My first full day in Denver gives a hint to what might be in store.
I started the day at a morning rally at the Denver capitol organized by “Recreate 68”. Turns out that this collection of peace groups could draw speakers like Ron Kovic (Born on the Forth of July), Cindy Sheehan who is challenging house speaker Nancy Pelosi in San Francisco in November, and Cythia McKinney – Green Party Presidential Candidate. But they couldn’t draw out many other peace groups who organized their own marches later that day.
There were about 100 people gathered around the steps – and some speakers evoked the revolutionary spirit of the 1960s. In the crowd, some murmured to me within earshot, “the sixties are over”. Yes, they are. Tom Hayden, who was put on trial as one of the Chicago 8 in the aftermath of the 1968 election told me in an interview two days ago that he would never want to recreate ’68. It was a dangerous time, he says. One speaker told the story of Robin Long, a soldier recently extradicted from Canada where he’d escaped the army. He called hime a political prisoner, after his recent two-year sentence for resisting the Iraq War. New framing for me.
In one exciting moment there was a clash between the crowd and a surly Fox News reporter that bordered on ugly. They surrounded the reporter after he was aggressively went former University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill while he waited near the stage to speak. I found myself in the middle of a huge media cluster with dozens of cameras and mikes focused on the screaming match between KGNU Boulder’s Sheerif Aleen and the Fox reporter. I asked a police officer (one of about 30 standing 20 yards back) why they didn’t intervene. He told me, “We’re watching the situation, but it’s political.”
Ron Kovic – of Born on the Forth of July fame – spoke passionately. He said, “This is my 40th year in this chair and I’ll be damned that I will allow more of my brothers and sisters to be in this position like me…We will not go silently into this dark American night.” Sitting directly below him at the foot of the stairs, I was awash with memories of him speaking with me at a San Francisco church during the Persian Gulf War.
By the way, there is alot of buzz about Senator’s Obama’s pick of Biden for Vice-President. It seems some Hillary Clinton supporters are pissed. The delegation from Puerto Rico, for example, held an event tonight in her honor and privately voiced this fact.
In the afternoon, I made my way past the downtown Sheraton, bustling with well-dressed politicos and gee-wiz delegates. Protests and arriving delegates clogged the downtown. I sat in a van driven by my KPFK Los Angeles colleague for over an hour trying to move 5 blocks from the Pepsi Center to the 16th Street Mall. While we were in traffic, three platoons rushed forward and had a tense stand off with some marchers that were coming up from the park.
Later, I met my producers at a nearby Starbucks to pick up my credentials. I will be able to find stories in and around the Pepsi Center. Tight security. There are concrete barriers and metal fences and rows of police cars, trucks and satellites. There are plain clothes men with the high and tight do. There are men with black FBI bullet proof vests. There is a large brick CNN headquarters (CNN=Politics the 20 foot letters say) and four huge white tents And under the brutal sun, I waited with my colleague Verna Avery Brown to get my bags searched. At one point I was nudged between Sam Donaldson and rising star Rachel Maddow. I was secretly thrilled.
I found my spot on radio row, on the outer rim of the floor activities where our nightly broadcasts will be held. We’ll catch politicians and delegates on their way into the activities for interviews. We’ll broadcast important speeches live. I found a spot at the tip top of the stadium and could see the 50-foot screens, the stage, the banks of cameras, and the hundred of 20 somethings scurrying around. They looked like ants. It truly looked like a sound check to a rock concert, and felt like one, too with the speakers booming Shakira. Oh, it’s gonna be quite a show.
Of course, it’s on big time tomorrow. The Pacifica Radio broadcast begins at 6pm Central (5pm Pacific). Michelle Obama is giving a big speech. She’s been a major stumper for her husband over the long presidential campaign road. She follows Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush as potential first ladies to address the convention. As you know Michelle Obama as borne the brunt of evil racist attacks – everything from characterizing her “terrorist fistbump” to calling her Barack’s “baby mama”. Our broadcast will carry her speech live along with Nancy Pelosi. You know speaker Pelosi, the one who said on The View that there was no evidence to pursue impeachment hearings on President George W. Bush. Hmmm. Jessie Jackson, Jr. will also speak (notably, not his dad after his major gaffe musing about the crushing of a certain Democratic candidates family jewels). And then there’s Jimmy Carter, who now is being vindicated by the likes of Republican Andrew Bacevich, former army officer and professor who recently wrote, The End of American Exceptionalism” who is trying to Carter’s foresight into the need to move away from foreign oil in the 1970’s. And, finally, they’ll be a tribute to the ailing Ted Kennedy who will likely join from his convalescent bed.
