August 24, 2003
On the Road Between Boise and Portland With Dean
Byline natasha
Ah, travel adventures. My ancient laptop battery gave up the ghost in Boise, so I had to borrow someoene else's computer & didn't get to write as much about the trip as I wanted to.
On the way to Boise, the governor spent about 40 minutes with the press, but heading to Portland there was only time for a staff meeting up front. There's always work going on up front on the Grassroots Express. This scenery is hard to ignore. The green view out the window in Wisconsin and the mountains heading into Boise were beautiful. Though the view heading back to the Northwest was my favorite (yes, I'm prejudiced), we got a great eyeful of Mt. Hood, with Rainier and Adams off in the distance. The weather has been sunny and wonderful today, so it definitely helps with the sightseeing.
The volunteers have been talking and having a great time along the way. In between catchind a few winks now and then. Everyone was up late last night and got up early this morning. A couple folks said they were too wound up to sleep last night.
Fran Egbers, a volunteer from New Hampshire, told us about an experience with the campaign about a month ago at the American Legion in Salem, NH.
"During Q&A a veteran of WWII who was passionately against the war in Iraq asked the governor, 'Will you be the first one to stand up and tell the parents of those slain soldiers how senseless it was.'
"And the governor looked straight at him and said 'No sir. I will not, and I'll tell you why. I would never exploit or intrude on the grief of anyone.'"
Fran said that what impressed her was not only the governor's statement. It was that he'd been willing to tell this gentleman something that he didn't really want to hear.
When we got on the ground in Portland, the staff grew cellphone attachments. In between keeping in touch with campaign volunteers and making sure there are Internet connections available, they're pretty busy. We learned pretty quickly that the Seattle fundraiser has sold out all 600 vacancies. So anyone who hasn't registered won't be able to see Governor Dean until the rally afterwards.
The Dean volunteers speaking to the press here are very concerned about the high unemployment rate. The fact that the Bush administration hired overseas telemarketers to do their campaign calling was particularly galling to one volunteer.
That's all for now, don't want to miss the rally.
[Editor: I met up with Natasha at the Portland rally and offered to put her posts up on the site so she could continue on to the Seattle rally. ]
x-posted on Blog for America
Posted by Mary at August 24, 2003 08:08 PM | TrackBackThank you, Mary. You were a lifesaver today, I was so glad to see you there. I wouldn't have got anything at all written without your efforts to find a system to mail my scribblings from.
Posted by: natasha on August 25, 2003 03:08 AM