One thing I heard on C-SPAN Radio yesterday is that Wellstone told his family and friends after he voted against the Iraq resolution that he would probably lose the election as a result, and that he was pleasantly surprised when he went up in the polls after that vote. I suspect that, by making that vote, Wellstone was defying orders from Daschle, McAuliffe, and the Clintons. They would have had an interest in making an example of somebody who had defied their orders, and who was unreliable for their plans precisely because he was too principled a leftist.
Do we know whether the friend's father whose funeral the Wellstones were flying to attend died a natural death?