Lest you think Atomizer exaggerates the obsession that state Democrats have with the legacy of Paul Wellstone, let me take you a on a quick stroll through some local lefty blogs on the fifth anniversary of his death:
Corner House Comments:
I remember the day clearly as I was working and a coworker came up to me and asked if I had heard that the Senator's plane had crashed. I couldn't believe it and I did not want to believe it. I could think of nothing else the rest of the day and as soon as I punched out I raced to my car to turn on the radio. The news announcer confirmed what I didn't want to hear. Senator Wellstone had been killed in an airplane crash. It was a long tearful drive home. Our lives would change forever.
Bluestem Prairie:
We were working on a state senate campaign in the Northfield area in 2002 and that cold and deadly day hit the small college town with a punch to the heart. It looks to be a sunny autumn day today. Oh sun, where were you then?
From the comments at MNpublius:
All I was interested in, five years ago today, was trying to console my 16 year old daughter. Us old farts having been through this too many times weren't able to express our feelings completely. Why is it, John, Martin, Robert, now Paul? I'm not a conspiracy advocate but, damn, doesn't it seem like there's a trend here? It's much more difficult to kill the idea then the man. Paul's conscience live's on in people like my daughter who, when they stopped crying, became iron. No compromise, no giving in. What's right is right, what's evil is evil. My daughter is hell on wheels now because of Wellstone.
As JB pointed out, if you charted this--1963, twice in 1968 and then 2002--it doesn't exactly look like much of a trend.
Across the Great Divide provides a hymn for the day:
As a recording, "Eveleth" could've used revising and polishing after the fact, and the vocal track should've been recut. But I wanted to preserve the pulsing roughness, the tension between knowing/not knowing. This was a gulp of emotion, of trying not to dwell on what couldn't be changed and looking for what could.
As I wrote in a bar five years ago, the fire was still burning in TV footage from that obscure, lonely swamp.
A fire's still burning.
And last but not least, Eric Black--formerly a political reporter for the Star Tribune--explains how he finally decided to drop the veil of objectivity when Paul Wellstone Spoke to Me from the Grave:
I don't want to overdramatize. This was just one of many moments that led to my decision to drop out of mainstream journalism. And, after all those years of writing in the disembodied voice of a reporter, it still embarrasses me to write something this personal.
But by the time I got Kahn's email, I had moved into open rebellion against the model of so-called objective journalism. The memory of that lame piece, written at such a crucial time, seemed an abdication of responsibility. That, combined with my repressed admiration for Wellstone as a guy that at least stood up for his beliefs, felt like a message from Paul. The message was:
Seek the truth. Share the closest approximation of it that you can assemble. Stand up as bravely as you can for your convictions. When the end comes, don't be full of regrets for things you should have said.
Or biases you should have even more clearly revealed.
I think the more important message is, why put off until tomorrow, what you can take care of today?
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