We'll be embedded most of this week with the Lobbyists For McCain, who claim to be the real power behind George Bush's John McCain's campaign. Of course, it's a satirical group of people that don't support McCain and think lobbyists-- and money-- have too much influence in our government. They are technically nonpartisan.
While thousands of protesters either stabbed cops, broke windows, or more likely walked peacefully, the L4M mainly stood off to the sidelines and kept everybody laughing and generally calming the atmosphere made all the more tense by the presence of Darth Vader dudes with batons...
At first, almost everyone got the point-- it's clearly a joke (see above sign)... then, the Democrats-- the scary, scary ones who have megaphones and think if you scream chants, interesting or not, you will somehow change minds-- got wind of what the Lobbyists For McCain were up to. At that point, the anti-RNC march we were "counterprotesting" had made a loop in front of the Convention Center and headed back toward the Capitol area. At this point, as far as we know, few arrests had been made. (We just heard, at 1:17am Minnesota time Tuesday, that more than 200 arrests have been made, mainly cases of anarchists breaking things and allegedly attacking cops.)
Among the highlights:
-getting screamed at by smelly-- and by that mean that we could actually smell them and it was painful-- anarchists who didn't get the joke... and even when they were informed it was satirical, they continued to scream
-the older woman who shouted: "Why don't you get a decent job?"
-doing a song and dance in front of the literally-crumbling ice sculpture of democracy
-the huge piles of unused counter-protest posters made by the pro-war people
-standing above the parade in a skywalk and the silent reactions (middle fingers, applause, laughs) to the Lobbyists For McCain posters ("Four More Years!") from the thousands passing below
-we had set up in front of a group of totally silent pro-war Republicans with identical posters and were holding our signs (including "Don't Change Horsemen Mid-Apocalypse") up among theirs to make it appear as if we were in agreement with them. A woman affiliated with one of the anti-war march's organizing groups got right in front of us and tried to yell over us. When she said, "Yes, we can" we shouted, "No, you can't" right over her. Finally, as it became clear to us that she was the only person who remained clueless about the real point of Lobbyists For McCain, with the Republicans literally patting us on the back and the protesters laughing as they went by, we finally walked up directly behind her and started chanting:
"You don't get it... you don't get it... you don't get it..." to the applause and cheers of the crowd until she finally went away...
Among the lowlights:
-Toby Keith played the State Fair, which had nothing to do with why the Fair kind of sucked.
There were political people out by the tens of thousands... one guy called me a "cocksucker" for "deceiving him" by claiming the L4M are McCain "supporters." Meanwhile, the guy running the McCain booth, which we were "coincidentally" standing in front of, raced out of into the walkway to shout, "Hey, you're infringing on my right to free speech!"
Of course, this was hilarious since we were a good eight to ten feet into the pedestrian walkway in front of his booth. Johnny: "Yeah, meanwhile a hundred thousand people are getting sealed up in protest pens and you're worried about your booth." "Yeah, yeah, yeah."
There are sure to be more ridiculous stories from today's (Tuesday's) events, especially with the RNC presumably moving into full swing.
Lobbyists For McCain Take On The Minnesota State Fair.
Meanwhile, the real lobbyists were ignoring the hurricane and partying it up, supposedly off the radar, with the band Hookers and Blow. Classy!
Related:
Top photo by Mike McGregor. Others via Flickr.