Fun_People Archive
12 Nov
Garrison Keillor on James Janos

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Thu, 12 Nov 98 12:11:49 -0800
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Subject: Garrison Keillor on James Janos

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Forwarded-by: Nichael Lynn Cramer <nichael@sover.net>
From: Time, posted on the rec.arts.wobegon list.


 ELECTION REPORTVIEWPOINT
 NOVEMBER 16, 1998 VOL. 152 NO. 20

 Minnesota's Excellent Ventura
 The state proves it can rock 'n' roll. Now comes school
 By GARRISON KEILLOR

 Georgia had Lester Maddox and Louisiana had Earl Long, and now Minnesota
 has gone and got an interesting Governor of our own: a pro wrestler with
 a shaved head and a bad-boy swagger whose voice is hoarse from bellowing
 at opponents and threatening to rip their arms from their sockets. He was
 the protest candidate, a chance to throw toilet paper in the trees and piss
 off Dad, nobody dreaming he would actually be elected. But in a three-way
 race the ball takes funny bounces, and that is how Minnesota got a 6 ft.
 4 in., 250-lb. Governor named Jesse ("The Body") Ventura, and all week
 Minnesotans were feeling sort of giddy about it, like Lutherans who've
 drunk a little more than we meant to and now here we are singing Alley Oop
 and dancing on the sofa. Who woulda thunk we could get this crazy?

 "Rest assured. You got the most exciting Governor in the United States,"
 Jesse announced afterward in his alpha-male voice to all of us turkey
 necks. He uses the phrase "rest assured" a lot, and when he wants to sound
 official he says, "At this point in time." He loves to talk and does it
 stream-of-consciousness style, segueing suddenly, coming back to his basic
 reference points, which are pro wrestling, talk radio and the Navy SEALS.
 He doesn't automatically shut off, reporters have discovered.

 He ran a smart race, snarled, boasted, was entertaining, campaigned in a
 sweatshirt ("Retaliate in '98"), sat in on the televised debates with his
 two opponents (who didn't bother to mess with him), kept saying he was no
 politician and expressed himself more bluntly than had been customary in
 Minnesota politics. He cussed a little. He was vaguely outrageous, the
 right thing to be when you're running against two suits.

 The Republican and the Democrat were perfect fall guys for him. The
 Republican was an ex-Democrat and glibness on wheels, and his big smile
 looked as if he'd worked on it all summer. The Democrat reminded you of
 your classic, cheerfully clueless high school principal. Both of them had
 that tendency common to career politicians of putting their mouths into
 gear with their minds only partly engaged. They blathered. This made Jesse
 look like Abe Lincoln.

 People were grateful for the diversion, and of course politics is pretty
 much debased this year anyway. When the farm economy is tanking and
 meanwhile Washington is in the thralls of sexual obsession, and Congress
 is dormant until late October when it produces a $500 billion spending bill
 that is passed unread and undebated, then what exactly is the objection to
 Jesse ("The Body") Ventura?

 He glided in under the political radar. Right up to about 10 o'clock on
 election night the local press treated him like a cartoon character. It
 wasn't reported until later, for example, that Ventura is his stage name,
 that his legal name is James Janos--a small detail, but Minnesotans had
 never elected a pseudonym before. He mused about the death penalty and
 legal prostitution, which are not winning issues here except among drunks,
 but nobody held it against him. He likened the war on drugs to Prohibition
 and called it a failure. People let that one go too.

 So, late on election night, the suits are up in their suites, brooding and
 trying to look confident, waiting for the Glocca Morra vote to roll in and
 save them, and Jesse is strutting tall turkey at his campaign headquarters
 at the racetrack, looking like everyone's nightmare of a brother-in-law,
 shaking his big fist, yelling, "We shocked the world!" and comparing
 himself to Muhammad Ali and the U.S.  Olympic hockey team of 1980 that beat
 the Russians. All across Minnesota, the quiet, decent people who believe
 in Good Government and Working Together to Resolve Differences are leaning
 forward in disbelief at the thought that the next Governor of their state
 might be THIS GREAT BIG HONKING BULLET-HEADED SHOVEL-FACED MUTHA WHO TALKS
 IN A STEROID GROWL AND DOESN'T STOP. And then he won.

 Well. We are a state of highly repressed Scandinavians, and sometimes we
 like to surprise ourselves. Minnesota is a $12 billion-a-year operation,
 and we have taken the janitor and made him the CEO, but hey. Now we have
 the inauguration to look forward to. He promised to be lowered by
 helicopter to the capitol dome and rappel down the side of the building,
 and that would sure be something to see. Meanwhile, everybody in Minnesota
 can do a pretty good Jesse imitation. A good way to start the winter.

© 1998 Peter Langston