Democratic U.S.Senator - a High-Risk Profession

Candidates should consider sticking to ground transportation until after Election Day


30 Oct 2002
 Democratic U.S.Senator - a High-Risk Profession

My first thought upon hearing of Democratic U.S. Sen. from Minnesota Paul Wellstone's death in a private plane crash on 25 Oct 2002 was to wonder, "Was Wellstone in a tight race for reelection?" and "Was Wellstone beginning to lose ground?" A minute later, the radio answered the first question in the affirmative. Whether he was losing ground is more conjectural, but Wellstone's defeat of Coleman, his Republican challenger, was by no means assured.

Two years ago, Democrat Mel Carnahan died (in a plane crash) weeks before the election in which he was challenging incumbent Republican U.S. Senator from Missouri John Ashcroft. Ashcroft appeared to have been leading, but the Governor promised to appoint Mel's wife, Jean Carnahan, to replace the dead man if Mel won. The sympathy vote carried Jean to the Senate where she has been the perfect incompetent stooge for the Democrats ever since.

Three weeks ago, the morally bereft incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator from New Jersey, Robert Torricelli, bowed out of his reelection bid under pressure from the Democratic Party. Torricelli's ethics violations might well have forced him from the Senate even if he evaded prison. Ignoring statute, a New Jersey Court permitted the Democrats to substitute a possible winner, retired Sen. Frank Lautenberg, to replace obvious loser Torricelli on the ballot.

This isn't tag wrestling. Substituting for a loser at the last minute is not only questionable democratics, it also raises practical questions of how to get rid of your losing candidate. Torricelli could probably sense the wind and quit before someone could arrange him a one-way plane trip to nowhere.

Republican candidates who are leading their opponents might also pay attention to the possibility that their unexpected demises might serve the Democrats just as well as the removals of trailing Democrats. Each should consider sticking to ground transportation until after Election Day. *

* This line of thought arguably says more about me than about the Democrats, but I didn't create my low opinion of the Democrats by myself; the Democrats provided it:

  • This is the party for which poverty is an enterprise.
  • This is the party of liars that refers to tax reduction as "giving money to the rich", claims that killing Bush's judicial nominees in committee is "Advice and Consent", and has accused Republicans of shutting down Social Security and taking away school lunches.
  • This is the party that, rather than lose any power, defended Bill Clinton, a president who took campaign contributions from the Army of the People's Republic of China and molested interns.
  • Recently, the Democrats have been caught forging absentee ballots on Indian reservations in South Dakota and filling out ballots for the insane in Milwaukee.
  • The Democrats routinely attack any regulation to curb voter fraud as "minority intimidation."
  • They attack almost any opposition to social spending as "racism."
  • For two years, the Democrats have been saying that they won the vote in Florida in 2000 and that George W. Bush is not actually President of the United States!


- Andrew Hadley

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