October 2002 Archives

Paul Wellstone is dead and the Republicans want equal time. I guess it don't hurt to ask.

Maybe they'll get it.

Maybe they'll win the election.

I have no idea.

All I know is Paul Wellstone is dead and the Republicans are upset because....well, allow me to quote Doug Grow of the Star Tribune:

"Let's see. There were more than 20,000 people on hand to honor a unique politician who wore his passion on his sleeve.

"Most of the 20,000 were true believers in Wellstone and his causes. The people who were closest to him -- Rick Kahn, a devoted campaign worker and friend, his two sons and Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa -- delivered the eulogies.

"They pleaded with Wellstone supporters to keep up the senator's fights.

"This is shocking?"

Wellstone's campaign manager was quoted widely in the media as "regretting" the tone of the event; Here's the full context of his comments:

"It was not our intent to inject that into the service," campaign chairman Jeff Blodgett said of comments made at the Tuesday night ceremony. "I take responsibility for that and I deeply regret it."

The guy is a class act.

By the way, "that" was referring to the comments of Wellstone's best friend and campaign treasurer Rick Kahn who said, in part:

"We are begging you to help us win this election for Paul Wellstone."

He even pleaded with Republicans -- specifically U.S. Rep. Jim Ramstad -- to work for Wellstone's Democratic replacement.

How did Ramstad feel about "that?"

Ramstad struck a conciliatory chord. He's still supporting Republican Norm Coleman for the Senate, but he said he's also grieving the loss of "a great, great friend" in Wellstone. He said he wasn't bothered that Kahn singled him out.

"I think it's unfortunate that a memorial service has become a center of controversy.

"Last night was about paying our final respects to six wonderful people and beloved Minnesotans who perished in a terrible tragedy. That was where my focus was.

"People get carried away sometimes with emotions. We all get carried away sometimes with emotions. Just let it be," Ramstad said.

Let it be. Wise words.

Other reports went like this:

Blodgett said the event at the University of Minnesota was not scripted and the comments of individual speakers were not previewed. Organizers simply asked participants to speak from their hearts, he said.

"I regret if people took offense or were taken by surprise ... We are a hurting bunch here," Blodgett said,

"...a hurting bunch..."

No doubt.

So, when Don Imus, Rush Limbaugh, Jesse Ventura, et. al. whine about the event, it kind of pales in comparison to the loss of Wellstone, the man.

Did you hear State Republican Party Chair Ron Eibensteiner complaining about the "great political imbalance" created by the broadcast?

The imbalance caused by the broadcast pales in comparison with the imbalance caused by the death of your candidate, your friend, your father.

Life is occasionally cruel. We know that. But that knowledge doesn't fully prepare us to cope when we have to experience the shock, the loss, the crushing disappointment of an instance like this.

So I guess I don't begrudge 25,000 people their 3-hour cathartic outpouring.

Go and ask Wellstone's family, friends and supporters this question -- if you could choose between getting your guy back and giving up three hours of raw cathartic emotion in return...well, which one would you choose?

Other comments from pundits included the following:

It was not in the spirit of Paul Wellstone, at all.

I dunno. Neither do they. But I would bet that his surviving family knows best of all what the spirit of Paul Wellstone would want. I trust them.

The Vice-President was told not to come.

I heard Mary Matalin speak about this. If she was mad, she wisely kept it to herself. This wasn't about Dick Cheney.

Republican challenger Coleman received death threats if he showed up.

Hm. I hadn't heard that. While it's true that Coleman wasn't there, he did tempt fate another way -- he continued his campaign the next morning by getting on a private plane nearly identical to Wellstone's. Is that bizarre, or what?

BTW, there were a lot of smiling faces and plenty of back slapping at that memorial.

Let people grieve however they want.

How would you have felt, if, the 911 memorial looked that way?

I remember one 9/11 memorial where a NYC firefighter told 25,000 people that Osama bin Laden could kiss his royal Irish ass.

...And the crowd at Madison Square Garden went...insane!

[Postscript: The crowd booed Hillary Clinton that night. Local radio station gleefully replayed that sound bite for days.]

Frank Rich writes about a newly released report from the Council on Foreign Relations. It states that we are unprepared for the possibility of the next terrorist attack. He quotes former Senator Warren Rudman on the need for funding practical, anti-terrorist measures:

"The states are in dire straits and the federal government has to step in," says Mr. Rudman, a fiscally conservative Republican. "We have to do something. Give up a tax cut, pay a surcharge, something. This is a damn war we're involved in. We can't expect [the necessary funds] to materialize out of the air."

Rudman & Hart's complete report can be read here.

I was in a hurry. I was eating a sandwich while I surfed the web, trolling for news. I saw the web site headline: "A senator dies."

In the moment before I clicked on the link, I wondered whether the senator might be from a state with a governor from the opposite party.

You know where I'm coming from, right?

Then I clicked the link. I saw Paul Wellstone's face. I blinked once. I slumped back in my chair.

If you're a novelist, you can't write a story like this: it's too unbelievable. Especially coming almost two years to the day after the death of Mel Carnahan.

I read that his wife and daughter were also killed. He is survived by two sons and six grandchildren. My heart broke for his family and friends.

By now you've read the story arc of his life: son of Russian immigrants, radical 60s activist, college professor. He was a long-shot senate candidate who defied the odds and got elected. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.

I never met Wellstone but I felt I had a rapport with him. I felt like I knew him. He grew up in a culture like mine at the same time I did. He was even the same age as my brother. I considered him too liberal for me most of the time. But, like in a family, when it's time to fight, you pull together. Besides, he seemed authentic. I liked that.

His first big vote in the Senate was against the Gulf War; his last, against regime change. Even when his very re-election might be riding on his vote (as it was this year), he ignored the polls and voted with his heart and mind. In that, he was nearly alone -- no other Democratic senator involved in a close re-election race voted against the resolution. It was "pure Wellstone" and his constituency appreciated him for that kind of leadership and integrity.

And another thing: his colleagues -- both friendly and adversarial -- were genuinely moved upon hearing of his death. They were universal in their praise, respect and affection for him. That tells you a lot about a man; it tells you a lot about Paul Wellstone.

Note: if you are interested in reading more, Arianna Huffington's Death of a Populist Giant says it best.

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There is a prayer in Judaism, the Kaddish, the Mourner's Prayer. It is said for any member of the Jewish People who has passed away. Jews believe that by reciting Kaddish on a soul's behalf, by saying this prayer, it allows the soul to climb to the next level or "world".

It is recited by members of the mourning family at daily services, but the rest of the congregation recites parts of it in support. The last part contains these words:

Oseh sholom bimromov, hu ya'aseh sholom olaynu...vimru Omein.
"He who makes peace in His heavens, may He make peace for us...Amen."

Crown Prince Abdullah (left, with President Bush) bloviates for the students of King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals:

"I call on our sons, the students of today and the men of tomorrow, and every citizen to stick to their faith without excess, for Islam is a religion of moderation and wisdom."

Meanwhile, back in Bali:

The spiritual leader of the Islamist group suspected of responsibility for the bombings in Bali was backed by a Saudi who gave $74,000 (£47,700) to buy explosives, a top al-Qaeda detainee has told US interrogators.

Extra!
Axis of Evil power gets the Bomb!
America set to invade Iraq!
Can't wait for the smoking gun!

Uh-oh...it's North Korea, not Iraq, that has the nukes.

Hmm.

Here's another thing: containment is now the preferred policy, not regime change.

Do you feel good about that?

What's going on here?

"I've got a bad feeling about this..."

Once upon a time, combat-veterans-turned-politicians tried to impugn the character of their draft-dodging opponents by drawing attention to their selfish, unpatriotic behavior during wartime.

No more. Now the tables are turned.

Saxby Chambliss, GOP Senate nominee in Georgia is trying to trash the character of incumbent Senator Max Clelland. Here's how Jeff Berry tells it:

In a recent press release, Chambliss accused his opponent of "breaking his oath to protect and defend the Constitution" because Cleland had voted "yes" on a routine Chemical Weapons Treaty amendment allowing inspectors from neighboring nations like Syria and Iran to serve on U.N. inspection teams in Iraq.

For those of you unfamiliar with Senator Clelland, he is a Vietnam vet, a recipient of the Bronze and Silver stars. He lost his legs and and his right arm in a grenade explosion during the siege of Khe Sanh after he volunteered to serve his country as an Army officer. Berry continues:

Saxby Chambliss had a bad knee. In fact, his knee is so bad he told his draft board on two occasions in the 1960s that he was unable to serve in the military during the Vietnam War. This was after he'd already sought a student deferment so he could attend law school.

Mitch Albom observes that the sniper in VA/MD/DC is just the visible manifestation of our popular culture:

I noticed the No. 1 movie in America is "Red Dragon," a film about what? Serial killers. We went in droves. We always do. We lionize its madman, Hannibal Lecter, so much so that the actor, Anthony Hopkins, has reprised the role three times.

I noticed a coming attractions preview for a film called "Phone Booth" in which a sniper holds a man hostage by threatening to shoot him if he hangs up the phone.

I noticed the biggest drama on network TV is "CSI," in which detectives try to find killers by examining the evidence left at the murder scene.

And, I might add, the most popular musical genre on the radio is supercharged with a plasma-hot anger that smashes the listener upside the head:

I'm sick of you little girl and boy groups, all you do is annoy me
so I have been sent here to destroy you
And there's a million of us just like me
who cuss like me; who just don't give a fuck like me
who dress like me; walk, talk and act like me
and just might be the next best thing but not quite me!

And every single person is a Slim Shady lurkin
He could be workin at Burger King, spittin on your onion rings
Or in the parkin lot, circling
Screaming "I don't give a fuck!"
with his windows down and his system up
So, will the real Shady please stand up?
And put one of those fingers on each hand up?
And be proud to be outta your mind and outta control
and one more time, loud as you can, how does it go?

Now don't get me wrong -- when I hear Eminem do his Slim Shady thing, make no mistake, I crank it up loud. I believe it is healthy for artists to express themselves in whatever way they feel is appropriate.

And if you can dance to it, so much the better.

And, no, I don't think Eminem is serious. Yes, he is angry. No, he is not a murderer.

And, no, the sniper will not turn out to be some lunatic rapper wannabe.

By extension that means that I do not think that Eminem's music (or someone else's movie or book or whatever) caused the sniper to kill anyone.

And, no, the sniper will not be a terrorist, not in the conventional sense: he is not killing innocents to make a political point. Yes, I know witnesses have described someone with olive skin. But that could describe about 20% of the people in that area. Hell, it describes me.

No the reality will be far worse: he is killing innocents for the entertainment value. He wants to ascend into the pop-culture pantheon of villains. He wants to be the real Slim Shady, the authentic Hannibal Lechter. But he can't do it artistically. Or even politically. So he does it the easy way, by getting on the news.

He knows that the news media will oblige him by transforming events like this into a ratings bonanza.

So here's the thing: we're being stalked by a sniper who is transfixed by what he sees on TV. He knows that the more he kills, the better the ratings get. And the better the ratings, the more famous he becomes.

Why not? It's a win-win situation. The news media has become expert at transforming it's news content into entertainment content. In a quest for ratings (and the accompanying advertising revenue), the line between news and entertainment becomes blurred. And you get ... the sniper. It's a symbiotic relationship.

The news media gets big ratings and the sniper gets into that pop-culture pantheon of villains.

So the next time you tune in your favorite cable news channel, the next time you see a barking head speculating about what the killer was thinking, rest assured that he's watching, too, and getting his rocks off, just like you.

With all eyes on Iraq perhaps we need to be reminded that there have been a string of terrorist killings and mayhem elsewhere in the world. Daniel Pipes points out that In Pakistan alone, Muslim-on-Christian terror murders have spiraled out of control in the last twelve months:

• Oct. 28, 2001: an attack on St. Dominic's Church in Behawalpur kills 16.
• March 17, 2002: an attack on the Protestant International Church in Islamabad kills five (including two Americans).
• May 22: an attack on the executive secretary of Karachi Diocese of Church Pakistan, who was tied to a chair and injected with poison.
• Aug. 5: an attack on the Murree Christian School kills six.
• Aug. 9: an attack on the Christian Hospital in Taxila kills four.
• Sept. 25: an attack on the Institute for Peace and Justice, a Christian charity in Karachi, kills seven.

Then there is all the rest:

• The murder of a Marine in Kuwait, now linked to al Qaeda
• The recent explosion on the French oil tanker, now acknowledged to have been a terrorist act
• The bombing in a Helsinki shopping mall, now being called a terrorist act by the Finnish Prime Minister no less
• The 2 recent bombings of nightclubs in Bali, now suspected to be terrorist acts
• Then, of course, there is the sniper in Virginia.

By the way, am I the only one who has the creepy feeling that this lunatic gunman might be warming up for something even more barbaric? I mean, he's already claimed at least one victim in Washington DC and many others in Virginia.

Hel-looooo?

If and/or when the war in Iraq commences, will we be ready for a widening of the terror war in any (or all) these other places? I mean, how bad are we going to feel if all hell breaks loose somewhere else before, during, or after the war in Iraq commences?

William Saletan offers a pretty good explanation of what the US Congress just approved.

Given the gravity of this step, you'd think senators would be psychologically and morally prepared for war. But they aren't. Many of them, if not most, voted for the war resolution on the theory that by appearing to be prepared for war, they might avoid it.

As I said before, this is the right thing to do.

That said, let's crunch the numbers behind the numbers:

In the House, 81 Democrats and 215 Republicans voted "yes". Voting "no" were 126 Democrats, six Republicans and one independent.

In the Senate, 29 Democrats and 48 Republicans votied "yes." Voting ''no'' were 21 Democrats, one Republican and one independent.

The majority of Democrats went against their own leadership in both houses -- Daschle and Reid voted "yes" in the Senate and Gephardt voted "yes" in the House.

On the other hand, Bonior, voting so soon after his career-defining trip to Baghdad, voted "no."

In the House, 61% of Democrats voted "no."
In the Senate, 42% of Democrats voted "no."

Senate Dem luminaries voting "yes": Feinstein, Dodd, Lieberman, Biden, Bayh, Harkin, Carnahan, Torrecelli (could only be called a "vote of conscience" if he actually had one), Clinton, Schumer, and Edwards.

The lone dissenting Republican was Chafee from Rhode Island. Jeffords was the dissenting Independent.

Weird note: According to USA Today, there are two Senators Kennedy: one in Massachusetts and one in Maryland. The one in Maryland is aka Senator Mikulski. BTW, they both voted "no."

Speaking of Massachusetts, 70% of the House Dem delegation voted "no." Not a single Republican voted "no." Hmm. That must be because there isn't a single Republican Congressman from Massachusetts.

Did you know that?

House Republicans voting "no" included:
Hostettler (IN), Leach (IA), Morella (MD), Houghton (NY), Duncan (TN), and Paul (TX). Stump (AZ) and Roukema (NJ), didn't vote.

The following list represents some of the states won by Al Gore in 2000. The number represents the percentage of Democrats voting "no." For comparison, remember 61% of House Democrats voted "no."

Michigan -- 89% of Dem delegation voted "no"
Illinois -- 80%
California -- 67%
New York -- 53%
Pennsylvania -- 40%
Florida -- 38%

Florida?
Yeah, Florida.
Don't get me started...