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The Audacity of Minnesota: Senator Amy Klobuchar

Meet the woman who (thanks to Hillary and Sarah’s bushwhacking) many say should be pointing her ambition at the White House

By Lisa DePaulo | March 30, 2010 10:00 a.m.

She loves to tell that one. Today she is telling it to 800 wool-suited, kitten-heeled, and bow-bloused Minnesota women who have turned up in a ballroom in downtown Minneapolis to watch Amy—everyone calls her Amy, and if they don’t, she instructs them to do so—get a Pioneer Award. Well, who’s more of a pioneer than she? As the luncheon crowd is reminded, she’s the first woman from Minnesota ever to be elected to the Senate. (When Hubert Humphrey died, his wife, Muriel, was appointed to serve out his term.) But we would argue it’s more: Klobuchar is like the Cousin Marilyn of politicians in a state that for decades has produced Munsters: Jesse Ventura. Al Franken. Norm Coleman. And (cue the Star Trek music) let’s not forget Michele “Obama-is-anti-American” Bachmann.

So how, on November 7, 2006, did Amy Klobuchar get elected in Minnesota, in a landslide vote? Or perhaps more to the point: Could it be that her utter normalcy has something to do with the fact that while she’s one of only 17 women in the Senate (“the great thing about having 17,” as she puts it, “is they can no longer call us the Sweet 16”) and serves on the commerce and judiciary and three other Senate committees and is a major player in the health care debate, that shockingly little is known about Klobuchar outside her home state?

This is not for lack of trying. The daughter of a well-known Minneapolis sportswriter, Klobuchar is one of the rare politicians who doesn’t see the press as the enemy. She never turns down The Rachel Maddow Show (Rachel being one of the few who Gets It), nor does she ever turn down Fox News (which doesn’t always get it, but still Amy goes on). The ugly truth is that when the national press deigns to come to Minnesota, it’s to cover the circus (the recent Franken-Coleman contested senatorial election or the spectacle that is Bachmann), not the senior senator who recently appeared on a New York Times short list of the women most likely to become president. Amy—“Please call me Amy”—prefers to shrug off all that president stuff. But not because the idea hasn’t occurred to her.

Besides wandering into the men’s room, the other story Amy likes to tell about her first day as a U.S. senator is about the first lunch she attended with the Democratic caucus. “There I am,” she says in a car on the way to some event in the Minnesota sticks, “I’ve got eight senators at my table. I get some soup and salad, and I bring it back to the table, and I’m thinking, ‘I’m in the LBJ Room!’ I’m ready to dive into my soup. And Patty Murray [senator from Washington State] grabs my arm and says, ‘Amy, you just took the entire bowl of Thousand Island dressing, and you’re about to eat it.’ And I said, ‘That’s what we do in Minnesota!’ ”

Herein lies a key to Amy Klobuchar. She is acutely aware of the need to blend her folksiness, her realness, with her driving ambition, which, quite frankly, no woman should have to apologize for but all of them end up doing. That she does it better than most—with humor and the requisite self-deprecation—obscures the fact that Klobuchar is no accidental politician.

A few more things you need to know about her: She is funny. At times even funnier than Al Franken.

“It is what it is,” she says about her colleague in the Senate, then quickly adds: “Oh, we get along, yes! I mean, he really, genuinely, you know, wants to do good. And he’s working really hard.”

She is scary smart (and not just because she graduated from Yale in political science and then went to law school at the University of Chicago). She has managed in her first couple of years in the Senate to be disarmingly effective. “Klobuchar conquered the learning curve very quickly,” says Jennifer Duffy, who covers the Senate for the political insider bible The Cook Political Report. “She plays well with others, not just her colleagues but across the aisle. I’ve yet to encounter anyone either in the Senate or who does business with the Senate who doesn’t like her, and that goes a long way.”

She can also be a hard-ass, in a good way. Like when she consistently digs her heels in on consumer-protection issues despite the fact that Minnesota’s big corporations helped her get elected. You don’t get to the Senate by being a wuss. But somehow she also manages to placate. And the most important thing, even though it sounds corny: There’s a sincere happiness about Klobuchar. She laughs constantly. She giggles. She does not project the typical guarded let-me-think-about-this-before-I-answer politician response. Her sportswriter father, Jim Klobuchar, who attended the luncheon in Minneapolis, told me when I asked him to sum up what makes Amy different: “There’s a lot of joy in her. She has an eye for the absurdities of life. And that reflects itself in a lot of ways.” He is correct.

[SNIP]

Today, Amy is headed to Big Lake, in Rep. Michele Bachmann’s very Republican district, to inaugurate the new train line. She arrives to find a packed tent and color guards. And she manages to upstage Bachmann on her own turf. She has to be practically dragged out by her staff, who are trying to keep her on schedule. But Amy is very Bill Clinton–esque in how she works a crowd. She stays till the last hand is shaken, the last photograph is taken. She’s supposed to spend part of this afternoon dialing for donors—the next election is but two years away—but when she hears there are five more train events at various local stops along the line, she instructs her staff to “cancel everything else.” She wants to hit every one. “We’re going rogue!” she announces on the phone to her finance director.

[SNIP]

“One of the things people really respect about her is she is committed to the Democratic agenda, but she is able to communicate that message in a very positive way, without being antagonistic,” says Karen Finney, a political analyst for MSNBC. “Some of the dialogue here in Washington has really disintegrated, but she doesn’t work that way, and I think that earns her a lot of respect. I view her as part of the next generation of politicians, kind of like President Obama.”

She heads next to the Senate floor, where a vote is being taken on Maryland senator Barbara Mikulski’s mammogram bill, which aims to guarantee women coverage of mammograms beginning at age 40. Amy, who is for it, of course, discreetly breaks away from the pack of women senators (who are all clustered together; it is just like high school!) to schmooze a bit with South Carolina’s Lindsey Graham. As soon as she spies him walking into the chambers, she makes a beeline over to him. In her constant efforts to work across the aisle, she is quite proud that she recently got Graham to cosponsor a bill: “To get a Republican on a bill that’s called ‘Torture Victims Relief Reauthorization Act of 2009’…” Well, that was pretty cool, she notes later. But from the Senate gallery, all you can see is her chestnut bob and dimples. She’s laughing, hard, with Graham. And working it. Whatever the next big thing happens to be. (Emphasis added)

Full article @ Elle.com

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I recall calling Amy Klobuchar as she was one of the super delegates who was undecided for a very long time. When I reached her she was in the midst of a wedding planning event (it was for her niece's wedding that was within a week or two if I recall correctly; there was some buzz in the background with many people talking) and said that if she has to cut short it is become someone else may have interrupted her at the event, but to please go ahead and she will listen for as long as possible.

Not only did she listen, she asked some questions that were germane and she also engaged in counter-dialog. She posed specific points about Obama and Hillary proposals and asked specific questions. Of course, my biggest hot button issue was Health care so I went into great lengths to convince her that Hillary's proposal is better. I also impressed upon her about offshore drilling off the coast of Florida and she agreed with that. She was unsure of natural gas from the shales in Pennsylvania - same position as Hillary. In the end, of course, she took side with Obama, but I truly appreciated that she was engaged in listening to callers.   She also closed the call nicely summarizing her takeaway.

I have to agree with the article above. She was very down-to-earth and very direct in her engagement in that dialog.  The conversation clearly stands out as she was so very respectful and engaged.

The 4-page article gives great insight to what women senators face... and how very savvy Amy is.  Hillary and Bill Clinton are mentioned in a couple of places.

As you see, she is very pro-equality and very pro-women in health care issues. I recall she was a key player in the Equal Pay Act that was one of the first things signed when Obama came to office.

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I just visited her website and her senate website - she has a very impressive personal profile.  This is a self-made person. Very impressive.


-- Edited by Sanders on Wednesday 7th of April 2010 04:25:44 PM