That last post, which got out of control in a hurry, was posted the day before the Fall '06 election primary here in Minnesota and in many states throughout the country.
Civic particiaption runs pretty high in these parts. Not as high, perhaps, as in some parts of the city, but certainly amongst a majority of the people I run into on a regular basis in the coffee shop and some of my other neighborhood haunts. The first two days of this week, I punted (my term for getting up & heading on my way late enough that I just head on over to the coffeeshop for a sit-down cup). Both mornings, I encountered a cast of characters; some I knew well, some I knew, but not well (including a guy I'd met in his run for County Comissioner two years ago), a couple I'd never met before (including our district's Park Board representative). I got involved in lively debates & discussions that probably spanned about two and a half hours between the two days. Yup, I got into work late.
Of particular concern, amidst the general collection of shoo-ins expending very little effort in fending off the fringe element you expect to see in local elections, was the US House DFL primary for the district that includes Minneapolis. Much like how the American League Pennant is expected to be the "real World Series," it was generally assumed that this would be the real race for Congress in the heavily-blue Minneapolis/inner-ring suburb district; and got quite heated in that the comfortable, perfectly-Scandanavian, venerable and perennial 87%-of-the-vote-getting Martin Olav Sabo was retiring from office, having served since the 1960s. The race was between (in my opinion) a kind of the typical "DFL Establishment" character, who'd been DFL party chair for the state in the past, as well as Sabo's chief of staff; a couple of other local notables (including a member of that Gothan City collection of legislators known as the Minneapolis City Council), and a guy by the name of Keith Ellison; who you will almost certainly hear about, and who-as it turns out this morning-won. He's like Barak Obama with a little more baggage. If (most likely "when") he wins the general election, he will be Minnesota's first black congressperson, as well as the US Congress' first Muslim. According to most who know or have simply seen him speak in public, he is electrifying, passionate, and just a plain warrior for the poor & a host of other progressive issues. However, a number of petty bookkeeping misdemeanors (unpaid parking tickets, late filing for campaign papers, etc.) were haunting him throughout the race. These issues, understandably, were really tough for a lot of voters to get around, and the race ended up being quite a lot closer than it would have otherwise.
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8 comments:
Hilarious your casula arrival at work.
I had heard of Ellison, principally as a result of him being Muslim, and also because I know far too much about politics.
Good for him. Hopefully he can just say, yeah, I screwed up and will do better going forward.
He acknowledged he screwed up (who doesn't when caught, right), but is at least currently on the right side of the law and has vowed to stay there. I voted for him. Again, I totally, totally understand those people who would say "how are you going to pass laws when you can't even follow the laws?" I guess you could say "...cast the first stone..." but actually my reasoning had more to do with a couple of other things:
- For the last dozen years or so, Republicans have enjoyed having these colorful, maverick characters that are certainly involved in their own questionable practices (much more shadowy & tough to pin down, but almost certainly a lot more heinous than unpaid parking fines). Our democrats have been so fearful of taking passionate stands, and have so often (in vain) tried to play both sides of the fence, it's hard for me to pass up the opportunity to help put someone on our side who has pizazz on the national radar. And it'd be different if he'd been, for instance, guilty of corruption or bilking a retirement home out of it's money, as opposed to piling up a few parking tickets around the state capital and forgetfully sticking them above the visor in his car.
2. Secondly-and this is perhaps a bit of a stretch-but I'm giving myself a chip a chair and a chance on this part: aren't there those certain people in the world, whether it be artists, or physicists, or politicians that are absolutely so passionately consumed with their work that they leave their own personal affairs in shambles behind them? I think there's at least a chance that's what's going on there. I'm telling you, all accounts of this guy are that he's like the 2nd coming of a Wellstone or a MLK sort of figure. Granted, Wellstone was as clean as they come, as far as his personal affairs. But he's also had the opportunity to not enter politics officially until he was quite established in life. Anyway-it's what I'm going with, though I do think that, having acknowledged his errors and pledged to not let things slide again, he needs to be held accountable on this 2nd chance.
I agree on all counts.
You usually do, in our curious Heckle & Jeckle-styled political discourse.
Indubitably.
Sorry about not reponding to your posts, but I haven't refreshed your page in days that's why I didn't see any ne posts. The one I had was from your poster of your CT group.
This comment of yours makes it all worthwhile.
It's not just your page that needs some refreshing.
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