An Outspoken Independent Makes His Mark

Al Gore '69 can't seem to ditch the "boring" moniker. What's a guy with a fairly impressive track record, and not even a hint of an extra-marital affair to do when Senator Daniel P. Moynihan (D-NY) declared that he "can't win?"

Perhaps don a feathered boa and head to the gym to pump some iron.

If the worst crime in politics is to be boring, Jesse "The Body" Ventura is as virtuous as a Boy Scout.

Aching from a 19-point slide in the polls after a slew of controversial comments in Playboy Magazine, Ventura refused to back down from some of his most colorful comments at several campus events yesterday--and added a few more to the media stew.

When Ventura was elected governor of Minnesota last November, he was more likely to be a punch line on "The Late Show With David Letterman" than to be considered a respected political figure.

Shortly after his election, The New York Times wondered cynically if Minnesotta residents had developed a "sense of humor."

Today, however, it is hard to deny his importance on the American political landscape, both because he has become something of a beacon for the traditionally disaffected voter, and because he is locked in a battle for control of the Reform Party with its eccentric founder, H. Ross Perot.

Ventura brags that his dominant selling point is that he is decidedly a political outsider.

At last night's speech, Ventura described how both the Republican and Democratic parties rallied against him and told voters he was "evil" when he ran for mayor of Brooklyn Park, Minn., and then, without blinking, courted him shamelessly after he won the election by a landslide.

For Ventura, this came to symbolize the hypocrisy and corruption of the two main political parties, and he vowed to present voters with something different.

While most politicians mince words and split hairs, Ventura is known for speaking his mind with brutal honesty.

"It's good that when he talks it's not washed down B.S.," said Mathew A. Stratton '00, who heard Ventura speak last night.

Ventura raised money for his gubernatorial campaign by selling T-shirts, and his campaign ads featured Ventura action figures taking on evil "Special Interest Man."

His irreverent showmanship worked wonders for him, attracting large swaths of voters traditionally disenchanted with politics and politicians.

Ventura carried every age group under 60 in Minnesota. In some places, students in their 20s lined up to cast their vote for him.

There may be a lesson in Ventura's success.

Voters have power. Real power. When they tire of the system, they're likely to do something dramatic.

Republicans and Democrats alike are casting a wary eye toward Minnesota, wondering if Ventura might represent a new brand of politics--without the politics.

But while some are enthralled by Ventura's new approach, others are convinced that his attraction is only fleeting.

In a recent interview with The New York Times, Senator Joseph R. Biden (D- Del) said that voters traditionally latch onto third-party candidates partly out of frustration over the current state of affairs than out of any real affinity for the candidate himself.

"In four years, he'll be where our boy from Texas [Perot] is--only without the money," he said. "It's a predictable aberration; every four to 10 years in American politics there's a character like Rush Limbaugh or Jerry Falwell with something interesting to say who becomes a repository for despair within the existing system."

Thomas E. Patterson, Bradlee professor of government and the media at the Kennedy School of Government, suggested that controversial candidates rise to prominence quickly, but they tend to fall even more rapidly.

"There are people in Congress who get themselves re-elected time after time by not being controversial," he said. "Media attention is a double-edged sword....and the brightest stars burn out faster."

Patterson may be speaking presciently, for if Ventura's trademark is his willingness to speak his mind, it could also prove to be his undoing.

Recently, Ventura has had difficulty reconciling his brazen honesty with some of the more sobering demands of political prominence.

After he called organized religion a "crutch" and "a sham" in a recent interview with Playboy, and then continued to say that he would like to be reincarnated as a 38 DD bra, his approval ratings dropped 19 points overnight. His support among women dropped to its lowest levels ever.

"If I believed in polls," said Ventura, true to form, "I wouldn't be governor of Minnesota."

Although the governor claims to be indifferent to the effect his words have on the electorate, some think he exhibits mere political naivete.

"He could stand to think a little more before speaking," said Alexis J. Loeb '02.

While Ventura first stole the spotlight as a populist icon, he was catapulted to greater prominence earlier this month when Patrick J. Buchanan threatened to quit the Republican Party and run for president on the Reform Party's presidential ticket.

Buchanan has a tentative nod from the Reform Party's founder and father-figure, Perot, but the arch-conservative's isolationist politics clash with Ventura's libertarian leanings.

Ventura has his own candidates in mind, such as developer Donald Trump, and the showdown is making national news.

When Ventura's hand-picked candidate to be president of the Reform Party beat out Perot's incumbent earlier this summer, Ventura positioned himself to control both the party's national offices and, as its highest elected official, its national image.

Ventura is now charged with bringing the Reform Party from the sidelines of American politics to the mainstage--to make it a dominant fixture of a three-party system, instead of the occasional spoiler for one or the other parties.

Back home in Minnesota, however, Ventura still has practical problems to attend to. He has made reform of the state's education system a priority and wants to do so without spending more money. Like many politicians around the country, his approval ratings have profited from the strong economy.

It's easy to support a governor who can balance the budget and increase government services, all while cutting taxes. But such slights of hand may become more difficult if the economy does not continue its expansion, and voters may then give short shrift to Ventura's unique approach to politics.

.