ST. PAUL, Minn. — I’ve been writing a lot lately about political hubris, incompetence and naivete.

Take a look at this picture. It’s the face of all three of those traits.

It belongs to the late Wendell Anderson, the former governor of Minnesota. We came to the Twin Cities to visit a family member. I heard Anderson’s name mentioned on a local news broadcast. I began to recall something he did back in 1976.

Sen. Walter Mondale got elected vice president of the United States. Gov. Anderson decided he wanted to replace Mondale in the Senate. So he quit the governorship and then asked the new governor, Rudy Perpich, to appoint Anderson to the Senate seat that Mondale vacated.

State law prohibited Anderson — who was born and died in this city — from appointing himself, so he did the next best thing.

How did Minnesota voters react to this? They were angry about it. Anderson stood for election 1978 and got beat. Indeed, the entire Democrat-Farm Labor ticket took a battering that year over Anderson’s fit of hubris. Perpich got the boot, too.

This all came to mind as I continue to watch the madness and chaos unfolding in Washington.

Politicians should take a lesson from Wendell Anderson. Sadly, they don’t … and they won’t.