Thissen camp to Kelliher camp: Stop stealing my stump speech

The DFL candidates for governor have spent months together, hearing each others' lines, listening to each others' talking points, absorbing each others' stump speeches.

And now, according to DFL gubernatorial candidate Paul Thissen's campaign manager, they're starting to sound alike. A little too alike.

Tuesday, Thissen campaign manager Gia Vitali said Democratic gubernatorial candidate Margaret Anderson Kelliher had "appropriated the language and message Paul Thissen has been promoting for the past six months."

The problem seems to center around the words "yes" and "no." Both candidates have used it in very similar phrases (and neither was President Obama's "Yes, we can.")

The Kelliher campaign finds the dust-up bewildering, according to MPR's Tom Scheck.

"I don't think 'yes' is a copyrighted statement or term," Allison Myhre told public radio. "We're not coopting their message."

Here's a selection from a pre-caucus email from Kelliher's campaign that Vitali said made her "sad." for Kelliher.

And here's a selection from a Thissen palm card:

Minnesota needs a governor who will stand up and say "Yes" to Minnesota and its extraordinary promise.

And from Thissen's 2009 campaign kick-off speech:

The answer that our current governor and his allies have given to Minnesota families is simply to say 'No'. 'No' to education. 'No' to affordable health care for everybody. 'No' to the kind of investment we need to make in innovation and technology and science, to compete in this global economy. 'No' to hardworking families who are losing their homes and losing their jobs.