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The Golden Ticket

(Photo: “Politics, my dear friends, is 93% perspiration, 6% electricity, 4% evaporation, and 2% butterscotch ripple…”)

I admit it. I feel like Charlie about to have an audience with Willie Wonka. Today I got the email that thousands in this city were hoping for: my non-transferable ticket for me and a guest to attend Barack Obama’s Grant Park election night rally.

In answer to the obvious question that I’ve already been asked a dozen times, the second the Gapers Block announcement of the ticketed rally showed up in my RSS reader, I dropped everything and flew to the Obama campaign website to sign up. That’s how.

You may not believe it, but unlike all the opportunists on Craigslist, I had a hard time finding someone who wanted to come. I asked my groovy ex, Chris–who still has a terrific apartment share in Oak Park for the right roommate, maybe you?–but pastry is his thing, not politics.

(The 12 hours of Ikea hell we collectively suffered through over the weekend to make my postage-stamp apartment Thanksgiving-ready for eight people probably sealed the deal.)

In the end, my old friend, florist-extraordinaire Brian Braddy asked to go. He drove me with a cat on my lap and my stuff all the way to Chicago from New York City in 2003, so I feel this finally returns the favor.

Even though I early voted for Obama (and against that nutcase Sarah Palin) and despite being a former citizen of an over-crowded metropolis, this ex-New Yorker doesn’t care for crowds. But I do geek to once-in-a-lifetime events, and I certainly know them when I receive tickets for them.

Besides, fellow blogger Jasmine Davila will be there.  Given our usual madcap topics of conversation, that in itself is reason to show up for me.

I don’t know what the future holds for this country.  And I doubt McCain can win every single contested and leaning state, as according to the Washington Post he would need to do at this point to win. But I’m holding my breath nonetheless.

Still, as far as I’m concerned, as long as there are enough porta-potties at the rally so I don’t have to hold something else for six hours, I’m good.

Now will all the theater queens in the readership please stand and join me in a rousing chorus of One Day More…

Categories: Politics

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Mike Doyle

I’m an #OpenlyAutistic gay, Hispanic, urbanist, Disney World fan, New York native, politically independent, Jewish blogger in Chicago. I believe in social justice, big cities, and public transit. I write words and raise money for nonprofits. I’ve written this blog since 2005. And counting...

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5 replies

  1. As usual, Salm, you’re a breath of stale air. Sometimes I think you think if you’re opinion isn’t negative it’s not worth having.

    A potential President from Chicago? Where else would you hold the rally?

    Chilly November temps? have you checked the Weather Channel (or walked out your downtown front door) lately?

    Cost concerns? Are you suggesting one of America’s Presidential contenders not hold a rally? That’s just silly, and I think everyone deserves a party after the past eight years of Bushdom.

    You’ve also obviously never been to Times Square on New Year’s Eve. Speaking as a native New Yorker, let me fill you in on that particular Gotham experience: arriving 12 hours early; nowhere to sit; nowhere to eat (storefronts boarded up); nowhere to pee (if you can’t aim into a bottle, once you leave your holding pen to empty your bladder you’re not allowed back in); and 15 degrees Fahrenheit.

    I’m also absolutely certain you received a “thank you” for all the wonderful work you did on the Obama campaign, considering the number of warm and fuzzy emails I’ve received for simply downloading the campaign’s iPhone app.

    If you have a point here, I can’t find it. My take on your comment however is this:

    Your favored candidate, for whom you did alot of politicking, is having a party which you had an opportunity to attend through a friend with a ticket but turned down because you were irked that after all your work you didn’t get thanked by being sent a rally ticket, and now you’re pissy.

    Considering the 70,000 of us equally Obama-supporting ticketholders who listened to the news, followed directions, and registered in a timely fashion on the campaign website in order to get those tickets, that’s quite a sense of entitlement you’ve got there.

  2. If this multi-million dollar rally is the Democratic Party of Illinois/Citizens for Barack Obama/City of Chicago/State of Illinois’s way of showing the country fiscal restraint and common sense, it’s not a great way to kick-off what I think will be a much narrower Obama victory than pundits are expecting. Standing around for five hours in chilly November temps paying carnival concession prices for hotdogs and soft drinks sounds about as inviting as a five-hour, mid-January O’Hare delay. A New Year’s Eve in New York’s Times Square this is not.

    My friend Paul received a “golden ticket,” though unlike Charlie, he didn’t have to eat a chocolate bar. Nor did he give Obama’s campaign $300 like I did back in January when I had a job and could easily afford it. Nor did he sign-up on barackobama.com, blog a few entries on their website, join a couple of special interest groups (including Jews for Obama…oy!), make a few phone calls, risk violating his apartment lease by putting Obama signs in his windows, travel to Indianapolis and volunteer in Indiana campaign headquarters for six hours before their Primary Election, leave dozens of Spanish language campaign brochures in his Indianapolis hotel room for the housekeeping staff to read, nor did he buy $50 worth of Obama stuff from the campaign website. Sadly, I received no golden ticket. Democracy is a wonderful thing. Receiving some kind of a simple “thank you” is too.

    So everyone enjoy the rally. Paul decided that inviting me, his “ticketless” best friend over to enjoy a scrumptious buffet of food in warm comfort and watch the returns in a Lakeview highrise will be the best party in town.

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