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Clever Ventura
By Mike Lauterbach
Published:
Monday, November 4, 2002
Mike Lauterbach -- Staff Column
Jesse Ventura, perhaps more than any other governor, has always walked that fine line between clever and stupid.
Now he's out walking it one last time, this time over his replacement for Wellstone. But this time, his proposed move has to fall on the clever side.
Minnesotans like to complain that Ventura has given them a bad name. He has managed to insult just about every group that made up his constituency. Remarks like "organized religion is a crutch for the weak-minded" surely must fall on the stupid side of the line.
But in the process, he's done a good thing for politics. He's been a lens of sorts � look through him, see the gulf between smooth-talking political figures and the regular folks they represent. As governor, he was more like my grandpa in his armchair or my neighbor in his 4x4 than a Clinton or a Coleman. For better or for worse, the man spoke and acted his mind.
And with every true-to-character act or comment, he showed the weak, equivocating comments of career politicians for what they were.
And now, if he does actually appoint a regular citizen to fill Wellstone's seat, he'll be taking the object lesson to a national level.
Most folks I know just laughed when they heard Ventura's idea. Maybe they were picturing themselves in the Senate floor; Daschle talking in one ear and Bush on the phone on the other, begging for that deciding vote. They heard themselves say, "I'm sorry George, but I just think Tom is right on this one."
Laugh they should. It isn't going to happen. But the fact it's so ludicrous on its face � that the idea that any of us could actually influence public policy gets only a laugh � is a very real problem in American politics.
But isn't a senate session too important to use as an object lesson? Sure, if Ventura really makes good on his (joking, his aides say) threat to appoint his friend the garbage collector to the seat. But Ventura has been receiving resumes all week, including many (according to the Star Tribune) from doctors, teachers and other professionals. To say that none of these folks could handle being a senator violates a central tenet of representative democracy � the belief that the people are fit to make decisions about policy for themselves.
And if it's the swing vote, big deal. I'm not sure that I trust some low-level Minnesota Democrat to fill that responsibility but not my local doctor or my high school English teacher.
Ventura has this one last shot, with the whole country watching, to make an argument for independents. If his citizen appointment is overwhelmed or swallowed up by the system, he shows how much that two-party system needs reform. If his appointment works out, he shows that regular folks can make it in politics.
It's pretty clever � in a Ventura sort of way.
