![](\"http:\/\/cyber.law.harvard.edu\/blogs\/static\/dowbrigade\/meinker.jpg\")
\n The Dowbrigade harangues Sen. John Kerry today in NH (Gabriel Feldman photo)<\/p>\n
Despite the heightened Orange Alert, Logan Airport was surprisingly
\n quiet at 9:00 am this morning, bereft of obvious security measures,
\n as the Dowbrigade waited to pick up his younger son, arriving on
\n Delta from Atlanta.<\/p>\n
Since his flight had left at 6:30 and
\n his mother lives some distance from the airport, he had embarked in
\n a taxi at 3:30 and hadn’t slept
\n the night before. As
\n such he was even less loquacious than usual when he ambled up, greeting
\n us with a "hi" and answering questions with "yeah" or "nope" whenever
\n possible. Gabe spends syllables as though they were his last silver dollars.<\/p>\n
As soon as he threw his bag in back and we pulled away from the curb,
\n we exposed our plan. "Hey, Gabe, how would you like to take a little
\n detour on the way back to the house? We could go check out a couple
\n of the
\n presidential candidates."<\/p>\n
"Okay"<\/p>\n
Now, Gabe is not inclined to do things unless he feels like it, in
\n which case he is capable of doing just about anything, as his recent
\n enlistment in the USMC unbeknownst to family and friends is mute testimony.
\n So, "Okay" meant he really wanted to go, although he had no idea where
\n we were going or when we would get back. The plan was to catch Gen. Wesley
\n Clark giving a policy speech in Concord, New Hampshire at 10,
\n and
\n then head
\n to
\n a Chili
\n Chow Down with John Kerry in a VFW Post in Milford, NH at noon. We
\n headed for the Interstate.<\/p>\n
On the drive up to the Granite State the conversation ranged from New
\n Years Eve:<\/p>\n
"What did you end up doing on New Year’s Eve?"<\/p>\n
"Went out" (no details were forthcoming)<\/p>\n
to modern music (his):<\/p>\n
"Guess what this song’s called?"<\/p>\n
"You mean these are actual songs, with titles? But there’s no words
\n or tunes!"<\/p>\n
"They have a beat. Can’t you hear that repeated beat?" (son
\n illustrates)<\/p>\n
"I thought the CD player was busted. That’s what my diskman sounds like
\n when it can’t read the disk."<\/p>\n
"That’s the idea, Dad"<\/p>\n
to, inevitably, politics:<\/p>\n
"So tell me again why you don’t like President Bush"<\/p>\n
(This son is a Bush supporter, partly, as far as the Dowbrigade can
\n discern, for the abundant dismay and discomfort it causes his father,
\n and partly
\n as he sees this president’s adventurism as the most likely to lead to
\n his being
\n allowed
\n to
\n unleash the
\n world’s deadliest
\n weaponry in the cause of truth, justice and the American way.)<\/p>\n
"Because he’s an idiot"<\/p>\n
"Some of our greatest presidents have been idiots"<\/p>\n
It’s hard to argue with logic like that. It had started to snow hard,
\n and driving required concentration. We listened to the "music".<\/p>\n
It seems they had relocated Concord, the site of the Clark speech, since
\n the last time we had passed this way. It was now NORTH of the infamous
\n New Hampshire Tolls. By the time we reached the toll plaza it was
\n almost 11, and so cutting his losses, the Dowbrigade pulled a neat if
\n technically illegal U turn right in front of the toll-takers, and headed
\n back south, to the noon Kerry Chili cook-off in Milford, near Nashua,
\n and close to the Massachusetts border.<\/p>\n
We found the Milford, NH VFW Post just at noon. We pulled into
\n the absolutely packed parking lot just as the Senator was alighting
\n from his big blue bus and entering the hall. We dropped Gabe at the gate
\n and
\n found parking in a nearby gas station.<\/p>\n
Inside the hall, the joint has hopping. It was definitely a SRO crowd:
\n all of the tables were filled and people were crowding all around the
\n edges of the room. There were at least 150 "real" people in attendance,
\n in addition to the 50 or so press and Kerry staff.<\/p>\n
But the most immediate impression was the vibe in the room. There was
\n a real buzz here, unlike the ersatz, hard edged testosterone and caffine-laced
\n urgency of the Dean machine and the boozy earnestness of Joe Lieberman,
\n who for some reason always seems to be campaigning in bars.<\/p>\n
This Kerry event felt like a party. Everyone was smiling and happy,
\n talking in animated tones and looking around the room like guests at
\n a wedding waiting for the bride to appear. There was gaiety and song
\n in
\n the air,
\n as a heavy-duty
\n sound
\n system pumped out reggae and up-tempo world-beat music. Perhaps it was
\n the holiday season, perhaps it was the fact that Kerry was the first
\n of
\n the candidates we had seen who actually dared or cared enough to feed
\n the people. Somewhat simplistic, perhaps, and seemingly cynical, but
\n people like to be fed, and the symbolism of a political communion was
\n not lost on the crowd.<\/p>\n
It was a happy and hungry crowd, hungry for good food and an entertaining
\n show. There was a feeling of community and fellowship in the air, and
\n an energy and enthusiasm which seemed most unusual for a political meeting,
\n but in a good way. There was good cheer in the air. Unfortunately, at
\n this point the candidate began to speak.<\/p>\n
After a short introduction by ex-NH Gov Jean Shaheen, Kerry launched
\n into the familiar litany of Democratic dogma; education, the environment,
\n tax cuts for the rich, inclusion, multi-lateralism and a woman’s right
\n to choose. At first, he was a little stiff and his timing was off, as
\n he almost seemed to ramble from topic to topic. He was having trouble
\n reading the crowd; he would rush ahead when the audience wanted to applaud,
\n and then pause painfully in pools of silence, as if waiting for a cue
\n that never came.<\/p>\n
But gradually, as he talked and listened, for he did listen, his words
\n and his emotions seemed to come into synch. Suddenly, he was like
\n a different speaker. Although he had surely recited these same
\n words dozens or hundreds of times before, he made them seem as though
\n he had just
\n thought of them, especially for us, and that his whole heart was behind
\n every word.<\/p>\n
And the crowd was reacting. Every person in that room had, at least
\n for a moment, the absolute conviction that John Kerry was speaking directly
\n and exclusively to them. They were moving, physically and emotionally,
\n swaying
\n and leaning and applauding
\n at appropriate
\n moments.
\n Even Gabe applauded when Kerry lambasted President Bush for having the
\n lamest foreign policy in American history. We were watching a master politician
\n at work.<\/p>\n
As he got into his rap, and the air in the room got closer, Kerry removed
\n his pressed blue blazer to reveal a wrinkled blue Brooks Brothers Oxford-collared
\n shirt that looked like it had been slept in, but clean, pure Prep. The
\n most amazing thing was that it was completely sweat-free. Not a patch,
\n not a shadow, not a dried-out high-tide line in sight. Although
\n he was wheeling and ranging, gesticulating and emoting, in a warm and
\n humid room filled to the rafters with heated-up people and steaming bowls
\n of chili, the candidate was calm, cool and collected. Enthusiastic
\n and alive, yes, but absolutely relaxed and comfortable in front of the
\n crowd.
\n The
\n man has
\n obviously had his sweat gland surgically removed.<\/p>\n
In a quiet moment the Dowbrigade got to shake the Senator’s hand, and
\n ask him a couple of personal questions. When Kerry asked the Dowbrigade
\n what he did, we replied, "I’m a blogger. Do you know what a Blog is?"<\/p>\n
"Of course," he replied, "its a weblog. What’s yours called?"<\/p>\n
We told him.<\/p>\n
Later, the Dowbrigade mentioned that the Untied States has the highest
\n incarceration rate of any country in the world, and asked Kerry if there
\n were anything the President could do about that. It was a trojan horse
\n of a question, as we were interested in whether he would venture into
\n two separate political minefields intricately involved in the incarceration
\n question: drugs and race.<\/p>\n
Kerry leapt in without hesitation, stating that the President had EVERTYTHING
\n to do with solving that problem, which he attributed to discriminatory
\n drug laws (as close as he got to the second of my inferred issues) mandatory
\n sentencing and lack of legitimate opportunity. He proceeded to accurately
\n encapsulate why we can never win the "war on drugs" as delineated by
\n the current administration, and advocated a program of early childhood
\n education, counseling and intervention, and treatment on demand to reduce
\n the need for more prisons.<\/p>\n
As he worked the crowd it became obvious that Kerry had a charisma and
\n a personal connection with his audience that doesn’t come across on television. How
\n could it – it is based on touch and smell and demeanor and reaction and
\n a glance,
\n a moment of
\n eye
\n contact, a fleeting half smile the camera can never capture. He made
\n simple people understand complex problems. Around the crowd heads
\n were nodding, and not from sleepiness. He made simplistic jingoism sound
\n reasonable to reasonably complex people, as when he said he was the only
\n candidate
\n who in the arena of world affairs could stand toe to toe with George
\n Bush and say to him, "Bring it on" (See how cheesy it sounds when written
\n down? Not when Kerry said it).<\/p>\n
He commented wryly on his recent drop in the major polls, comparing
\n this stretch of the campaign to the terrible cold winter of 1775, when
\n the Continental Army of George Washington practically froze to death
\n in Valley Forge. He mentioned, in what sounded like a bombshell, at least
\n to the
\n Dowbrigade,
\n that he had spoken to former Presidents Carter and Clinton, and that
\n both had declared themselves ready and willing to act as Special Envoys
\n to the Middle East in an eventual Kerry administration. He took questions
\n from the audience.<\/p>\n
Finally Jean Shaheen tore him away. He seemed genuinely sorry
\n to have to go. As we left the hall Gabe asked for our assessment.<\/p>\n
"Much more impressive than the other guys I’ve seen so far. He
\n really seemed to believe what he was saying."<\/p>\n
"Don’t forget he’s still a politician just like the other guys." Who
\n says the young ar gullible?<\/p>\n
Driving back to Boston we passed through a strange and semi-mythical
\n stretch of the Interstate Highway System. Although we’ve driven through
\n it on several occasions, at key junctures in our life, we could never
\n find it on purpose, and believe it may only occasionally appear here
\n from another dimension. <\/p>\n
At certain times it seems, like this afternoon at approximately 3:30
\n pm, one can spend several miles traveling simultaneously South on Route
\n 3, and North on Route 95. The signs are quite clear. You are flying down
\n Rt. 3 at 70 mph, and you are flying UP I-95 at the same speed, AT THE
\n SAME TIME.<\/p>\n
The first time we experienced this seeming physical impossibility was
\n during our sophomore year of college, and oddly enough while under the
\n influence of a mind-altering substance. Believe it or not, at one
\n time doing things like dropping all our incredibly intense academic endeavors
\n as well as massive doses of LSD and heading up to New Hampshire to visit
\n a Christmas Tree farm during Reading Period in January seemed like a
\n GREAT idea. <\/p>\n
Encountering the phantom stretch of road during our return, we became
\n convinced we had strayed into a non-Einsteinean bubble in the space time
\n continuum. A place where one could be doing the limit in two
\n opposite directions at the same time. The funny thing is, before you
\n know it, that strange stretch of road leads straight home.<\/p>\n
John Kerry is an old-line, traditional politician of the Kennedy-Patrician
\n school, but he’s a good example of the genre, and would at least stand
\n a chance against President Bush. On the other hand, were he somehow
\n to win the election, nothing would really change. Forced to make a choice
\n between him and an authentically innovative campaign led by a candidate
\n who doesn’t really even understand the implications of his own success,
\n the Dowbrigade is at a loss as to what to do. Count us, still, among
\n the undecided.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Dowbrigade harangues Sen. John Kerry today in NH (Gabriel Feldman photo) Despite the heightened Orange Alert, Logan Airport was surprisingly quiet at 9:00 am this morning, bereft of obvious security measures, as the Dowbrigade waited to pick up his … Continue reading