News, Politics and Anything Else I Want to Say

This year North Carolina is a swing state and it is really exciting! A few weekends ago I got to see Barack Obama in Fayetteville and yesterday John McCain was here too! Both campaigns have been making frequent stops all over the state.

Yesterday's Road to Victory Rally was at the Crown Center Coliseum, the same location as the Obama rally was held on the 19th. There were a lot less people at this rally than the Obama rally but that was expected. This rally was held on a Tuesday afternoon instead of a Sunday afternoon. The coliseum was setup with that in mind too as the seats in the very top sections were all covered. I knew as soon as I drove up when there weren't cars parked all along the street that there would be less people there.

Getting in the rally today was much more organized than the Obama rally. There was actually a line and we were sent to several temporary areas before going through security. There were a lot of school groups here today. At least 2 of those groups were from Christian schools as indicated by their shirts/coats. In all it took me about 30 minutes to get inside. There were also a handful of judges and politicians greeting voters and passing out campaign materials.

Once inside, I tried to get on the floor but they weren't letting any more people on the floor. From what I could tell anyone was allowed down there before they reached capacity. Instead I walked around to the other side of the stadium to get a front row seat in the nearly empty section. By the time the rally actually started most every seat was full though.

The rally got going at 4:30 with an opening by Mike Surles of VFW post 670 here in Fayetteville. After that there were a handful of speakers (many more than the Obama rally) and then Hank Williams, Jr.



After the mini Hank concert McCain made his entrance.

And what an entrance it was! They drove the Straight Talk Express bus right onto the coliseum floor. Cindy McCain, Tom Ridge and Lindsay Graham all spoke before McCain.

I'm not going to give any more play by play details. Read the live blogging posts from the Fayetteville Observer at the bottom for that. My overall impressions of the event were this: This rally was exiting and much more so than the Obama rally. We had Hank Williams Jr. and a bus driven straight into the building. There were bang sticks and it was loud. But there was also more talk about why Obama is bad than why McCain is good. Most of the event speeches were very economic focused but some of the Ayers/ACORN distraction still got through. McCain's speech was mostly something I could get behind and support but many of the speakers went to far for my politics.

All of my pictures of the event are here and I took more videos this time which can be found here.


Live Blogging of the event by the Fayetteville Observer

• The McCain campaign owes me 50 cents
• John McCain’s alternate VP choice
• Pardon the interruption
• The crowd as barometer
• The McCain playlist
• Stage to nowhere
• Bang your, erm, things together
• Keeping with the rock star theme
• Hotdog mania
• My disguise worked
• 4:42 p.m.
• We all know…
• “I don’t know about you, but I’ll take the fighter over the talker”
• Patriotism
• Unpleasant laughter
• “Hank! Williams! Junior!”
• Hank is loud
• Hank’s off
• Sorry, it’s the cynic in me
• McCain is in the room
• Tell all your friends
• The Tom Ridge gaffe
• If I’m honest
• Putting his breast stroke where his candidate is
• These people are going to burst their thunder sticks if they’re not careful
• But who’ll serve me at Taco Bell?
• My friends…
• And he’s gone
• The best shot I could get
• Sad litte shrivelled thunder sticks
• The Last Word