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The Minnesota Daily

Serving the UMN community since 1900

The Minnesota Daily

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Incumbent Sabo is the best choice for district 5

With the limelight focused on the gubernatorial and Hennepin County Attorney races, the press and the electorate have paid scant attention to the race for the District 5 seat of the U.S. House of Representatives, which encompasses Minneapolis and some surrounding suburbs. Even if it were the only race this year, the candidates would have a hard time seizing the public’s interest.
Candidates from the Libertarian, Socialist Workers and Anti-Federalist parties represent fringe groups that have little hope of garnering many votes on election day. Similarly, the Republican Party seems to have given up any hope of unseating the 20-year-incumbent, Democrat Martin Olav Sabo. Relatively unknown Frank Taylor will represent the Republicans on the ballot, but his lack of any political experience and his inability to provide concrete answers to many questions about the issues have left him looking like a fish out of water during his minimal campaigning.
Therefore, without a better option, Sabo, though not the ideal choice to represent District 5 in the U.S. House of Representatives, is the only viable candidate, and receives our endorsement.
Sabo has not performed poorly as the District 5 representative in the past. Students will continue to be well-served by Sabo’s dedication to education and affordable student housing. His attempts to protect funding for the National Endowment for the Arts have been laudable during Republican efforts to slash it from the budget. Of particular recent interest has been his stance regarding the presidential impeachment hearings. Sabo is one of the few congressmen who has come out and stated the obvious fact that President Clinton’s crimes do not rise to an impeachable level.
But all is not rosy for Minneapolitans with Sabo in office. He has consistently demonstrated a traditional viewpoint on many issues. As the Twin Cities region tries to portray itself as a city for tomorrow, a center for high-tech industries, Minneapolis dubiously sends a man to Congress who has little knowledge of the technology issues that the coming congressional sessions will face. When issues surrounding online commerce, communications decency and cryptography key escrow systems come to the House floor, Sabo is not the best man to represent the district. Likewise, his extreme dedication to reducing income gaps between corporate executives and average workers shows that Sabo is not entirely in touch with American economic realities.
Residents of U.S. Congressional District 5 should certainly cast their vote for the incumbent Martin Olav Sabo. While his election will bring a mixed bag of pros and cons to his constituency, there is no other candidate who can come close to Sabo’s. However, in two years, voters must seriously consider whether Sabo is the right person to represent them in the next millennium. With any luck, serious contenders will step forward for the next election. Eventually all congressmen fall behind the times and should be replaced by new representatives more in tune with the issues of concern to contemporary citizens, not those of 20 years past.

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