The Blogger Attends A Cruz Meet And Greet

Living in New Hampshire and having a newfound interest in politics I have twice pledged to be a more engaged reporter in presidential politics. 2015 was a dream season. Open primaries in both parties, a boatload of candidates, lots of issues. Yet, I stayed home most of the time.

Part of the reason for my non-involvement is a lack of enthusiasm for most candidates. Donald Trump eclipsed everything. I can't jump on his bandwagon but I love his style, his candor and his courage. Furthermore, like Sarah Palin I grew disgusted with the GOP candidates who would only speak out on issues AFTER Trump lead the way. I have had enough of jellyfish Republicans, thank you very much.

I turned out for Pataki's kickoff and then, nada. So earlier today (1/20/2016) I went to a Ted Cruz meet and greet at Exeter Town Hall. I play a game with myself where I try to blend in with different groups: the campaign, the press, the partisans, the townies. I chatted with a Dem videographer who had been asked to leave. I talked to two guys who denied any affiliation but I suspect were Larouchians. One was in a VATMAN suit with a sign denouncing Cruz's Vat tax. The other held a sign that labeled Cruz a friend of Snowden.

I chatted with Phillips Exeter's Ladies hockey coach. Great guy. Spent some time chatting with a woman who yesterday stood outside in 14 degree weather at the state capitol to pray with Franklin Graham. There were other conspicuous Christians in the crowd.

I have met Cruz's point man in NH, Ethan somethingother. I made a point of addressing him by name and we shook hands and I spent some time standing in his proximity with other campaign people, mimicking their body language and looking official. I was able to briefly chat with former Senator Bob Smith who is a magnet for reporters.

The boys and girls on the press bus know each other but there are always stragglers and newbies and local yokos and you can sit with them and act disinterested and bored and text some messages and you will fit right in.

Cruz's speech was exactly what I expected. He looked tired getting off the bus but after speaking he got fired up. Spoke for at least fifteen minutes without note or prompter. Answered questions for a sleepy morning crowd.

I would estimate spectators at 150-200. Cruz campaign would be about 25-50. Press would be 25-50. Guesses more or less.

As mentioned I can blend in pretty well. When the Pataki Campaign was at the same venue, a warm spring wind blew over a cardboard "Pataki" sign, some jackass pointed at me and told me to pick it up, even though I wasn't adorned in a blue polo shirt like all the other P-men. I stayed in character and assisted the campaign. Didn't much like following orders from the jerk but I felt satisfied that I looked the part.

So I was chitchatting with some straggler partisans and a "New York Times" reporter asked if we could talk. She had rightly identified me as a spectator-partisan and that bothered me a little bit. I agreed to sit with her and a voice inside me reminded me of my principles, such as they are. I believe candidates--and civilians as well--should shun the dinosaur media. They are the enemy. Trump is heroic for standing up to our overlords. A polite request and my principles go out the window.

I sat down feeling as if I had entered a chess match. She was going to make me out to be either a foam at the mouth racist or a movie extra who hasn't worked a day since they stopped shooting "Deliverance." First rule of walking through a minefield is to remove the clown shoes.

I could make excuses that I did not have time to eat breakfast or that the coffee shop across the street was temporarily closed or that I was not expecting to joust with a reporter from "NYT." This woman was good at what she did. She did not immediately talk about issues. She asked about New Hampshire quality of life, my life and how I ended up in New England. We were still talking when all the other chairs were folded up and put away.

For two days I have replayed our conversation paranoid about getting misquoted, wondering why she asked me certain questions, wondering if my unprepared or off the cuff answers would translate well into print (or electronic text.) Quite possibly I will be left on the cutting room floor and that would be fine with me. In the meantime I still replay our conversation, that reporter's interview technique and how I might be treated by The Gray Lady.

Maybe I am not cut our for the pressures of the public life.

No Sign Is A Bad Sign For Obama

I tweeted about this but the 140 character limit sometimes makes it difficult to express precisely what you mean. Anyway, this afternoon I was driving through the streets of Exeter to neighboring Stratham where I would ultimately perform grocery shopping. Yard signs are plentiful. A bountiful harvest this year.

I noticed a trend. There are a lot of Democratic yard signs, that is signs with their party's nominee on display. Conspicuosly absent from the arrangements is the presidential candidate. There are signs for The Dems' gubernatorial candidate, their congressional candidate, their state house candidates and their local candidates. I don't know if there is even one Obama yard sign anywhere in town.

I started counting yards that had Democratic signs but no Obama sign. I took a different route home from Market Basket so as to not count any yard twice. 31! Thirty one yards that contained at least one Dem sign but no Obama sign. I thought I had seen an Obama sign before I started my count but I am not certain about that.

Granted my survey was not even a little bit scientific. The Dem gubernatorial candidate lives in Exeter so one might expect to see quite a few Hassan signs standing by themselves. But 31-0? That is not coincidence.

I was not counting Romney yards but there were at least a dozen on the route I took. It was possibly two dozen. Exeter tends to be a Democratic town, largely dominated by Phillips Exeter Academy. But if yard signs could vote, Romney would win by a landslide and possibly pitch a shutout.

One has to suspect that the Dems' internal polling might show something a little different from CBS's prognosticators. Word is out: distance yourself from the pariah. Reading between the signs, one can surmise that the incumbent faces an uphill battle in the Granite State.

Report From Exeter: Romney and Christie and Occupants Oh My

As mentioned, My Handycam has a dead battery and I do not have a charger. I went to the storage unit and found my Handycam accessories. All the accessories except for the AC charger. Hopes dashed.

I spent about seven hours this weekend trying to hook up a printer. Long story but I'll try to summarize. When I moved two years ago I gave away one printer and put the other printer in storage. I don't have much space these days.

Anyway, my friend returned my printer to me at one point and I threw it in the closet. I tried to add the computer without the disk (I know I will find the disk soon now that I have the other printer running) but for whatever reason I was unable to install the printer, even with help from Hewlett Packard. So today, I dug the other printer out of storage.

The second printer was already installed on the computer. In two years time the installed cartridges froze and thawed and froze and thawed. After much futile tinkering I bit the bullet and bought a color cartridge and a black and white cartridge. Seven cumulative hours and $42 later I was able to run off a Bingo card template for my friend.

I decided to drive across town to see Mitt and Christie at the high school gym. I know. Mitt is not my first choice and he is not a great orator. But I have missed the circus this year and I figured there would be a lot of sideshows. I was not disappointed.

I have spent my life in the cheap seats away from the limelight, so this is the highest concentration of media fixtures I have seen in one space. Counting tech people there were literally hundreds of them. There were rows and rows of typists on laptops. There were so many news people that hundreds of civilians, including me, were routed away from the auditorium to a nearby gym.

In the gym, we listened to a speech that was piped in. Dumb ass me thought that the audio track was a previous Mitt and Chris rally and that they would be starting this evening's rally later. After talking to a fellow reject I learned that we had been excluded but that Mitt was going to be dropping by to say hi.

In this era of camera proliferation, it is hard to tell who is in the business and who is a mere civilian. But it seems that even some of the privileged members of the fourth estate were excluded from the grown up room. A mob armed with expensive looking cameras huddled around Mitt. I was able to see the governor's tan forehead and not much else. I guess he got that perfect tan on the campaign trail in Soth Carolina.

I saw David Gergen and Carl Cameron and a bunch of bug-eyed foreign correspondents. There were probably more civilians than media people but it's hard to tell. There were a few dozen Occupiers, a half dozen or so Ron Paul supporters and some guy with a loud voice who yelled something about Romney being a draft dodger. There were even some pro-Israeli Zionists holding signs at the parking lot exit.Some of the Occupiers infiltrated the crowd and started chanting. This happened a couple of times. I was standing by a Gang of Four who started some silly ass chant. I might make C-Span just yet.

I did my own political theater. Whenever an Occupant handed me a flier I would ask if it was printed on recycled paper. After a heartfelt "I don't know sir," I would either act despairing or hostile. I think I frightened one timid soul. But I did learn that "polite occupier" is not an oxymoron. A rarity perhaps, but not an oxymoron.

I wish I had my camera running. I wish I would have purchased a fancy phone with video capacity (mine costs $15.) Instead of video I have pleasant memories that will fade over time. Read: Tuesday. But I will treasure a vague composite memory of the evening that was uniquely New Hampshire. How sweet it is.