In the 8th Congressional District of Minnesota, there has been so much good work done or influenced by Jim Oberstar that it is a job just to record.
You cannot travel on a road, cross a bridge, ride a snowmobile, bike or hike on a trail that Jim didn't have a hand in. His work has created business of all sorts not the least being resorts and restaurants. The Boundary Waters Canoe waters and Voyagers Park are world known.
He worked to give us quality health care facilities and bring improved medical practice to the area. You cannot fly in or out of the area without Jim's involvement in the airports and their expansions and improvements.
His efforts and time promoting the people, jobs and products of the Iron Range are unmatched. The beautiful city and harbor of Duluth has his signature of excellence everywhere.
Because of his efforts and determination many families have made a living with many thousands of paychecks being earned. The brutal recession had created another challenge to test his skill to find jobs and bring home the bacon.
Jim, you have left a legendary legacy of good and a big, big pair of shoes to fill. It will be very difficult for anyone to produce like you did. If a person is measured by what they do for others you are in that elite group. Thank you.
We need a lot of good luck wished to your successor.
John and Marlys Orr
Deerwood
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Comments (22)
Add commentMissing Oberstar
This is an excellent summary of the legacy of a great legislator. We are going to miss his efforts to upgrade our second rate transportation network as we fall farther behind Europe and Asia without energy efficient electric rail.
Cry Me A River
Six weeks after the fact and the Progressives are rising with the dairy farmers to praise pork and lament how four decades in power are just not enough. Apparently there isn't an area of their lives the Orr's DON'T want their Congress, with its bacon greased fingers, poking around in. Do I really have to comment on Professor Westgard, our dear Rolflindy? He still pines to live in any country other than the one his party is out to destroy. Forty years of upgrading our transportation system and it still stinks? Time for you to join Jimmy O in France, Rolf? Or, how about Sweden? You could say hello to Jesper Parnevik for me!
If you just can't tear yourself away, however, you will find more money in your pocket with a conservative Congress. Why don't you see if you can send more of it to Mark Dayton than George Soros does? I'm sure he will have the same respect for it as Oberstar did. In the meantime, cheer up! There's another election just a few months down the pike. Won't THAT be fun!
Guy
Typical. After forty years
Typical. After forty years of insurgent tactics by the GOP to prevent the building of mass transit Gramps says it still stinks. Just who's fault is it?
That reminds me of the way the GOP criticizes Obama for not fixing the broken economy they created before getting booted out.
Cry me a river
Someone pass the kleenex.
Typical
Fish remains as thick as a brick and unredeemable. Didn't you notice the question mark, Guppy? It was Professor Westgard who was saying the transportation system stinks, and that was after DFL in power for the vast majority of the last forty years. I just jump in a Caddy and drive. Happy as a lark! It helps when your realization of history exceeds a decade. Try it sometime!
O'Berstar
did you hear Ober's gracious congrads to Chip? You're darned right you didn't. That's the liberal sore loser way.
Bringing Home The Bacon
There is no question Representative Oberstar brought home the bacon to the Eighth District. He and his staff made a difference in the lives of his constituents over the course of the Congressman's nearly forty year run in Washington DC. It is pitiful however that the Congressman's ego has stained his last days of service and he will be defined as going out a sore loser.
Huge ego
Oberstar has an ego that just wont quit. Dare to disagree with him? He wont even listen! I remember one time at a banquet for senior volunteers someone dared ask him about cutting capital gains taxes..you should have heard him rail against the "fat cats" as he called them. Jim's arrogance came home to roost this year when he didnt even thing he had to campaign..after all who wouldnt want the great Jim Oberstar? Now his arrogance is showing in spades when he refuses to pass on constituant issues to his successor..hows that for caring about your district? The shredder is fired up in Jim's office, and all done just to make Chip look bad when constituants dont get any results or even a reply from the new congressman. Hide behind "data privacy" all you want, Jim. Fact is no other transfer in recent history in MN has been like this. Maybe T-Paw should follow Oberstars lead and start the shredder...leave Dayton in the lurch.
In my former radio career I had the chance to meet many politicians and public figures. Politics aside, the biggest jerks I ever met were Oberstar, Boschwitz and Arlen Stangland. The nicest guys were Wellstone, Pawlenty, Perpich, Dayton and Orin Hatch.
pork spending
yes he helped spend money we have not yet paid for!i still have never seen 1 person on the 1.1 million bridge in baxter! where are the jobs from this waste? he also is one arrogant spoiled jerk! he does not even live here! that much pork and acts like a p-g!
Cooking the books TPaw style
>>>Maybe T-Paw should follow Oberstars lead and start the shredder...leave Dayton in the lurch.<<<
Tork: TPaw has already done this, providing a $6 billion deficit ditch for Dayton to climb out of.
Cooking the books TPaw style
Let's keep blaming the deep pocketed deficits to the leaders like Bush, TPaw and Obama! Why not consider who was writing the budgets in the houses? Oh, that's right, it's been the Democrats in all three cases!! So under those circumstances, who is to blame? The Republicans? No, it actually is the Dem's who have worked so hard at putting us at state and national levels in the bankrupt line !!! They dont like to spend a little less than what is available but would rather spend more than we can afford! Kind of sounds like most of the folks who have had their houses repoed!!!
New Policy Needed
I think we should push a new policy in this Country that anyone with a net worth over $3,000,000 should be jailed or they should have to distribute 1/2 of their net worth to people making less than $50,000 per year to stay out of jail. I'm sick and tired of supporting these people who have been successful in life and it's high time we knock them down a few pegs.
New Policy Needed
Maybe we should just go to a flat tax! Let's let EVERYONE pay a flat 15% on everything they make from every source! If your annual income is $1,000 you pay $150. If you make $1,000,000 you pay $150,000. That sounds fair, we all have the same percentage confiscated!
Retract new policy
Sorry I just wanted to see what it is like to make a "Fish" post. My fun is over so I'm back to being a conservative!!
Oldandretired, I agree with you 100%, I've long been a supported of the flat tax.
Scam artist at work
I've just been reading that Mr. Craavack has been scamming the disability system to the tune of just under $80,000/yr.
Ever hear of sleep apnea? Lots of people have it and nearly all of them just deal with it and go to work. If they can't work at their normal job they get a different job.
Not REPUBLICAN Chip Craavack. No sir. He's disabled.
Who could have known that it could be a cash cow.
Now Mr. Craavack is working on his second government pension.
tork, Do you even think for
tork,
Do you even think for a second before you spew?
If I had sent a letter to my congressman I would NOT want it to be passed around without my permission. Oberstars office has contacted people who sent him correspondence to see if they wanted their private letter forwarded to Mr. Disability.
O'Berstar's bacon
What a sad commentary on politics in America. Bring home the Bacon, indeed! Where did Washington get this bacon and is the true measure of a politician, how much of this pork belly he or she can recapture? The system stinks and Jim leaves with the stench of corruption. Good riddance.
But what about the money
The problem is that Ostar voted for almost every spending bill there was.....and now we wonder why we don't have any money. Some of you think Ostar paved the roads with his own bare hands.....we would still have roads if he was never in office. Way to arrogant for me. He does not know any better than the average american.
Millions for bike paths while the I-35 bridge was rotting
Dear John, Jimmy was busy stealing money from the hiway fund for bike paths, while the I-35 (and others) bridge was failing and getting the band aid and bailer twine treatment. Now there's something to be proud of, stole from the road and bridge fund to try to get us out of our cars and trucks and onto yellow bicycles and public transportation. And for the snowmobile trails, federal hiway moneys are rarely used for snowmobile trails in general, you will find some money spent on "multipurpose trails and bridges", this usually includes the bikers and hikers. The snowmobilers have a self funded system, they do not depend upon the likes of Jimmy O. for their existence. They use moneys generated from registration, a trail pass and their percentage of the unrefunded gas tax that has been formulated by how much gas, on average, they purchase. And for rolflindy, we are much more ADVANCED than Europe or Asia when it comes to our transportation system. Our country is efficient and timely in delivering goods and services with our current system, much to the chagrin of Al Gore and George Soros. We have the freedom to move around this country, for the most part, as the founders envisioned. The people of this country are NOT YET piled upon each other as they are in those national-socialist countries you mentioned, it may work over there because that's all they are offered, thankfully we still have some freedom and choices for our travel wishes and means.
Education needed
>>>>And for rolflindy, we are much more ADVANCED than Europe or Asia when it comes to our transportation system.<<<<<
Wildman: you need to get a passport and travel more. And check those balance of payments numbers.
Advanced Asians
China is still building 1930 technology coal-fired steam locomotives to tug their friction bearing equipped box cars around and they are hiring kids to caulk the fire bricks with asbestos. sign on now, comrade. Women need not apply.
China's "technology"
You got it Steve, if we could export some or most of our OSHA department, the EPA, the ERA, EEOC, ADA, FDA, and the list of alphabet soup goes on, to that part of the world, we could stall or completely destroy their economy just like it has done to ours. I would love to see our OSHA and EPA try to flex its fascist muscle overseas instead of here. We are so hamstrung by outdated/overbearing governmental agencies its spooky. As a businessman in the electrical contracting world, I have to deal with multiple layers of government that cannot get the money/fees in the their hands fast enough. And they work very hard at lobbying (using the money they got from us) the Minnesota House and U.S. House for more control, power and confiscatory fees to fund their own existence. We will never become a strong and vibrant nation again until we limit the powers of the federal government the way the founders had envisioned it. Strong pressure needs to be applied to our new house members to defund and eliminate many federal agencies ASAP, just cut them off and let them die on the vine.