Senator Paul Wellstone's death

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: kendall
Date: 28 Mar 04 - 10:43 PM

I guess the democrats can't afford good pilots either.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 11:09 AM

One of the two pilots was very young and inexperienced. However, the mistakes are believed to have been made by the older, experienced pilot, who wasn't properly trained and never should have been flying. But because there was no cockpit voice or data recorder, it is presumed it was the more experienced pilot who was making the landing.
The airline, Aviation Charter, had already paid a huge settlement to the families when the final report was issued, because by then it was known that the pilots weren't adequately trained, and the plane wasn't adequately equipped with things like the recorders and an airspeed alarm system.

As to how Coleman won. First, Mondale was the only Democratic candidate the family wanted, and the DFL was in total disarray in the wake of his death. Although he is highly respected in Minnesota, he has been out of public life for so long, he didn't have much name recognition with people under, which did make a difference in the vote. Many young people didn't vote at all in that election, or cast their votes for Wellstone as a write in. Add to that the fact that Coleman never stopped campaigning--he just kept appearing distraught in front of the TV cameras every day after Paul died. At that point, a DFL candidate hadn't even been named, and Coleman had agreed with the Wellstone campaign that he wouldn't campaign until after the memorial. That information (about not campaigning until after the memorial) was known by the local press, but none of them ever called him out on it.

The vehemence, hate, and vitriol directed at the Wellstones, their families, and their campaign by the national and local right wing media the morning after the memorial was unprecedented.

Only one voice of reason was heard in the wake of the memorial, and that was the last Republican in Minnesota with a shred of decency, US Rep Jim Ramstad. He said that anyone who expected a "Hubert Humphrey" memorial service (which was a highly formal, somber, Protestant church service) coming in to the arena obviously didn't know anything about Paul Wellstone. The media went into a feeding frenzy because there wasn't anything "senatorial and somber" about the memorial service. The public memorial went against the expectations of most people outside Minnesota, where people didn't know the Wellstones. But there was no surprise or consternation publicly voiced prior to the memorial being announced in basketball arena. It was planned to be a celebration of the lives of all seven people killed, and done in the spirit of an old time political rally, NOT a conventional funeral. The organizers had been crystal clear about that in advance--including making numerous press releases, and holding a press conference in advance of the memorial, giving all the details. The media didn't bat an eye, apparently because they were too busy sharpening their knives for the morning after the memorial.

I watched the entire memorial (how many people can say that?). The only remarks that were inappropriate were Rick Kahn's, who was blinded with grief, and made absolutely no sense as you listened to him. Any caring person watching him speak could only have felt extreme discomfort for him, because his remarks were just bizarre, and everyone who saw him just wanted him to hurry and finish, get off the stage. His remarks weren't just inappropriate in the sense of them being political. His remarks were just bizarre, and didn't make any sense. That the right wing media seized upon Rick Kahn's remarks the way a pack of wolves attacks prey, was so far beyond disgraceful even today words don't come to me to describe what they did to the grieving family, friends, colleagues, and supporters. I'm still stunned by the rapaciousness of it all.

Like I said, Republican Jim Ramstad was the only voice of reason after the memorial, and of course he was brushed aside in favor of the Limbaugh and Hannity response which created a FIRESTORM. Not just a few remarks about the sadness of Rick Kahn's speech. Not a couple of digs at the way the memorial was planned to be a progressive populist rally, which would have been fine--expected from conservative types who can't conceive of anyone have a public memorial rally rather than a state funeral for a senator. But for the Minnesotans in attendance, the memorial service hit the perfect note, with the exception of Rick Kahn who was just painful to watch.

Jim Ramstad, when asked about Rick Kahn's speech said something along the lines of it was painfully obvious that Rick was simply overcome with grief, and never should have spoken, and that everyone should just shut up, and let the loved ones grieve. He said he was absolutely ashamed of his fellow Republicans' and Governor Ventura's responses (Ventura and his wife walked out of the memorial very publicly, and denounced the whole thing as political).

No one remembers that Paul Wellstone's eldest son, who spoke after Rick Kahn, apologized for Rick's remarks and said if he had known that was what Rick would do he never would have let it happen. As it turned out, in the chaos following the deaths, no one vetted Kahn's speech. He had been totally secluded since the crash, and wasn't even in the loop planning the memorial because he was so distraught. He was one of Paul's closest friends.

People in Minnesota, outside the political circles, really loved Wellstone. They loved that he was a progressive populist in the old school DFL/Debs vein, and proud of who he was and what he did. He was renowned throughout the state for his fighting for the little guy, who would go up against any power, corporate or government, and he would do it to win for the little guy. No senator in recent memory had taken constituent services as seriously as Paul Wellstone did--without being the least bit cynical or opportunistic about it, as most politicians are. They perform constituent services because they have to do it to get re-elected. For Paul, it was one of his favorite aspects of the job. He loved campaigning, because he got to spend so much time with his constituents.

Sure the Republicans hated him. And we saw what the Republican party, both locally and nationally, has become in the wake of the Wellstone memorial. The poison from the right wing has taken over what was once a moderate, fairly progressive Republican party in Minnesota. The old guard Republicans, like Jim Ramstand and Dave Durenberger, Republicans who one could disagree with politically, but still know that they were truly decent men of integrity, are nowhere to be seen in Minnesota politics nowadays. It is all the sharks, wolves, and attack dogs now. Just like at the national level.

And it was sending those sharks, wolves, and attack dogs that won the election for both Norm Coleman, and our current Republican governor Tim Pawlenty, two men cut from the same mold of greedy opportunism.

The pendulum won't swing away from those sorts of despicable men soon enough for my liking.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST,JH
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 11:38 AM

Mondale lacks name recognition? You gotta be kidding, right?

Republican attendees to the service were dissed. That's not arguable.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 01:25 PM

No, I'm not kidding about Mondale being unknown. He wasn't on the radar of voters under 30 at the time of Wellstone's death. Most Americans outside Minnesota didn't know who he was without being first told by the mainstream media either. Considering how long Mondale has been out of public service, that should be a surprise to no one.

As to the Republican attendees being dissed (I presume you mean booed by a handful of hecklers, which is what really happened), only a handful of Republicans, along with Minnesota's governor, were actually booed. Was it in poor taste? Yes. I, as any reasonable person would, don't argue that.

But in the big scheme of things (ie in the context of seven people's deaths) it didn't bother me, or a number of Republicans, like Jim Ramstad and Dave Durenberger, who didn't hesitate to say so publicly, though the media refused to listen to them, or give their remarks any validity. For the people who were grieving those deaths, those were totally insignificant blips on the radar, because they weren't thinking in political terms, but personal terms.

But that wasn't true for the Republican attack dogs and right wing media that despised Wellstone. They weren't grieving at all. They were too busy being morally outraged, and chasing Jesse Ventura for some colorful commentary on the (as Ventura put it so viciously) "so-called memorial rally". As if the memorial was supposed to be about the governor who hated Wellstone, and not about those who had died, and their survivors.

The whole phony moral media outrage thing was utterely incomprehensible to the people who were just trying to get through the week--reality turned on it's head as it only can be at a time of deep grieving. The grieving just couldn't comprehend, much less counter that kind of shit--they were too busy trying to plan the funerals for seven people, a public memorial, and not fall apart with their own grief. And that is precisely how the right wing attack dogs exploited the grieving, descended upon them, and ripped them to shreds. It absolutely revulsed me to the point where I couldn't stomach watching tv for weeks. It was traumitizing for me, who barely knew the Wellstones and didn't know any of the other victims of the crash. I can't even comprehend how deeply it must have wounded the grieving loved ones of those who were killed.

So, the booing and Rick Kahn's speech really weren't a big deal in the context of the entire event, but you'd never know that from listening to mainstream media reports of it. What the media and Republican attack dogs didn't tell you, is telling. They didn't bother to mention the crowd had been forced to sit in the arena FOR TWO HOURS waiting for the "dignataries" section to be seated. And that was after every person had waited for hours to get in, and was searched and harrassed by security just to get in the door. They weren't allowed to move around the arena. Wellstone's people had begged the security people NOT to do that shit, because their intention was that the memorial rally be for Paul's Minnesota constituents and guests of the families who lost loved ones in the crash who wanted to say goodbye, and NOT for the national media and dignitaries.

Highly visible dignitaries with a good reason to fear the security situation, like the Clintons, Tom Daschle, and Teddy Kennedy didn't have any trouble going along with the family & campaign's request. But for some reason, the Jesse Venturas and Rush Limbaughs couldn't go along with it? Hell, even Trent Lott, who despised Wellstone, had the class and decent Southern upbringing not to say anything to the media about being booed. But then, it is always the vulgar and tasteless who engage in that sort of thing anyway, isn't it?

That said, the memorial definitely had the feel of an old time, feel good, celebratory political rally, because that was what it was intended to be. No one except those of us who saw the whole thing remembers the moving, heartfelt, eloquent, beautiful speeches that were given that night, especially by the brother of 23 year old Will McLaughlin (a campaign intern), Paul's youngest son Mark (who is the spitting image of his father), and Tom Harkin.

There were some political villains in the audience at the Wellstone memorial, who were there only because they had to be there, not because they admired and respected Wellstone, and wanted to pay their respects. They got momentarily booed by about 20-30 people, when their pictures came up on the big screens after two hours of being held hostages in their seats before the memorial rally began. So what? You think Trent Lott and Jesse Ventura wanted to truly pay respects to Wellstone? No, they didn't, and everyone in the crowd at the memorial rally knew that.

So there was a handful of booers out of the thousands of people who were there. They shouldn't have done it, but nor should the media have held the Wellstone campaign and the DFL party responsible for a handful of jerks. That is why their fake moral outrage was just despicably phony. Their partisanship was so blatant in the news coverage, one got the sense they really were working overtime to trash the Wellstones' memory by demonizing their family, friends, and supporters as foaming at the mouth political radicals who couldn't even stop their politicking to grieve.

Would Paul Wellstone have approved of the booing or Rick Kahn's speech? Absolutely not. He absolutely wouldn't have approved, and most certainly would have intervened to stop both. But lest we forget, Paul Wellstone was dead, and was powerless to control the situation. Though you'd never know that from the right wing media coverage. The surviving family members and the Wellstone campaign did their utmost to honor all of the dead, uphold their good names, their personal legacies, and their memories. In the days following the memorial, the Republican attack dogs and the right wing media did all they could to utterly destroy them.

The media created firestorm of controversy is what put Norm Coleman in the US Senate, the same way the media created firestorm of controversy put Howard Dean out of the Democratic presidential race.

The two things that happened at the memorial rally--the booing from the audience before the memorial started (which no one could have controlled), and Rick Kahn's remarks (which could have been controlled if one of the Wellstone sons or the campaign director had vetted his speech in advance), just showed how little control the organizers of the event actually had over the circumstances. Not surprisingly given the circumstances, they were really in complete disarray.

But that didn't stop the Republicans from exploiting the few negative things that did happen, and making a mountain out of a mole hill, so their hand picked Bush boy, would win. Now there's compassionate conservatism for you, in a nutshell. Attack the survivors of a plane crash that killed seven people five days after their deaths, to win a political race. That's damn compassionate, isn't it? A lot of moral integrity there.

Actually, the only moral integrity I saw in the wake of the Wellstone memorial, outside Jim Ramstad's remarks to the press, was Mondale's concession speech. When he spoke to the young people who were the heart and soul of the Wellstone campaign, the full brunt of the horror of the Republican attacks came home to roost. Mondale showed more decency, more class, and more personal and professional integrity (not to mention family and community values) in his pinky finger than any of the attack dog Republicans, especially Norm Coleman, will ever have.

You know those cliched sayings like "I don't know how they sleep at night" or "I don't know how they can look themselves in the mirror"? That is what springs to mind about the Republican fueled media response to Wellstone's death. And I don't say that as a Democratic partisan (I'm a political independent) or a Wellstone groupie (see my remarks about him in the "Who are your heros" thread). I say that as a human being who was utterly disgusted and devastated by the Republican exploitation of the Wellstone deaths.

Those were grieving, fallible human beings who planned and carried out the memorial rally to honor all seven dead. How many sitting US senators's families do you suppose would have chosen to "share the memorial stage" of the deceased senator with the other victims families? Not many, if any, is my guess.

But the Republican attacks won the day. No one remembered the Wellstones or their legacy. The relentless, extreme, shrill, negative attack tactics (same we've seen the White House use in the past week against Richard Clarke) worked. The attack dog Republicans succeeded with their P.T. Barnum strategy of fooling enough of the people to win the election.

That is how Norm Coleman won the election. The only way he could have, because Wellstone would surely have won it had he not died. And Wellstone would have won it because he deserved to win. If ever there was an opportunistic politician whose didn't deserve to win, it is Norm Coleman.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 02:46 PM

And for the record Guest JH, the final tally in the election (with over 75% voter turnout), was split down the middle along partisan party lines: Coleman too 49% and Mondale 47%.

The third parties weren't a factor in Minnesota Senate race, but there is no question that the Green candidate and Jesse Ventura's reactionary Independence party got enough votes from a wildly unpopular party machine Democrat, to put right wing Republican Pawlenty into office.

The lesson in the governors race wasn't that we should lock out the third parties. The lesson is, the Democrats have to run strong, viable candidates, instead of the party hacks who can amass the most money and wield the most power within the party. The lost to Ventura doing it in 1998, and to Pawlenty doing the same damn thing all over again in 2002. So know we are stuck with a draconian right wing Republican ideologue for governor, who is doing a tremendous amount of damage to the state--he picked up where Ventura left off running Minnesota into the ditch, and managed to get his vehicle moving enough to drive us right into the swamp.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST,JH
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 03:25 PM

"Yes. I, as any reasonable person would, don't argue that."

...and yet, you pontificated for four long paragraphs arguing just that.

As for the 25 point swing I assume you're addressing in the second post -- It was you, not I who claimed that Wellstone enjoyed a 20 point pre-election lead. When Mondale lost, that represented a 20+ point swing by your numbers, not mine.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 04:50 PM

Guest JH, it is clear you aren't going to let your ideological loyalties get in the way of the facts. I didn't deny or argue that Republicans were dissed. I said their being dissed by a handful of impatient partisan jerks was insignificant. BIG difference.

Now then, just where did I say Wellstone enjoyed a 20 point lead? I said he enjoyed a 10 point lead in the final polls prior to his death, and by the time he died, some pundits were predicting it had opened up even further, and suggested he might win the election by as many as 20 points. That isn't even remotely close to saying that Wellstone was 20 points ahead when he died.

Perhaps your mathematical ability is as bad as your read comprehension?

The final polls just prior to Wellstone's death, showed he was 9-10 points depending upon the poll) ahead of Coleman. Here are the results of the final MSNBC poll prior to his death:

Final MSNBC poll prior to Wellstone's death

According to the final Minneapolis Star Tribune poll just prior to the election (and after the memorial), it looked like this:

"The poll, conducted Wednesday through Friday, shows Mondale at 46 percent and Coleman at 41 percent, but that falls within the margins of sampling error of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points."

The number of undecided, according to the Strib poll, was 9%. It was clear then that the memorial had caused Coleman to gain in the polls, and that Mondale was sinking. Despite that final poll, everyone on the ground already knew that the post-memorial Democrat bashing had won the day, because it was clear the momentum was with Coleman.

The article I quote from is full of anecdotal evidence that the swing voters (the undecided 9-10% depending on the poll) were going to go against Mondale because they were angry at Democrats for the Rick Kahn speech (very few Minnesotans cared about the booing, unless they were hardcore Republicans). There was just too much emotion and volatility the weekend before the election for the polls to accurately pick up on all that was going on with the electorate. Hence, the Coleman victory of 2 points in a squeaker, where he gained 12 points in the final election results from the first Mondale/Coleman poll taken just before the memorial.

Prior to the Wellstone memorial, but after it was publicly known that Mondale was going to run, the numbers were Mondale 47% and Coleman 39%, which was virtually unchanged from the final Wellstone/Coleman poll prior to Wellstone's death.

I can post a link to the article if you would like "proof" that what I'm saying is accurate.

Yet amazingly, the weekend after the memorial, the Strib (along with all the other local media) astonishingly claimed this:

"Both campaigns...marked the end of a four-day period in which every campaign in the state went dark after Wellstone's death."

What the Strib doesn't say is what is most telling of all. Every candidate in Minnesota quit campaigning Friday afternoon, as soon as word of Wellstone's death was released. All of them except Coleman, that is. Coleman kept doing tv & radio interviews after Wellstone's death was announced, rather than just holing up and issuing a press release, which is what the circumstances dictated, and was in fact what nearly every candidate in the state did.

So right after the local news announced the death of Wellstone on the Friday evening of the crash, there was Norm Coleman and his beautiful Hollywood B actress trophy wife, holding an "informal, impromptu" (my ass) press conference in front of their house, talking about how tragic it all was. That night on the local political news show, the Republican attack dog Sarah Janacek, kept lamenting how awful it was for Norm Coleman, who now had to run against the Wellstone sympathy instead of the Wellstone record, and how terrible it was going to be because of course Norm would almost certainly lose the race.

The entire day after Wellstone's death, Coleman did radio interviews and phone interviews with the print media. He held another "informal and impromptu" press conference in the parking lot of a the local TV station that put him on local TV and did the national network feed, so he could appear on all the national networks the Sunday (two days) after Wellstone's death. Republican attack dog Sarah Janacek also held an intensely eerie news conference in the parking lot outside an empty Coleman campaign headquarters on Sunday morning (to prove, of course, that Norm wasn't campaigning, even though his face was on every local and national news station from across town at KSTP-TV).

On Monday, three days after Wellstone's death and the day before the Wellstone memorial, Coleman was back making staged "informal and impromptu" non-campaigning media appearances again, all over in the local, but mostly national media, talking again about how he was still so upset over the death of his honorable opponent, and how decent a man Walter Mondale was, but he wouldn't comment on the DFL party's choice to replace Senator Wellstone who was, of course, irreplaceable. Coleman's campaigning was so blatantly obscene, even the former Republican governor Arne Carlson (who was still deluding himself that he was still the Republican party's leader, despite being out of office for two years) demanded he stop campaigning and go home, because his behavior was "unseemly and reflected badly on all Republicans".

But of course, the local and national media never picked up on former governor's smackdown of Coleman either. That's because the media appearances were all being orchestrated by the Rove/Cheney machine, who was giving the marching orders to the Coleman campaign via Sarah Janacek. Besides, it was much better that the local media keep up the charade that Coleman's campaign had gone dark like the others "out of respect to the families", because if they didn't, the public might notice that Rick Kahn was distraught with grief, and NOT campaigning for Mondale, when he went off on his bizarre rambling "If you love Paul Wellstone..." rant which he aimed at the Republican friends of Paul's who were in the audience (whom he REALLY bizarrely called on by name), like the aforementioned Jim Ramstand.

The Wellstone sons did not make a single public appearance or comment to the media until months after their family's death. Their speeches at the memorial were it, so it absolutely couldn't be argued that they were campaigning. And Mondale had only appeared on tv by default, when he was caught going into Wellstone HQ on Friday afternoon after the crash. He wasn't seen or heard from until the memorial (he made no media appearance or comment, unlike Coleman, at the memorial).

Of course, Coleman just HAD to appear at the memorial service, and despite former Governor Carlson's admonishment to him the previous day to quit campaigning, Coleman chose to make more comments and more media appearances for the cameras, to all the assembled national and local media about how it wouldn't be decent to comment on the memorial, and that he would let others decide whether Rick Kahn's speech was appropriate or not when he began his campaign the following morning. It was a time for healing, he said, looking somber and senatorial right into the national tv cameras.

For a man who wasn't campaigning, he sure as shit got a whole lot of campaign face time in the media while his campaign was supposedly dark. His somber, senatorial manner was seductive. Even I bought into it until Republican Governor Carlson told him to shut the fuck the up and stop campaigning on Monday.

Of course, a year and a half later, we know the Rove/Cheney strategy was for Coleman to keep making media appearances in which he appeared somber, subdued, and to be reaching out to grieving Minnesotans, while the national (and a few of the most notorious local) Republican attack dogs ripped the Wellstone family and campaign to shreds in the national and local media for being "political". The game plan was to complain that all the media coverage being given to the Wellstone story was unfair to the Coleman campaign. That the media was giving all these high powered Democrats coming in to town to talk turkey with Walter Mondale and the local DFL party apparatchiks, so much media time (which they really didn't get, BTW), that it was the equivalent of the dead Wellstone still campaigning.

So Coleman's media appearances just had to be done, Republicans claimed, because otherwise it wouldn't be fair to the Republicans. After all, fairness had so much to do with the Democrats losing their incumbent on the eve of the election, and the national media frenzy over the race being orchestrated behind the scenes by the White House. They kept pumping up the volume, saying it was the race that would decide which party would hold the majority in the senate, control the Congress, blah blah blah. The truth was, there were (depending on whose count you used) roughly 10 Senate races that determined that, not just one.   Including the despicable job they did on Max Cleland.

It is true the Democratic heavy weights were coming in to the state to meet the Wellstone family amd campaign, and to woo Mondale out of retirement (Mondale and Wellstone were personal friends, and the sons really wanted Mondale to take their father's place, even though Mondale hesitated to accept at first). Because local news media were covering the Kennedy celebrity train coming to town, Coleman and his White House puppeteers decided they couldn't let "Wellstone surrogates" like Kennedy and neighboring South Dakota senator Tom Daschle (another good friend of Wellstone's, who was already in the Twin Cities at the time of the crash to attend a family wedding on Saturday night), get media time without Coleman getting media time to counter the sympathy the Wellstone family and campaign was getting.

So Coleman cynically and manipulatively never quit campaigning, despite his pledge to do so. And when the local media kept repeating the mantra that no one was campaigning, when Coleman clearly was doing just that, the whole thing had an air of Coleman the emperor appearing without clothes to his media throngs who were cheering him on for looking appropriately somber and comforting to the unwashed masses.

Never mind that Kennedy, Dashcle, and Mondale couldn't escape the wall of journalists outside the campaign headquarters on Friday (the day of the crash) even if they'd wanted to, when they went to offer their condolences, and sit with and reassure the campaign staff while the Wellstone sons and the campaign director went to Eveleth to visit the crash site (something relatives often choose to do after a crash). But that was the only time Mondale appeared publicly until the memorial itself.

Like I said, the cynical exploitation of the Wellstone deaths still stuns me. I don't know if I'll ever get over it. We'll see if Coleman can get re-elected. All he appears to do, according to Minnesota Republicans and Democrats alike, is sit in Big Daddy Cheney's chair when he is gone from the Senate (and in a secure, undisclosed location where he can pull the puppet strings without any interference from things like his duties as vice president).

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST,JH
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 07:42 PM

"At the time of his death, Paul Wellstone had pulled far enough ahead in the polls (nearly 10 points and gaining) that it was looking pretty certain that Coleman was going down to defeat. Some Minnesota pollsters had already predicted he might win the race by as many as 20 points.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Mar 04 - 08:42 PM

Like I said, there is a huge difference between saying "he was ahead by 20 points" and saying "some...had already predicted he might win...by as many as 20 points."

The salient keywords (since you you do seem to have a reading comprehnsion problem) in your quote of my words are:

    1) "some Minnesota pollsters" (I assure you, I'm not a Minnesota pollster);

    2) "predicted", and;

    3) "might"

Your words were:

"It was you, not I who claimed that Wellstone enjoyed a 20 point pre-election lead."

I think it is quite clear from the quote of mine you provide, that I said no such thing.

But then, that isn't what is bothering you, now is it?

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: kendall
Date: 30 Mar 04 - 07:26 AM

This is all very interesting, but it doesn't give me what I asked for.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST,JH
Date: 30 Mar 04 - 07:48 AM

When it was to your rhetorical advantage to exaggerate the "Wellstone lead" you made the 20 point reference. When I pointed out that the bigger the lead, the more improbable the point you were making, you said you never claimed to have quoted a 20 point lead. You are clearly wrong.

I'm not bothered.

Just as an aside, I've always wondered why you post anonymously. You are obviously an intelligent thinker, willing to source the points you contend, rarely out and out obnoxiously rude (at least not by mudcat standards), and you post as much or more than anyone on the mudcat (meaning, I assume you are here to stay). Only one person seems to have known or cared who you are, and now he's gone. I guess I'm left to guess that perhaps because you are a woman you have been stalked by a mudcatter? (I've heard a few other women here with that complaint). Just find it curious.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Mar 04 - 08:22 AM

Guest JH, here is what you said, that sent me off on the rants:

"It is highly likely that Wellstone was going to lose his election -- it is easily argued that Mondale came as close as he did on the strength of the sympathy vote. Remember how energized the MN Democratic party was after the death? The huge emotional rally(s)?"

I corrected you because you were wrong about Wellstone likely losing the election, you were wrong to say that Mondale came as close as he did on the strength of the sympathy vote, and you were wrong to say the DFL party was energized, because they were totally demoralized, devastated, and in total disarray in the wake of Wellstone's death, which also effected the outcome of the election.

All the facts you put forward to support your assumptions were wrong. You did it again in your last post with your assumptions about me. You seem to talk out your ass a lot. It is quite clear talking out your ass is a regular occurence for you, so it is probably a good thing you aren't bothered when people challenge your bullshit with the facts.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST,JH
Date: 30 Mar 04 - 09:57 AM

No, I actually just see us as having different opinions and those opinions determine to some degree how we interpret events. That, and I'm just a nicer person than you. *BG*

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Mar 04 - 10:35 AM

Actually, you are quite pedestrian in your belief that differing opinions and interpretations actually alters the facts to support your bullshitting proclivities. Most people think their opinions are worthy enough to change the facts. That is why most people's opinions are wrong, not to mention stupid. They base their opinions on their ideological beliefs instead of the facts.

I also don't give a shit whether people think I'm nice.

This conversation reminds me of a quote from John Stuart Mill, who said "Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people...it is true that most stupid people are conservative."

Or some such. I do hope your problems with reading comprehension doesn't prevent you from catching the drift, or my intention that the drift carry you far away where you won't bother me anymore.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST,JH
Date: 30 Mar 04 - 10:47 AM

*BG*

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Mar 04 - 10:51 AM

Happy I could make your day.

Subject: RE: Senator Paul Wellstone's death
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 31 Mar 04 - 09:14 AM

His death is a total accident of course...but..
... and the beat goes on!