GOP party

The Republican convention is over—but not done. The Grand Old Party politicked and partied for four days, laying out their grand plan for America—and presenting their hot pick for VP.

The verdict on their promises and pick will come November 4th when the Electoral College decides who’s the next president.

I was there opening day: September 1st, which was my birthday. How considerate of my fellow Republicans to give birth to a McCain-Palin ticket on my 53rd.

Unfortunately the birthday boy was left outside the party. I could not get inside the Excel Center building.

At the last minute a blunder occurred with the press credentials. The GOP said they sent them; the radio station I was reporting with said they never got them.

The most plausible explanation is something only a mother may know.

"Wayne, they must think you're a terrorist threat." This from my mother, to her only begotten son.

 

Real action

Regardless, the real action at the convention was outside. That’s where the street politics were performed. The Excel Center area was an international three-ring circus for anarchists, political demonstrators and every other group on the planet.

The anarchists got center stage—everyone came to see the riots. The militants did not disappoint.

Discontent was their theme. Dressed in dark clothes with bandit-black bandanas hiding their identity, they ran up and down the streets yelling anti-war, anti-government, anti-society, anti-anti things—with brief stops to destroy public and private property.

I chased them for a few hours. But I'm too old and fat to run after these young vegetarians. They wore me out! Covering the GOP convention was more aerobic than covering the war in Iraq!

 

Immigrant anarchists

The anarchists were mostly out-of-towners, not from our community.

Take David McKay, 22, from Austin, Texas. He ran away from home in Texas’ capitol to join the militants in Minnesota’s capitol. He may have thought it a capital idea.

He was arrested for possession of a Molotov cocktail, which is deemed an unregistered firearm. Authorities called dad who came up and got mad at the lad because he “shouldn’t have been here in the first place,” he said in the Pioneer Press.

The anarchists made headlines with their craziness. But it was not total bedlam. Intelligent protests paraded down main street, despite mindless pandemonium on the side streets.

 

People’s cause

People from around the world wanted all the world to hear their cause.

The advocates for New Tang Dynasty Television in China were shouting about the government silencing of independent media. Communist China does not have the First Amendment, so they came to America to exercise it.

It seems freedom of the press is a big story in the Far East—and an issue in the Middle East.

Of the surrounding countries in the Middle East, the only country with freedom of the press is: Israel.

“Israeli media, in both Hebrew and Arabic, can freely criticize the head of government without fear,” stated literature from The Israel Project. “Close to 400 journalists from around the world work freely in Israel every day.”

(This sounds like a future trip and column.)

All of these folks are serious about their raison d’être. But some are so far out there; you had to laugh around the edges.

 

Drag queen

Take the self-proclaimed "drag queen."

He(?) was boldly on the front line of the Love Thy Homo assembly, a Gay-Lesbian-Transgender consortium advocating Gay rights and public funding for sex changes.

The bombshell was dressed to the nines in a cocktail dress with a slit up the side and a hairstyle that screamed Carmen Miranda: The Brazilian Bombshell.

I took his picture and I asked for some biological information for the photo caption.

"Excuse me," I said. "I don't mean to be rude, but are you a man or a woman?"

"That does not matter," he/she said.

(Actually, it does matter if someone asks you on a date.)

"Well," I said, "Can you tell me, were you born a male or a female?"

The reply: "Gender is a concept."

Being a philosophy major in college, I never considered this before. But upon contemplation, I must say: Plato might agree.

 

15,000 journalists

I was one of the 15,000 journalists covering all this news. This time, I was not one of the 42 reporters arrested/cited at the four-day event. This time, I was only detained/released by the police.

Of course liberal commentator Amy Goodman was busted. The radio host of Democracy Now! was arrested for obstruction and interference with the police.

Upon release, she cried the police were "systematically targeting journalists." That’s poppycock.

That never happened, and you won’t find any mainstream reporter who says it did. I checked with the Associated Press, St. Paul Pioneer Press and the Society of Professional Journalists.

Not one of these observers concurs with Amy’s claim. Once again her fact finding is flawed—and once again she won’t respond to my repeated calls to defend her comments. That’s brave journalism.

 

Media culpability

But lastly I will comment on a sad journalistic point: Media culpability

Most of the protesting would never have happened if the media were not present. My colleagues and I didn’t cause the melee, but we did perpetuate it—and promptly put it on the nightly news.

I saw scores of protesters waiting and posing for the camera. And there we were, obliging and photographing. Militants and media in a common goal: to make the news.

“I think in a sense we were provoking,” said John Brewer, Pioneer Press reporter.

He was assigned to report on the peace through violence around the convention and was able to question one brave rioter.

 “What good does breaking windows and causing destruction?” Brewer asked. “How does that help what you’re doing?”

And the rioter simply said: “Well, you’re out here covering it—aren’t you?”