Well I'm not sure I believe that there was 75000 people like it is being reported, but I can report that there were at least 500 bicycles locked the the railing along the water north of the hawthorne bridge. Oh yeah, heres a picture:
I'd never been to a political rally before, and this was certainly a beautiful day to go to one. He spoke for about 35 minutes, it was pretty much the same speech I'm sure as always, but it was fun to be in the crowd and chat a bit with the black guy next to me.
The most interesting thing to me though was getting there. Ginny and I parked on the east side by the Morrison bridge, walked over to saturday market and got some food (east african chicken wrap and then some sherbet) Then we started towards the bowl on the south side of the hawthorne where the BO was going to be. Well the PoPo's had the underbelly barricaded off and guarded, and the herds of people were being redirected away from the river. At this point there really isn't a flow of people one direction or another, nobody really knows where the heck to go.
Then we started hearing some Obama staffers saying there was a line, that we should get in it, and that it was "over there" OK great. But by golly, there was a line. And then more line. Apparently there was only one entrance (or was there?) to the event, and a fatty line. Ginny really wanted to just go back to the park and sit on the grass, but I was overcome by the duty to stand in the line. But as we traced back the line, after about 8 blocks I came to the conclusion that it just wasn't going to move fast enough to get inside. But was curious how long the thing was, so I drug Ginny along. And along. And seriously, not until we were in the park blocks well inside PSU's campus did the line end. Probably about 20 blocks with some zig-zagging.
So that wasn't going to be any good, so I thought we'd go back and try to find some sidewalk space on the south side of the bowl. We might stand a chance of hearing something without a bridge between us and the speaker. So we got back to the bowl, this time from the south, and were able to keep walking down the sidewalk, and lo and behold we were in the bowl. I don't know what the crack those BO staffers were smoking, but they clearly should have told folks to walk around to the south side, where there wasn't a 5000 person line. I was beaming that we actually got in, I had given up hope and was kinda taking some heat from the girl for our wild chase down the line. So that was fun.
As for the man himself, I am hopeful, but I'm not betting on anything. I really hope he doesn't sell out to lobbyists. And I hope the lobbyists don't have him killed if he doesn't sell out. But either of those seems a lot more likely than him succeeding at being an honest president. But I am more than willing to take that chance. I believe he's got some fight in him, and I'm optimistic that the oil companies won't have him by the balls like they have Bush. I like his energy policies, his diplomatic attitude, and the fact that he is black. I do think that is important for this country.
But he is certainly no Jesus. The crowd felt kinda dead to me today, it was beautiful weather and the candidate of their dreams, but they really weren't all that excited. They seemed to mostly hate Bush. The holy spirit certainly wasn't a dominating presence. I want to trust BO, but I know that he will fall. And I feel like this might be similar to Bill Clinton's support in 92, and that kinda makes me shudder. Because essentially I like BO on the basis that he speaks as if he is not corrupted. Which is a house of cards. McCain I know what he is, he will not change, and he's a fool on Iraq. BO might be a fool, but it will be in a very unpredictable way. I'm willing to take that chance, but I understand those who are not.
What gets me though is the cynicism. Of my friends, the newsmedia, and myself. It's pretty discouraging when we talk expecting the worst out of someone. And one of the reasons I love Ginny is that she is not cynical, she will assume face value is true, because thats the way people should talk. But we've learned we can't trust politicians, I just wish it wasn't so easy to cross the line from a healthy caution to a discouraged cynicism. I've been pretty cynical here for craps sake, and it makes me sad. The system is broken, we make fun of each other for being optimistic, but experience will tell us pessimism will better predict outcomes, especially in politics. It's time for Jesus to come back and fix this all, I don't see any other way.
