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Unconventional, Day Five: All’s Hell That Ends Well

By Chris Fara1

This week has been a lesson in freedom and protest, in politics and propaganda. Reporters have consumed a lot of John and John, pepperoni and plain, Molson and Bud. Together we’ve piled onto buses and trains, from caucuses to crackhouses, and we’ve complained every inch of the ride. The past five days have brought out more celebrities than Betty Ford, and enough booze for the Cirrhosis National Convention. In retrospect, I couldn’t be happier with the way it turned out. Me Three’s been Bar Mitzvah’d, with well earned due credit and a fan base that’s sure to grow like I have through this remarkable experience. I spent most of my last day reflecting from within the Fleet Center, which was a good idea since hundreds of hollering flag burners were getting thrown in paddy wagons outside.

The potential riots were as disappointing as screeching tires without the climax of a collision. On one side there were the same characters who have been organized in anarchy all week, and on the other there were members of Boston’s most ignorant sect. Cops aren’t pigs, they’re sheep, and they’re ready to bah at the command of a megaphone. Some were too dumb to correctly affix their riot gear, and others were just too fat to get the vests over their guts. Physical and mental shortcomings aside, each and every one sweated out more bullets under their Kevlar than the Nader supporters would have ever fired at them. I can’t help but feel bad for the poor rookie schmucks who serve as waterboys to the storm troopers.

Not much else happened for me outside the Fleet today. In minor news, I reluctantly dished out five bucks to a DNC volunteer. It was a trade for some information on an exclusive event, but the disillusioned young woman pointed me in the wrong direction. Never known as an American-Indian giver in the past, I wasn’t about to take back my Lincoln, but it feels good to have an outlet in which I can retract the gesture. The Democratic National Committee needs my pocket sauce like the RNC needs my paycheck, which is to say that I’ve urinated in rivers and had a more profound influence.

On my last day I finally cruised over to the “Blogger’s Boulevard” and parked my laptop alongside the play-by-play posse. Say what you want about this eclectic bunch (I know I have), but they’ve kidnapped the big headlines all week long. While their press appeal is the result of a lackluster floorshow, they have still had a bigger impact than anyone behind the podium. Thanks to the kind folks at command-post.org, I got tipped off to the secret rabble rousing rafters. Sure my Macintosh didn’t get wireless service up there, which brings up another type of discrimination, but I kicked in the door and made it through the barrier between Me Three and them. Their hard work has even gotten some of them access to the RNC in New York, where they were hand picked depending on whether or not they have partisan leanings. Guess whose skull you won’t be cleaning off the roof of Madison Square Garden any time soon.

After leaving the cheap seats in the tool shed on the seventh floor, it was time to fantasize from where the big boys play. This paragraph is being written from where The Nation and The New Yorker set up shop, or at least where they’re supposed to be hanging. For the first three nights these box seats have been empty, and the starving artists have feasted our eyes on this delicious section from the press projects up top. If the highly credentialed reporters aren’t filling their chairs at the year’s grandest political event, then should they really be the highly credentialed press? While the bloggers and muckrakers sweat it out in every nook and corner with a wireless signal, the well-paid penmen are in luxury suites tapping their manicured fingers in front of twenty-inch flat screens. Can’t wait to join them one day. On a funny chord, these two stellar publications have been placed next to People Magazine down here on the convention floor, which proves that at least some people at the press gallery have a good sense of humor. This may not be where I’m supposed to sit quite yet, but I felt it was my intellectual duty to highbrow the rag’s representative anyway.

Sitting down here makes me wonder if the thousands of signs that are hoisted within the convention hall boggle sensible people watching this on television. It’s completely illogical for a band of brothers and sisters, who are already knee-deep in confetti and bullshit, to invite in another obstacle, particularly one with such sharp edges and that block the spectators behind them. When my grandmother heard I was coming here she had the typical nightly news catalyzed fears of terrorism, but now she’s more concerned about me poking an eye out.

If you’ve been reading anything beside Me Three this week, then chances are you were wasting your time and your company’s money. Sure you may be bored in that cubicle, but it’s no excuse to get mangled by the same ball and chain every day. The traditional reporting is about what happens on the floor, which is only exciting if you’re shouldering up to sweaty delegates from the Midwest. The editorials all sound the same, with plenty of raves and rants about the lack of substance. If you were wondering about why the world of opinion and news never collide, it’s because they simply don’t mix. No wordworthy polemicist would ever seriously write, “John Kerry and John Edwards will unite all Americans.” As slaves to some sort of perceived truth, most of us know that’s a bigger lie than WMD’s in Iraq. In four years, regardless of who becomes the pres and vice, I’ll still be the one feeding the bums outside the Fleet Center. Until presidential politicians start telling the truth, and respond to reality rather than stats and advisors, I’ll be behind this keyboard throwing paragraphs at them. Judging by the lucidity of almost every line and quote, gesture and speech, at DNC 2004, it doesn’t seem like that will be happening any millennium soon. Still, thanks for letting me be the one to machete through the jargon and cut you a fat piece of the truth all week. I hope it was tasty, because it was sure as hell was fun to be in the kitchen.

Chris FARA1 is a writer living in New York City.  He can be reached at fara1andonly@netscape.net.

© 2004 Me Three