but nobody knows anything about him. The best place to start is probably Noam Scheiber's recent TNR profile which lays out the basic facts -- he's a young, smart, hard-working guy who marries social conservatism to a certain amount of populist rhetoric while mostly hewing to GOP fiscal orthodoxy. Like a lot of governors who've had to grapple with opposition party control of the state legislature, he doesn't have much in the way of grand accomplishments and also has a certain aura of moderation about him but it's a little bit hard to know exactly where he stands.

Basically -- he seems like a good VP choice along a bunch of dimensions beyond the fact that this seems like McCain's only hope of putting Minnesota in play.

Comments

OK. Now tell us more about Rob Portman. OH>MN.

Posted by wren | June 23, 2008 12:39 PM

Pawlenty is a CfG Fundie. The Christian right loves him. Don't forget that Pawlenty vetoed a transportation funding bill(which made CfG feel even better about him) a short time before the bridge collapse. Of course he had egg on his face when he has to sign a new bill shortly after. In short, he's another awful Republican politician.

Posted by Joe Klein's conscience | June 23, 2008 12:40 PM

Pawlenty couldn't even pull in 50% in 2006.

Posted by Anonymous | June 23, 2008 12:40 PM

That about covers it.

He initially got into office by being against light rail, but now he supports it and expansion is proceeding under him. My sense is that with overwhelming dominance by the DFL statewide, he can't do much crazy stuff though he did put an end to a concealed weapons ban to allow private business their discretion. Now all the stores have little signs that say "We do not allowed guns on our premises."

Honestly I was out of state for a long time when the bridge collapse happened (back now as of a month ago) but there is growing evidence to indicate that it failed due to a design flaw, and one that has been largely ignored until now by everyone. Um, yeah he's basically a rightist bureaucrat who is restrained by Dems and has to be more affable as a result. There's no reason to vote for him, but there's no specific reason to vote against him unless you are on the state payroll (he wants to cut your jobs then).

Posted by MNPundit | June 23, 2008 12:45 PM

Being from Minnesota, I would like to implore McCain to pick T-Paw. That way, even if the worst happens and McCain does win, we'll get rid of our stupid governor, and his Lt. Gov. is not a popular figure at all and I'm sure she'd not run in 2010, meaning we'd have an open seat shot for the Governorship.

Posted by Chris O. | June 23, 2008 12:49 PM

So true, Molnau is a tool. For instance, almost alone she wanted the replacement i35 bridge to not be designed for mass-transit so he had to over-rule her as everyone would have been pissed off otherwise.

Posted by MNPundit | June 23, 2008 12:52 PM

I've always been miffed by the suggestion that Pawlenty would somehow deliver Minnesota for McCain. There are some homers here for sure, but not nearly enough who would base their decision solely on having a mediocre local product on the ticket to overcome Obama's support here. Pawlenty couldn't even deliver Minnesota for McCain in the Republican caucuses here; despite Pawlenty's open support, McCain's numbers (22%) were closer to Huckabee's and Paul's (20% and 16%, respectively) than Romney's (41%).

Add to that the fact that Pawlenty's departure would leave the hated Carol Molnau in charge of the state, and the fact that Pawlenty eked out his re-election with only a plurality of the vote, and it becomes apparent that Minnesota is simply not in play this election cycle. Pawlenty may have other qualities that would suit him to McCain's ticket (he's young, he's actually legitimately friendly with McCain so he wouldn't have to fake it), but Obama is winning Minnesota this year, period.

Posted by Midwest Product | June 23, 2008 12:54 PM

Poblano doesn't think even Pawlenty puts MN into play for McCain:

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/06/mccain-vp-pawlenty-guarantees-mn-wi.html

Posted by In Texas | June 23, 2008 12:57 PM

Pawlenty doesn't give McCain a prayer at winning Minnesota's few electoral votes. He might help McCain elsewhere though, he's a charming guy, and he's actually quite right-wing and mean spirited but manages to come across as friendly and unfanatical.

Posted by aleks | June 23, 2008 1:23 PM

As the MN commenters allude to, Pawlenty is highly overrated by the national political press.

He won election the first time around mainly due to a weak Dem candidate and Tim Penny's indy run which got about 20% of the vote (IIRC). He barely won reelection against a pretty unpopular Dem candidate and probably would have lost if Mike Hatch hadn't blown his top at the press a week before the election.

His political skills are mediocre at best, the state Dems have significantly increased their share of the legsislature during his tenure. He is co-chair of the McCain campaign yet Romney won the MN republican caucus.

Also, he vetoed a transportation funding bill after the bridge collapse and had his veto overriden by the legislature with some key republican defections. So I agree with Chris O. I hope he picks him. The embarrasment of losing MN despite having Pawlenty on the ticket will be worth it alone.

Posted by DP | June 23, 2008 1:26 PM

...while mostly hewing to GOP fiscal orthodoxy.

Limitless tax cuts and endless deficits?

Posted by LFC | June 23, 2008 1:42 PM

In neither of his two gubernatorial victories did Tim Pawlenty ever get more than 50% of the vote; rather his victories were due to the presence of independents on the ballot. In 2006, Pawlenty got 250,000 fewer votes than Amy Klobuchar did in her victory in the Senate race.

I do not think that this demonstrates that choosing Pawlenty as VP will guarantee Minnesota's ten electoral votes this November.

Posted by Vadranor | June 23, 2008 1:44 PM

I had a buddy who was an independent. Pawlenty turned him off to Republicans forever with his handling of the transit workers strike. Pawlenty's idea of paying for cabs for poor people really irked him.

Posted by crack | June 23, 2008 1:54 PM

Irritatingly, having high-drawing independents on Minnesota ballots is becoming a fact of life. I have never seen polling asking why people vote for Independence Party (as they are called) candidates, but my hunch is they are low-information voters who self-identify as independent. I am pretty sure this still hurts Democrats more than Republicans.

Posted by Aaron | June 23, 2008 2:05 PM

he doesn't have much in the way of grand accomplishments

Apart from the collapse of the I-35 bridge . . .

Receiving reports of fatigue cracks in the bridge, Gov Pawlenty scheduled its replacement--in 2020.

Posted by rea | June 23, 2008 2:13 PM

Besides all the above, well stated political reasons Pawlenty sucks, isn't he also the guy who told the whole world that his wife doesn't put out enough? What does THAT say about him?

Posted by Ella in NM | June 23, 2008 3:25 PM

Actually his biggest accomplishment, I alluded to it in my previous post, is his handling of the Transit Workers strike. I've heard it was pretty awful.

Posted by crack | June 23, 2008 3:52 PM

I've lived in mn 25 years. In that time we've gone from the acclaimed MN Miracle to a race to the bottom of the charts in everything from education to healthcare. TP is just a taxpayers league stooge. According to some studies we have the worst commutes in the country. He doesn't give a shit.

Posted by jammu | June 23, 2008 5:45 PM

According to SurveyUSA's polls, John Edwards trumps Tim Pawlenty in Pawlenty's home state. Obama beats McCain by 5 in Minnesota without VP candidates, and Obama-Edwards beats McCain-Pawlenty by 7 in Minnesota.

Posted by Neil the Ethical Werewolf | June 23, 2008 5:51 PM

"For instance, almost alone she wanted the replacement i35 bridge to not be designed for mass-transit so he had to over-rule her as everyone would have been pissed off otherwise."

As much as I hate to take her side on the issue, that stretch of 35W is a horrible place for rail. Aside from the fact that the geography really doesn't work, from a planning standpoint it would be better to run it up Central Avenue, or even Snelling (which would allow a connection at University) than 35.

Posted by danno | June 23, 2008 5:55 PM

Matt,

Thanks for the great insight.

Best regards,
Dude from the glasses store

Posted by Patrick Donovan | June 23, 2008 8:50 PM

his temper tantrum line item veto of the central corridor line was absolutely disgusting

Posted by Mike | June 23, 2008 9:50 PM

Many commenters here are underrating Pawlenty, I think. He's pretty smooth, has an attractive family, and knows how to frame GOP orthodoxy so that it sounds so gosh-darn reasonable. In debates, he doesn't rattle easily, and he effectively deploys ridicule against his opponents without seeming mean-spirited, which is a pretty effective tactic, although Roger Moe and Mike Hatch, his DFL opponents in '02 and '06, were pretty tightly-wound guys with no senses of humor, which definately helped him.

In any case, I'd recommend to Matt and his commenters that they actually listen to Pawlenty speak or debate his opponents before they dismiss him so quickly. The image on TV is 99.9% of what the American public votes on.

Here are some of Pawlenty's biggest vulnerabilities, none of which were mentioned in the Noam Scheiber article. The earlier the Democrats get them out there, the better.

*In a 2005 budget deal with Senate DFLers, Pawlenty raised the state cigarette tax 75-cents-a-pack, and renamed it a "fee" so that he wouldn't technically be in violation of his "no-new-taxes" pledge in the '02 campaign. NB: The cigarette "fee" was Pawlenty's idea. The Democrats had wanted a temporary state income tax surcharge on high-earners. So much for populist "Sam's Club conservatism."

*On a recent Fox News broadcast, Pawlenty was selling McCain as "the real change" from the Bush administration. But Pawlenty told The Minneapolis Star-Tribune in 2005 that he would "stand by President Bush if his approval rating were 2%." In an MPR interview on October 27, 2005, Pawlenty had some pretty harsh things to say about Republicans who would distance themselves from Bush because of his low approval ratings, calling it a "weenie move"; "I'd be a bad friend and a bad person"; "this is what makes people cynical about politics and politicians"; "I'm not gonna run away from him like a little chicken just because he's unpopular"; etc. You can listen to the entire interview at this link:

http://www.publicradio.org/tools/media/player/news/midmorning/2005/10/27_midmorn1

*In 2006, Pawlenty told Minnesota grain farmers that if he were in the federal government, he would advise the State Department to open up trade relations with Cuba. On the Fox News program I mentioned earlier, Pawlenty mocked Obama for, you guessed it, allegedly shifting his position on the Cuba embargo. Democrats should challenge Pawlenty to make his original comments in South Florida. Here's the audio from the 2006 Farm Fest debate:

http://www.publicradio.org/tools/media/player/news/features/2006/08/15_extra_farmfestgovdebate

*In March 2003, as the Iraq War got underway, Pawlenty spoke at a "Support the Troops" rally, where he said something along the lines of, "We didn't start this war. This was started by a bunch of sucker-punching cowards who attacked us on September 11th." Now, a bunch of Americans still believe something along those lines, so this might be a better line of attack for Democrats to push among media people and DC elites who have a soft spot for "reasonable Republicans." Statements like Pawlenty's convince center-left reporters that Pawlenty is one of those types of Republicans, and thus helps lead to slightly less swooning coverage.

Posted by Another Chris | June 23, 2008 11:46 PM

Another Chris is right. I don't know why people seem to fall for Pawlenty's soft-spoken reasonable guy schtick when I can see what a prick he is from a mile away. I also agree with a commenter on the Five ThirtyEight site who says that Minnesotans are such insecure homers, that Pawlenty could theoretically deliver Minnesota. I don't see the wisdom of picking someone to deliver 10 electoral votes, though. If Pawlenty gets picked, Dems would be smart to point out how the vaunted Minnesota quality of life has deteriorated under him.

Posted by Gus | June 24, 2008 1:20 PM

Matt,

As a Minnesotan and long-time M.Y. reader, I feel I must chime in.

T-Paw doesn't have the juice, if you will, to flip the state red. Mike Hatch is one of the worst human beings the DFL has ever nominated --just ask Ashwin Madia -- and he still came within 21,108 votes of Pawlenty in 2006.

Conceal and carry was one of T-Paw's only real winners. As others have mentiond above, he's been forced to cave on his tax and light rail positions. With the bridge collapse magnifying the issue of fading infrastructure -- the Star Tribune regularly runs interactive maps showing all of the metro area's closed bridges -- he's been forced even further to the center.

I guess other than delivering Minnesota, (something he can't do) I don't see the upside to running him with McCain. There's no balancing aspect that I can see between them.

Posted by Sammy | June 24, 2008 6:35 PM

he's got major political skill. the mn press (before it got crushed with declining circulation) is awesome -- fierce, independent, all that good stuff. but when t-paw turns on the charm, grown men swoon.

dude's got major likability. people hate his policies, but once he starts talking w/ those half-open eyes and sort-of creepy smile, everyone says "aw shucks"

Posted by holdup | June 24, 2008 10:54 PM

Pawlenty is simply not gonna cut it. To win, McCain needs Sarah Palin as his veep-mate.

I do believe that Palin will get the nod.

McCain/Palin '08

Posted by Ted | June 25, 2008 2:17 AM

I've flipped my position on this. The reason is that I've been seeing a lot of McCain ads on Twin Cities TV. I don't believe that McCain would be wasting money in a state where Obama has such a commanding lead unless he was planning on doing something about putting the state into play. There is the possibility that McCain is aiming at the Western Wisconsin market, but it appears to me that he's leaning Pawlenty.

Posted by Gus | June 25, 2008 11:26 AM