From The New York Times:RAPID CITY, S.D. — Senator Tim Johnson speaks slowly and haltingly, and is sometimes difficult to understand. He moves with a cane, and spends much of his time in a wheelchair. He rarely addresses large crowds, and he has declined a request to debate his Republican challenger in next month’s election.
Mr. Johnson’s supporters in South Dakota, a state with a large share of older people familiar with health problems, say they have been inspired by his display of grit in battling back from a brain hemorrhage nearly two years ago.
But questions about Mr. Johnson’s health — until now largely off limits and deemed unseemly — are being raised publicly by his Republican opponent, Joel Dean Dykstra, a state representative. Mr. Dykstra said voters “want some evidence as to whether he can hold his own.”
It is sensitive territory, but some voters say they fret that Mr. Johnson’s health issues could shortchange South Dakota in Washington, especially during a time of deep financial crisis.
“I have a lot of respect for Johnson,” said Jack Lefler, a 72-year-old retired Caterpillar worker. “But I don’t think he’s physically able to compete” with the politicians from other states.
Before his hemorrhage in December 2006, Mr. Johnson — a Democrat in a largely Republican state — had been considered vulnerable by Republicans, having won re-election in 2002 by a margin of just 524 votes out of more than 330,000 cast.
Now, though, even voters like Mr. Lefler acknowledge that they are in the minority.
“We’re a loyal state,” Mr. Lefler said, “so people will back Johnson.”
Most polls show Mr. Johnson, who is seeking a third term, leads Mr. Dykstra by comfortable margins.
“South Dakota is a very kind state,” said Steve Jarding, a Harvard political scientist on leave to run Mr. Johnson’s re-election campaign. “People were rooting for Tim — Democrats, Republicans, independents — they wanted him to be O.K.”
On mornings when the Senate is in his session, Mr. Johnson plows through stacks of memorandums and his daily press clippings, newspapers and magazines. And he maintains a regular calendar of meetings with constituents and others. On Tuesday, he traveled to Washington from South Dakota to meet on Wednesday with officials from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, ahead of a Senate banking committee hearing.
Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut and the chairman of the committee, said Mr. Johnson had been a full participant in recent months as the committee dealt with the effects of the mortgage and financial crises.
“Obviously, having a conversation is slower because of his speech,” Mr. Dodd said. “But there’s nothing slower about his mind.”
Some things have changed. Mr. Johnson no longer drives himself to work. He uses e-mail less frequently in favor of face-to-face conversations with his staff. And he is less likely to jump up to make his own photocopies or fetch pens from a supply cabinet, aides said.
Mr. Johnson, in an interview here, said he had been a legislative powerhouse for South Dakota, leading the drive for federal approval of two huge water projects. Since returning to the Senate in September 2007, after a nine-month absence, he has not missed a vote.
“I had my most successful year ever,” he said.
Mr. Johnson was recently here in Rapid City for Native American Day, a holiday South Dakotans observe while other states mark Columbus Day. Wearing a bolo tie with a Medicine Hat design, he sat in a wheelchair at the Black Hills Pow Wow, when an elderly woman moved toward him to whisper in his ear.
“You’re a true friend to the native people,” Phoebe Kuecker, 84, who belongs to the Rosebud Sioux tribe, said she told him, as she clasped his shoulder.
With nine reservations in the state, American Indians account for perhaps 10 percent of the vote in South Dakota. In his last election, in 2002, Mr. Johnson won 94 percent of the vote among the Oglala Sioux, the state’s biggest tribe.
South Dakota can seem like two different states, divided by the Missouri River. To the west, where Republicans dominate (except for Indian Country), the culture seems drawn from the Old West: cattle ranches, old gold towns, the Black Hills. To the east, where Democrats are more competitive, corn and soybean farms outnumber ranches, and the financial and technological sectors are important players.Despite its Republican leanings, South Dakota has produced some high-profile Democrats, including two senators, Tom Daschle, the former Senate majority leader, and George McGovern, the Democratic presidential nominee in 1972.
While Mr. Dykstra has sought to portray Mr. Johnson as too liberal for the state, most South Dakotans seem to see him mostly as a pragmatist. As a show of Mr. Johnson’s political strength, and his popularity among conservatives, he recently won the endorsement of the National Rifle Association. He has also been endorsed by Dave Munson, the Republican mayor of the state’s biggest city, Sioux Falls.
Mr. Johnson visited 20 cities in August, and is in the midst of a state tour now, but much of his time is spent in private meetings. He visited the popular South Dakota broadcaster Tony Dean not long before Mr. Dean’s death on Sunday.
“He came to see me when I was in the hospital,” said Mr. Johnson, explaining his visit to the ailing Mr. Dean, evoking the sort of loyalty and sense of caring that tends to resonate in South Dakota.
For his part, Mr. Dykstra, a social conservative educated at Oral Roberts University, has called Mr. Johnson a “workman-like, bring-home-the-bacon” sort of politician.
Democrats here heartily welcome the description. People in some parts of the country might consider earmarks a symbol of waste, but in South Dakota, according to Mr. Jarding, the Johnson aide, “if we don’t get earmarks, we don’t have water running to some people’s houses.”Mr. Dykstra’s references to Mr. Johnson’s health seem to have gained little traction. Among many South Dakotans, even talking about Mr. Johnson’s medical history seems out of bounds.
Rob Wasilk, a 39-year-old road construction worker, said all that counted was Mr. Johnson’s work in the Senate.
“I don’t care what Johnson’s voice sounds like,” Mr. Wasilk said. “His record speaks for itself.”By historical standards in the Senate, Mr. Johnson could hardly be considered incapacitated. Seniority rules the day, and there is a long tradition of lawmakers remaining in office well into old age and regardless of infirmities.
In 1946, for instance, Senator Arthur Capper, Republican of Kansas, then 81, became chairman of the Agriculture Committee, even though he was almost totally deaf and could not make himself understood. And in the 1940’s, Senator Carter Glass, Democrat of Virginia, remained in office even though illness kept him confined to a suite at the Mayflower Hotel.
These days, Senator Robert C. Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia, who will turn 91 next month, always enters the Senate chamber in a wheelchair. And Senator Edward
M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, has been mostly absent from the Capitol since his brain tumor was diagnosed in May.
When in Washington, Mr. Johnson mostly uses a wheelchair, but he typically walks into the Senate chamber for votes, steadying himself with a cane — partly a matter of pride, his aides say, and a signal to his colleagues and to C-Span viewers everywhere of his recovery.
