Republican angered by Bachmann revives candidacy
By NICK COLEMAN, Star Tribune
Last update: October 21, 2008 - 4:27 PM
An Immelmann is a precise aerobatic maneuver in which an airplane performs a
half-roll to reverse its direction. A Bachmann is sloppier but more
spectacular: To perform a Bachmann, a candidate for Congress puts her foot in
her mouth, talks stupidly for seven minutes and watches her reelection campaign
burst into flames.
Michele Bachmann, Minnesota's Sixth District member of Congress and former
bush-hiding peeker on gay rights rallies, exploded on the cable TV show
"Hardball" Friday, questioning Barack Obama's patriotism and suggesting that
all 535 members of Congress be investigated to determine which ones are
"anti-American." Immediately, money began flowing to the campaign of her main
opponent on Nov. 4, Elwyn Tinklenberg, who has both DFL and Independence Party
endorsement, as well as at least $800,000 in campaign contributions he didn't
have before Bachmann pulled her early Halloween "Fright Night" on MSNBC. But
she did more than get Tinklenberg revved.
She put herself in the sights of an Immelman again.
Aubrey Immelman, 52, is a psychology professor at St. John's University in
Collegeville, Minn., who ran against Bachmann in the Republican primary.
He finished second, with just 14 percent of the vote, but he got his campaign
off the ground again Saturday by announcing he will run as a write-in candidate
on Nov. 4 in the hope of knocking Bachmann out.
A South African immigrant to the United States who chose Minnesota for the
great walleye fishing and the great colleges, Immelman has taught at St. John's
since 1991. He calls himself a moderate Republican and says he supported Bob
Dole in 1996 and George W. Bush in 2000, but opposes the disastrous turn in
U.S. foreign policy that followed the Iraq war.
"I gave up everything to come here, which is why I feel so strongly about the
direction my country has been taking," he said Monday. "I'm a proud, patriotic
American. And I cannot tolerate this festering brand of neo-McCarthyism Michele
Bachmann is pushing."
In election years, Immelman and his students study the leading political
candidates and draw up political personality profiles. This year's profiles
make sense to anyone who has been following the campaign: John McCain is a
dominant individual and strong leader whose tendencies toward impulsive
decisionmaking may be tempered somewhat by his age and experience ("I'm one
person who thinks McCain's age is an advantage," Immelman says); while Barack
Obama is ambitious with a strong sense of self-confidence, is cool and
unflappable, but has a habit of being too accommodating with opponents.
Translated into fighter-pilot terminology that would be familiar to the
inventor of the Immelmann, WWI German ace Max Immelmann (no known relative),
the professor says it comes out this way:
"McCain has a light trigger finger, while Obama might hesitate a second."
Prof. Immelman didn't hesitate at all when he saw Republican Bachmann's
meltdown on Friday: He got his campaign back off the ground in the hopes of
helping end Bachmann's career in Congress, which is still in its first term,
before she takes American politics back to the era of 1950s Red-baiter Joe
McCarthy, or even farther back. To the Stone Age.
As a professor who teaches evolutionary psychology, Immelman said Republican
campaign tactics this fall have played on primal fears and xenophobic traits
that developed in humans during the Stone Age. Both Sarah Palin and Michele
Bachmann have tried to make voters fear Obama as an outsider, an other, not one
of us. In the Stone Age, the only answer for that kind of thing was a club.
Now, perhaps, it's a contribution to the opponent.
"We have a Stone Age brain," Immelman says. "When you say the kind of things
Michele Bachmann has been saying, you activate the Stone Age brain, and people
react in fear. You don't have to be 'bombed back into the Stone Age.' You can
be scared back into the Stone Age, too."
Immelman, who has four children, is related distantly to Trevor Immelman, the
South African golfer who won the 2008 Masters Tournament last spring.
But when it comes to his write-in effort against Bachmann, he has more in
common with the derring-do of Max Immelmann (sometimes spelled with a single
'n') who was called the Blue Max in World War I. For he has embarked on a
one-way mission: He doesn't want Democrats or Independents to vote for him. He
just wants to take enough votes from
Bachmann to bring her down.
"Someone has to stand up and do something about her," he said Monday. "I'm
asking Democrats not to vote for me, because I just want this to be a
referendum on Michele Bachmann and the direction the Republican Party has taken
in this country. She is appealing to the worst human attributes, when what we
really need is tolerance. I want to bring back the way we were on Sept 12 --
the day after 9-11 -- when we were all together as Americans. I want to help
bring forth a new Republican Party from the ashes that will be left on Nov. 4."
Bachmann may still win this dogfight. But her mouth has made it harder for her,
and sanity just might be making a late comeback in the Sixth District.
Tinklenberg is flying high, Immelman has taken off on his write-in mission and
even retired general and GOP icon Colin Powell, who endorsed Obama over the
weekend, took a moment to fire a salvo at Bachmann's remarks: "We have got to
stop this kind of nonsense."
Poor Bachmann says she was misinterpreted on "Hardball." But the record, and
the video, show that she accused Barack Obama of harboring "anti-American"
views and suggested that all those anti-Americans in Congress be ferreted out.
Perhaps with the help of waterboarding, electric wires and thumbscrews.
Bachmann is choking on her own hateful words. And there is only one maneuver
that can help with that problem:
Not an Immelmann.
A Heimlich.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 612-673-4400
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"WebTV Dawgs/Dittos" group.
To post to this group, send email to [email protected]
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/WebTV-Pals
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
