Making the Wrong Enemies: How Rep. Dean Urdahl Hurts Himself By Being a Bully

Rep. Dean Urdahl 18B, Minnesota.

We tell bullied teenagers that things get better, and they do. Your happiness is not dependent on being cool after high school. In real life, people who punch you have charges pressed and spend time in jail. But we should never tell children that bullies go away. They still exist in life after the 12th grade and they're still something you have to deal with.

Minnesota's Rep. Dean Urdahl is one of these bullies. What started out as a poorly explained attempt for the GOP politician to cut budgets and save the state some money turned into an immature spat of name calling Tuesday (Star Tribune).

Urdahl targeted funds given to the arts, specifically legacy funds that are given annually to certain groups without them having to reapply or compete for these grants. While one opponent of the opponents of the Stillwater Library's legacy funding is a group that wants the money for a stadium, it is understandable how anyone toughing out this economy might be unsure about allocating sales tax money to arts and parks. We're talking about millions of dollars here. If Urdahl had some sense he could compose a well-worded argument for why our government, in unimaginable amounts of debt, can't afford entitlement programs for non-essentials, no matter how enriching they may be.

It seems, however, that Urdahl could not even find this basic conservative argument and instead had to resort to name calling. In an ill-conceived attempt to point out what he saw as inappropriate use of program funds, Urdahl missed the mark completely and began spewing insults at acclaimed author, Neil Gaiman. Urdahl used the phrase "who I hate" when talking about Gaiman and continued to call him a "pencil-necked little weasel." Uncalled for? Entirely.

I'm going to address 3 major points now:

1. The level of immaturity in his statement
2. The misinformation in his continued statement about Gaiman's involvement in the legacy funds
3. Why it is a very foolish idea to target Gaiman

Playground Insults

First of all, public name-calling is usually something reserved for rowdy supporters of political candidates, not the politicians themselves. Politicians with a scrap of dignity and poise are careful to avoid being quoted with playground insults. Being quoted name-calling can do a lot of damage to a reputation. That is why politicians who sling mud usually, at least, stick to political mud.

"Socialist", "Fascist", "Naive", "Under-qualified", and "Corrupt" are examples of the type of mud we expect to hear slung. Urdahl's comments are immature jabs at Gaiman's physical appearance. They are weak choices. Can you imagine if the 2008 Presidential debates dissolved into McCain calling Obama "Big-Ears" and Obama retorting with "Grandpa"? Do we want petulant children running our country? Urdahl's remarks are childish.

Do Your Ever-Loving Research
Urdahl cites his motive for these insults as a response to Gaiman's payout for a Minnesota library speaking engagement. He claims Gaiman "stole" $45,000 of government money. Gaiman tells it differently. (Gaiman)

Gaiman charges high fees for speaking to discourage frivolous requests so he can focus on writing. For some libraries he speaks for free. For some corporate events he charges more. Speakers like President Clinton and Sarah Palin charge at least twice his fee but he admits that his fee is high for a writer.

Gaiman asked the Stillwater library if they were sure they wanted to pay so much for a small venue and they said yes. The funds had to be spent by the end of the fiscal year or they were cut. We've all seen the spend it or lose it. A former employed of mine once put a plasma TV and a Blu Ray player in our break room to avoid losing money that another year might be needed to replace a refrigerator or patch the ceiling. Is it Gaiman's fault that this flaw is built into most budget systems? No. They were looking for a quick way to blow the money and asked him to help.

These funds used to pay Gaiman were part of a program meant to pay hard-to-snare authors market price to bring them to Minnesota. It did what it was meant to do and the event was even broadcast to a wider audience on a radio show also supported by these legacy funds. More bang for your buck!

Here is the kicker. Here is what Urdahl failed to mention. The $40,000 (not $45,000 as Urdahl cited) was donated 75% to a social charity and 25% to a literary charity for a grand total of a %100 donation! If you failed basic math, that means Neil Gaiman kept 0%. Gaiman, who Urdahl claims "stole" it, donated it all to charity before Urdahl even shot off his mouth.

The Wrong Enemies

So does Urdahl think he did himself any good picking on Neil Gaiman? Gaiman and his wife are very influential people. Neil Gaiman is not only a best selling author and film writer (Beowulf, Coraline, Mirror Mask). His best-selling books, such as The Graveyard Book and Wolves in the Walls are loved by parents and children alike. Most dangerous of all, Gaiman is part of the Twitter dynasty.

Gaiman (@neilhimself) is one of the most followed writers on Twitter with over 1.5 million followers as of this post. His wife, Amanda Palmer (@amandapalmer) has another half a million. He is also followed by the unofficial King and Queen of twitter (respectively Wil Wheaton [@wilw] and Felicia Day [@feliciaday]) with 1.8 million followers each. Not all of that can be overlap.

Palmer is so influential that a joke she started on Twitter sold $11,000 worth of t-shirts in one night. This story can be found in David Meerman Scott's (@dmscott) best-selling book The New Rules of Marketing and PR as an example of brilliant customer relations via Twitter.

Can you really afford to be bullying someone with that many devout followers?

Urdahl had best pick his battles wisely. It may seem easy to pick on a British guy to win conservative votes in a cheap way, but Gaiman lives and payes taxes in America and his wife is an American citizen. Some people never grow up and Urdahl effectively told voters that he is overgrown bully who takes pot shot at others to stroke his own ego. Gaiman's exactly the kind of guy bullies like Urdahl can't stand. He's a clever nerd who got rich being a nerd and married a hot rock star. How dare he!


UPDATE: I have learned from this blog that Gaiman posted a link to Urdahl's blog and so many people flocked there that they CRASHED it. Don't mess with that kind of following!