The political odd couple made it to Winner, SD and were lucky enough to get here for the first bit of sunshine and decent weather in several days. Abourezk, the former bartender, and McGovern, the son of a preacher man, are traveling around SD doing good things for the Heidepriem for Governor campaign. Abourezk noted that he did have to watch his language at bit. I think McGovern has become a little liberated from the bounds of usual bland political responses. I guess when you get to 87 and are still out trying to do some good in the US and World that you get a bit of a license to speak more freely. I won't repeat the better comments here, but they were refreshing to hear.
I got a few photos, but I really must get a better digital camera with a real optical telephoto lens. Below is George McGovern and local yellow dog Democrat Pete Duffy.
Got to give both these guys credit for getting out to a meeting like this. McGovern has been on a very long political trail mostly as a prairie statesman for around 50 years and Pete apparently had some serious recent surgery. Puts a couple of faces on the current medical coverage discussion.
The real point of the evening was to push the Scott Heidepiem for Governor of South Dakota, but like all Democratic meetings, there was a bit of rambling. Both Abourezk and McGovern hammered on the idea that near one-party control of State Government is not good for South Dakota. South Dakota's reputation for good government is disappearing as no bid contracts and tie ins between University Presidents and corporations with an agenda are excepted as nothing out of the ordinary by Republican leaders. They have become so accustomed to control that they seem oblivious to conflicts of interest.
McGovern noted that when he got started in SD politics around 1953, there were about 2 Democrats out of over a hundred legislators. It was a 2-party government situation, but not the right kind.
It is not that bad now, but not good enough to be good for either the Democratic Party or the Republican Party.
Below is one of my fuzzier less than focused photos of Jim Abourezk and Marian Jorgensen.
Abourezk hit the no-bid contracts in South Dakota. Something like 1800 of them. Maybe that explains tax increases without evidence of increased good government or governance. He mentioned Lawrence and Schiller getting a $12,000,000 no bid contract. He tossed in some interesting ethics-related facts on Joel Dykstra and Pres. Chicoine of SUSD and his sweetheart connections with Monsanto.
Abourezk has been a lawyer for those opposing the Hyperion oil refinery and related some interesting facts related to that.
McGovern hopes people will again realize that the Democratic Party is the Party that is on the side of everyday people just as he realized it years ago even if his own parents never grew out of their Republicanism.
McGovern listed programs that Democrats have pushed and Republicans in Congress have opposed. Had Republicans gotten their way, there would be no rural electricity, no rural telephones, and no social security or medicare. South Dakota would be a literally dark, sick, poverty-stricken area even worse than it is now had not Democrats succeeded. I have to mention however that Abourezk still thinks the US Senate is a "chickenshit outfit" and is perhaps even worse now because so many Democrats seem to have lost courage and perspective and a willingness to educate voters as they hold their wet fingers to the political wind.
I asked McGovern a question in the general nature of, "With the incredible complexity of society and government, what percentage of current congress does he think are actually sharp enough to honestly grasp issues or do they mostly just parrot on the basis of ideology?
McGovern did not directly answer that, but his response was dead-on any way and interesting. McGovern noted that in his first campaign for Congress, he spent $12,000. Now campaigns burn up millions of dollars. Here in SD, Abourezk noted that Daschle-Thune both put in around $20 million. Thune won, Daschle lost.
The demands for campaign funds occupy significant time for current congress..perhaps 2 or more days out of each week reserved for fund raising. This greatly reduces time for study and work, but also in McGovern's perspective makes congressmen less than free agents. He didn't skip from "kept men" to political prostitutes, but from my perspective we are there already. The current situation of campaigns and money cries out for public funding of campaigns.
McGovern was also on the George and James excellent adventure to push his book on Abraham Lincoln. His royalties are going into a fund for study of alcohol and abuse...a project given his attention because of the tragic life and death of one of his daughters. I waited a bit too long in line to get the last autographed copy. McGovern signed a few dozen books.
McGovern gave a good short talk on Lincoln's accomplishments despite his own depression and the civil war. Guess we should get the book. Will have to follow up on that...perhaps if we get an interview with Senator McGovern for Dakota Today sometime in the near future. Abourezk got him to talk a bit about his WWII experience. I think I will discuss that in a post tomorrow.
It was a pretty good night for Democrats in Winner, SD October 3, 2009, ..well at least for some of us with too much gray hair. Abourezk teased one of his old Winner Republican friends with a telephone call saying there were about 150 of us, but it is a sad fact that the export of educated young people from South Dakota is having an impact on every kind of social and political organization in rural areas. The group was more like 40 than 150. Years ago, I noted that Janklow's policy could seem to be summed up in "Import garbage and export graduates." Unfortunately, that has not changed.
It really is time for a resurgence of Democrats in South Dakota. Maybe Jim Abourezk and George McGovern, old war horses that they are, can help get Scott Heidepreim into a position where South Dakota can move forward again for all of us instead of just the privileged and connected few.
*** Stay tuned for the old political ramblings and rumblings of someone who worked first on the McGovern campaign in Rapid City, SD in 1961 or 1962---- Doug Wiken
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