I look forward to this current session of our Legislature with little enthusiasm. Gov. Tim Pawlenty and the Democratic majorities in the House and Senate will both seek to extract their pound of flesh from the other. The governor will not want to move on new taxes, and the Democrats will demand more spending on government programs – both in the face of a very large deficit.

Somehow, at the last minute, their conflict will be muddled through with some set of complex arrangements so that both the governor and the Democrats can say to their respective base voters “We won!” “The other side caved!”

It will be like Garrison Keillor’s Lake Wobegon, where every child is above average in defiance of common logic.

Gov. Pawlenty said in his recent “State of the State” speech: “The state of our state is challenged, but overcoming challenges is what Minnesota does best. So let’s get at it.”

But I ask: Does our political process still have an appetite for excellence?

As Keillor says: All Lake Wobegon men are handsome, and all its women are good looking. But perhaps it’s only by being nice, by not speaking out truthfully that all of us can be “above average” when some of us are neither handsome nor good looking.

What standards do we set for ourselves?

Can we still rise to the challenge of doing the difficult at once, and the impossible only a little later?

Seeking excellence in politics today would demand biting the bullet and raising taxes or cutting bureaucracy where it hasn’t delivered the goods, and turning those services over to private providers who’d face consumer wrath when they fall short of meeting consumer expectations.

Either raising taxes or cutting government would demand setting standards and imposing them. Neither alternative is really comfortable for today’s Minnesota leadership.

I think Minnesotans are becoming too comfortable with seeking only to be second best. After all, there is a cultural tradition here that it is OK to be second best. You really can’t be criticized much for being second best. It’s just a nice place to be – above average perhaps, but not far above average.

Being a third-rater might be embarrassing, but being second is not. We don’t want to be third rate. But do we really want to be first?

Being second is respectable enough and doesn’t run the risk of the excessive self-regard that could come with being first.

I’m worried because Minnesota is quietly and gently slipping down the rungs of achievement from where it once was in various surveys of educational accomplishment, intellectual leadership, venture capital investment, etc.

Have we lost our passion for doing our very best, for innovation, for drive and determination to work wonders?

With a passion for excellence and the guts to get things done well and on time, we could spend public monies for good results and be proud of our accomplishments.

But if mediocrity is our best standard of achievement, then why should we be taxing and spending?

Doing things right at times comes at the cost of raising more public revenues.

A penny saved may well be a penny earned, but we should be thinking big, not small. There is no glory in being penny wise but pound foolish.

A passion for excellence can cut the other way, too. It can lead to major cutbacks in spending, especially in education where there is overcapacity in facilities in some systems and lack of achievement in others.

Doing things right at times comes at the cost of cutting government budgets.

The point is not that taxes are inherently bad or that government provides all the answers to social shortcomings. The point should be that we need to start from an inspiring dream of what might be, treat it as a viable destination – and work hard to get there.

Steven B. Young is executive director of the Caux Round Table, an international network advocating ethical principles for business and government. He was dean of Hamline Law School and now teaches ethics at the Carlson School of Management. He ran for the Republican Party nomination for the U.S. Senate in 1996. You can reach him via e-mail at sbymn@msn.com.