Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Pawlenty Burnishes His VP Credentials

I've not seen any overt indication from Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty as to whether he welcomes the speculation that makes him a leading contender for John McCain's vice presidential nominee. If he's interested though, stories like this can only help:

The Minnesota Legislature voted to override Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty's veto of the $6.7 billion transportation bill Monday...

Six House and two Senate Republicans broke party lines to support the override and send the bill into law.

The transportation bill includes a gas tax increase which will be the state's first in 20 years.

The initial two cents go into effect in 30 days, and another three cents will be added Oct. 1...

Despite bipartisan support for the bill in the House, Rep. Dan Severson, R-Sauk Rapids, disputed its helpfulness to the majority of the state's population.

"This is probably one of the most important bills we can pass, but this bill is not that bill," he said. "There is a bunch of pork in this bill."

Standing in front of a gas-tax-increasing pork bill is not a bad way to earn the attention of the national media. The only unfortunate thing for Governor Pawlenty is that it has not attracted a lot of national attention -- at least not so far.

I suspect that most fiscal conservatives will cheer the Governor for his action, and hope that Senator McCain picks someone like him for the ticket.

Hat Tip: ATR

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