Imagine a world in which someone gave you $443 million (that's $443,000,000) of someone else's money to build a new house. And then imagine saying "mneh, that's not quite enough."
Well, what if I told you that such a world of fancy, fantastic whimsy does indeed exist, and that we call it Minnesota?
The Minnesota House legislature voted today in favor of $293 million in tax payer money, in addition to the $150 million in tax payer money that the city of Minneapolis is also pitching in, to the Vikings for a new stadium. The Minnesota House added an amendment to the original bill and in so doing put the Vikings on the hook for $105 million more than the Vikings had wanted, while reducing the state's share down from $398 million.
Vikings President Lester Bagley said the Vikings ownership is not prepared to pay the extra sum, calling it "unworkable," which means "we don't want to pay it." The poor bastards.
The Wilf family has been holding Minnesota hostage over the new stadium deal, threatening to move the team elsewhere if they are not provided with an opulent billion dollar new stadium. Because why spend anything less than a billion dollars on a stadium while state and municipal governments are in deep financial hardships.
So under pressure from frightened Vikings fans, and Minnesota unions who want the construction contracts, Republicans and Democrats came together across the aisle to agree on the one things they can always agree on: giving a huge sum of money to some rich folks.
Central Minnesota's Democratic representative Larry Hosch said that the deal "may not make sense in dollars and cents." So he voted against the bill, right?
Nope.
Foregoing any sense of courage or propriety, Hosch added "but I can't imagine a state without the Vikings."
And he didn't stop there. Hosch stood up in front of the Minnesota House and told a story about how he was born on a Vikings football Sunday, and that his father had to pull himself away from an overtime game to witness the birth of his child.
And in this fancy, fantastic world of whimsy we call Minnesota, this passed as a basis to vote in favor of the bill.
Well done, Larry Hosch. The bill doesn't make sense in dollars and sense. But you were born on a Sunday. And your father found it more important to look after the well-being of his family than to watch a football game. And this somehow adds up to a "yea" vote.
GO VIKES!!! FOOTBALL YES!!! I LUV USA!!!!!!!!
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Follow Bison Messink on Twitter: @BisonMessink
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