Don't Start the Revolution Without Me! - Jesse Ventura [72]
In Guerrero Negro, we spend our first night of the trip in a hotel. Baja hotels are often surrounded by walls. It’s like pulling into a fort, so there’s a true feeling of security. Down here, you get back to reading the basics of life from people—a hello, a smile on someone’s face. They can be said in many languages, but the feelings are still the same.
Terry is reading John Steinbeck’s Log from the Sea of Cortez, written in 1941, a true account of a voyage the great novelist made on a boat called the Western Flyer. As we go to sleep after a forty-eight-hour journey I expected to make in twelve hours, she reads aloud to me this passage:
“What was the shape and size and color and tone of this little expedition? We slipped into a new frame and grew to be a part of it, related in some subtle way to the reefs and beaches.... This trip had dimension and tone. It was a thing whose boundaries seeped through itself and beyond into some time and space that was more than all the Gulf and more than all our lives. Our fingers turned over the stones and we saw life that was like our life.”
It is mysterious to feel this way, a couple of thousand miles away from Minnesota.
CHAPTER 9
Money, Sports, and Politics: A Universal Language
“Baseball commissioner Bud Selig earned as much last year as some of the league’s top players. Selig received $14.5 million in the 12 months ending Oct. 31, according to Major League Baseball’s tax return, which was obtained by the Sports Business Journal.”
—Associated Press, April 3, 2007
It is the weekend, and the banks aren’t open in Guerrero Negro. We need some pesos, and the hotel suggests we shop around for a casa de cambio, a private money-changing service. There are quite a few of these on the main drag, all posting their rates in terms of how many pesos you receive for a dollar. Right now, it all seems pretty standard—about ten pesos to the buck.
We are next in line at the counter, when the man ahead of us finishes his transaction, turns around—and recognizes me. “Governor!” he exclaims. I resist the temptation to put a finger to my lips telling him to shhhhhhh.
“How are you?” I say quietly, as he extends his hand.
“Well, we’re from Minnesota!” he exclaims again, pumping my hand like he is draining all the milk from a lactating cow. “What are you doing down here?”
“Traveling,” I say. “Just getting away from winter for a little while.”
“Us, too!” The man is nothing if not enthusiastic. Finally, he releases his grip. “Listen, can I buy you a drink this evening? Little mescal, maybe?” He winks at me.
“Sorry, I’m off the drink these days,” I say, which is true. Having one from a bottle with a worm floating at the bottom could intrigue me. But doesn’t.
“Well, one thing I have to tell you,” the man continues. “What you did when the state had those big budget surpluses—returning the extra money to the people three years in a row—that was a noble thing to do.”
“Well, thanks,” I say. “It just seemed more like the right thing to do. But don’t try telling that to the Democrats or the Republicans.”
Politicians have led us to believe that only certain people are qualified to do the job of governing. It’s a mystique, and a misconception. As governor, I had a terrific group of commissioners, and I paid attention to them. If you’re intelligent and surround yourself with good people, they’ll educate you. It’s not rocket science. The greatest compliment I had came six months after I took office, from Skip Humphrey. He came up to me at a gathering out in Wayzata, Minnesota, and said, “Governor, you’ve put together the best administration the state of Minnesota has ever seen.”
Economics was always something I’d had a knack for. In high school, I got A’s in business law and business administration. When I took aptitude tests in the Navy, they first sent me to “Storekeeper-A” school, which is all about requisitioning; basically, you’re trained to run the ship’s business. I