The inspirational effect Bush has on Dem candidates

February 21, 2006

Tim Walz, a high school teacher, football coach, and veteran of the war in Afghanistan, toured his community yesterday to let voters know that he’s running for Congress in Minnesota’s 1st Congressional District, currently represented by Republican Gil Gutknecht. (thanks to KnobBoy for the tip.) Ordinarily, this announcement may not seem like a big deal, but I have a special fondness for Walz, in part because of what helped convince him to get into the race in the first place.

In 2004, Bush visited Walz’s hometown of Mankato, and Walz, a command sergeant and 24-year veteran of the Army National Guard, decided to take a couple of his high school students to see their president. They had tickets and valid identification, and went through the metal detectors like everyone else. Walz and his students, however, were ordered to leave — because one of the boys had a John Kerry sticker on his wallet.

Indignant, Walz refused. “As a soldier, I told them I had a right to see my commander-in-chief,” the normally jovial forty-one-year-old recently explained to a Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party dinner in the small town of Albert Lea, Minnesota.

His challenge prompted a KGB-style interrogation that was sadly characteristic of Bush campaign events. Do you support the president? Walz refused to answer. Do you oppose the president? Walz replied that it was no one’s business but his own. (He later learned that his wife was informed that the Secret Service might arrest him.) Walz thought for a moment and asked the Bush staffers if they really wanted to arrest a command sergeant major who’d just returned from fighting the war on terrorism.

They did not.

Instead Walz was told to behave himself and permitted to attend the speech, albeit under heavy scrutiny. His students were not: they were sent home. Shortly after this Walz retired from the Guard. Then he did something that until recently was highly unusual for a military man. He announced he was running for Congress — as a Democrat.

Who says Bush can’t inspire Americans?

Wasn’t that part of Bushie’s No Child Left Behind (Unless They Have a John Kerry Sticker) Law? An instructional emphasis on the Three Rs – Readin’, Ritin, and Republicanism?

  • Does anyone have a score card of the number of Iraq and Afganistan veterans running as Democrats and the number running as Republicans?

    I know it is at least two Republicans.

    So far the ratio seems to be 10 Dems to 1 Republican

  • Thanks for highlighting this story Mr. CB. It’s a tale of common sense in the face of absurd authoritarianism.

    The established political class in this country is inbred and tainted. Not every last one, but overall, I think those words apply.

    It’s a shame that Paul Hackett felt the need to leave the Ohio senate race. We need more like Mr. Walz and Mr. Hackett. Maybe the best part of the “war” in Iraq will be the citizens who have experienced the price of a poorly justified, thought-out and executed mission first hand and come home willing to change, (or reclaim), the process.

  • I mention Paul Hackett just wishing he could have remained involved in the electoral process in some capacity. I don’t know if his response to the overall situation in that particular case was the best one or not. It would have been great if he had felt comfortable running for the house seat.

  • I grew up among the kind of rich and powerful people (including a Bush or two) who had kids who believed that they ruled the world.

    Walz’s story is appalling but not at all unfamiliar. The pattern of this administration is so blatantly the pattern of the worst kind of rich and privileged who believe — really believe — they have a right to call all the shots. In one of the deliberate Rovian twists the opposition is labelled “elitist.”

    It’s beyond disappointing that Walz’s story isn’t more widely reported and (above all) hasn’t become an issue on the Senate floor. Let’s start with the use of the Secret Service to act as a Gestapo…

  • You got it PW, the first word that came to mind when I read this was “Gestapo”… Won’t belong until “your papers please” will be a familiar greeting.

  • Mr. Walz’s behavior appears to be a good example of how the USA is supposed to work. Thanks for giving him some press, CB. Hopefully he can raise enough $ to be a viable candidate.

  • This sounds a lot like the Hackett story – Now, will the Dem. Establishment also kill this candidate ??

  • You can find a list of Dems running for Congress who are vets at vetpac.com. They also list a few Repubs, but the message is clear–this is the year of the veteran, and the veteran is overwhelmingly a democrat. And when they ain’t a democrat at first, they shift. In VA, we just got Reagan’s Navy Secretary to switch parties and run as a Democrat against gasbag and likely GOP prez nominee Senator George Allen.

    the chickens are coming home to roost. Big, military eagles is more like it.

  • Doesn’t matter who runs as long as the Repugs count the votes and control the voting machines. They will “allow” the Dems to “win” a few insignificant races to throw off the scent of fraud while ultimately still controlling the government… and unfortunately, our destiny.

  • This is exactly what we need to turn the Country around. I think all incumbant politicians need to go. We need true patriots in Congress like Walz who will represent “We the People”. Our Country can’t survive with the current corrupt politicians at the helm. With Bushco. leading the charge and his Republican henchmen gutting our Constitution and covering up corruption and incompetance, our once Great Nation is sinking into the abyss. Our last chance to fight back and restore America is to rid our Nation of these Parasites.

  • Are they getting rid of the voting machines? I hated to see Hackett quit he was amouth peice seemed to be unafraid .The machines will play apart in the elections like before .I still thinke Kerry won liike GORE did. Sure hope for a change.

  • THE TROUBLE WITH RUNNING A FORMER REPUG.AS DEMOCRAT IN ELECTION IS THEY DON’T LOSE THEY EMERGE AS REPUG. WEARING DONKEY SUIT.KEEPS TRUE DEMOCRAT OUT OF RACE.AFTER ELECTED YOU HAVE ZELL MILLER OR SHELBY,TURN COAT FROM ALABAMA.PLAYING THE PART OF DEMOCRAT!!!

  • OUR LAST HOPE IS THAT ALL VOTING MACHINES LEAVE PAPER RECORD FOR RECOUNT.WHY WOULD THE REPUBLICANS NOT AGREE IF THEY WERE HONEST??????

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