Several weeks ago, another news organization asked me if I wanted to go to the Democratic National Convention and blog, which is a major challenge for a print guy who prefers some time for contemplation before going to the keyboard.
On one hand, there was home at its best time of year, the river low and clear, the big peaks shining in the crystalline air. Opposed to that pleasant prospect in Salida were large crowds and tight security. It sounded a lot like being stuck for four days in an airport, and that’s not something I’d wish on Dick Cheney, let alone volunteer for. And besides, you see it all on TV anyway.
Well, no, you don’t, unless you watch on C-SPAN. Then you would have seen Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer’s delightful speech. On the other cable channels, it was talking heads, interrupted occasionally by speakers whom they deemed significant, followed by in-depth analysis of every intake breath, shift in pitch or volume, hand movement, rhetorical emphasis, omission of what the commentator thought should have been said, etc.
Now, I have nothing against punditry, and I realize that exhortations to the party faithful can be about as exciting as waiting for an oil change, but if they have to chatter, couldn’t they at least be interesting? I yearned for something along these lines:
“Britt, are you sure that’s Michelle Obama up there?”
“Why do you ask?”
“She’s not wearing a dashiki and she’s not waving a Kalashnikov. Besides that, I’m not even sure we’re at the right convention.”
“Trust me on this. We are.”
“Then why do they keep talking about families, parents, children, veterans? They look way too normal. Where are they hiding the meth- head tattooed bisexual America-hating welfare-cheat San Franciscans who are the real base of the party?”
“They can’t fool us by pretending to look like Americans. Now for some more fair and balanced coverage from Hooter’s.”
CLICK.
“Keith, did you notice how Bill Clinton said Obama ‘is the man for this job’?”
“Indeed I did, Chris. Doesn’t that imply that there’s a woman whom he believes would be the best person for the job, but of the men available, Obama is the best?”
“It’s more than an implication. It’s a subtle nod to all four PUMAs we’ve been able to interview in order to drive our narrative that this is a bitterly divided, down-to-the- last-out contest with a convention that will fail to unify the party.”
CLICK.
“Wolf, I just interviewed a Westerner who said there was a dog-whistle message hidden in New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson’s statement that a few days again, he’d been with Sen. Hillary Clinton, campaigning for Sen. Obama in Española, N.M.”
“Anderson, you’re going to have to explain why that’s significant.”
“My informant told me that Española has the reputation of being kind of an armpit place, and it’s the butt of dozens of jokes they tell out here. So if Hillary was willing to go to Española, it means her support of Barack is much more sincere and energetic than we had previously surmised.”
CLICK.
“When the conservatives are calling Obama ‘The One,’ are they mocking him, or are they really trying to tie him to an unpopular president? After all, Richard Nixon’s 1968 campaign slogan was ‘Nixon’s the one.’ ”
“Maybe that’s what the Recreate 68″ people outside are referring to. Let’s go ask them.”
CLICK.
But instead, the pundits managed to be more boring than many of the speeches they didn’t want us to hear.
Ed Quillen (ed@cozine.com) is a freelance writer, history buff, publisher of Colorado Central Magazine in Salida.
