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Thursday, October 23, 2008
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Coleman rallies backers in Baxter stop
Associate Editor BAXTER - Sen. Norm Coleman on Wednesday urged supporters at the Black Bear Lodge and Saloon to keep working hard in the waning days of his too-close-to-call re-election campaign.
"Reach out to friends," the first-term Republican U.S. senator said. "Go through your Christmas card list, your e-mail list."
The former mayor of St. Paul preached optimism to the largely Republican crowd of about 75 people. It was Coleman's fourth stop in a five-city tour that began in Park Rapids and was scheduled to end in Little Falls.
"I'm an optimist," he said. "I believe this is a great nation. I look at challenges and say 'Here's an opportunity.' "
One of the opportunities he pointed to was nuclear energy, which he said was one way to establish U.S independence from foreign oil.
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Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., talked with Luke Friedrich, a campaign aide who is originally from the Wadena area, Wednesday as a DFL-sponsored George W. Bush impostor applauded him. Coleman had just concluded addressing a crowd of about 75 supporters at the Black Bear Lodge and Saloon in Baxter. Brainerd Dispatch/Steve Kohls
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"The best time to build a nuclear plant was 10 years ago," he said. "The second best time is right now."
Coleman's close re-election bid, in which his main two opponents are Democratic challenger Al Franken and Independence Party candidate Dean Barkley, is drawing considerable attention because of the tight poll numbers.
Tom Baldwin, Washington Bureau chief of The Times of London, said he was following Coleman Wednesday because the race was seen as one that might determine whether the Democrats achieve a 60-vote super majority on Nov. 4. A television news crew from the Twin Cities also made the trip up for Coleman's appearance.
Also tagging along was a masked George W. Bush imitator who playfully danced in the Black Bear parking lot while Coleman spoke to his supporters inside. Kelly Bjorklund, a spokesman for the Minnesota DFL, said the impersonator was tailing Coleman to remind people of what she termed the senator's steadfast support of the president in the Senate.
Coleman's day started on a disturbing note after he woke up in Walker and a neighbor called him and told him his St. Paul garage had been vandalized with graffiti threats that read "U R A criminal resign or else," "Scum" and "Psalm 2."
Coleman said his wife and daughter were home at the time of the incident.
"There's too much anger out there," he said. "There's too much vitriol. I find it frustrating because I know Americans are better than that."
Speaking to the media before he addressed the crowd, Coleman said his primary reaction to the vandalism was the reaction any parent would have.
"As a parent you don't want your family to wake up to that," he said. "Families shouldn't have to go through that."
In his talk to supporters, he singled out Brainerd's Bill Wroolie, a past national commander of the Military Order of the Purple Heart, as a "great American hero." Coleman talked about his father's experiences as a veteran of D-Day and the Battle of the Bulge and the two perspectives he kept in mind as he served in the Senate.
"I look back to the generation that gave us the privilege of living in the greatest nation on earth," he said. "At the same time as a parent I look to the next generation."
He pledged that wrong-doers in the financial meltdown would be held accountable but that he was focused on finding solutions to the economic problems.
"It's not just about who's to blame," he said. "How are you going to fix it?"
Raising taxes, he told the crowd, was the wrong action to take during this economic downturn, and would hurt small business owners.
"People who run small businesses are heroes," he said. "We have a responsibility not to make their burden any tougher."
The senator thanked his supporters for turning out and for their efforts to re-elect him.
"A leader without followers is just a guy taking a walk," he said.
Coleman's earlier stops Wednesday were in Park Rapids, Detroit Lakes and Wadena.
MIKE O'ROURKE may be reached at mike.orourke@brainerddispatch.com or 855-5860.
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