A year ago this week, the senior Senator from Minnesota, Paul Wellstone was killed in a plane crash, along with his wife, daughter, several campaign workers, and the flight crew. He was approaching the end of his re-election campaign and decided to attend the funeral of a friend in northern Minnesota.
It seemed that people either loved or hated Wellstone, reminiscent of the feelings many of my parent’s generation had about Franklin Delano Roosevelt. I realize that hate is a strong word, but I thought about it and decided it was the right word.The reasons for hating Senator Wellstone were (and very sad to say, are):
He was a politician.
He was a liberal.
He was an inveterate optimist.
He was Jewish.
He was balding.
He was short.
He was a former amateur wrestler.
He was a former college professor.
He was enthusiastic about damn near everything.
He enjoyed being with people.
He liked the give and take of the debate.
He stood up for what he believed in.
He never gave up.
Like Roosevelt, he was “a happy warrior,” and like it or not, we are the better for having had both of them pass through and affect our lives.
It appears that we live in a country where debate has two colors – black and white. No room for gray, for complexity, for subtlety. Maybe one day we’ll realize that our lives are not thirty second tv commercials, that we need to think about the issues facing our families and our country, and that we need more than another “suit” to pour the clichés of the day into our ears in the perpetual search for our vote.
Wellstone was an original, and we are still searching for his successor. Sad to say, it looks like it’ll be a while.
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