Continued: Lori Sturdevant: Experience in office: An advantage, until it's not

Running for elective office might be the only competitive endeavor (that I can think of) in which having been around the track a time or two can be as much a liability as an asset.

Hillary Clinton could attest to as much. Her constant references to 35 years of public service haven't closed the deal with the legions of Democratic primary voters itching for change.

Closer to home, check out the hot contest in the Third District DFL congressional race. It appears that state Sen. Terri Bonoff will go into the April 12 endorsing convention trailing political newcomer Ashwin Madia in the delegate count.

"What happened?!" e-mailed a snowbird of long DFL connection, upon returning to her west-suburban nest. "And who's Ashwin Madia?"

Here's a stab at some answers, in reverse order.

Madia is a bright, personable 30-year-old attorney with a distinctive life story. He's a first-generation American, the son of immigrants from India. He served as student body president at the University of Minnesota and got a law degree from New York University.

Then he joined the Marines. He was a military attorney in Japan and, for six months, in Baghdad.

Sixteen months after leaving the military, he was a hard-charging candidate for the seat being vacated by Republican U.S. Rep. Jim Ramstad. In recent months, campaigning has been his full-time job.

Bonoff, by comparison, is a 50-year-old former corporate marketing executive and mother of four who has spent the past few months representing Minnetonka and Plymouth in the state Senate. She's had limited time to campaign.

That difference isn't the whole answer to my friend's first question. But it's where to start.

In many an intraparty contest between a sitting legislator and someone otherwise engaged, the advantages of incumbency outweigh the disadvantage of the legislative calendar. The legislator starts out better-known. He or she has a political machine ready to rev up.

And the very title "state Sen." or "state Rep." packs a credibility punch in a race for Congress. Legislative service is often a launching pad for a congressional career (see the numbers on page OP1).

But circumstances unique to Bonoff and to 2008 have denied her incumbency's usual lift. She's far from entrenched. She came to the Senate in 2006, in a special election.

Her network of loyalists was dwarfed by the outpouring of humanity at DFL precinct caucuses this year. Many of those new caucusgoers came to support Barack Obama's presidential candidacy -- and likely couldn't help linking Obama and the well-spoken young congressional candidate with non-European ethnicity.

The parallel isn't perfect. It's Bonoff, not Madia, who supported Obama's candidacy in the early going. Her position on the war in Iraq better matches Obama's -- she wants a full withdrawal as soon as it can be safely implemented. Her history as a community advocate for public schools is akin to Obama's beginnings as a community organizer.

Nevertheless, Bonoff has been seen as the establishment candidate. That hasn't been a plus in a year when overthrowing the establishment strikes a lot of DFL delegates as a good idea.

Madia says that it's his message, not his assiduous courtship of delegates or his résumé, that have him leading in the delegate count.

The claim can't be discounted. Madia is a former Republican -- a backer of John McCain, circa 2000 -- whose caution about an abrupt withdrawal from Iraq, emphasis on civil liberties, and call for reducing the federal deficit strike a chord in the Third District. Its DFL caucuses were likely loaded with people who once were moderate Republicans.

"I don't have experience in St. Paul, but I have experience in Baghdad," Madia said in an interview. "Dick Cheney had experience, too. Clearly, other things matter -- values, judgment, courage, work ethic. Those are things that you don't have to go to St. Paul to get."

True enough. A truly representative democracy ought to choose people with a variety of backgrounds to make its laws.

But if Madia is the DFL endorsee on April 12 -- and if that settles the nomination, as both candidates say it will -- he'll be up against a former seven-term House GOP majority leader, 42-year-old Rep. Erik Paulsen, in the general election. And Madia can expect that comparisons between his qualifications and those of a legislator will just keep coming.

Lori Sturdevant is a Star Tribune editorial writer and columnist. She is at lsturdevant@startribune.com.