(Longtime lurker, first-time poster. Thanks for the indulgence.)
Sunday, September 25, my friend John and I drove 180 miles to Minnesota's Iron Range for a memorial dedication to Paul Wellstone and the seven killed with him almost three years ago. Didn't know this happened? No worries. Few in the mosquito state did, either. Ditto for our friendly liberal media. For the nuts and bolts of the 6-acre site, you can read the AP's modest coverage here:
http://www.wellstone.org/news/news_detail.aspx?itemID=6357&catID=7
It rained the entire way to Cloquet but cleared as we neared Eveleth. We passed Paul's familiar green bus near Cotton, so we knew we wouldn't be late for the short program. Only a few hundred gathered, and among us stood Rick Kahn. It was good to see him. One of Paul's dearest friends, Rick was, reportedly, apolitical before he met the future senator. But something in Wellstone inspired and motivated Kahn. I know the feeling.
Kahn caught a bad rap after his speech at the 2002 memorial. Driven by passion and pain and burdened by a lack of speaking experience, Kahn's plaintive declarations were a tad over the top. But hardly criminal. Fueled by hate, the Republican noise machine vilified the unassuming Kahn for, to paraphrase my buddy John, promoting such horrifically partisan ideas as feeding the hungry and housing the homeless.
Kahn didn't take the podium at the dedication. Few did, befitting the low-key ceremony, somber setting and typical Iron Range stoicism. Judy McLaughlin - whose son, Will, died with Paul that morning - and Mark Wellstone spoke with pride and dignity. I can still remember Mark at the `02 memorial service calmly telling his dad - and the audience - that it was all right. We'd be OK, he said. But we're not.
A small platform off of "legacy trail" opens to a grassy marsh. Straining, I tried to find that spot 2,000 feet away where Wellstone's wings crashed and exploded in a blazing fury. I wondered what Paul would say of our current climate. He wouldn't hate on Obama. He'd count Hillary Clinton as a friend. He considered Feingold a protégé. He'd stay focused on real goals and enemies instead of surrendering to the convenience of intra-party squabbling.
Paul wasn't perfect, either. I'm grateful for DailyKos, but thank god the blogosphere wasn't active in 1996, when Wellstone supported the Defense of Marriage act. Would we have challenged and crucified our standard-bearer for that stance? Of course. What positive purpose would that have served? I'm not smart enough to know.
I found no enlightenment 2,000 feet from the crash site. John and I jumped off the prepared path and trudged halfway to where we assumed the earth hides its scorched scar. But the brush and peat moss gave way to deep marsh and our progress stalled. The closure we came for evaded us.
While we were glad to make the journey and the location is a fitting tribute, this place of reflection offered no solace and no answers. But I know that I love Paul Wellstone. Most of us here did and do. I proudly stood behind him even when we disagreed. To publicly rant about our differences only encouraged divisiveness, not understanding.
John and I were two of the last to leave. Ten miles southeast of Eveleth, the rain returned.
As an aside, I'm especially bitter about Paul's untimely demise because it breathed new life into Norm Coleman's walking corpse. I mean, here's a dude who's knocking on death's door, politically. In 1998 he staggers for governor ("runs" is far too flattering), gets his ass kicked by a steroidal ex-wrestler and then is on the brink of a double-digit defeat to a Rove-targeted two-term senator seen as out of step with the Minnesota mainstream. Without Wellstone's crash, Norm isn't so Smilin'. Paul pounds him by 11 points and that hollow man's obit is writ large on the political landscape. Now, he's my, um, senator.