Al Franken ~ Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer
Senate candidates leap hurdles for DFL endorsement

By Tom Driscoll

Fillmore County DFL will hold its convention in Fountain on Saturday 29-March. Among other things, delegates will vote to endorse a candidate for U.S. Senate.

Time Trials

The race so far has fielded as many as 6-contenders galloping around the state. Jim-Democrat-Different-Cohen, dropped out last month. Pro-Iraq-war-hawk, Dick Fransen, remains in. "Power-Sex-Money" blogger-biologist, Soren Sorenson, is in. Darryl Stanton, who did not respond to a request to be interviewed for this piece, is still in. Stanton is the only African-American running. He polls relatively-well one-on-one against Norm Coleman, but lost three-previous DFL-bids.

Considered at the start-of-the-race to be a likely front-runner by this time, attorney Mike Ciresi dropped out the first week of March for lack of traction with the party base. According to the Star Tribune, Ciresi complained to reporters that the endorsement process was not really democratic. Maybe Ciresi is on to something. In 2000, the DFL endorsed Ciresi to run against Republican Rod Grams. But an unendorsed-DFL renegade with deep-pockets, Mark Dayton, whipped Ciresi in the Democratic primary, then went on to upset Grams.

If the roar of the fans and the rasp of winded orators is any indication, the race for the DFL endorsement this long-awaited spring comes down to 2-men, comedian-slash-satirist and unapologetic liberal pundit, Al Franken, who holds a documented lead in a recent Survey-USA poll commissioned by KSTP-TV, and Franken's surging opponent, a divinity-scholar, professor, author, unflinching-Progressive, Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer.

The winner will be decided only after 60-percent of the 1,200-plus delegates attending the DFL state convention 6-8-June in Rochester say so. Put another way, after a 6-month steeplechase through Minnesota to curry party favor and to impress independents, fewer than 750 of what Ciresi calls "party activists" will likely determine the winner. Let's be fair though, winners and losers wear a reversible raincoat: one politician's party activist is another's civic-minded, politically-engaged voter.

Caucus

Representation-districts must be biennially supplied with new and incumbent candidates for political office. So each of the State's 87-counties are divided into precincts, small towns and whole townships in rural areas, neighborhoods and sub-divided suburbs in metropolitan areas. The precincts of course are peopled with those grassroots high-office-gatekeepers who become engaged early-on in deciding who will represent us in Government.

It is at the State level where caucus-vetted candidates are officially chosen or endorsed to run against the other party. In essence, more of a selection process than an election process, the majority of voters don't have to get off their duffs to cast a secret ballot until months after time trials have thinned the field.

Willing contestants agree to abide with the convention results ostensibly to foster party unity, and, sensibly, to gain the financial and network resources controlled by the party. But time-and-again, rich candidates, stubborn candidates, idealistic candidates, independent candidates thumb their noses at party endorsements. Mark Dayton did it in 2000, and he ended up winning a prestigious Senate seat. Owatonna State Senate Republican Dick Day said he's going to do it this year in the red race to oust Tim Walz from his blue seat in the 1st Congressional District.

DFL frontrunners, Al and Jack, as they refer to themselves, agree to abide with convention results. And like the Democratic Party nationally, DFL-leaning voters will have no reasonable choice but to abide by the decision of a few-hundred - what did anti-tobacco activist lawyer Ciresi call them? - party activists.

The 5-Year War

The day after Al took part in a 45-minute phone interview with the Fillmore County Journal, he appeared live on the David Letterman Show, validating the most politically-relevant impression I took away from talking to him. To put it in joke format - as a nod to the former Saturday Night Live cast-member, 5-time Emmy Award-winner, author of the memorably cathartic screed, "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot", and pilot of liberal talk radio's Air America - Why is Al Franken like John McCain? Because the issue both candidates seem most comfortable talking about is the Iraq War.

"The Coalition of the Willing has become the Coalition of the Leaving," said Al of the Bush Administration's league of international war allies. "Since no military solution alone will solve Iraq's problems - as General Petrais himself has said - our only leverage with the international community is to announce we're leaving."

Al is quick to point out that war advocates offer a false choice. "They say, if we leave Iraq, the terrorists will come and get us here," chuckled Franken. "Anyone who says they know what's going to happen when we leave is either fooling themself, or trying to fool the person they're talking to."

On his campaign website, Franken states, "I support immediately beginning the process of bringing our troops home. Our withdrawal should not be precipitous, and we should have a national conversation about the best way to complete our disengagement."

So how would a National Conversation work now?

"I'm talking about having a debate in Congress," said Al. "Congress will have the discussion, then take it back to the town-hall. We didn't put enough thought and planning into how we went into Iraq. We need to put more into how we get out."

Al cautions against withdrawing hastily. He wants to avoid spreading Iraq's conflict across the region, and wants to avoid as well, "a more grotesque humanitarian tragedy." Speaking knowledgably about the region after 7-USO entertainment tours last year, Al explained, "Our troops can redeploy to bases in Kuwait, Qtar, while international peacekeepers move into Iraq. There needs to be a regional conference to discuss Iraq. Millions of Iraqi refugees have fled to Syria and Jordan. Turkey doesn't want to see an Iraqi Kurdistan. I don't think Iran wants to see Iraq fall apart either."

Al frequently mentioned Norm Coleman's support of the war during our interview. On the Letterman Show, Al leapfrogged the DFL-endorsement entirely and referred to Coleman as, "my opponent," pointing out that Coleman had voted in the Senate against setting a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq.

A year ago, Congressional Democrats tried to attach a $124.2-billion war appropriation, political benchmarks for Iraq and a troop withdrawal timetable. Coleman voted against it. The bill narrowly passed and Bush promptly torpedoed it. With too-few votes to override a veto, legislators faced a choice that has come to define the Democrat's role in Iraq: cut-off funding for troops and force an ignominious end to the war, or support the troops and try to shift blame for the conduct of the war onto the President.

The Struggle Within

Jack, Peace-and-Justice Professor Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, pleasantly reminds his audiences that he is an optimist, then draws dark lessons from the Iraq War, hinting at political conspiracy and a bamboozled Nation.

Jack asks, Why didn't the Bush Administration listen to the U.N. inspectors? And Jack answers, Because Bush invaded Iraq to control Iraq's oil supplies, and to establish permanent military bases in the Middle East. Because Bush's war is a war of shameful cronyism that padded Halliburton's bank account at the expense of America's reputation in the world, not to mention hundreds-of-thousands of lives.

Jack tends to refer to the Pentagon budget as war-preparation and has little to say about the Defense Department per se. He points out extraordinary funding disparities between war and education, war and healthcare, war and investment in building a renewable energy economy. "We've spent 88-times more on war preparation than on climate change. Climate change is the greatest threat we face."

Jack tightens the frame on his argument, "Here's our choice. We can borrow 7-to-12-trillion-dollars and fight continuous wars to have oil, or we can change our priorities and put that money to other things."

The son of a printer, Jack attended St. Olaf College. He taught social studies at a "poor middle school on the west side of Chicago" and spent a semester studying in Africa and Asia. In 1977, he graduated from Union Theological Seminary in New York. His masters thesis, "Hunger for Justice: the Politics of Food and Faith," became the first of a dozen books he's written. Jack and his wife Sara spent 2-years teaching in Managua, Nicaragua during the U.S.-backed Contra war of the '80s. In 1992, Jack started teaching Peace and Justice Studies at the University of St. Thomas.

Jack's resume provides a deep foundation to plant his feet on when he makes statements like the following: "I'm the only candidate to call for cuts in military funding." He reminds listeners that they were "lied to" in the lead-up to invading Iraq, that no weapons of mass destruction were ever found. Al says pretty-much the same thing. But Jack is quick to yank on the comedian's earlobe. "Al says he thinks he would have voted for the war. But he's against it now. I think Al's going to have a hard time holding Coleman accountable for supporting the war. I have never supported the war. I advised Paul Wellstone before he voted against it."

"We have a moral obligation," says Jack with un-mincing elocution, "to help the Iraqi people in the aftermath of an illegal war." Analogous to the choice Jack proffers between spending trillions on continuous wars to try to control world oil supplies or spending it on something else, he submits a parallel deduction, "Every effort to hold-on to military might further unravels our military might. I still don't hear Al address the real obstacle to getting out of Iraq, oil. We want to take Iraqi oil. We need those permanent bases."

How do you get past the obstacles?

"Ending the U.S. occupation of Iraq is prerequisite to fixing Iraq. We can't get out of this mess without the help of Iraq's neighbors and the international community. Regional conferences and all the rest, once we announce we're leaving, the international community, Iraq's neighbors and Iraqis will get engaged, once we're not occupying Iraq to take its oil."

Both Al and Jack have built Senate campaigns on essentially the same plot of social, economic and political real estate. Both men talk favorably about labor unions, they complain about "tax-breaks for the wealthiest 1-percent of Americans", and threaten not only to repeal the breaks, but to tax the pants off the rich to help pay for programs aimed at helping regular people.

Both Al and Jack support universal health care. Jack further supports a single-payer program. Al supports only providing "kids" with single-payer healthcare.

Jack states, "I'm for tackling the power of the insurance companies. Universal coverage is just a goal. How do we get there? Al proposes letting the States decide, 50-laboratories. It's not movable! What if you switch jobs, move out-of-state? I propose Extended Medicare. Not a crappy system, but a good system. Rewards for prevention and wellness. Parity among physical, dental and mental care. Just like Paul Wellstone would have wanted. This is a huge difference between me and Al."

The only time Al mentioned Jack in our conversation was at this same juncture. It's the sometimes confusing crossroads where health care wonks ponder mandatory universal healthcare and a single-payer system. Universal coverage could be accomplished through a payroll tax, an employer mandate or some exotic combination of obligatory employer-individual fees and government contributions.

Single-payer healthcare, something like what Jack proposes with extended Medicare, almost certainly means a big department in Washington with customer service offices in cities like Atlanta, Chicago, Minneapolis and Denver, staffed with clerks who look at every SINGLE universal insurance claim. They pool all the resources available through private insurance and government programs, then, as PAYER, they cut a check.

Said Al, "I would argue with Jack. My proposal, a State-based solution, we'll get to single-payer faster with mine than with his approach, one that just won't go politically. Politically, we just can't get to a national single-payer system."

Al elaborated humorously on the single-payer subject to Letterman, explaining that People don't trust government. He defended the statement by noting that Republicans spend all their time out of office saying government doesn't work, then they get into office and they prove it. It was funny, and in a funny way, it underpinned a point Al-the-comedian is compelled to make over-and-over, as he did with me, as he did on TV when he called himself a satirist and Letterman a clown, that humor - satire is the term Al clearly prefers, putting him in the company of Jonathan Swift and Mark Twain - can be used to unearth deeper, more serious truths. Point taken.

Jack is more intellectually playful than funny. His bright optimism, darkened as it is by his and his supporters' dire perception of the State of the Union, doesn't make you laugh so much as it causes you to think. Al, on the other hand, despite his clear and present intelligence, makes you - at least me - laugh before you think. Some of it is conditioning. Al cannot snap his fingers and erase the image of SNL-neurotic Stuart Smalley from our collective consciousness.

Street Fight

Jack and Al quickly agree that the general election next November will turn on the Iraq War. Both tender comprehensive platforms that cover a full spectrum of issues, not least of which are well-thought-out responses to environmental and energy needs. Al proposes an "Apollo Program" to ramp-up renewable energy research and development. Jack calls it a "Marshall Plan", one that promises to transform the military industrial state into an Energy Economy.

In a race to represent a political base that extends as far to the left as the eye can see, yet embraces the middle hoping to appeal to the greatest number of voters, there appears little substantive difference between Al and Jack. The single-payer issue is significant, however, especially if you read into Al's humor about government's innate inability to deliver what the people say they need from government. Jack believes government can do.

Al's campaign has deep pockets. It's been reported that he held a 4-1 funding advantage over multi-millionaire Ciresi before Ciresi dropped out. His advantage over Jack is probably off the scale. Al-the-humorist appeals to a wide audience, one that turns out in droves to see Al-the-politician. He's been criticized for taking support and donations from Hollywood, New York, for looking outside Minnesota to win the Minnesota race. How many million-viewers saw his proxy dismissal of Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer on Letterman when Al Franken identified his opponent as Norm Coleman?

Jack is a professor. He professes, which is etymologically close to confession, meaning, he speaks without guile, from the heart. To suggest that intellectual honesty is somehow more appealing than other forms of honesty - like satirical Truth - cannot be supported by the evidence found on TV. But just as comedy and satire tops Al's resume, intellectual honesty tops Jack's resume. He speaks passionately about transforming America from a country that responds to the "politics of fear" to one that responds to people's needs. Deeply critical of the present Administration's policies on education, immigration, the economy, Jack speaks optimistically about an idealized future crafted through sacrifice and partnership.

Al talks about the new progressive majority he sees in a future Congress. "One Senator can do stuff," he told me, "but a lot of Senators can do a lot of stuff." But first Al has to win the DFL endorsement race, before he can beat Coleman. Talking about experience, I mentioned that Norm Coleman had served as Mayor of St. Paul before going to the Senate. Al responded, "Norm was a mayor. I was a satirist. The difference between me and Norm is that he's been on the government payroll his whole career. Every once in awhile, someone new has to come along and look at things with a fresh perspective."

Jack responded this way about the question of serving as a lower-level elected official before aiming at the U.S. Senate. "I think my previous experience leaves me better prepared than if I'd served on the city council. I haven't been dreaming about doing this for the past 30-years. It's absolutely urgent, it's time for the country to build an effective movement to change our priorities. I think I can inspire people to do that."

This race won't end until November. Assuming Jack or Al ultimately kicks to the finish against Norm, Norm - who presently leads Al by 10-points and Jack by 19-points all across the State, in every demographic - will have his work cut-out for him.

Al Franken and Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer are genuine. Al is a born funny man, perceptive, witty, intelligent, serious and committed to working one day with that progressive majority in the Senate. Jack is a minister who believes in social justice more than consumer capitalism. He is smart, charismatic and honest, good qualities for the leader of a grassroots movement.

Al cites his endorsements, 70-legislators, 15-unions and 1,500-donors, and says he will beat Norm in November. Jack says you can't beat Norm in a street fight, so he will have to do it not with fisticuffs but ideas, not with a riot of donors but a democratic majority.


Copyright Fillmore County Journal 2008