Maybe a new paradigm emerges?
Hopefully. What happens is, it’s almost like the Arab-Israeli conflict. Where there are such long-standing crimes each has committed against the other—at least that’s the perception each side has—that there’s no trust.
So, when Norm Coleman says in his debate with Walter Mondale that “I want to change the tone,” after he called Paul Wellstone “a joke,” after they ran ads against Paul that were dishonest…
The Republican Senate Committee ran an ad against Paul in which they said, “Paul Wellstone voted to spend millions for saving the seaweed in Maui.” He did do that. But so did 89 percent of Republicans in the Senate, and so did Republican Majority Leader Bill Frist. So when you’re doing stuff like that, and then you say, “I want to change the tone,” it’s very hard to turn the other cheek and go, like, “Oh, well, OK, you can hit us, you can say dishonest things about us, you can play that way, but we’re not supposed to?” You know what I mean? So then somebody draws a cartoon of a Republican throwing an old person off a cliff. And it’s all Sean Hannity can talk about for the next year.
You don’t think much of Senator Norm Coleman.
I thought the comment he made that he was a 99 percent improvement over Wellstone—about six months after Paul’s death—I thought that said everything you need to know about the guy.
Are you still involved with the Wellstone family at all?
Do you know about Wellstone Action? Wellstone Action is basically training people to be activists in the same way that Paul was.
Who do you like as the Democratic candidate for president?
Well, I’d like Clinton to be president.
Which one?
Either. But, of the candidates that we have now, I think we have a lot of strong candidates. I could see John Kerry as president, I could see Howard Dean, I could see Richard Gephardt, John Edwards. I could see Graham and I could see Lieberman.
Here’s an easy question: Who don’t you want for president?
George W. Bush. And Al Sharpton.
What issues do you think the Democrats need to focus on to be a contender in future elections?
Bill Clinton said that in a fight of the small, the meaner one wins. I think the Democrats have to get a little bigger, and I think we have to show that we’re for national security, sure, but also for economic justice, expanding the economy, protecting the environment, improving education and health care, all those things…a way to make sure that the people who lose in globalization don’t fall through the cracks.
Those were the same issues, though, that the Democrats campaigned on in the last election.
Well, I don’t think those are issues that they actually campaigned on effectively at all, especially nationally. I mean, they got caught, you know? Also, I think we have to be more aggressive in getting our message out and more aggressive in combating the right-wing part of the media. That is a very organized and pernicious group.
What would a third party, say, the Greens, have to do to become viable competitors in future elections?
I have very mixed feelings about that. Actually, I’m a Democrat and I think that people in the Green party should become active in the Democratic party and try to make sure their concerns are handled within the party.
Would you ever join a third party?
No. Unless the Democratic party just went haywire somewhere, but no.
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