Posted on 10/26/2002 3:57:54 AM PDT by JohnHuang2
WASHINGTON - Sen. Paul Wellstone, a Minnesota liberal who was locked in one of the tightest reelection contests in the country, died Friday with his wife and daughter, three aides and two pilots in a plane crash in northern Minnesota. Continues.
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Tragedy in Eveleth
As a dyed-in-the-wool conservative, there were few issues -- very few issues -- Minnesota's Paul Wellstone and I would see eye-to-eye on, but the Senate's most unabashed liberal, I hasten to say, was more than a worthy opponent.
Dubbed a "60s radical" by Mother Jones, the former Carleton College professor-turned-Senator was resolutely true to his beliefs, a liberal's liberal, tenaciously championing often-times daringly unpopular causes and positions, heedless of the risks, politically. An example was his 'no' vote on a resolution authorizing military action against Iraq, the only Democrat locked in a tight race to do so. The measure earlier this month sailed through the Senate, 77-23. Another was his vote against the hugely popular Welfare Reform Act of 1996, at the time again the only Democrat up for re-election casting a nay vote.
Indeed, the North Star State's senior Senator, who proudly bedecked his Senate offices with posters and pictures of Hubert Humphrey and Bobby Kennedy, was, in many ways, the very antithesis of the modern-day, phony-baloney Democrat Party. Sen. Wellstone eschewed poll-driven politics, he hated the two-faced, the devious, the insincere. Unlike most of his colleagues, he stood for something -- firmly, intently.
He delivered his speeches with the fervor and intensity, the ardor and zeal of a Sunday morning Baptist preacher. No-one slept when Wellstone spoke.
President Bush calls him "a man of deep convictions."
Scoring a stunning upset in 1990 against GOP Sen. Rudy Boschwitz, Professor Wellstone, whose old and decrepit green campaign bus became symbolic of his longshot bid, came to Washington loathing North Carolina's conservative Sen. Jesse Helms. Not long afterwards, the firebrand liberal was warmly singing his praises on the floor of the Senate.
It's why even his staunchest rivals have nothing but good things to say about Sen. Wellstone, who crossed the aisle only rarely, yet was always polite, decent, cordial, gracious, attentive. Wellstone, to borrow an oft-used cliche, could disagree without ever being disagreeable.
Times like these reminds us all how very fragile, how very precious, how very fleeting life truly is.
His doomed twin-engine plane crashed in a marshy, wooded area in northern Minnesota, tragically taking his life and that of his wife, Sheila, and his daughter, Marcia.
The world will be a lonelier place without them.
My heart goes out to David and Mark, Wellstone's two sons, and all his family and friends.
Anyway, that's...
My two cents..
"JohnHuang2"
He honestly wanted to steal money from me and make me poor. I don't give credit to such beliefs.
Nor do I.
But he let me know he wanted to steal my money, unlike most pols...of both parties....who want to do the same thing to some degree or other, but try to tell me that they really do not.
this sounds alot like the plane crash that took out Ron Brown...
it wouldn't take much to offset the locator beacon thereby causing the aircraft to come out of the clouds in a place other than over the landing threshold!!
Keep in mind he was lagging in the polls and I wouldn't put anything past the demonrats to hold onto the Senate!!
Well, hon, I've flown on planes in both areas.
Ron Brown's airport is at the base of a mountain. Despite being a major city, it had minimal approach help for IFR. You miss the airport, you hit the high cliff. Indeed, the Serbs sat on the top of the mountain and shelled Dobrovnik for a couple of years...luckily the town was stone, and survived, although the tourist areas didn't. So the pilot should not have taken the chancy flight.
In Minnesota, however, snow is the rule. Icing is common. Planes crash all the time. When I heard the crash, I was afraid it was the local commuter. The rule is that when it's foggy, you are bussed two hours to the next airport to take off, or go the next day. Right now, you could leave St. Paul with a clear forcast, and an hour later hit icing. (flight time in commuter is about 45 minutes to Hibbing. The real question is why he went to the smaller Virginia airport rather than Hibbing and take a car). Closest thing to northern Minnesota is Alaska in climate and weather. It's already snowed there.
second the point still stands, if you break out of a low cloud cover expecting to be over the apron and you see forest all around, it is entirely possible that recovery would be impossible and icing would further rob the aircraft of the necessary lift required to prevent impact!
Although I probably will lay off the conspiracy theory sites for a while!!
Happy Landings!!!
5.56mm
Agree 100%. CSPAN is becoming NPR on TV and the rats calling in on the REP. line is a common thing(assuming these moderators actually push the Rep. line in the first place). Since when does "playing by the rules" mean anything to them, considering their leaders of the past?
After all, there's no legal controlling authority anyway is there?
My sympathies to the remaining family members of Sen. Wellstone, but keeping with the honesty that i've read here about Wellstones convictions, i'll say I prayer for him and his family, but shed no Clinton(Ron Brown)crocodile tears for the loss of an admitted socialist. Too many others have died trying to prevent the disease of socialism from spreading here and around the world.
WX (metar)at the time KEVM 251654Z AUTO 14003KT 5SM -SN OVC004 01/00 A3003 RMK AO2 2002/10/25 16:45
But I did notice Hibbing to the west... I totally dig Bob Dylan!!
Actually, if I had a week or two and some manuals I could make some sense of the NOTAM!!
But, we have had three straight weeks of gains in the "market" and that takes the issue of the Economy out of the dims hands and focuses the question on terrorism and the Republicans are like Superman on the war on terror...
I think we will regain the Senate and increase in the House!!
and as a surface squid even I know SE is 135 not 140!!
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