Or from sudden heart attacks, or in one-car accidents. I'm just sayin'.

This is also a good moment to recall that but for two plane crashes - the other being the one that took Mel Carnahan of Missouri in 2000, which the went Republican in 2002 in a special election that would not otherwise have been held - the Senate would have had a slim Democratic majority for most or all of the Bush usurpation. Nothing really happens without consequences.

[@-Gordon Wagner - Conservatives do die in one-car accidents in Austria]

I'm glad to see War Room continue coverage during the final weekends before the election.

and their 2000 year war against Newtonian physics.

Before America could learn to fly straight.

Slumber well in Wellstones.

Yes, Franken might have some big shoes to fill, which certainly didn't happen with Coleman who immediately succeeded Wellstone.

It'd be good to get rid of Coleman, as well as Mitch McConnell. It looks like that awful cretin Marilyn Musgrave is going to lose, and I hope Michele Bachman loses as well.

--Ron

I went to Carleton College in Minnesota, where Wellstone was a political science professor before he got into politics. The shock and grief of that day is still palpable. It got even worse when, after his memorial, Republicans manufactured outrage about "partisan behavior" and Norm Coleman went on to win Wellstone's seat.

A lot of us have been waiting for this year, and it seems as if Paul Wellstone will finally be vindicated.

My sister lives in Northfield, MN--home to Carelton College and Paul Wellstone. He is still deeply missed there. Such a tragic loss for the people of Minnesota and the people of our country. He was one of the really good guys.

You want to really pay homage to the greatness and fundamental decency of Paul Wellstone? Get the hell out to the polls on election day along with everyone else you can cajole, coerce, and kidnap, and vote. If it takes 12 hours, if it takes submitting provisional ballots, if it takes calling the cops to clear out Republican thugs at the polling places, vote to preserve what’s left of our democracy and eradicate the disease of Republicanism from the American political process. Vote to make sure the Republican base gets the message in no uncertain terms that this is our country, not theirs, and that there’s a high price to be paid for spitting in the face of this country by trying to install a corrupt, ignorant fascist like Sarah Palin anywhere near the White House.

I also graduated from Carleton College ('79) & I remember Wellstone as a teacher of integrity & spirit. Most of us, most of the time, have a faux-knowledge of candidates that comes from seeing them at a distance, on the radio and TV. All of these people are "real" in some sense, but their public personas may be vastly different from their private personas. To a great extent, Wellstone's personas were not in conflict and I am glad to have his genuinely great spirit recalled.

In fact, for a while I lived in a neighborhood in St. Paul where I saw him out & about regularly.

An amazing bundle of energy, with class and integrity for days, and he always took the time to say "hello" to just about anyone.

In fact, I got a call to work coverage of his plane crash - I could not do it. I was far too stunned, and could not have carried through.

I will also never forgive Norman Coleman for popping up every day to "remind" us that he was not campaigning during the sad days between the crash and the funeral, nor for saying he felt himself to be "99% more effective" shortly after taking office.

That a man of Wellstone's caliber was replaced by someone like Norman Coleman is the most galling part of the tragedy. That can be rectified in a few days.

Vote. Vote as though your nation depends on it. It does.

and he wasn't even from my state. I made that donation early in 2002 and I bought his book about running for the Senate and really felt that he was what every politician should aspire to be.

When I heard the news it was out of luck that I saw his name on msnbc.com off in the corner. It was a sad bit of news but I wondered why it wasn't front page news. Perhaps it was in other areas but this is something America should be saddened by, not just people like me that spend so much time reading politics.

I only hope we can have more politicians like him in our future governments.

These were some impressive words. It's seems like Wellstone is going against the normal of the liberal illuminati but is really coming to a sensible place on the issue. He doesn't just want to pull out or something but wants to really think it through. I can appreciate that.

As another UNC-Chapel Hill undergraduate and MPA grad (1980)

who has been working in the trenches as a local government manager for the last 29 years I am so proud to call these individuals "UNC colleagues". I have tried to keep Paul's forceful invocation that "significant social change comes from the bottom up from an aroused opinion that forces our ruling institutions to do the right thing" in mind as I navigate the the intricacies of economic power on the city level. I have a poster of this statement from the Northland Poster Collective, Minneapolis, on my wall to remind me every day of meaning of true justice and how we must practice this every day in our personal and social relationships. Thanks Paul.

They shot him down.

Or caused his plane to go down by other means.

It was no accident.

Thanks for remembering, and even for the tears from hearing his voice and seeing him speak, one more time. They say that we all remember where we were when we learned that JFK was shot (if we're that old), or when we learned of the 9/11 attacks. I do, but more painfully and immediately than those, I remember, visually and in my gut, where I was when I learned of Paul and Sheila's deaths.

I wear a button that says "WWWD: What Would Wellstone Do?" I was wearing it when I visited Senator Pat Leahy's office, and got to hear a five-minute impassioned speech from him about his and his wife's love for Paul and Sheila. They touched, and were touched by, everyone they met.

I was a volunteer in Paul's last two Senate campaigns, and friends with his chief of staff, so even before the Senate speech, I had word that I was going to like what he said. Paul was the only Senator running for re-election that year who opposed the war resolution. Think of that when the question of political courage comes up. He would have won, too. I was at his memorial service, and I urge everyone to join in that "partisan" cry to all those present and to Americans everywhere: "Win this election for Paul Wellstone!"

Give your all, give everything you have and are to take America back. Do it for Paul Wellstone. He was worth it.

And after the election, give money to Wellstone Action! to keep the energy going and the young Democrats coming.