Photo: governor.state.mn.us

St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman caps off the long version of his new TV ad by quoting hockey great Wayne Gretzky’s advice to skate to where the puck will be. It’s a quote Gov. Pawlenty has been using for years, as Brian Bakst of the Associated Press notes. Indeed, it’s a favorite among consultants, businessmen and politicians, including former U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman. But Gretzky wasn’t the first to say it, and in any case it’s of dubious value as advice, according to people who know their way around a rink. 

Here’s how Coleman rephrases Gretzky’s maxim (at the 3:54 mark):

I really feel like the mayor of the City of St. Paul has to be a leader of all the people. We need to look to the future. We need to think about where the puck is going to be.

Pawlenty has been using the quote at least since his first year as governor. He found global meaning from Gretzky’s words in 2003, according to the University of St. Thomas Aquin (pdf):

Pawlenty compared the progress of Minnesota to his favorite hockey player, Wayne Gretzky. Pawlenty said Gretzky attributed his success to the fact that he didn’t care where the puck was; it was where the puck was going that mattered. “It’s a great metaphor for the times we live in,” he said. “We’re living in a world with enormous change, and it’s an exciting time.”

St. Paul’s other mayor named Coleman, Norm, said Gretzky’s wisdom could help the nation defeat terrorism. He cited them in 2006 to open two days of hearings as chairman of the U.S. Senate’s Homeland Security Committee’s subcommittee on investigations:

In the words of the hockey legend Wayne Gretzky, a good hockey player plays where the puck is; a great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be. In other words, we cannot safeguard a post-9/11 America by simply using pre-9/11 methods. If we think that terrorists are not plotting their next move, then we are mistaken.

Given how frequently Gretzky’s words are repeated, it’s surprising a key fact about them is often overlooked: they’re actually his father’s, according to an extensive 2000 investigation by Fast Company magazine’s Consultant Debunking Unit.

Walter Gretzky’s original version: “Go to where the puck is going, not where it has been.”

Fast Company probed further, asking the elder Gretzky whether the adage is actually advice he’d give to pros, or the movers-and-shakers who like to cite it.

“Mama mia, no!” Walter says. “That advice is strictly for little kids. It’s just simple basics, like the ABCs. You have to know the alphabet before you can write. And naturally, going to where the puck is going is something that pros take for granted — or they wouldn’t be playing professionally.

The younger Gretzky wouldn’t give Fast Company the time of day, but his idol Gordie Howe took a swipe at the quote:

It’s not really the greatest piece of advice I’ve ever heard. Besides, sometimes you don’t want to be where the puck is going. One time, I was anticipating a pass from [Ted] ‘Teeder’ Kennedy and was leaning over to get in the way of it, when Kennedy, following through, swung his stick in my eye. I had double vision for two months and had to sit out the rest of the season.

A clear-eyed look at the saying by the late Herb Brooks, who coached Minnesota’s Golden Gophers and North Stars, resulted in a similar conclusion:

You’d have to be a real idiot to skate to where the puck used to be. On the other hand, if everyone skated to where the puck is going, you’d have one big train wreck. Sometimes your job on the ice is to take the pressure off of the guy who’s headed for the puck by drawing players away. And sometimes you want to skate to where the puck is, not to where it’s going. When you shoot the puck into the zone, it’s up for grabs — and you have to chase it.

An appeal would mean another return trip to the city, an expensive proposition that already has cramped her campaigning style in the final weeks before the Nov. 3 election. Hill was set to fly in and out of Pittsburgh today so she could be back in Minneapolis for a Ward Three candidate debate Thursday at the University of Minnesota.

Pittsburgh was the site of a September meeting of leaders from the G-20 group of nations that drew sizable street protests — protests that Hill says she was only trying to cover as a journalist for Indymedia when police arrested her, damaged her camera and confiscated a video cassette.

Hill is on the Minneapolis ballot as a “Civil Disobedience” candidate. She was also arrested outside the Rage Against the Machine concert in downtown Minneapolis during the 2008 Republican National Convention (charges were dropped), and has coordinated several “End the Fed” demonstrations at the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank.

The New York Times reported Tunheim’s remarks in a front-page story Saturday on Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests by Minneapolis-born journalist Jefferson Morley, formerly an editor at the Washington Post and past national editorial director for the Center for Independent Media, the Minnesota Independent’s nonprofit parent.

After years of pressing the CIA to release its records, Morley got an appeals court earlier this year to force the agency to ‘fess up to George Joannides’ role as case officer in Miami at the time of Kennedy assassination. But the CIA still has nearly 300 documents about Joannides it won’t reveal, citing “grave” national security concerns.

Tunheim told the Times he may ask the CIA for redacted versions of the documents even if Morley is ultimately stymied by the Washington, D.C., federal court.

Nelson-Pallmeyer, assistant professor of justice and peace studies at the University of St. Thomas, sees Obama’s prize as a symbol and symptom of the “great relief” felt by people in America and around the world that what he terms “the period of the Great Revulsion” — the Bush administration — is over.

But the president so far hasn’t measured up to the broad hopes he stirred, Nelson-Pallmeyer told the Minnesota Independent via email:

Obama’s message of hope and change resonate with many, but the desire for authentic hope and real change are deeper than Obama’s words and far deeper than his actions to date. The Nobel Committee may be attempting to encourage the President to act more boldly.

As a politician, Nelson-Pallmeyer twice pressed peace and other progressive issues all the way to DFL Party endorsing conventions — for Congress in 2006 and U.S. Senate in 2008, before finally giving way to Keith Ellison and Al Franken, respectively.

By the time Obama took office, Nelson-Pallmeyer was already worried that progressive efforts to influence his position on war in Afghanistan were too late. The announcement of the Nobel Peace Prize for Obama finds Nelson-Pallmeyer still holding out a little hope:

Escalating wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan based on inflating the almost non-existent threat of al Qaida will continue to bankrupt the country morally and financially. … One can only hope that receiving the prize will encourage Obama to fundamentally change the direction of U.S. foreign policies under his watch. Without such a change in course, the period of hope following the Great Revulsion will likely give way to the period of the Great Disappointment.

Photo: Alper Bozkurt, Boyce Thompson Institute

Gov. Tim Pawlenty got it wrong last week when he talked about Minnesota’s U.S. Senate recount, but the winner of that recount got it right when talking yesterday on another topic: cyborg bugs. Franken made this statement during a speech in Washington, D.C.:

Several years ago — I can’t remember exactly when, I think it was the mid- to late-’90s, I went and gave a speech to the folks at DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. And I remember asking what cool things they were working on. And later a guy came up to me and took me aside and told me he was working on an unmanned aerial vehicle the size of an insect. I was really excited about that.

Evidently that hasn’t happened. They didn’t make the bug-sized unmanned aerial vehicle work.

But they did create the ARPA-net 40 years ago. And the ARPA-net grew into the internet, which is almost as cool as a bug-sized unmanned aerial vehicle with a camera and a Hellfire missile on it.

Hmm … he “can’t remember exactly when”? Even in his prepared remarks (”pretty sure it didn’t happen”) Franken sounded iffy on this fly thing, like he was inviting a fact check.

Turns out he’s right: DARPA’s hybrid insect microelectromechanical systems (HI-MEMS) program has not so far achieved its dream:

To be considered successful, the final HI-MEMS cybernetic bug must fly 100 meters from a starting point and then be steered into a controlled landing within 5 meters of a specified end point. On landing, the insect must stay in place.

Jeff Goldblum as "The Fly"

But military research sometimes has beneficial civilian side-effects (for example, DARPA’s role in pioneering the internet — now threatened, Franken says, unless Congress enacts net neutrality legislation).

Cyborg bugs may not yet be delivering tiny payloads to enemy targets, but in the course of trying scientists have developed nifty little radios you could implant in a moth.

One thing holding back full implementation: Moths don’t live long enough to make it worth it.

Here’s video of Franken, with his insightful insect comment at the 3:23 mark:

And, without comment, President Obama:

Pawlenty is in line with conventional conservative wisdom on that, but out of step with one of the state’s leading experts on Iran. University of Minnesota anthropology Prof. William Beemon told Minnesota Public Radio this week there’s no evidence that Iran is trying to manufacture nuclear arms.

As for the governor’s sudden interest in pronouncing the names of foreign leaders correctly … who could have been prodding Pawlenty on that? Maybe it was some the new advisors for his Freedom First PAC who don’t want to see their presidential hopeful repeat the pronunciation struggles of their old bosses, President George W. Bush and U.S. Sen. John McCain.

Pawlenty, who keeps his passport current with international hobnobbing, corrected sidekick Brian McClung’s pronunciation of the Iran leader’s name.

But, as sometimes happens, the governor was also slightly off his upbeat game, offering a couple unhelpful interjections during the show’s opening patter about football rivalries with Wisconsin. McClung suggested Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle might “defect” and move to Minnesota.

McClung: He’s not running for another term.

Pawlenty: Neither am I.

McClung then tried to defend Minnesota against a Doyle jab (”We’re all intrigued by what ‘Minnesota beer’ might be,” Doyle said, a comment Pawlenty termed “fairly snarky”):

McClung: Minnesota is one of the great brewing states in the country.

Pawlenty: Was.

Pawlenty maintained his three-week streak of trashing (but not naming) Republicans who participated in a budget summit that the governor boycotted last month. Again he used his radio platform (now secure from DFL balance) to attack former House Speaker David Jennings, also a former Minneapolis school superintendent. When enrollment declined in Minneapolis several years ago, Pawlenty said, “leadership in the district at that time didn’t act very boldly.”

Photo: Paul Demko, MnIndy

WASHINGTON — Just in case he wasn’t familiar with it, Sen. Al Franken decided to read the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution to David Kris, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, who was testifying to the Senate Judiciary Committee today to urge reauthorization of expiring provisions of the USA Patriot Act.

Franken opened by acknowledging that unlike most of his colleagues in the Senate, he’s not a lawyer, but according to his research “most Americans aren’t lawyers” either. He’d also done research on the Patriot Act, he said, and in particular, the “roving wiretap” provision that allows the FBI to get a warrant to wiretap a an unnamed target and his or her various and changing cell phones, computers and other communication devices.

Noting that he received a copy of the Constitution when he was sworn in as a senator, he proceeded to read it to Kris, emphasizing this part:  “no Warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

“That’s pretty explicit language,” noted Franken, asking Kris how the “roving wiretap” provision of the Patriot Act can meet that requirement if it doesn’t require the government to name its target.

Kris looked flustered and mumbled that “this is surreal,” apparently referring to having to respond to Franken’s question. “I would defer to the other branch of government,” he said, referring to the courts, prompting Franken to interject: “I know what that is.”

Kris explained that the courts have held that the law’s requirements that the person be described, though not named, is sufficient to meet the demands of the Constitution. That did not appear to completely satisfy Franken’s concerns.

Today’s Judiciary Committee hearing has so far proceeded much the way yesterday’s House Judiciary Committee subcommittee hearing did, with Democrats (except the Justice Department witness) expressing skepticism that the current law adequately protects Americans’ civil liberties and Republicans emphasizing the need to have all possible tools for law enforcement available because another major terrorist attack could occur at any time.

Daphne Eviatar is a law reporter for the Washington Independent.

Photo: The Truth About..., Flickr

Just a year ago, the theory that poor and minority borrowers were to blame for the housing crisis took hold with a vengeance, and so did the belief that the government forced lenders to make subprime mortgages to meet affordable housing goals. The view took on greater prominence in the heat of a presidential campaign, and an obscure anti-redlining law known as the Community Reinvestment Act became a scapegoat for subprime lending and the collapse of the mortgage market.

Things have changed quite a bit since then, as the spotlight has shifted to lenders and their behavior during the boom. States and cities continue to aggressively pursue subprime lending discrimination suits, and judges across the country are signaling a willingness to move forward with some cases. As the lawsuits wind their way through the court system, more details and allegations about the inner workings of the subprime world are emerging. And as startling as some of the charges already have been — a former loan officer for Wells Fargo testified in one affidavit that employees regularly referred to minority borrowers as “mud people” and called subprime mortgages “ghetto loans,” — there’s even more ahead, said David Berenbaum, executive vice president of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition.

“The ’smoking guns’ are coming out,” Berenbaum said, referring to possible evidence that lenders targeted minority communities and borrowers for higher priced loans. “And I expect more and more of these smoking guns to become apparent.”

In the latest development, a Superior Court Judge in Los Angeles recently certified a 2005 lending discrimination lawsuit against Wells Fargo as a class action case. The suit contends that area managers at the bank refused access in some minority neighborhoods to a software program that allowed for discounted prices on mortgage loans. Barry Cappello, a partner with Cappello & Noel in Santa Barbara, which represents some 10,000 to 20,000 borrowers in the suit, said he believes it is the first subprime lending discrimination suit in California to be classified as a class action.

According to Cappello, Wells Fargo introduced a program in 2002 called “Loan Economics,” which gave loan officers the authority to offer discounts to loan applicants. The savings on lower fees and interest rates could be significant, ranging from $500 to as much as $10,000 per loan. The suit claims that the Los Angeles area Wells Fargo manager refused to allow loan officers operating in certain minority neighborhoods to offer the program. Borrowers in predominantly white neighborhoods were given access to the software.

Cappello said the suit stemmed from complaints by black and Hispanic loan officers for Wells Fargo, who said they asked to use the software in their branches but upper management refused.

Wells Fargo is fighting the suit and has denied all the charges. In a statement, the bank said, “We are disappointed in this ruling and intend to vigorously defend this matter as the case proceeds. The decision does not indicate the court believes the underlying allegations have any merit. We feel the allegations represent a complete mischaracterization of our long-standing commitment to responsible lending and the pricing practices and tools we use. The policies, systems and controls we have in place ensure race is not a factor in the pricing or products we offer.”

The case could go to trial in about a year, Cappello said.

More lawsuits are expected in the near future over the treatment of Hispanic borrowers in Arizona and Texas, who were offered high-cost loans they didn’t understand at misleadingly low teaser rates, then refinanced into even more expensive loans than their initial mortgages, Cappello said.

Wells Fargo, the nation’s largest home lender and Minnesota’s second-largest employer, also has been a target of lawsuits elsewhere. Last month, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan sued the lender, alleging that blacks and Hispanics were sold high-cost subprime loans more frequently than white borrowers with similar incomes. The suit contended loan officers were offered incentives by the bank to steer borrowers into the more expensive loans, and that white borrowers generally received the lower-cost prime mortgages.

Some borrowers thought they were getting prime loans from Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, the suit also charged. But their loans actually came from Wells Fargo Financial, the bank’s subprime unit.

In Iowa, two watchdog groups charged this week that minority homeowners in Des Moines were three times more likely to receive high cost subprime loans from Wells Fargo than white homeowners.

In June, the New York Times reported on affidavits from a 2008 lawsuit by the city of Baltimore against Wells Fargo over subprime lending, which charged that the bank targeted blacks in Baltimore and suburban Maryland for high-interest subprime loans. Former loan officers testified in affidavits about using terms like “mud people” and “ghetto loans.” The bank also had an emerging markets unit that pinpointed black churches as fertile ground for selling subprime loans, according to the former officers. And in March, the NAACP filed suits in federal court in California against Wells Fargo and HSBC, alleging minority borrowers were more likely to be issued higher rate subprime loans than white borrowers with similar credit scores and qualifications. Both banks have strongly denied the charges. The NAACP also has pending litigation against nearly a dozen other banks and lenders over subprime lending discrimination.

Should all the charges in all the lawsuits be proven, it would amount to massive and violations of the Fair Housing Act, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, and other fair housing and lending laws, Berenbaum noted. Enforcing fair lending laws has been “an issue the government has failed to address over the past decade,” he said. Lenders could face criminal penalties from the government for violating fair housing laws, and they could be subject to punitive damages and fines from government lawsuits.

Big lenders like Wells Fargo and HSBC are obvious targets for suits because of their size and the amount of lending they did. In addition, many other lenders and originators of subprime loans have gone out of business, complicating efforts to address allegations of lending discrimination through lawsuits.

That leaves a major question regarding all the lending still unanswered, Berenbaum said: Where has the U.S. government been? The Federal Reserve reported in 2005 that an analysis of federal mortgage data found that blacks and Hispanics were more likely to receive higher interest rates on mortgage loans – and that it intended to examine the practices of 200 lenders as a result.

But nothing’s happened since that announcement, Berenbaum noted. Instead, as the years go on, and the government takes no action, allegations about price differences in mortgage loans based on the race of borrowers and their neighborhoods continue to grow.

Mary Kane is an economy reporter for the Washington Independent.

Related: Wells Fargo: Minnesota’s No. 2 employer is No. 1 for targeting minorities with high-cost loans

Elsewhere in Minnesota news this morning …  

WHO KNOWS WHERE: President said to speak in state Saturday. The topic: health care. The draw: Mayo Clinic. The place: Who knows? [MinnPost]

ROCHESTER: Walz lukewarm on Afghan troop surge. Just back from Afghanistan, the First District DFLer said he won’t support more boots on the ground “simply to increase our footprint.” [Rochester Post-Bulletin]

STATE CAPITOL, EDEN PRAIRIE: Doom and boom. At separate summits on the state’s economy, leaders said things are worse than they look or better than they seem. [Star Tribune]

MINNEAPOLIS: Separate and unequal. Disrepair and decay haunt parks in poorer parts of town, and the park board can’t prove it’s not redlining because it doesn’t track its own spending. [City Pages]

DULUTH: School board candidate endorses opponent. He’s already a board member but filed to run for another seat in case a judge kicked him off … it’s complicated. [Duluth News Tribune]

UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA: One in three will get flu soon. The H1N1 virus will strike 30 percent of the student body in the next three to four weeks, an expert says. [Minnesota Daily]

Kline gave the GOP response to President Obama’s weekly address, reaching a bit for Labor Day relevance by tying fears about health care reform to fears about job losses. (Gov. Pawlenty had his turn delivering the Republican message last April before another holiday — Tax Day.)

It’s a new role for Kline, a strong, silent type whose conservative credentials helped him leapfrog more senior Republicans in June to become the ranking member on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee.

Now he’s the GOP’s official point man attacking Democrats’ efforts to reform health care — though he’s outdone almost daily by his colleague in Minnesota’s Congressional delegation: Michele Bachmann.

She held a townhall on the topic; he won’t. But the man who once carried the suitcase containing the presidential Denny’s-style menu for nuclear war told a telephone townhall meeting that Senate Democrats passing health care reform by simple majority would be “the nuclear option, because it would cause the Senate to explode.”

The video of Kline’s Republican address is below. Here are the main themes:

Be very afraid

American families are worried … If you think that’s frightening, I’m sorry to say it could get even worse … No wonder Americans are scared … They also fear, and rightly so …

Au revoir, doc

What will happen to my coverage, and my choice of doctors? … the comfort of a familiar physician … Democrats’ plans may cost patients the right to see their family doctor …

Did I mention the re-set button?

It’s time to press the ‘reset’ button … It’s not too late to start over … honor American workers by hitting the ‘reset’ button on health care reform …