Turnbuckled

Jesse Ventura wrote an op-ed in yesterday's Strib.

It's perhaps redundant to call anything Jesse Ventura does "self-serving" - the man practically defines the term.

But this article is amazing:

Last year the state had a deficit of about $2.3 billion. In an attempt to correct the deficit I made some very difficult decisions. Basically I proposed to cut government spending substantially and raise and reform taxes in an effort to mitigate the effect of future recessions on the flow of revenue.

It was a proposal that Democrats could have and should have supported. But not Moe. When Roger had the chance to show strong leadership and do the right thing (avoiding Draconian cuts to social services and other programs), he sold out the party for his own selfish gain. Roger and his followers got into bed with those civilized Republicans, called my proposal "Jesse taxes" and agreed to ignore the problem for another year, when we all knew it would double in severity.

Why did Roger do such a thing? Why would the Democrats marry their political adversaries? Did they not know that Republicans don't approve of divorce, and that if in the end they did agree to one the Democrats would pay dearly?

Of course they knew. But there were bigger fish to fry. We all know that power and politics are more important than good public policy, and as the leader of the Democrats Roger Moe had a score to settle. Roger and his followers could not stand that an Independent had become governor of Minnesota, and this was his way to set up a race that would defeat Jesse Ventura and restore "order and civility" to politics in Minnesota.

That's right, Formergovernor Ventura. It was all about you. Roger Moe - the leader of the former majority party - staked his entire electoral, and his party's future (and its tenuous present) on a vendetta against a fluke governor with a one-seat legislative caucus.

(Incidentally, did I miss all the stories about how the Republicans and Democrats were so successful in restoring "civility and respect" to the legislative process now that the third-party Independent governor is gone? Oh, and then there was the gridlock that was going to end.)

That was one of Ventura's more irritating misconceptions; the notion that government was supposed to function as smoothly as the engine in one of Ventura's Porsches.

Ventura's stupidest proposal of all was his mania for unicameral government - a one-house legislature. I always wondered where that came from; Ventura's one-track mind, or the relentless, "Good Government" wonkery of Dean Barkley and Tim Penny, who were the men behind the curtain of the Ventura administration.

The rest is history. Jesse didnt run. Roger lost the election and with it every bit of leverage the Democrats had against the Republican majority.

The Republicans reign and John Hottinger is left to wallow in lost battles over important DFL social issues like a 24 hour waiting period for an abortion, a mandatory pledge of allegiance and a more liberal conceal and carry law.

Jesse?

Just a question, here, formergovernor; how does Jesse Ventura's absence from the scene lead to John Hottinger's problems?

And for a guy who ran as a putative libertarian, you act as if shall-issue is a bad thing...

Seems to me that you have to give credit where credit is due: To Gov. Pawlenty and House Speaker Steve Sviggum for suckering the Democrats into a trap, and to Roger Moe for falling head first into it.

Hunh?

Trap?

Perhaps it's early. Perhaps I need coffee before I try to tackle Jesse Ventura's reasoning; maybe Ventura is really making a point of yeshiva-like complexity that merely has gone past me.

I'll go make a pot, and read this again.

I'm back. The coffee was good, but it's not helping.

Formergovernor Ventura; the only "trap" Tim Pawlenty set for Roger Moe (and Tim Penny) was the same one Ronald Reagan set for Jimmy Carter - or for that matter, that one Jesse Ventura set for Norm Coleman and Skip Humphrey. He articulated a vision. He portrayed that vision relentlessly on the campaign trail. And when the electorate responded to that vision, he pushed it through the legislature with single-minded tenacity.

Except when you were governor, Jesse, the last sentence would have been "...he dumped the vision from the campaign trail and ran to the left".

In fact, the only "trap" that the state as a whole - Moe, Pawlenty, Hottinger, Sviggum and the whole lot of them - are currently in is the eight billion dollar trap that formergoverner Ventura left them in; the incredible increases in spending that the DFL forced through against a weak governor who was being led around by the nose by Tim Penny and Dean Barkley.

And finally, please spare us the comparison of Roger Moe to Vince Lombardi. Coach Lombardi would never have purposely lost the final game of the season on the chance it would improve his chance of success in the following season.

Maybe. Comparing politics and football rarely works. But it's certainly a fair cop that Roger Moe, legislative technician that he was, never came within a country mile of articulating any kind of vision that voters - even many of his base - could sink their teeth into.

So there's the comparison you wanted, Governor:

• Roger Moe: No Vision
• Tim Penny: Wonky vision
• Jesse Ventura: Vision abandoned.
• Tim Pawlenty: Vision fought for with relentless perseverence.

And that is a message Vince Lombardi would sink his teeth into.

I always said that in politics the best road is the right road -- even if it takes a little longer.

Corollary: But if it takes longer than you have, is it really the best road?

Posted by Mitch at June 9, 2003 07:02 AM