Gil Gutknecht's Comments

MSNBC has a fairly long article about the MN-1 race, featuring Gil Gutknecht (R-inc) and Tim Walz (D). The article is interesting, but the reason I'm posting on this is that I take exception to some of the comments made by Gutknecht. First, some background. Gutknecht was elected 12 years ago, and the Minnesota 1st is a pretty conservative place. Despite this, Gutknecht is in a very tough race with Walz, and while I expect Gil to pull out the win, it should be very close.

Gutknecht was asked whether he was surprised that the race was so close. His response: "Yeah . . . Gee whiz, I've done a good job, I've done what people asked me to do. People like me, and why am I in a tough race this year?"

Now, this is not egregious. Politicians stay unbelievably stupid things all the time, and this isn't in that category. But, it does strike me as a bit conceited - and I would remind Gil that he is not entitled to the seat. Obviously, people aren't happy about something, and his comments just strike me as appearing to display a little bit of entitlement.

Then, Gutknecht had this to say: "A lot of people are a little disappointed. They expected better results from a Republican Congress and a Republican administration. But in the end, they have to ask themselves, 'would we be better off to turn the keys over to people like Nancy Pelosi?' " I hate that kind of statement. It's pretty much a "we're bad, they're worse" argument, and I think there's no place for it. Tell people why they should want to vote for you, not why they should be afraid to vote for your opponent.

Again, these aren't huge things - pretty innocuous, really, compared to a lot of what's out there (just look at the chaos in Virginia for an example). But Gutknecht's comments rub me the wrong way. Maybe I'm just getting cranky as we approach election day.