August 6, 2015

"[I]f you were choosing a state that would abandon the two major parties and elect a one-time professional wrestler governor..."

"... Minnesota might not be high on your list. It’s among our most literate states; its voter turnout is always at or near the top. But in fact, Minnesota has an historical appetite for alternatives....  Moreover, in Jesse 'The Body' Ventura, voters saw something more than the flamboyant showman...
Since voters had the chance to see Ventura as a viable candidate, the normal falloff for a third party candidate did not happen; instead, he won a narrow victory over St. Paul Mayor (and future Senator) Norm Coleman and Attorney General Hubert Humphrey III. Enough voters decided: 'Hey! We can do this!' to shock the political establishment..."

From "What If Trump Wins?/Sometimes voters do break the rules," by Jeff Greenfield.

30 comments:

rehajm said...

Jeez, it's not like they elected a television comedian or something.

Quaestor said...

A state that would put Jesse Ventura in the governor's mansion and Al Franken in the Senate is at the core of its being barking mad... It must be the lutefisk.

Annie said...

Franken, who won due to a convenient 'found' trunk full of ballots.

Michael K said...

Minnesota has been unserious since the DFL party was founded. Anything can happen.

Germany was the best educated country in Europe, remember ?

William said...

Greenfield is playing on the fear that Trump might be another Ventura. Ventura was genuinely awful. Schwarzenegger was a disappointment, but there was some competence beneath the flamboyance........Perhaps a more apt comparison is with Mike Bloomberg. Like Trump, Bloomberg knows how to make money and get things done. Bloomberg had no political skills on the visible spectrum, but he was able to sell himself as a competent and incorruptible manager which to a large extent he was. Bloomberg, unlike Trump, would never be a star on reality tv, but he looked smart and independent........I know Bliomberg is not beloved by the people here, but he is a successful example of a billionaire with no political experience who won election and governed successfully.

Brando said...

Just shows that the so-called "sophisticated" are often anything but. Al Franken does nothing to disprove this.

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

If we apply Occam's razor here, the simplest explanation is that the other candidates are all very weak.

Brando said...

I thought Bloomberg was a pretty good mayor by NYC standards. He was no libertarian but then again, this is NYC we're talking about. He also continued some of Guiliani's more successful policies and his 12-year run saw the city get richer and safer. It'd take De Blasio some time to undo that.

Michael K said...

"It'd take De Blasio some time to undo that."

From what I understand, he is making real progress.

Sorry for the pun.

AllenS said...

There are plenty of blue collared Democrats that like what Trump is saying, and would vote for him.

Hint: it's the person, not the party.

Conclusion: Trump would end up being another Ventura. Ventura would never have been re-elected.

Original Mike said...

Whatever happened to garage's plan to move to Minnesota? Perhaps they wouldn't grant him a visa.

Original Mike said...

In Ventura's case at least Minnesota does not have nuclear weapons. The thought of Donald Trump as president gives me the willies.

Anonymous said...

Minnesota is nuts about politics. They throw tantrums and pick low information candidates even if they are supposedly high information voters.

But nonetheless, I'm fairly certain Ventura won before organized vote fraud has reached all elements of the Democrat party and its lawyers. Nationwide Ds won't let that happen this time.

Bob R said...

Trump knows how to make money: inherit it.

Matt Sablan said...

If Trump wins, and Clinton is the nominee, it'll be really hard not to vote for SMOD.

TosaGuy said...

As a former Minnesotan I can shed some explanation. Skip Humphrey is a boring nothing of a person who got to run because he is a Humphrey. The only people that voted for him were die-hard lefties. Norm Coleman was a Democrat who had recently flipped to GOP and was from St. Paul. Outstate MN people do not like Twin City politicians. Ventura had been a mayor of the state's sixth-largest city who had a clever ad campaign and got a bunch of people who rarely vote and those distrustful of the other two candidates. He also campaigned on regular-people issues like how DMV registration in the state was too high.

I had just moved to Wisconsin, so I did not vote in that election.

averagejoe said...

Ventura wasn't enough of a fool for Minnesota, so they elected Al Franken.

Quaestor said...

AllenS Wrote: Conclusion: Trump would end up being another Ventura. Ventura would never have been re-elected.

It may be just my thickheadedness, but I don't see how you arrived at that conclusion. While a similar kind of voter obstreperousness that elected Ventura might put Trump in the White House, there's no reason to conclude anything beyond that.

gerry said...

Whatever happened to garage's plan to move to Minnesota?

His parents did not move, so neither could he.

Original Mike said...

"I had just moved to Wisconsin, so I did not vote in that election."

Minnesota has voter ID, huh?

Original Mike said...

@gerry - that explains it.

AllenS said...

Quaestor, I live about 20 miles from Minnesota, and most of the local news where I live comes from the Twin Cities. Ventura talked tough when he was running, just like Trump. Ventura started to make a fool out of himself right away, and eventually most people regretted the decision to vote for him. It was too late.

AllenS said...

MPR --

Dec 17, 2002 - Ventura inherited a $4 billion surplus, and leaves office with the state facing a $4.5 billion deficit

cubanbob said...

For all of the dumping on non traditional candidates especially those who managed to get elected one ought to keep this in mind: had they been elected president how would they compare to Obama? Does anyone think Arnold would have been a worse president than Obama (yes Mick, I know legally he couldn't have been-just a conjecture)? For all of his clownishness does anyone believe Ventura could have been a worse president than Obama? Does anyone believe Trump can be a worse president than Obama? For all of the smark, the Democrat have run and elected and reelected the worst president since the 19th century.
For all of the Trump bashing just exactly does Hillary! tower over Trump? She has no accomplishments other than marrying Bill and has an aura of corruption and graft. Sanders? Really, a communist. Now there is a viable candidate- in progressive fantasy land so who is left in the Democrat lineup? O'Malley a bar band musician and former governor of Baltimore? Great qualifications for the brain dead. Then there is the well known court jester and plagiarist Slow Joe Biden. Arnold, Ventura and Trump in this universe cannot possibly be any worse than the current Democrat lineup and certainly couldn't be worse than the current Democrat disaster in the White House.

Skipper said...

Whatever the moral of Jesse's victory, we quickly realized the Governor gig was just another private business venture to him.

Original Mike said...

"Whatever the moral of Jesse's victory, we quickly realized the Governor gig was just another private business venture to him."

Remind you of anyone else?

AllenS said...

Not only that, Mike, a lot of Trump's business adventures have failed or went bankrupt.

Original Mike said...

"Not only that, Mike, a lot of Trump's business adventures have failed or went bankrupt."

So if President Trump, LLC goes bankrupt, who gets the nuclear weapons?

William said...

I think Trump would be an experiment. It's possible that things would work out, but it's just as possible he would be another Ventura or Obama. In any event, there are far better choices among the Republican candidates......That said, a few words in defense of Trump. He's a successful real estate developer. He started with inherited wealth, but he found a way to increase that wealth by several orders of magnitude. He's sometimes tacky, but he's a successful businessman in a very tough business. Making a few billion dollars is a better indicator of intelligence than community organizing or even professional wrestling.

Static Ping said...

As a pro wrestling fan, I can say that Jesse Ventura is very charismatic as most successful professional wrestlers are. He was always a villain but he was a fun villain, the kind of guy you would hang out with as long as the room did not have too many folding chairs. I figured it was all an act and I got a kick over his election.

Since those days the mask has fallen off and it is apparent that Jesse is just a jerk and not an especially competent one.

As for Trump, I tend to agree with Ace's assessment. The Republican party keeps promising stuff and does not deliver, instead giving us wondrous "failure theater" about how they tried really, really hard but instead gave into whatever the Democrats wanted because they had no choice. The base is catching on. Trump may be a clown, but at least he's not one of the establishment. A little bit of respect is better than contempt.