Keeping up with a theme of "side shows" at the 5th Ward DFL convention, as discussed in the previous post, here is another one: CAROL BECKER, THE AMAZING TAXATION AND ESTIMATION GEEK!!!!!
Last time Becker ran for the Board of Estimate and Taxation, her signs said "Geek Is Good." (See one of the signs, above) This slogan was so attractive to her fellow geeks that...
...one of the stolen signs ended up on a dorm room at MIT!!! How does Becker KNOW this? Trust me, geeks have ways of ferreting out information.
Carol Becker's campaign literature provides a humorous top ten list of the reasons you should vote for her. (Geeks LOVE Top Ten Lists!) Here, David Letterman style, are the Top Ten Reasons to vote for Carol Becker:
No. 10: Reads books about government FOR FUN!!! (Gasps of amazement and horror from the crowd)
No. 9: Admits that she is cheap. Her father would argue she is frugal. (No, Becker is cheap. When she brought up MIT and I said my son wanted to go there, the first thing she said was, "Your son has expensive tastes.")
No. 8: She actually LIKES to talk about TAXES! (Members of the crowd who feel faint should sit down, and put their head between their knees)
No. 7: She has 15 years of Minneapolis budget books at her house, and will let you read them!
(The horror! The horror! BUT THE SHOW MUST GO ON!!!)
No. 6: She can explain the last four years of the Minneapolis budget and what we could have done differently!
No. 5: She is too cheap for expensive campaign literature.
No. 4: She has a spreadsheet and is NOT AFRAID TO USE IT!
No. 3: She actually UNDERSTANDS the financial crisis!
No. 2: She understands humor can be important in tough times.
AND THE NUMBER ONE REASON TO VOTE FOR CAROL BECKER: She wants to talk about how we can all work together to get through this financial crisis!
Naturally, being a geek she has a website: CarolBecker.net.
Now, I don't know if DeWayne Townsend is an opponent of Carol Becker, or if they're both running for different seats. However, in a spirit of fair play I am highlighting some of the amusing stuff I found on a flyer for DeWayne Townsend.
Townsend says he is "nearly retired, so he has time to devote to getting it right." He says his kids live in Minneapolis, and so that gives him "extra incentive." He was born in Brooten, the oil capital of Minnesota. (OK, a lot of people may not understand how funny that is, but you can just go a-Googling and find plenty of stuff about the Brooten oil well dream/fiasco/hoax or whatever you want to call it)
His email is DeWayne4BET@gmail.com.
I'd like to point out that both Becker and DeWayne list massive amounts of educational and professional qualifications on their fliers which are, well, far too boring to write here. Besides, too much sunshine is bad for geeks, so best to get them out of the public eye as suddenly as they arrived. END OF POST!!!!!!!
my two cents...
ReplyDeletecarol and dwayne are running on a 'ticket' so to speak - for 2 of the at large seats of the BET. I think there is at least one other person running, who says he is running so he can abolish the BET.
also in the pick I think not sure tho, that the woman pictured with the Geek sign is NOT carol becker, I think the woman pictured is the woman who was acting as the sergent at arms at the 5th ward convention.
Do you have her name? Despite the side show theme, I never came out and said "This is Carol Becker in the photo." I was under the impression it wasn't, but I wasn't sure, so I kind of wrote around it.
ReplyDeleteHi guys - this IS Carol Becker. First off, I want to say "Thank you" for the kind mention. We are working hard to talk to folks and it is nice that it is noticed. As you can see, we try to have some fun as we do the work of campaigning. The DFL party used to be a "party" and sometimes I think people forget the joy that comes with democracy.
ReplyDeleteAs to the picture, that is not me. That picture is my campaign manager, Megan Thomas, at the Fifth Ward convention last Saturday. Megan has been a total trooper, helping out and giving great advice. She also put together my website at CarolBecker.net
As to the other folks running, there are two seats and currently three people have announced. Myself, DeWayne Townsend (who was there on Saturday) and Sean Broom, who was not. Sean is running on the platform of abolishing the Board of Estimate. Hopefully two of us get endorsed at the City Convention on May 16.
Thanks again for the great post.
Carol
My name is Megan Thomas
ReplyDelete