Legitimate Lying

Sun., Feb. 27, 2000

Staff

Fishing

Politicians are known for stretching the truth, so it’s no wonder a full-fledged lie came out of Jesse Ventura’s latest fishing trip.

The Minnesota governor entered an ice shanty in Alexandria with a TV newswoman and yanked out a beautiful northern in a matter of minutes.

Area anglers laughed about the feat until the state’s First Fisherman bragged about his catch on a radio program.

Then the bait started to stink.

Further investigation revealed that the pike was not “caught” in the sense that any Minnesotan worth his waxworms would use that term.

“One of the locals - he caught them,” Karl Nilsson, publicist for “The View,” an ABC talk show that filmed the event, said of the fish hauled in by Ventura and the show’s co-host, Lisa Ling.

“I guess they were on the hooks … they pulled them out,” Nilsson said.

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