Ready To Rumble

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"Kids who work in my office with rings in their noses and blue hair wanted to know how to register to vote," says Sandra Gardebring, a University of Minnesota administrator.

Ventura is nothing like anybody who ever passed this way, so it's hard to make predictions, but that's part of his appeal. And however things turn out, he can't be worse than the other hyenas in high places. "Isn't politics 90% showmanship anyway?" asks Jim Murphy, a tattooed bouncer at Billy's on Grand, a St. Paul bar.

At the University of Minnesota, students said they voted for Ventura even though he had told them to quit looking for government handouts and put themselves through school. "I agree with him," said Andrew Labonte, 21, an advertising major who works 30 hours a week.

So does Jerome Wagner, a 75-year-old former science teacher who shrugged off a 40-below chill factor to attend Ventura's swearing-in. "He's got the physical presence to take the two little guys next to him and say, 'Hey, could you guys stop this? Let's go down the middle of the road.'"

And here's how he might do that:

"Jesse was a brawling-type, punch-and-kick kind of guy, and he had this big flying elbow drop," says wrestler Lawler, the man who nearly broke comedian Andy Kaufman's neck with a pile driver. Now that politics and pro wrestling have melded, Lawler is contemplating a run for mayor of Memphis, Tenn.

There may be no more appropriate lab in which to study the Jesse phenomenon than the Mall of America, which is referred to by all six or seven cynics in Minnesota as the Fall of America. On an upper level there's a Planet Hollywood next to a Hooters. Several Hooters waitresses are split on Jesse's virtues.

Erin wouldn't even have voted if not for Jesse, but Trista wasn't that impressed. A third waitress, not crazy about either Jesse or being a Hooters girl, asked TIME to make up a name for her. O.K., we can do that. "I think it's stupid to cut tuition credits," said Bambi. "And all he ever talks about is how he was a Navy SEAL."

At the other end of the Mall of America, Sandra Freese is buying a Jesse's World Order T shirt for her son Travis' 10th birthday. "He's starting to ask a lot of questions about politics," she says, drawn by his interest in Ventura.

How can this be a bad thing?

You need go no further than room 315 in the capitol for an answer to that question. During the campaign, a Ventura TV ad depicted a Jesse action figure beating up Evil Special Interest Man. Room 315 is Evil Special Interest Man's office, and several hundred of his clones work there.

"I'm a skeptic," said a lobbyist who paled at the thought of giving his name. It's especially important that a novice like Ventura hear the needs of farmers, truck drivers, doctors, teachers, etc., the lobbyist said. "It takes more than sound bites to run a state with a $20 billion budget."

Guess how many lobbyists have tried to get to see Ventura. Over 200, Jesse says. And how many has he met with?

"None."

But he has surrounded himself with people who know what they're doing, and he was working 12-to-14-hour days last week boning up on government dreck and going to meetings. And he relentlessly preaches self-sufficiency. "Government cannot be your parent," Ventura said on a radio talk show when callers complained that they couldn't afford housing or insurance.

It remains to be seen, of course, how long the big guy can tell struggling Minnesotans to fend for themselves while he drives his Porsche out to the 32-acre horse ranch, the Governor's mansion or the lake cabin. But the truth is, it's going to be hard for him to screw things up.

The Minnesota economy is good, expected budget surpluses are huge, and legislators all face re-election in the year 2000. "If they buck me," Jesse says, "the public may say, 'Hey, let's throw the bums out.'"

Ventura met last week with house speaker Steve Sviggum, a Republican, on the house's $1 billion tax-rebate plan. Sviggum brought another legislator with him. Jesse had four staff members on his side, armed with background.

So who did the talking?

Jesse.

"I was impressed with his ability to take control of the meeting," Sviggum said. "He's going to be wonderful to work with."

As for the Gov, he's feelin' good. He compares himself to Rocky, to Muhammad Ali, to Viking quarterback Randall Cunningham, who resurrected a dead career.

Any regrets after a week in the job?

Hoo-yah! Dumb question. Like Jesse told the kids at U.M., if a guy like him could be elected Governor, anything's possible.

"Tourism's gonna go up," he says. "People are going to come to Minnesota just to look at the people who voted me in."