» Democratic National Convention - On The Floor With Barack Obama

Thursday did not start auspiciously for your humble blogger correspondent. An arthritis flareup exacerbated hugely by miles of walking on Monday and Tuesday made it a painful experience just to move ten feet from bed to bathroom by Wednesday - and Thursday morning, although I felt a little bit better, mobility was still an issue. I spent the day quietly working on other projects and talking with some Democrats, but eventually had to get moving down to Invesco Field to hear the Big Speech. Getting to Invesco Field was a comedy of errors. The media shuttles which allegedly ran until 5:00 had stopped at some point prior to our arrival; a bored security guard at the Pepsi Center advised us to take the train. The trains were apparently running on a special Convention schedule that involved routing many, many trains to the areas NOT connected to the convention, but eventually we managed to find two trains in succession that got us to the Invesco Field station - a crow-flight distance of perhaps one mile from our starting point at Pepsi Center, but a mile made impassable by security barricades and closed streets.

The pedestrian approaches to the Center were largely empty by the time we got there, but a steady trickle of latecomers at least let us know that we were headed in the right direction. Forlorn Obama fans lined the approaches, begging for spare passes. Security was allegedly tight, but the security - always lax and forgiving for media types - was cursory at best. The security people asked if I could get through the gate without my cane, and when I said yes, they took it - a piece of metal three and a half feet long - and literally passed it around the X-ray machine and metal detectors and propped it against the table for me to pick up when I got through myself. As a temporarily disabled person, the solicitation and helpfulness of the security personnel was appreciated. As a suspicious security-minded person, I thought “note to self - to get a gun into an Obama event, hide it in a cane.”

Wandering - actually, owing to the arthritis flareup, hobbling - around the Invesco Field media area, we looked in vain for the blogger seating area. Speeches by Democratic notables came and went as we searched futilely for a seat. The writing press section, where technically we didn’t belong but which after thirty minutes of searching was good enough, looked inviting - but the occasional empty seats were inevitably “saved” - in one memorable exchange, a reporter told me that her son and daughter were getting concessions and would be back soon. That’s efficient use of the media seating area, there. Every staff member or volunteer approached had no clue who bloggers were, what a blogger seating area was, or where we should go. We ended up wandering the entire arc of the press tunnel, winding up at one point in the DNC offices. (They were nice, and completely abandoned - the only person guarding what looked to be six figures of electronic equipment was a friendly, pizza-eating IT technical guy, who had no idea of where we should go, but who was kind enough to let us (ahem) “borrow” a color-coded map of the various underbelly areas of Invesco Field, which at least gave us some sense of where the devil we were.

As the Obama speech loomed (along with depression and despair in our minds), we resolved that we would just have to stand in an aisle in the writing press section. Heading back that way, finally, FINALLY we encountered a staff person who had apparently been empowered to make actual decisions. I don’t know if it was the cane or the tiredness etched into my face, but he asked us if would like to go out onto the field with the delegates. Would we like to meet the Pope? Do we want a winning lottery ticket? Yes, the field will do JUST FINE. He directed us into a security holding area where people with actual Floor passes - far in excess of our paltry Hall credentials - were waiting for the Secret Service to let them in. After just a few minutes, a mountain of a man in a black suit came over, eyeballed our group, and opened up the gate. He saw our press passes and - literally - looked up into the air and said “I don’t want to see that!” while waving us through.

We entered the arena floor and were immediately stunned by the sound and magnitude of the crowd. They were enthusiastic even before Obama came onto the platform. We spent a few minutes wandering the floor, looking at the delegates (from behind - the actual delegate area was off limits even to people with our amazing luck) and the various highly-privileged members of the press fine-tuning their camera setups and jockeying for the best angles. We found a section just behind the New York delegation where we had an actual sight line to the podium, and worked our way up through the crowd as best we could.

About Obama’s speech itself, I find myself not having much to say. It was an excellent speech, well-delivered, if not the epoch-making event that some in the media have portrayed it as. The crowd was highly enthusiastic, and responded with great energy to all of the programmed applause lines. It cannot be doubted that the audience, 75,000 or more strong, was in love with this man and his message of hopeful change. Specifics of the speech were limited, but the generalities were broad and thrilling. Left unsaid, or addressed with sad inadequacy, was how to pay for all of the wonderful changy hopefulnesses, but the crowd was not there for 14-point position papers on tax policy. They were there to hear Obama accept his nomination, and they roared approval of him and his message. And although I hold no brief for Senator Obama, it was genuinely moving and thrilling to be on the floor at this moment in history, the first time a major party has nominated a person of color to the Presidency. What an affirmation of America this is, and how exciting for our future, that the racial barrier in politics is not only down, but trampled in the dirt beneath so many feet.

Some random folks on the floor: