TWIN CITIES, MN, Day Two RNC-Our stop at Golden’s Deli in downtown St. Paul marked a rare pre-planned event for our RNC stint. We joined a number of different progressive and labor leaders for a press conference inside the deli this morning. We were joined by Elliot Siede from AFSCME who spoke about what the Bush legacy has meant locally. My favorite part of his speech was when he mentioned the the infamous comment made by Bush ally Grover Norquist about wanting to skrink government so small that you could drown it in a bathtub. Elliot retorts, “People drowned all right. They drowned in Katrina and they drowned when the I-35 bridge collapsed here in Minnesota.” Steve Hunter from the AFL-CIO spoke off the cuff about some of the problems that he see with the conservative legacy and what it has meant for American workers.Golden’s Deli was incredibly supportive of the bus and have opened up their business for all of the progressive efforts going on during the DNC. The deli was full of bloggers on their computers and progressives from a multitude of organizations, planning events, networking and charging up with necessary caffeine.Most of the afternoon we rolled around St. Paul doing visibility with the bus. We had great responses overall. Needless to say, some of the delegates were not big fans of the bus. We received some obscene gestures from the “family values” party. Despite the large protests, the city appears to be pretty dead. There is nowhere close to the level of excitement as there was in Denver. The Republicans did such a good job making sure that no one could get anywhere near the convention festivities that you would never know there is a convention going on here.Due to some parking issues we needed to move the bus from the supporter housing we were staying to a hotel in Bloomington just outside the city. As we were unloading and ready to check into the hotel about 8-10 Bloomington police came over to find out what the bus was doing and make sure we were not up to no good. The police were very nice and we invited them on the bus to see the museum and reassure them that we were not harboring 45 protesters in the back. One of the police commented on the way out that he had voted for Bush but regretted it. He said that the bus was something that everyone should see and that it left a strong impact because it is, “just the facts.”Later in the evening we attended the funniest event of the convention so far. We were lucky enough to drop in of the Support Our Oil Companies party. The party was outside of a “legitimate” party hosted by Mississippi Governor Haley “Offshore Drilling” Barbour and the American Petroleum Institute, big oil’s lobbying firm. The mock party celebrated big oil executives and their political allies like McCain, Palin, Cheney, and MN Senator Norm Coleman. The protesters work their finest party attire complete with oversized masks of the likenesses of the aforementioned big oil beneficiaries. Fake money was strewn about that said “Separate Oil and State” with a picture of the Capitol surrounded by oil rigs where E Plubis Unin usually goes. There satirical chants almost sounded too literal given the current administration: “We love oil, we love war, we love McCain even more.”
“Down with people, up with profits!”
“More wars, less jobs!” and the simple
“Drill! Drill! Drill! Drill! Drill!" A character in a polar bear suit was mockingly kicked and beaten (especially by Sarah Palin) while the crowd screamed, “Sink or swim, sink or swim!” We drove the bus by a few times for the some visibility. The idea of the Bush “Legacy” bus as a tribute to the failures of the administration fit in well with the tongue-in-cheek nature of the protest. We normally refrain from the satirical with the bus but the ambiguity of the term legacy as we utilize it, was perfect. After the event several of the members of the press that were filming the protest hopped on the bus for a tour. We eventually pulled into a nearby neighborhood in St. Paul that was somewhat untouched by the convention. Some locals came on and were relieved to see the bus in the midst of the RNC. They said they almost did not come on because they saw the words Bush on the side but were glad that they did.
