On Tuesday night,
Plutonium Page and I went to the Kerry rally in Albuquerque, NM.
The crowd was big (18,000 according to NM governor Bill Richardson), excited and pumped.
Read on for a more detailed report..
[Yes, one-line diary checks are still broken, so I am adding a filler line once more!]
We got to the rally, in Civic Plaza, downtown Albuquerque, at about 3:30pm. The scheduled start time (read: time that they start letting the people in) was 4:30, but we wanted to get a good spot upfront. And, we did, we were right by the podium, on the left side.
The crowd was a mix of all different kinds of people, as it should be in a culturally diverse state like NM: white folks (like us), Hispanics and Native Americans were all present.
The crowd got warmed up by the usual musical acts. Meanwhile, people were pouring in, slowly filling up the entire plaza. We amused ourselves by looking at the Secret Service people, and the snipers positioned on the buildings around the plaza. I asked one of the guys what Kerry's codename was (like "Big Dog" for Clinton), but he wouldn't say. We also looked for celebrities in the crowd, and, strangely enough, noticed 2 actors from "Days of our Lives". People actually had pictures of their kids taken with them..
After an initial announcement by Senator Bingaman, and the giving out of many signs and t-shirts by the Kerry campaign people, it was time for the Real Deal himself.
Senator Bingaman introduced Chester Nez, who was one of the original Navajo code talkers from WWII. He performed a short Navajo blessing ceremony, which he, according to Kerry, also performed for the Boston Red Sox, so obviously it works! :)
After that, governor Bill Richardson introduced Kerry himself, who then took the microphone. He launched into his stump speech (adapted for NM) with much energy. During the first few minutes, he was interrupted a few times by what seemed like a Republican heckler (the sounds were those of a dumb obnoxious redneck shouting..). Kerry handled it well. He joked "a mind is a terrible thing to waste" in reaction to the heckler, and also got the crowd cheering by mentioning that he respected anyone's right to speak out, and that no loyalty oaths were required to get into his rallies. The heckler went silent after a few minutes. We couldn't see where he was, but we wondered if the crowd "got to him".
Kerry's speech was great. He hit all the right notes. He hammered the Al QaQaa explosives story hard, mentioned healthcare, Iraq, the environment, stemcell research, energy policy, terrorism, minimum wage, you name it.
After the speech, he came down and shook people's hands. Both Page and I were wearing "Bring back complete sentences: Kerry/Edwards" buttons. He saw Page's button, and laughed. We both got to shake his hand.
We got back from the rally tired, yet energized and happy.
Update [2004-10-27 2:53:9 by Frank]: Pictures sadly deleted for now due to server limits.
Update [2004-10-27 3:24:19 by Frank]: Pictures should be back..