Politics

Apparently, I'm not a politician -- except, perhaps, at the breakfast table. The Politician of the Breakfast Table.

Last night, I attended a dinner at a local facility for the country Democratic organization. I've never been to one before. I keep saying that I'd like to do something to support the party I believe in, but I haven't so far, as it's not convenient for this reason or that. So, when the invitation came, I thought: what the heck. It's something. Well, as it turns out, I was right about that, though not for the reason I would have suspected.

There were about a hundred fifty people there; roughly a third were older than me, and roughly two thirds about my age. Very few were less. Several politicians were there, including the state's lieutenant governor, a newly elected Congressman from a neighboring city, a country commissioner, and two people who intend to run for office. The first three gave speeches, as well as a couple of officials from the Democratic organization.

The first was - odd. The speech was halting, wandering, as if the person had been drinking and then abruptly informed that they had to give a speech. The content was, pretty much, that we had to turn the precinct, county, city, and state Blue, because the evil Republicans had nasty plans for all of us, including reapportioning the state a la Tom Delay. We had to get out the vote, get out the vote, get out the vote. This was repeated multiple times. After a while, the speaker staggered off, and the freshman Congressman leapt up. His content: he used to be a Republican, but he switched, and you know what? He likes being one of those wacky Democrats who actually cares about people, who makes life better for the common folk. He said this several times, with great vigor. Apparently, his speech coach told him to always keep sentences, sentences short and repeat them, repeat them, because that's what he did, did. The final speaker was the country commissioner, who was concise and lucid; by comparison to the others, he was a paragon of the speech-making ability. He, too, referred to the Republicans in terms that sounded almost like a mockery ('I told my esteemed Republican colleagues that if they acted to transfer that nursing home to the private sector, I would personally lead protests on their front lawn'). He nodded approvingly toward staff from the nursing home who were seated at a corner table, asking two to rise for general applause. (Which, I admit, I thought was kind of nice.)

Okay, I know its not all West Wing. And I know that Pennsylvania party politics is vicious and intense. But I didn't expect this. Some of it, sure. But I thought there would be at least a little thoughtful evaluations of the political landscape, comments about leading issues, discussion about what works and what doesn't.

I must be more naive than I thought.