Have you read the Parts One & Two?
7:30am Election day
RING!!!
“Huh…huh…hello?”
It was my boss, the EP for "Mr. Election."
“What’s up?” I said, trying to focus.
“Oh,” he said, “my phone called you by accident.”
Sigh.
Since I was up, I debated going to watch McCain vote. The campaign hadn’t sent an email about it, so I figured they didn’t actually want press showing up. And, with no cameraman, really, what was the point? When I finally saw the coverage, I realized I’d made the right decision. Cameras were not allowed inside the polling place, so 20 guys with gear jostled each other to get a shot through one narrow door as John and Cindy McCain voted. Each cable network aired their own wobbly sea-sickness inducing shot of their cameraman shooting other cameramen. Glad I stayed in bed.
A few errands and one fitful nap later, it was off to McCain’s Election night HQ.
The Arizona Biltmore Spa and Resort is called “the Jewel of the Desert.” Every president since Herbert Hoover has stayed there (Hoover, huh? More great symbolism.) The hotel was designed by a student of Frank Lloyd Wright, so the hotel had lots of those nifty Wright influenced pre-formed concrete blocks, and gilded walls. Taliesin West, one of Wright’s studio, is in Scottsdale, AZ, so there’s a lot of Wright-inspired architecture here.
(There’s a lot of Wright’s original architecture in Chicago too, where Barack Obama celebrated his election night victory. Symbolism? Still workin’ on it.)
The hotel was packed with (liberal) media, and (republican) Republicans. I toured the Frank Lloyd Wright ballroom, where the ‘victory’ party would be held. Except that the actual ‘victory’ speech would not be given there, but rather on the Squaw Peak Lawn in the center of the hotel complex. Why make it simple when you can make the press spend More Money on a More Camera Crews.
On the lawn, there were more gigantic risers full of press, a small stage and podium adrift in the middle of the giant circular lawn, and behind the stage, a Gi-normous American flag. Behind the flag was Camelback Mountain (cuz, you know, it looks like the back of a camel). The whole tiny podium, giant flag setup was straight out of Citizen (John Mc)Kane.
In between the lawn and the ballroom was a Press Filing Center. For $695 you got power, wireless and little sandwiches. If you didn’t pay, you didn’t go in, and they had armed security enforcing this rule. And the journalists whose companies didn’t want to pay for the PFC? They sat on the ground, fighting over A/C outlets and praying the hotel wireless didn’t crash.
Senator McCain and his family watched the returns in the Barry Goldwater Presidential Suite. (Symbolism? Not great for someone who actually wants to WIN the presidency).
I figured the ball room would be the best place to watch returns come in, and former Louisiana Governor Buddy Roemer was in charge of giving the crowd the electoral vote update. Somehow, in these updates, McCain was always in the lead. How did they manage that?
As the night went on, and the wireless in the ballroom failed, and Gov. Buddy appeared on stage less and less, I found myself farther and farther removed from the reality of what was happening vote-wise in America. I also found myself realizing that there was no way in hell I was ever going to be talking to "Mr. Election" on air.
“Well, sir, the mood here in Arizona is…ignorant.” How can you describe people’s reactions to the news that their candidate is losing if the campaign isn’t telling people their candidate actually is? Guess they didn’t want people to flee the ballroom. The only person who fed me accurate and up to date information all night was my fiancé via text message. Another colleague was getting text updates from his niece.
The biggest cheer of the night wasn’t for any particular electoral call, but when CNN showed footage of Sarah Palin’s plane landing at the Phoenix airport. “She’s here!” I heard one woman yell.
As the night progressed, my sole form of amusement was watching the representatives of the McCain campaign address the ballroom crowd. From around 8-9pm ‘we’re gonna win it’ bluster was still in effect. From 9 to 10pm “It’s gonna be a long night!” was the rallying cry the still pumped up crowd. After 10pm, the speakers stopped giving any electoral updates at all, and started talking about what a ‘great man’ McCain was. Hmm…
I decided to wander around and talk to more people. I exited the back of the ballroom, and walked through the narrow hallway until I found a woman slumped down in a chair hand over her eyes. I smiled at her and asked her how she was feeling about the election results tonight.
“I have sciatica,” she said, “that’s why I’m sitting.”
OK, then. After reassuring her several times that I wasn’t taping the conversation, the 50-something homemaker agreed to chat further.
I asked her, “How will you feel in the event of a potential Obama administration?”
“Petrified,” she said, “just petrified.”
I asked why.
“I just feel that he was born and bred for this.”
(Huh?)
“You know, he was born in Indonesia” (uh, no actually)
“So,” I asked her politely, “you think he’s some kind of Manchurian candidate?”
“If I told you what I really thought,” she said darkly, “you wouldn’t believe it.”
(No, I thought, I’d just go find one of those noodle-ear guys and have them cart you off to the funny farm.)
We continued to chat for a while, and then, as graciously as possible, I fled.
Around 10pm, I sent this email to the folks I was working for, just to show that I was still alive and working.
To: People who are actually working
From: Me
Subject: 10pm Update.
Long faces in the ballroom, long lines at the bar.
And that pretty much summed it up.
At around 10:30pm EST, Gov. Buddy came out and asked people with tickets to the ‘lawn’ to head there now. People without tickets to the lawn grumbled, apparently unamused by the idea that they would have to watch their candidate speak on the big screen in the ballroom.
I guess the word got out, because at 10:45pm (15 minutes until polls closed on the West Coast), Gov. Buddy told the remaining audience in the ballroom that they too could go to the lawn, tickets or not. Thus began the Last Mad Dash of the Republican Faithful.
I got onto the lawn around 11pm EST, and despite the fact that there were 3 full risers of press assembled, there was absolutely no information available there either.
So where was I when Barack Obama became the next president of the United States?
I was wandering around a giant lawn filled with the grim-faced Republican faithful, most of us blissfully unaware that at 11:01pm EST, MSNBC and many other networks called the election for the democratic nominee.
Even my faithful text messaging fiancé was off the grid, busy sneaking into the Obama victory celebration in Los Angeles. He got in just in time to see the victory call. As he shed tears of joy, a weeping black grandmother pulled him to her enormous bosom for a Victory Hug. Now that sounds like a good way to celebrate history.
Back in the Land of White Republicans, no one in the audience quite knew who to expect at the podium…would Sarah Palin come out and rally the faithful one last time? Would John McCain come out and tell them it wasn’t all decided just yet? Certainly the press folks on the riser knew that it would be a concession speech, because the AP reported it. But the vast majority of the folks on the lawn were not up to speed, since no one had a TV monitor any where nearby.
Then Senator John McCain took to the stage and gave a truly gracious, patriotic concession speech. And yes, the crowd booed. But I have to admit, I think that was less a reflection of the actual mood of the crowd and more a reflection of poor ‘crowd preparation.’ All night long, the Republicans had been gearing these people to ‘never give up’, to ‘fight through the long night’ for their candidate. Then suddenly, before half of the people in the room were aware that their candidate had conceded, there he was giving away the store. I firmly believe that if someone had come out before hand and said, ‘ok folks, we lost, but we’re ok with it, and you should be gracious about it too’ they would have behaved much better.”
By this point I was sitting down in the comfortable rattan chairs on the patio behind the press risers. I had been dismissed by my show for obvious reasons. I mean, why would you need a reporter in the crowd to tell you what the losers were feeling? They were feeling like losers!
So I sat and listened to the booing. And I worried. Is this what it’s going to be like for the next four years? One half of the country in rapturous love with their president and the other half booing every move he makes?
The speech ended, and the Rich White Republicans streamed towards the exit like Dodger fans in the 7th inning (or maybe like Angel fans when the Red Sox are schooling them in the post-season.) Off they went to their claim their Mercedes and their Lexus and drive off in to the post-Apocalyptic desert night.
Across from me sat a woman in her 30s with a depressed look on her face. In my last gasp of reportorial duty, I asked her how she was feeling, fully expecting her to say she was considering whether to go down into her Obama-bunker that night or wait until he was inaugurated.
And then, on this of all nights, a Republican surprised me.
“I can’t believe these people,” she said glumly. “I can’t believe they booed.”
And that’s when I knew there was some hope for us all.
12am est Nov. 5th
So where was I when Barack Obama became the next president of the United States?
I was in the doorway of the press filing center munching on a big Italian meat sandwich and a swigging a Pepsi, watching Barack Obama’s historic acceptance speech. I was standing in the doorway because, despite the fact that it was all over at the Biltmore, the security guards were STILL not letting anyone into the press filing center if they hadn’t paid for it.
So I watched Obama’s acceptance from the sidelines, straining to hear history as other journalists battled the implacable security guard at the door.
“It's been a long time coming, but tonight…
“But I just need to pick up my gear!”
“I’m sorry, you don’t have a pass!”
…defining moment change has come to America.”
“But I just need to pick up my gear!”
“I’m sorry ma’am, I cannot allow you access, I’m just doing my job, ma’am.”
Stirring.
Early next morning…
So, after spending this historic, once in a lifetime kind of night amongst the least enthusiastic people in the country, fearing to even smile for fear of being roundly attacked as the liberal media person I so clearly was at that moment, I really needed alcohol.
I made plans to meet a friend at Houston’s for a celebratory clink and drink. But Houston’s was closed, as was McCormick and Schmick’s, as was the Capitol Grille. All the places where rich white people drink in the richest whitest Phoenix neighborhood had closed hours ago.
Then, on the corner of 24th and Camelback, I spotted a raging party. I scoped out the name of the bar. Oscar Taylor’s. The original Oscar Taylor’s restaurant was 1980’s era power-lunch location for rich white Phoenix republicans. It folded a couple of times then came back as OT’s, a hipper incarnation.
In the city of Freeport, Illinois there is another Oscar Taylor’s. It’s not a restaurant, but rather the estate of a rich businessman who made his home an important stop on the Underground Railroad during the Civil War. Dunno if they named this restaurant after that guy, but on election night in 2008 it seemed perfectly appropriate, because the clientele of Oscar Taylor’s restaurant in Phoenix was 100% African American.We ordered drinks at the bar. A group of black men were jumping up and down behind us, hugging each other and yelling at the top of their lungs, “We have a black president! We have a black president!”
So where was I when Barack Obama became the first African-American president of the United States? I was at Oscar Taylor’s, watching people for whom history was so often something to be overcome, now overcome by joy and elation in the early hours of the first morning of the rest of their lives.
Now that’s more like it.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Where were you when... Part Three: The Big Day
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