RUSS TO JUDGMENT

Sen. Russell Feingold has been traveling a great deal lately, trying to get his name before the public across the country. Wednesday was time for folks in the Milwaukee area to meet the junior senator from Wisconsin on a day when he attended at least two fundraisers and one State Fair.

The senator and his small campaign staff travel in a Ford van with “Feingold 2004” painted all over it, and the van was outside the Marshall Building, 207 E. Buffalo promptly at 6 p.m. for a fundraiser for Bryan Kennedy, the democrat who is challenging Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr. for his seat in the House of Representatives.

Kennedy told the crowd of fifty or so in an airless room in the basement of the building that “we are blessed to have one senator when 99 didn’t care about the bill of rights we had one senator who did.”

Kennedy also told the crowd, and Feingold, “God performs miracles through us average everyday people who step up and answer the call,” and then went on to ask the crowd, “How many know a parable from the new testament that goes …” [Feingold did not raise his hand for this one.]

Kennedy, a Mormon, does inject a good amount of religion into his speeches, as can be seen from the above, but he was not above coming up with a pretty good crack that even had Feingold laughing.

It was a story about a fellow in bad straits after a flood. A raft came by to rescue the guy, and he sends it away, saying, “God will save me.” Then comes a boat, with the same response – “I’ll wait for God to save me!.” Finally, he rejects a helicopter ride for the same reason, after which the floodwaters rise, and he dies.

When he gets to heaven, he asks God, “Why didn’t you save me?” God replies, “What do you mean? I sent you a raft, a boat, a helicopter …”

Feingold told the audience that he had known Sensenbrenner since college – that is, when Feingold served as an intern in the state capitol and Sensenbrenner was a member of the legislature.

According to Feingold, “Wayne Whittow (now the City of Milwaukee Treasurer, then a legislator) tried to get him to smile. One of my hobbies was I would try to get him to laugh.” Apparently, the Whittow-Feingold glee club was not enough to break the stoic visage of Sensenbrenner.

Turning to more recent issues, Feingold said he “tried to fix the Patriot Act,” which Sensenbrenner blocked. “We’re not just on opposite sides on this issue, we are opposite sides on America”

Feingold added that Sensenbrenner called him names, but he said he felt “no bitterness at all.”

Rather, it was more like outrage, he said, claiming that “Sensenbrenner with the president more than any other reason is why the Patriot Act did not get fixed. He should go.”

Feingold also alluded to Sensenbrenner’s most recent cause – that of ridding our nation of illegal immigrants.

Feingold said his father, an immigrant, flunked a couple of years of school, blaming it on the poor level of Yiddish discourse in the public schools of Janesville, Wisconsin. Eventually, dad learned his English, and assimilated to the extent that his son could attend Harvard, join the world’s most exclusive club, and maybe someday move into the world’s most exclusive house.

Feingold, warming to the subject, continued to bash Sensenbrenner, saying, “He fancies himself with pride to be an agent of what is polarizing this country. It is time for him to go.”

It appears that Health Care For Everyone will be a rallying cry for Feingold as he crosses the country giving his speeches.

At the event, Milwaukeeworld offered Feingold a coupon good for two-for-one flavored milks at the State Fair booth run by his counterpart, Sen. Herb H. Kohl. Feingold took the proffered sheet and promptly passed it over to his manager, George Aldrich. (Feingold has always had a knack about treating his staff assistants like filing cabinets.)

I asked Feingold to explain a paradox to me – he voted against the war, saying it was illegal and immoral, yet now, when he calls for withdrawal of troops, he is accused of being a “McGovernite” and a “cut-and-run” democrat.

The Bush administration members, he said, "are the masters of intellectual dishonesty."

-- Michael Horne