Why am I trying to figure out a rather bare bones web ad?

I noticed the Steve Novick ad of a few days ago on blueoregon.  The ad spot for the Steve Novick has changed to one priming an interview on Rachel Maddow, but something about the old ad struck me.

3 frames of text flash.  “First there was Paul Wellstone.”  “Then there was Jon Tester.”  “Now there is Steve Novick.”

Interesting.  Apt for his audience there at blueoregon, the primary voter who would donate money.  The Wellstone reference makes perfect sense.  But I do not quite understand the Jon Tester reference makes all that much sense.  Is there a great contingency of Jon Tester love out there in the state of Oregon?
Sure, his campaign served as a protege and continuation of the populist politics Governor Brian Schweitzer, “blue” governor of “red” Montana, and a welcome discontinuation of the politics of the Senior Senator of Montana — Max Baucus.  At least rhetorically — in terms of policy and voting I don’t know that anyone has seen enough.  Nothing wrong with it, as it has been seven months so far in the Senate, but I don’t know that Jon Tester has established himself such that referencing him as a lineage makes any sense.

I can’t figure the “Turning a Red State Blue” figures into the mix either, because Oregon has voted for the Democratic candidate since Dukakis in the presidential races, and has surged very pro-Democratic at the moment.  Besides, Wellstone’s Minnesota is in that mix as well — they voted for Mondale.

Which leaves me with, at least with regards to Tester, the fact that Tester is missing some fingers and that Novick is missing a hand (“Great Left Hook”, as his campaign promises to use as a slogan).  Is that the connection?

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