Kevin D. Hendricks's Blog, page 12

Vote Lisa Eng-Sarne for West St. Paul Ward 3 City Council

I’ve held off on making endorsements this year in a number of local political races because of my work with West St. Paul Reader. However, I am enthusiastically endorsing Lisa Eng-Sarne for West St. Paul Ward 3 City Council.

The Bullying, Lying Opponent

Given the competition, my endorsement should be no surprise. I wrote extensively about her opponent, David Meisinger, in 2018 and his bullying, intimidating behavior.

He hasn’t changed.

This year he’s making false, misleading statem...

Politics Is Broken: We Have to Learn How to Disagree

There are less than two weeks until the 2020 presidential election.

I can’t wait for it to be over.

Never in my life has an election felt more important, and no matter how it goes, I think we’re going to have a lot of work to do.

Politics is pretty broken.

There’s so much fighting and scraping and ignoring the actual point. It’s maddening. There’s really no incentive for getting things done. That requires working with the other side, and then your own side will crucify you.

...

Turning the Heat on 2020

It’s time for the annual turning on of the heat. I woke up to an indoor temperature of 61 and highs outside not getting out of the 40s for the foreseeable future. Seemed like a good time.

A few hours later it started snowing, so I’ll take that as confirmation.

Here’s the annual (nerdy) comparison:

2020: October 16 (inside temp: 61)2019: October 5 (inside temp: 52)2018: October 1 (inside temp: 61)2017: October 12 (inside temp: 64)2016: October 14 (inside temp: 62)2015: October 28 (inside...

Political Scare Postcards

It’s an election year, so the political mailers are coming fast and furious. You know it’s bad when you can’t tell the difference between the Republican and Democrat scare mailers.

What’s a scare mailer?

The ones with manipulated photos, misleading attacks, charged language, and not a damn positive thing to say.

Here are five mailers I’ve received. Four from the Republican Party of Minnesota and one from the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor State Committee.

They all use th...

Better Politics, Please Now Available

Back in May I launched a Kickstarter campaign to support this idea I had for a new book called Better Politics, Please. It’s now available in print and digital versions.

More Necessary Than Ever

What a rollercoaster ride this has been. I could probably say that about every book project I’ve done, but this one really felt like it. With a pandemic, civil unrest, and now a Supreme Court fight, this has been a trying time.

And that’s why I think this book is more necessary than ever. People...

MN House 58A: Koznick Reveals Fear-Based Strategy, Preese Offers Hope

Today saw a few interesting twists in Minnesota state politics, including the Republican-controlled Senate ousting a member of Governor Tim Walz’s cabinet and a DFL House member disclosing that he had COVID-19. But no twist was bigger than Republican Representative Jon Koznick of Lakeville mistakenly emailing strategy talking points to his Democratic opponents instead of his Republic colleagues. Oops.

It’s more than embarrassing, however. On the anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks, when we...

Mazie: 2005-2020

Last week we had to make the brutal decision to put down our dog Mazie. Oh, Mazie-butt. (Yes, I called her Mazie-butt, a nickname she earned ).

We picked up Mazie as a rescue near the town of Mazomanie, Wisconsin (thus her name). She was a rat terrier/corgi mix, a brutal combination that meant she wanted to herd things while also killing them. It also gave her body a peculiar shape and those awesome radar ears (they started out droopy, then stood up one at a time; unless it was su...

Coronavirus: 5 Months In

I’ve been too busy to blog. We’re in a weird time here in 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic and probably the most important presidential election in my lifetime. That pandemic has caused an economic scare (never mind, you know, death), and things are just weird.

I wrote about it a bit this spring to capture my feelings, and those days feel so long ago. So maybe it’s time to do it again. (This is going to be a bit scattered, so I apologize in advance for that.)

The biggest change...

Cory Booker: George Floyd Is a Referendum on Us

A couple weeks back Senator Cory Booker appeared on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert to talk about George Floyd and the protests and the reaction. It’s an incredible interview and I encourage you to watch it.

The whole interview is about half an hour, but there’s about a 15-minute chunk that gets away from the current politics and focuses on racism and this moment in America that is just powerful stuff.

Booker and Colbert have been discussing the protests in Washington D.C. and how Pres...

Ruth Richardson: A Story I need You to Hear

Ruth Richardson is a state legislator in the next town over. I’d vote for her if I could, but she’s not in my district. I’d vote for her because she is a giant of strength and conviction.

In the aftermath of the George Floyd murder, she shared a very personal story that I need everyone to hear. It gets at the heart of how things are different for Black people in America.

Richardson had to tell her Black son, Shawn, not to go for a run in the neighborhood: “I had to tell my little boy that...