The Buena Vista Democratic Committee's breakfast broke attendance records. We didn't go to the breakfast, but did catch the tail end of Mark Warner's speech which was excellent. The speakers ran over and so we barely had time to get back over to the start of the parade. They were blocking off streets with cones by then, and there wasn't even time to blow up balloons.
Though Jim Webb could not attend because he was taking his son down to Lejeune, there were many Webb supporters in the parade, and many more along the route.
We finally met Mary Lee and Andy Cerillo from Fairfax, and Martha who comments here from time to time was there leading the cheers along with several other Lynchburg Dems. I understand that Shannon Valentine was in the crowd, but didn't walk in the parade. Mary Lee got many excellent shots and I hope she shares them.
Bringing up the rear of the Webb contingent are Nelson Dems Gordon Koerner (center) and Board of Supervisors member Connie Brennan (on the left with the purple umbrella). On horseback you can see George Allen. I am pretty sure that the white truck in the back is the same one that had Iowa plates at the shad planking.
Along the parade route several people shouted out macaca to George Allen as he rode by. One man had promised his teenager that he would not say it. So, he yelled out, "I promised my daughter I wouldn't say it!"
"What?" said George Allen, confused. I don't think he heard the guy.
"I promised her I wouldn't say that word!" the man responded.
I found it uncomfortable, but the more I thought about it, that's ok. These are ordinary people speaking up in the only way they know how, simply and directly.
Here's a better photo of Connie, this time with Mark Warner. He along with Tim Kaine and Creigh Deeds ran most of the parade route, shaking hands and talking with people.
"Vote yes" people were enmeshed with Allen supporters, and there were also "Vote no" supporters handing out literature. We ran into Mel White from Soulforce who had become separated from the rest of his group. Not to worry, Mel. A friend of mine on the sidelines received "Vote no" lit. I understand that the current spin for "vote yes" is that it's all about preventing bigamy.
At one point on the parade a man asked me to help him fix his daughter's balloon. So that's what we did.
And that balloon earned him a handshake. All his daughter got at that point was a string in her face. But she really loved having her picture taken so she ignored both the balloon string and Mark Warner.
When the parade was over, we saw a Webb supporter in a donkey suit being pulled in a wagon. He reached his hand out but didn't say anything. We thought he was passing out or something and finally figured out he wanted to get out of the wagon but he was stuck. As soon as we pulled him out, he pulled off the head of his costume and he was dripping wet with sweat. It is a wonder he didn't pass out!
We arrived at our destination and Tim Kaine gave an excellent speech in support of Jim Webb. Creigh Deeds spoke briefly since he was heading out to Covington. The audience was dominated by Allen shirts, that's for sure. But considering that Webb wasn't even there, we had an excellent turn out and a few good Webb chants going on there.
Then we came home and Gordon and I drilled two post holes for a large Al Weed sign we are going to put up.
I apologize to everyone whose photo I did not include. Many were fuzzy and did not turn out very well.
t's been a month since Allen was accused of yelling an ethnic slur at one of his opponents aids.
But you could still hear an occasional "macaca" from the crowd, Forcing Allen to respond once again.
"The Webb people are gonna be derogatory like that and I'm going to keep my poise and as far as I'm concerned the people of Virginia want to hear ideas about moving Virginia and America forward and thats what I've done in the past," says George Allen.
Although there were a ton of Allen signs, I must say coming into Buena Vista on Route 60 this morning it was covered with Webb signs. Unfortunately the Allen people took down
our Webb signs we'd put up yesterday afternoon. That's OK
we had a ton of support and people driving by giving us the thumbs up. We had dinner last night in Lexington and met
a ton of people at the restaurant who are all voting for
Webb.
Allen's speech was the same old same old, tired phrases and the rubber stamp for Bush. The crowd groaned when he talked about how bipartisan he is....especially when he was referring how he crosses the aisle to Lieberman. The most applause he got was in regard to the same old same old
issues they've used to divide our country.
Andy met several Vietnam veterans who are all like-minded and wondered where on earth Allen was when they were over there fighting for their country. Was it a dude ranch?
It was well worth the long trip down and back, even in the
rain.
What made this event unusual was the huge turnout of Allen machinery. More signs, people giving out stickers and balloons. Well, literally machinery. For a hay ride vehicle they had a semi with a gargantuan flatbed. And they had an elephant float. On the route, Kaine and Warner definitely appeared to be better received than Allen.
While there weren't that many marchers with Allen, he had a stronger presence because of all of the stuff. The pace was so slow he certainly didn't lose anyone along the route. From what I saw, we had more actual marchers, but because Kaine and Warner were all over the place back and forth and vehicles were involved, we were not in one orderly chunk.
The audience at the speeches did not seem very spontaneous; they applauded on cue, even for Lieberman. But my perspective may be skewed because we were so ad hoc.
I live in Lexington -- "next town over from BV -- and had been planning to attend, ever since I heard Jim was coming. Even when I heard that he wasn't coming afterall, I was still going to go and swell the ranks. But then I had an overnight family guest, who at first said she was going to join me, then began to have second thoughts, on hearing Webb wasn't going to be there (she lives in Charlottesville, so is more likely to have other chances). And really backpedalled strongly, when she heard I planned on taking a bunch of bananas as a gift for our beloved (not!) Senator Macaca; she's in her late 60ties, and has "but so much" tolerance for crazy Polacks and their sense of humour. Especially if those same Polacks ought to know better, being in the matronly age bracket themselves :)
And then, as I was getting ready to leave *anyway*, it started to rain... On my parade (I think that's the correct English term?). I decided it was "karma", and Jim would probably be as happy with my check as with my scrawny self in the parade, so I didn't go. Spent the time watching the You-Tube tapes from the kick-off instead. But I'm glad to have seen the pics from BV as well.
For those asking about the general breakdown around here... It's really freaky. Lexington (city. City!? 45hundred when neither of the two colleges is in season
Rural Virginia can surprise you (well, it still surprises me, after 33 yrs
Please, don't give up on us in the redneck country; we need Jim's help on getting us out of this multi-layered s***t pile, composed of Iraq, lack of health-care, split economy (tax cuts for the rich, benefit cuts for the poor),the "burning" of Constitution and all its promises, war on science and education etc, etc, et bloody caetera.
Buena Vista parade was fun. The Lyncburg group brought about 10 plus people some walking, others on the sidelines.
Shannon Valentine ( 23rd House of delegates) was there with her beautiful children! The man w/ the blonde child in Kathy's pics is working hard to defeat Ballot Amendment # 1 and also is a member of the local Americans United chapter.
Our Chair, John lawrence and our past Chair, Bo Driskill along w/ other activists all attended.We were loud!
Lynchburg does battle daily w/ the religious right and Jerry Falwell. We are HERE, in Lynchburg, proving that there is more to this beautiful, historic city than Jerry, LU and knuckle dragging right wingers!
Well, Allen does have more money, and may he spend it all as soon as possible :)
I was at the Community Festival here (Lexingon) last Saturday (26.VIII) and the Republican and the Democratic booths weren't all that far apart. Allen had a bigger booth and a better -- corner -- location. And they had -- I think -- more "stuff" to give away (our booth, for example, didn't have the "normal" size of bumper stickers only the mini ones, ca 3x6").
But, after I'd spent some time at both booths ("know thy enemy" is something I learnt back in commie Poland
"Here goes a woman who's gonna vote against her best interests" said my friend. But I recognised the woman... She'd stopped by the Webb booth also, got a cookie for each of the children and pasted the Webb mini-bumpersticker on the back of the hood of the stroller. Equal opportunity hand-outs, and it's stil 50-50 how she'll vote, if at all.
People *like* freebies and I nearly gave a heart atack to the folk who were manning the Cingular booth and who offeredd me another fan (Cingular logo-shaped) to match the Dem-donkey one I was carrying, when I said "no, thank you; I have a contract with Verizon"
So I'm not too worried about there being more Allen than Webb T-shirts; per chance, Allen was giving them away, while you had to buy Webb's :)
Not too much good here for Felix. He loses control of his mount and the voter interviews don't appear to be drinking the GOP koolaid (they are worried about jobs and Felix's close ties to dubya)... It seems that these voters are going to give Webb a good long look (and I think we can all agree that they will like what they find).
The video closes with the Felix's horse (in a low shot, just the legs) passing a bank of Webb signs...