Two of Minnesota's leading politicians squared off indirectly on Face the Nation Sunday morning to make their parties' late-election pitches on taxes, spending, and the state of the economy. U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, in the New York studio with CBS news veteran Bob Schieffer, and Gov. Tim Pawlenty, appearing via video link, offered significantly different takes in the debate over the 2001-2003 Bush tax cuts. "The middle class has to get more than a few Tootsie Rolls in their trick bag for Halloween here," said Klobuchar, a Democrat. "We just can't continue this policy of having the wealthiest get the biggest chunk of these tax cuts." Pawlenty, a potential 2012 GOP challenger to President Obama, argued for an across-the-board extension of the tax cuts, which expire at the end of December. "History shows, and good economic theory shows, if you reduce taxes you'll have more economic activity," he said, "If you don't extend the Bush tax cuts, all of them, it's going to send a very negative signal to the economy. It's going to be very counterproductive." Pawlenty also challenged the prevailing Democratic narrative that Obama has gotten a bad rap despite major accomplishments on health care, Wall Street reform, and the economic stimulus.

"I don't think it's about communication," he said. "It's about the product. They're trying to sell something that isn't any good." Klobuchar, defending the administration, talked about how the mines are hiring again on the Iron Range, and that previously unemployed workers are grateful for the extended unemployment benefits Democrats pushed through Congress to help weather the hard times. "You have to look at this time period as 21 months when we've been stabilizing things," she said. "Now it's time to move forward." They're "two very different world views," Pawlenty said. But he suggested that Tuesday will show that the Republicans won the argument. "Of course the issue is jobs and the economy," Pawlenty said. "The Democrats' view of it is to do that through government and more stimulus spending, to have government-centered approaches to solutions like health care, dragging it into Washington, D.C., top-down, command-and-control, government bureaucracies running systems. And Republicans and conservatives are making the case that doesn't work, hasn't worked, won't work, and we have to stimulate the private economy… by reducing taxes, reducing costs, reducing government spending." Not so fast, Klobuchar argued: "There are three more days here, and the people of this country are going to have to decide. Do they want to put people in that are going to face these problems, that are going to face the nation, or do they want to see people who are going to throw a bunch of flames and divide the nation."