Jesse Ventura: Hate Monger, Conspiracy Theory Advocate, World Class Idiot

Jesse Ventura Resurfaces on a Book Tour


What’s with the folks in Minnesota? For a state that’s generally moderate and has a pretty positive intellectual climate, they are about to send left wing hate monger, the former so-called comedian, Al Franken to the Senate. They’re also the state that elected former pro-wrestler Jesse Ventura governor.

Perhaps we can identify with the sentiment that compelled voters to vote for “The Body.” Voters are fed up with the same old partisan nonsense from the Democrats and Republicans who have lost all accountability to the average citizens instead being pawns of special interest groups and high rollers. To think, Barack Obama argues he has purged the White House of being a place for lobbists to exert their influence. If that bullshit isn’t a bold faced lie what is? No President has ever been the puppet of one particular special interest group the way Obama panders to organized labor. There has never been a national politician so conspicuously supportive of the pro-abortion lobby favoring killing babies who are only a “c” section away from being someone’s child. It is exactly this kind of dishonesty and detachment from real people that makes third party alternatives popular. But when has there truly been a viable third party alternative. Ross Perot sure had an impact in the 1992 election, not because he was a threat to win the White House, but he did cost elder Bush enough independent and alienated Republicans to award the Presidency to William Jefferson Clinton.

On the state level, however, third party and independent candidates can win. Consider Vermont has elected a socialist to the United States Senate with Bernie Sanders.

No third party candidate has gained the notoriety of Jesse Ventura when he captured the Minnesota state house. Running on red meat populist themes exploiting the alienation of the less politically savvy and seriously informed voters, Ventura swept to victory in 1998. Spending far less than his opponents, only $300,000 being one of the first candidates to harness the power of the Internet to spread the word, he drove home the slogan of, “Don’t Vote for Politics as Usual” with supporters sporting bumper stickers reading, “My Governor Can Beat Up Your Governor.” The efforts provided a slim victory over Republican St. Paul Mayor, Norm Coleman and Democrat Attorney General, Hubert “Skip” Humphrey III.

As governor, Ventura attempted to promote the façade of being a no-nonsense cost cutter temporarily closing down the governor’s mansion remaining in his private home. In response to constant conflict with the press, he issued press credentials which identified reporters as “media jackals.” He also became a frequent guest of David Letterman where he indicated Minneapolis was his favorite of the two Twin Cities quipping that, “…Those streets in St. Paul must have been designed by drunken Irishmen".

Fortunately, Ventura governed Minnesota during rather inconsequential times with no urgent issues requiring gubernatorial attention. His legacy is one of his publicity seeking antics more than any policy initiatives given no Democrat or Republican would want to be seen as doing anything to condone his status not being a member or either political club. While Ventura claimed to be physically conservative, socially liberal.

Ventura attempted to throw his weight around through use of the veto knocking down 45 measures only three of which were overturned. Things changed dramatically in his final year when he vetoed nine measures, six of which were overturned.

The biggest issue he championed was mass transit seeking light rail service from the Mall of America to downtown Minneapolis. The line would open two years after he left office.

Ventura drew fire for failing to support mandatory recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance arguning, "I believe patriotism comes from the heart. Patriotism is voluntary. It is a feeling of loyalty and allegiance that is the result of knowledge and belief. A patriot shows their patriotism through their actions, by their choice. No law will make a citizen a patriot". Another leftist charade was his excursion to Castro’s Cuba under the guise of a trade mission denouncing trade sanctions against the Communist country.

As if those actions didn’t inflame red-blooded patriotic traditional Americans, his comments about religion in a Playboy interview poured gasoline on a raging fire with his remarks, Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people who need strength in numbers. It tells people to go out and stick their noses in other people's business." He’d add further insult to injury making more anti-religious remarks in his memoir, “I Ain’t Got Time to Bleed.”

How far would these antics go? Ventura declared July 4, 2002 as “Indivisible Day” to honor citizens from minority religions and those who don’t believe in God with the issuance of a bizarre, historically inaccurate, rambling proclamation.

"WHEREAS: The unique feature of this nation at its founding was its establishment of a secular Constitution that separated government from religion - something never done before; and WHEREAS: Our secular Constitution has enabled people of all worldviews to coexist in harmony, undivided by sectarian strife; and WHEREAS: President James Madison made clear the importance of maintaining this harmony when he said, "The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the endless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe in blood for centuries"; and WHEREAS: The diversity of our people requires mutual respect and equal protection for all our citizens, including minority groups, if we are to remain "One nation, indivisible"; and WHEREAS: It is the unfettered diversity of ideas and worldviews that have made our nation the strongest and most productive in the world; and WHEREAS: Eternal vigilance must be maintained to guard against those who seek to stifle ideas, establish a narrow orthodoxy, and divide our nation along arbitrary lines of race, ethnicity, and religious belief or non-belief. NOW, THEREFORE, I, JESSE VENTURA, Governor of Minnesota, do hereby proclaim that Thursday, July 4, 2002 shall be observed as: INDIVISIBLE DAY In the State Of Minnesota."

Could Ventura rub it in the eye of Minnesota’s faithful any more? He also stated his belief prostitution should be legal.

By the time Ventura’s term ended, his popularity stood at rock bottom losing support consistently after the novelty of his showmanship wore off.

His activities since leaving the governor’s office have served to further reveal his bizarre beliefs and off the wall positions first turning MSNBC for a weekly showcase for his further attempts to seek publicity. “Jesse Ventura’s America” was produced in Minnesota attracting its share of controversial, highly opinionated guests.

Over the last several years, Ventura routinely took shots at various political figures and also supported upstarts like Kinky Friedman’s run for governor in Texas. No one became the subject of Ventura’s loathing as did George W. Bush who Ventura attempted to drive home all the media stereotypes of being stupid and financed by oil money including Bin Ladin’s brother.

Nothing Ventura has ever done has been more irresponsible and hateful than his constant reiteration of some of the most insane 9/11 conspiracy theories. Ventura insisted WTC Building 7 was destroyed by controlled demolition:

Two planes struck two buildings... but how is it that a third building fell 5 hours later? How could this building just implode into its own footprint 5 hours later - that's my first question - the 9/11 Commission didn't even devote one page to that in their big volume of investigation... In my opinion, there is no doubt that that building was brought down with demolition."

Obviously, Ventura neither understood the purpose of the 9/11 Commission Report or consulted the volumes of scientific and engineering studies that conclusively documented every aspect of every structural failure developed by teams of top scientists, architects, engineers, and demolition experts.

More recently, the issue of interrogation methods used on terror suspects has become Ventura’s latest topic to exploit as he continues to goad interviewers and throw tantrums when questioned in detail about his assertions. He contends he knows waterboarding is torture from his own first hand experience as he was supposedly subjected to the procedure as part of his naval training. Among his stops on his media blitz was with good old Larry King where Ventura proclaimed twice George W. Bush was the worst president in his lifetime telling Larry emphatically, "President Obama inherited something I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. You know? Two wars, an economy that's borderline depression." However, his tirade on waterboarding was more severe on King’s May 11th program. Ventura maintained:

[It's a good thing I'm not president because I would prosecute every person that was involved in that torture. I would prosecute the people that did it. I would prosecute the people that ordered it. Because torture is against the law. Waterboarding is drowning. It gives you the complete sensation that you are drowning. It is no good, because you -- I'll put it to you this way, you give me a water board, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I'll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders. If it's -- if it's done wrong, you certainly could drown. You could swallow your tongue. You could do a whole bunch of stuff. If it's it done wrong or -- it's torture, Larry. It's torture.”

We’d contend that trying to make sense of anything of Ventura’s bizarre assertions are torture, but that’s an issue for another day. He’d go on to call Dick Cheney a coward and a “chicken hawk.” He even offered he’d welcome the opportunity to serve as American ambassador to Cuba should relations be normalized.

On “Fox and Friends,” Tuesday, May 19, 2009, as co-host Brian Kilmeade attempted to question Ventura versus established documentation that Sheik Mohammed divulged information of future terrorist activities, Ventura lost his temper shouting accusations at Kilmeade suggesting he should be waterboarded and having never served in the military or been subject to waterboarding he had no grounds to criticize Ventura’s position.

Ventura is a lunatic on the fringe of American thinking whose positions are false and dangerous. Sadly, when presented by the media, he is seldom held accountable his insane assertions. While his values surely don’t conform to some of the media’s left-wing dogma and Ventura is surely a loose cannon, the media would seem to employ the Islamic warrior’s creed that the enemy of my enemy is my friend as they can count on him to viciously attack their favorite whipping boys, George W. Bush and Richard Chaney. Truly, if they were responsible, they’d put his outrageous comments in their proper context and counter them with the vast knowledge base which counters his bizarre perspectives.

The media controversy feeds on controversy and those capable of stirring up passions, not their newsworthiness or legitimate authority on any subject. We nominate Ventura for the All-American Assholes Hall-of-Fame with some reservation for demeaning the human anatomy.