Blog For Arizona

Edwards Rally

The Edwards Rally in Tucson at the TCC Arena was awesome. There were probably between 8 and 10 thousand people all told, though at least 1 thousand were turned away for lack of space.

Gov. Janet Napolitano and Rep. Raul Grijalva accompanied John and spoke before him. Pima County Supervisor Richard Elias served as master of ceremonies, and Eva Bacal (running against Kolbe for CD8), Nina Trasoff, and Mark Manoil (both running for Corporation Commission) were on hand to promote their races. Nina and Mark asked rally-goers to vote only for them, even though they can choose three candidates on the ballot. Clark, the third Democrat was was running for CC dropped out just after the ballots were printed for the primary.

Edwards was spot on. He took Bush's case for election apart at the joints and laid out the KE04 vision for America to a perfect rhythm of applause and cheers. The man is a skilled orator, and works a crowd with great facility. I had never seen him in a large group before, only in a personal campaigning setting in which he is, if anything, even better.

As expected, a group of Bush supporters had infiltrated the rally. I predicted that they would attempt to shout John down once he started his speech with "four more years", and indeed, that is exactly what occured. The woman sitting next to me, started a counter-chant of "two more months" which was quickly taken up by the entire arena. I was pleased the the crowd itself seemed to squeeze the Bushies right out of the arena. Too often Bushholes have been tolerated inside a rally and allowed to continue their disruption. We're learning.

After the rally ended, I watched John work the crowd for almost 20 minutes as the arena emptied. He shook hundreds of hands, signed dozens of signatures, and literally climbed the rails enclosing the arena floor to greet supporters. The man obviously a natural politician and loves what he does. That might just make the difference. His campaigning ability is easily superior to Kerry's. I suspect that Edwards may become even more of a draw than Kerry himself over the coming weeks.

Once KE04 takes the Presidency, I think Edwards is going to take an unprecedentedly strong role in the communication and political strategy of the Administration. He will be a powerful field asset for the Administration; he can easily do townhalls and midterm campaigning for Democrats with as much authority and skill as Kerry himself.

John-John's partnership is likely to be even stronger and more public than Clinton-Gore's. The Presidency has become not only too much of a job for one man, the VP is tending toward a President in waiting who has 8 years to campaign for the Presidency. We learned in 2000 how important it is that the public have a full sense of what sort of man the VP is long before the 7th year of the President's term. It is time for a good 16 year dynasty of Democratic control of the Whitehouse, and I'm beging to believe that this ticket might deliver that.

posted by Michael Bryan @ 9/14/2004 01:15:00 AM