MANKATO — Democrats were faster out of the gates, at least in Mankato, as the post-primary push toward the Nov. 4 general election began.

At Minnesota State University, several dozen students and staff gathered around the podium on the campus mall when Democratic Senate nominee Al Franken started talking about his plan to provide a $5,000 tax credit for families with a kid in college.

The tax credit, which would cost an estimated $48 billion over five years, would help the families of 10 million college students and would be available to families with incomes of up to $200,000. Franken said the increasingly unaffordable cost of tuition is making it difficult for average families to save the necessary money to send their kids to school.

He asked the assembled crowd to imagine accompanying a son or daughter on the final stop of the long process of touring prospective colleges.

“Your kid will turn to you and you’ll see that look in her eyes, that hopeful, anxious look that says ‘This is it,’” Franken said. “... I’m offering this proposal because at that moment you want to say ‘Yes.’”

Franken also criticized the 2005 vote of Sen. Norm Coleman, his Republican opponent, to approve a federal budget that made steep cuts in funding for college aid.

“Norm Coleman hasn’t been on your side,” Franken said.

Coleman’s campaign responded with a list of higher education proposals supported by the first-term senator. They include increases in Pell Grants, efforts to reduce student loan interest rates and attempts to address the increasingly high costs of college text books.

Energy in the 1st District

The other post-primary Democratic event Wednesday involved state Rep. Terry Morrow, DFL-St. Peter, and Chris Schmitter, campaign manager for Congressman Tim Walz.

The event outside the freshman congressman’s Riverfront Drive campaign office focused on the comment last week by Brian Davis, the Republican nominee against Walz, that a bipartisan energy bill sponsored by Walz was “too complicated.”

“People across southern Minnesota think it’s the way to go,” Schmitter said, noting that Minnesota’s two most conservative members of Congress — Rep. Michele Bachmann and Rep. John Kline — are among the 131 co-sponsors of the bill.

Morrow, a college professor, praised the plan, which would allow expanded offshore oil drilling and use $1 trillion in projected oil company royalty payments to invest in renewable energy and conservation. He said he’d be disappointed if his students rejected something simply because of its complexity.

The Democrats implied that Davis, a medical doctor and M.I.T.-educated engineer, considered the proposal too complex to understand. Davis, however, said he sees the proposal as more convoluted than necessary because it prohibits drilling within 25 miles of shore and allows states to veto drilling within 50 miles of their coast.

“We’re probably going to shortchange the amount of oil that is made available (with the restrictions included),” Davis said.

His alternative is to let the moratorium on offshore drilling expire completely on Sept. 30.

“Simply open those areas around the entire United States and make sure (oil companies) use good practices,” Davis said.

Barkley to talk about getting things done

Independence Party Senate nominee Dean Barkely, after easily winning the IP primary, issued a statement saying he will be able to compete with Coleman and Franken despite being severely underfinanced in the race.

While Barkley will have only a fraction of the financial resources of his opponents, he said his campaign will have something the other two don’t: a focus on real issues.

“We’re going to talk about the out-of-control national debt. We’re going to talk about not just getting out of Iraq, but avoiding future military misadventures,” Barkley wrote. “We’re going to talk about getting things done, rather than perpetuating the partisan food fight in Congress.”