Can outspoken Republican survive in Minn.?

Tom Curry National affairs writer • Profile • E-mail

ST. PAUL, Minn. - Minnesota Democrat Elwyn "El" Tinklenberg sounded frustrated on Thursday.

During his debate on Minnesota Public Radio with Rep. Michele Bachmann, Tinklenberg seemed unable to deal with the woman he's seeking to oust from Congress.

Bachmann’s Oct. 17 interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews on 'Hardball' has possibly made her, for now, the fourth most famous member of Congress after Barack Obama, John McCain, and Ted Stevens.

She said, “The people Barack Obama has been associating with are anti-American, by and large” and suggested that the news media should investigate members of Congress to find out how many are anti-American.

But in his debate with Bachmann on Thursday, Tinklenberg was stymied, ignored, accused, and at one point interrupted and drowned out by the more aggressive Bachmann.

Four weeks ago, this wasn’t a competitive race. Bachmann, who had raised $2.5 million, was on course to defeat the under-funded Tinklenberg in what is perhaps Minnesota’s most Republican congressional district.

A surge of Democratic donations
But after Bachmann’s 'Hardball' comments, 30,000 contributions rushed in to Tinklenberg’s campaign, with $1.85 million pouring in to his coffers in the 11 days after the interview.

Tinklenberg is a courtly, former Methodist minister who served as mayor of the town of Blaine, as well as the state transportation commissioner. He’s about as far as one could imagine from being an attack dog, which put him at a disadvantage in scrapping with Bachmann.

When the debate moderator, Gary Eichten, asked Bachmann about her 'Hardball' comments, she insisted that voters in her district just didn’t care.

“The number one thing people have been concerned about as they talk to me when I’m all over the district campaigning is the ($700 billion) bailout (of the financial sector)… They’re very upset about the bailout.” She voted against it.

The “anti-American” brouhaha is “not what people are interested in,” Bachmann said. “That isn’t what people have been asking me about…. The only people who bring that up are the media, not the people.”

Video Bachmann versus Tinklenberg Oct. 22: Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann’s comment about Barack Obama on MSNBC's "Hardball" has helped her opponent, Elwyn Tinklenberg, raise a large amount of money. NBC’s David Gregory reports. Today show

She then hammered again and again on the plan for raising taxes that Democrats supposedly have ready to unveil after the election.

Her constituents “can’t afford to pay punishing increases in taxes,” she argued.

Warning of a tax increase
The Democrats have been in control of the House and Senate, she reminded Eichten, “and they haven’t been shy about what their plans are if they retain control. They plan to increase taxes dramatically.”

Sighing in exasperation, Tinklenberg told Eichten that “The idea that this (her ‘anti-American’ comment) is not an issue in the campaign is simply not credible. It’s what’s given this campaign a national interest.”

In answer to a question about rolling back the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, Tinklenberg avoided giving a direct answer. “There are some of those tax cuts that need to be extended,” he said. “I don’t think that all of them do but I think that many of them do, especially those that focus on the middle class.”

He added, “We need to look at” taxing income on higher-income people, but would not be more specific than that.

But Bachmann was relentless, at every opportunity accusing Tinklenberg and Obama of seeking to raise Social Security taxes and income taxes. “And that is re-distribution of wealth,” she added.

Interactive Election A to Z Do you have questions about the election process? We'll answer them. NBC News

In her closing speech she reverted to that theme: “Compassion begins with the individual, reaching out to help others. But compassion is not taking away people’s money so that I can give it to other people.”

Time and again, during the debate and after it in talking to a gaggle of reporters, Tinklenberg used the word “disappointing.” As he noted with some accuracy, “Rep. Bachmann is just not listening to the answers.”

After the debate he added the word “unfortunate” to his description, but he seemed more frustrated than furious at Bachmann’s tactics.

But Bachmann was playing by different rules: not refuting Tinklenberg in a traditional debate manner, but staying single-mindedly on message and repeating her charges again and again.

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