[burningChrome]

Not true.

Too many people think they have to run for congress or president instead of thinking more locally. Jesse Ventura is a great example of what the founders envisioned as encouraging people to get involved in politics. He was unhappy with the local city government. He ran for mayor and won and spent four years in charge. Went back to his private sector life and then five years after leaving office, ran for governor and won.

I've had friends get involved in their local politics and have been effective. My buddy was a professional skateboarder and run twice for a local office and he barely lost both times and has vowed to stay involved in his cities politics.

You're seeing more and more people getting involved at the national level who said they never had any inkling of getting involved in politics but have thrown their hats in the ring.

There was a reason the founders made the barrier extremely low to get involved in politics, either locally or nationally. They wanted people to have a say in how their governments are run and to make it simple for them to be the change they want to see.

[rubylark]

As a counterpoint, Jesse Ventura was famous before he got into politics. It's much harder to win when no one knows who you are.

[burningChrome]

Fair point, however. . .

Jesse had been out of wrestling for years before running for mayor of Brooklyn Park. You have to remember this was back in the late 80,s early 90's when there wasn't any internet or social media. I remember reading an article about him resolving some issue the voters brought to him thinking, "I had no idea the guy was still living in the state, let alone running a city as their mayor."

I will give you he did use his radio show to air his grievances and tell stories about his wrestling years and being a frogman (the precursors to the SEALs) so that did bring him back into the public spotlight. He ironically had always dabbled in politics, and even appeared on Howard Stern saying he was going to run for president with gulp Donald Trump who made a guest appearance with him talking about it when he was governor.

So you're right, by the time he ran for governor, he was back to being very well known and leveraged that to a degree where he had to give up his radio show in order to run for governor.