A healthy serving of politics at the Swedish Inn

by Jon McBride • 9/24/08 • If you’d like a lesson on how to speak your mind about politics or how you think things should be run, then you should stop by the quaint little town of Lindstrom and go to the local diner, The Swedish Inn.

If you think that this sounds like a small place, then you would be right. The restaurant has tables and a kitchen and amazing prices. Discussions over $1.50 pots of coffee are about the only things that happen in this breakfast joint. People new to the town might think these conversations are just the ramblings of old men, but when you start to listen hard you can start to see what they are really talking about. Monday morning while enjoying my pancakes I started to listen and what I heard has changed my mind about how I should vote in this coming election.

There were four gentlemen discussing the race between the current mayor of Chisago City, Donald Taylor, and incumbent State Representative Jeremy Kalin for his seat in the Legislature. These four went back and forth over who would be good for our city and state and they came to the conclusion that Donald Taylor would bring a small town feel to the state and would accomplish what they want him to.

What is the biggest concern on their minds? Well, the simplest answer is they want the traffic going through the town to be rerouted to the north so that Lindstrom stays small. According to these men the traffic though the town has been going up and up and to them it is not okay. With the traffic increasing they are afraid that more corporations will move in and wipe out the atmosphere of the town. They want someone who will come along and defend their small town rights and Donald Taylor has promised to do so.

So instead of dismissing the views of some old men in a small town, maybe everyone should take a lesson from them about the value of speaking your mind. They may just change how you feel about your town and how you think things should be done.

Jon McBride, 18, lives in Chisago Center and is enrolled in an online course offered in collaboration between Anoka Ramsey Community College and the Twin Cities Daily Planet.