Dusty Johnson Last November: Most People in Mitchell Aren’t Relevant
Published 2018-07-27 by
Cory Allen Heidelberger
I’m a text guy. I don’t listen to many podcasts. It thus takes an eager reader/listener to point out this curious clip from Dusty Johnson’s appearance on Greg Belfrage’s KELO Radio program last November, in which he seems to say that most people in Mitchell, Pierre, and Fort Pierre aren’t “relevant.”
Let’s quote at length so we can see where Johnson took this unfortunate statement:
Belfrage: …It seems like we’ve got a whole host of issues that are erosions of state power at the expense of an increase of federal government power, and… that continues to happen… [because] the people in Washington just don’t want to give the power back to the states. How do you change that?
Would someone relevant get me some more coffee, please?
Johnson: Well, and that really dovetails well into a question you asked earlier on, which is how does one voice make a difference… I don’t know what it’s like in Sioux Falls but at least in Mitchell where I live or in Pierre and Fort Pierre where I grew up, you know, there aren’t 15,000 people that are relevant. I mean, there are—I mean, they’re all people and they all have dignity and they’re a part of a community, but if you really want to get something done, if you want to have a fundraiser for your friend who’s got cancer, there are going to be fifty or a hundred people in that community that are really really make it happen, people who folks trust, they’re smart, they’re hard working, those are the movers.
It’s not any different in Washington, D.C. I’m told there are only about fifty people in the House that are really really relevant. You know, everybody else knows how to hit the green button at the right time, hit the red button at the right time, they do a good job of constituent affairs, but they don’t understand how page 27 interacts with page 41 of the bill, and they don’t understand how to move this member from Tennessee from one camp to the other. I mean, there’s a relatively small number of people that really doing that blocking and tackling out in the House, and half of them don’t have any title at all. And that’s true in Mitchell, right? I mean, half the people who are really relevant don’t have any title. They don’t have to be the mayor or a city councilor. They’re just people that folks trust.
And I would tell you that South Dakota’s had a pretty good track record of having our delegation be filled with people who are relevant like that. I mean, listen, Bill Janklow was relevant. Tom Daschle—I didn’t ever vote for Tom, but he was relevant. I mean, he was a guy who really did understand how things worked out there. And he was effective in a way that was very different than I would South Dakota’s voice to be effective, but nobody could argue the guy didn’t get it. And I would just tell you, Greg, that my skill set is a really good fit for being effective out there… [my transcription from audio; Kristi Hergert, “Dusty Johnson Interview,” KELO Radio, 2017.11.06, starting at timestamp 8:46].
I see where Johnson is going with this version of the Pareto principle, or the 80/20 rule, the idea that 80% of the action comes from 20% of the actors. Johnson is likely right in applying this rule to Congress: a few real movers and shakers are at the table forging deals while South Dakota’s delegation natters inanely in the background waiting to be told how to vote. One could even argue generously that the 80/20 phenomenon in Congress is not a product of a lack of talent but an overabundance: put 535 high-powered individuals in one building, and it will take an extraordinary amount of talent to stand out and dominate so many other talented people. Johnson was driving toward the point that he is the kind of go-getter who can dominate in such an environment.
But more than 20% of folks from Mitchell, Pierre, Fort Pierre, and the rest of South Dakota will show up to vote this November. And imagine how those more-than-20% will feel when they hear that one bite in a 30-second TV ad, played under some washed-out photo of Dusty looking grim or haughty: in Mitchell where I live or in Pierre and Fort Pierre where I grew up, you know, there aren’t 15,000 people that are relevant. The ad might even play that dismissive part about dignity-community-yadda-yadda.
Fifty or a hundred people in Mitchell might make most of the fundraisers happen. Some very small segment of the populace is certainly putting most of the money in Johnson’s campaign coffers. But it will take more than fifty or a hundred votes to win in November, and candidates should never let slip any words that suggest otherwise.
How do you think South Dakotans feel about Adam and you calling them unintelligent on your website?
Roger Elgersma
All those “irrelevant” people are the ones that chose who they trust, which means that the ‘irrelevent’ people are the ones that chose who is ‘relevant’. So in a democracy, they all count.
leslie
Trolls like Jason raise irrelevant wedge issues to distract from thoughtful conversation and debate among voters. Like yelling “they are taking your guns”. Although a lie, that did 4 things: It got funding, got out votes, and gun industry made money. And “stand yer ground” ALEC-type legislation made USA more dangerous to live in.
Its like yelling fire in a theater.
Its like yelling ABORTION in a Survivors of Suicide meeting (SOS).
Its propaganda to de-legitimize our constitutional democracy. Putin’s goal of fighting the only kind of war Russia can afford. He is afraid of pissing off HRC and liberals who WILL defend our democracy.
Donald Pay
It’s really the philosophy of the Republican elite, and it’s a philosophy that Dusty has got to abandon if he is going to be a responsible leader. I don’t know where he gets that from, because it’s not what he learned from his folks, who might not have been considered “movers.” His mom, though, as I recall, was pretty active in helping save funding for programs for gifted kids that were threatened by Republicans. And that’s the lesson I learned from many years in South Dakota, and he should learn from his own family. You will find “movers” in every person.
Dave Baumeister
Dusty’s choice of the word “relevant” may have been misfortunate for the sound bites that will be used against him, but thanks, Cory, from printing all of what he said and pointing out the 80/20 rule. From reading the entirety of what he said, that is exactly what he was talking about. In any group or community there is only a small percent of the people who actually make things happen. The rest are happy to let others do work for them. But if anyone looks down at his comments he talks about how the “relevant” people are the ones whom people trust and having a title doesn’t matter. It is not an elitist statement at all. People who write intelligent comments on blogs are going to spend at least 15 to 30 minutes reworking them so they sound perfect. I’ve been on the radio and been on TV, as well as live Internet shows, and when someone sticks a microphone in my face and says “Thousands of people are listening, TALK,” I know all of the words I’m saying aren’t perfect. Cory, as to your assessment of more than 20 percent of people will show up to vote, that is true, when it comes to “big ticket elections,” but voting is easy. Where are those 20 percent when it comes to city and school board elections? We usually see fewer than half of those people show up to vote, so let’s use another rule, “the closer an election is to home, the more impact it will have on people’s lives.” If only the “relevant” people vote in those elections, then Dusty is being generous. But Cory, you are right, politicians always need to chose their words carefully. I still think of Gerald Ford saying “There are no Soviets in Eastern Europe”! Thankfully, we have things like your blog and Greg’s radio show that can give us a deeper meaning to just the mis-interpreted sound bites that political ads tend to shove down our throats.
John Kennedy Claussen, Sr.
Dusty claimed in a recent political ad, that when he gets to Washington, that “Washington won’t know what hit them,” but if he is relevant, shouldn’t they? Perhaps, the “Full Dusty” is full of something else…. ;-)
Cory,
How do you think South Dakotans feel about Adam and you calling them unintelligent on your website?
All those “irrelevant” people are the ones that chose who they trust, which means that the ‘irrelevent’ people are the ones that chose who is ‘relevant’. So in a democracy, they all count.
Trolls like Jason raise irrelevant wedge issues to distract from thoughtful conversation and debate among voters. Like yelling “they are taking your guns”. Although a lie, that did 4 things: It got funding, got out votes, and gun industry made money. And “stand yer ground” ALEC-type legislation made USA more dangerous to live in.
Its like yelling fire in a theater.
Its like yelling ABORTION in a Survivors of Suicide meeting (SOS).
Its propaganda to de-legitimize our constitutional democracy. Putin’s goal of fighting the only kind of war Russia can afford. He is afraid of pissing off HRC and liberals who WILL defend our democracy.
It’s really the philosophy of the Republican elite, and it’s a philosophy that Dusty has got to abandon if he is going to be a responsible leader. I don’t know where he gets that from, because it’s not what he learned from his folks, who might not have been considered “movers.” His mom, though, as I recall, was pretty active in helping save funding for programs for gifted kids that were threatened by Republicans. And that’s the lesson I learned from many years in South Dakota, and he should learn from his own family. You will find “movers” in every person.
Dusty’s choice of the word “relevant” may have been misfortunate for the sound bites that will be used against him, but thanks, Cory, from printing all of what he said and pointing out the 80/20 rule. From reading the entirety of what he said, that is exactly what he was talking about. In any group or community there is only a small percent of the people who actually make things happen. The rest are happy to let others do work for them. But if anyone looks down at his comments he talks about how the “relevant” people are the ones whom people trust and having a title doesn’t matter. It is not an elitist statement at all. People who write intelligent comments on blogs are going to spend at least 15 to 30 minutes reworking them so they sound perfect. I’ve been on the radio and been on TV, as well as live Internet shows, and when someone sticks a microphone in my face and says “Thousands of people are listening, TALK,” I know all of the words I’m saying aren’t perfect. Cory, as to your assessment of more than 20 percent of people will show up to vote, that is true, when it comes to “big ticket elections,” but voting is easy. Where are those 20 percent when it comes to city and school board elections? We usually see fewer than half of those people show up to vote, so let’s use another rule, “the closer an election is to home, the more impact it will have on people’s lives.” If only the “relevant” people vote in those elections, then Dusty is being generous. But Cory, you are right, politicians always need to chose their words carefully. I still think of Gerald Ford saying “There are no Soviets in Eastern Europe”! Thankfully, we have things like your blog and Greg’s radio show that can give us a deeper meaning to just the mis-interpreted sound bites that political ads tend to shove down our throats.
Dusty claimed in a recent political ad, that when he gets to Washington, that “Washington won’t know what hit them,” but if he is relevant, shouldn’t they? Perhaps, the “Full Dusty” is full of something else…. ;-)
FF: 00:50
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N384B2pjx1k
Let’s not even test the thesis. Let’s just send Bjorkman. He’ll hit ’em with 50-page position papers… and freedom from the Russian NRA members.