Take Back America opinionated report

This report is more about my friends and me at the conference. At the conclusion we really felt the conference was excellent but that it had lost it's "cutting edge" and that it had been somewhat hijacked by the moderate Democrats that were running for office. While I would highly recommend others to attend future years of the conference, we felt we should have followed Howard Dean to the Yearly Kos convention in Las Vegas. That is where the true progressive were hanging out
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I have been watching the TBA convention on C-Span the last 3 years so decided that this year I was not going to miss it. It was always energizing to see Howard Dean and all the Dean supporters, and this year I was going to be one of them.

Lois, Marcia and I had emailed each other several months ago arranging the hotel and flights, all the while checking and rechecking the speaker list. Where were Bill Moyers and Howard Dean, long time staples of the conference? More presenters were added including, Hilary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi and John Kerry. We began wondering if the was really a "progressive" meeting or not. Well I still wasn't going to pass up an opportunity to be with my special crushie friends.

Just a few days ahead of time Lois received an email stating Howard Dean was having a fundraiser on Tuesday midway through the conference. Either schedulers were really poor at the DNC or something was up. We never really found out the true answer but when Marcia (as you know who is not easily intimidated) cornered the organizer of the event he stated, it was part scheduling problems part philosophical. What the heck!! No matter, we decided to be sure that we would get signed up for the DNC fundraiser.

The most encouraging part of the conference was the Apollo project. It was great to see the Democrats are working on a cohesive plan for energy independence. Another reason that the Apollo session was so great is because Robert Redford is the Apollo spokesman. Any woman over 45 understands my excitement and when he was introduced the women in the room gave him a standing ovation. As crushies, we noted Robert was wearing an open collar shirt, no tie, tan pants and socks and loafers. While he sat in the panel section he wore his glasses. When the flashes from all the cameras started, he quietly put them away in his shirt pocket and never put them back on. He was the only presenter that went to the front without a written speech. Which doesn't matter because I have no remembrance of what he said. Meanwhile Marcia moves up to the front of the stage for close up pictures.

The big event was Tuesday morning breakfast. Lois decided she would rather lie around the hotel room than see Hilary and Kerry but I have never seen Hilary before so I was up for it. There were seats for 3000 and tons of media. I know I felt some resentment that she was there and not Dean. Most people in the audience were dressed in suits or casual business attire but not the Viet Nam vets sitting behind us. When they stood up behind us holding an IMPEACH BUSH sign the bouncers told them to remove it and eventually took it away. There was a major discussion between the Vets about if they were willing to go to jail over this or not.

Before we slipped away for the DNC event with Howard Dean we ran into Jim Dean. Marcia, with her Dean radar, spotted him as we were changing escalators. Jim of course knew Marcia at once I reminded him I was with the Chicago group and he recalled I was one of the "elected officials" DFA recognized last year. He told us he was around to support Ned Lamont's fundraiser. We asked him if he knew that Howard was having a fundraiser the very same time!! He said he had no idear what Howard is up to and with all the political criticizing lately, they felt it best not to be seen together.

(Tuesday night we attended the DNC fundraiser with Howard Dean, That is another story in itself.)

On Wed. morning we again ran into Jim Dean. This time Lois was with us too. Jim said the fundraiser went well and encourage us to catch Ned Lamont in the break out session. He said he had to leave early. After he left we all commented on how he looked thinner, healthier and better. Then Lois figured it out. He no longer had his muttonchops!!!

For those that don't know him, Ned Lamont is a tall slender, dark-haired man with blue eyes. Being too new for a crushie group, there were only about five of us that surrounded him after the session. There was one man that copiously wrote down every word he was saying off the cuff. It sure smelled of Lieberman. I asked Ned if I could have a picture to send to the blog and we told him we supported him like others from all over the country. A man with a media tag was taking this all down and interviewed Lois and me. Lois was nervous about what he might write about and I said, "Oh we will probably never see it" and the next morning Maura, sure enough, found it in her local paper.

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