Collin Peterson Conducts a Controlled Experiment

Tim Walz and Jim Oberstar might be sweating out the run-up to November 2, but obviously Collin Peterson isn't worried about the upcoming election. How do we know this? He apparently doesn't feel any need to be circumspect about his view of the, shall we say, intellectual curiosity of his constituents. He told Congressional Quarterly the following (H/T: Captain Ed):

More importantly, Peterson doesn’t expect that his constituents — other than those who have voted against him in the past — feel the same anger stirring up races in much of the country. Unemployment is low in his heavily agricultural district, he said.

“If they didn’t hear all this negative stuff from the national press, if they would’ve been isolated from everything the last three to four years, they wouldn’t have even known anything was going on,” he said. “Nothing’s changed.”

Now I have it on good authority that the REA went through that area back in the 30s, so they do have the potential of receiving electronic communication. Maybe they don't have the internet out there in Thief River Falls? Or perhaps the 7th is some sort of Brigadoon, insulated from the rest of the world. Somehow I doubt that either scenario is true. What's striking about Peterson's comments is the arrogance of them. He clearly doesn't think his constituents are capable of coming up with political opinions that aren't handed to them by Katie Couric or the other news readers who offer a window to the world in between Metamucil ads.

My theory is this is a controlled experiment. After all, if Peterson is correct and his constituents only know what they hear from the "national press," there's little chance that his derogatory commentary will ever reach his constituents and they'll simply pull the lever for him like they always have. If Peterson wins easily, I guess his theory will be proved correct.