If he has horns, he hid them well

Erratum

 

Cousin Shane rightly noted that "Spooky" is by the Classics IV. The lyrics I founded listed Santana in there somewhere, so they may have done a version at some point. Thanks for the correction, Shane!

 

Now to our Rovian adventure this evening. (Not everyone can say their name has become an adjective. I'd love to see the word "Bethian" catch on, but I'm not sure what it would mean.) The event was held at the Mendel Center at Lake Michigan College in Benton Harbor, Michigan. We got there pretty much on time, and the place was PACKED! We had kind of a hard time finding a place to sit, but finally found a spot. Turned out to be by John Proos (pronounced prose), a local Congressman in the state of Michigan. Ken has met him before at the nuclear plant, and he recognized Ken. He was really a nice, personable guy, and Ken told me later that he's a very good friend to AEP and the plant, as well as the "heir apparent" to Fred Upton's Congressional seat in Washington. So that was kind of cool!

 

As for the dinner...let's just say I'm glad I hadn't eaten all day and was really hungry, because otherwise I might not have been able to eat it! It was kind of barfy, but it was food.

 

This was sponsored by the Economic Club of Southwest Michigan, but seemed more like I was at the Republican National Convention! I felt like I had a neon sign over my head saying, "She likes Obama! GET HER!" Ha ha. No, it wasn't that bad, but it was definitely a Republican crowd. (There were people out front holding Obama signs as we drove up, but everyone was happy and peaceable. I gave 'em a thumbs up and waved as we drove by.) When Rove came out, there were some people that actually gave him a standing ovation--not everyone, and Ken and I stayed seated, but I started to wonder how I was going to get through the next hour or so.

 

I was pleasantly surprised to find out that he's actually a pretty good speaker, and the topic was this year's election. As you know, I'm a tiny bit interested in it, so I thought he gave a pretty good speech. Obviously, he put right wing spin on almost everything, and a lot of the polls and statistics I thought were questionable, but hey, he's Karl Rove. Ken and I agreed that all in all, considering who he is, he was fairly objective, and I managed to keep my head from exploding. A very good thing!

 

A few things that I found of particular interest. He did say early on that this election is about Barack Obama. The circumstances of timing (8 years of a Republican president and an economy in dire straits) should favor a Democrat victory. He feels that Obama's lead isn't greater because a lot of people are still unsure of him, and haven't placed their full trust in him, and that is Obama's task in the coming weeks. He said that the debates will be really important this year (first one is this Friday night on CNN--be there or be square!).

 

Someone today sent me an email that the rumor on the Net was that Biden was going to drop out of the race, and be replaced by Hillary. I took it with a grain of salt, but figured I'd keep my ears open. Someone actually asked Rove that question tonight, wondering what was the chance of Biden dropping out? In a word, "Zero." He went on to say that you have to be really careful about what you believe from the Net, that there's a lot of misinformation and lies out there, including that McCain is the father of an illegitimate child (they adopted her from Bangladesh) and that Obama is a secret Muslim. Rove said, "And he is NOT." Even Karl Rove is telling people it's a ridiculous lie, so can we please put that one to rest once and for all?

 

And finally, someone asked a question I was wondering about...to what extent is race playing a factor here? (Asked by a black woman.) He said frankly that there are bigots out there that won't vote for Obama because he's black--and I think he's right about that--but thinks that the majority of Americans are smarter than that. He went on to say that he thinks this is really an amazing election, and we're either going to have an African-American president or a female vice-president, and that's exciting stuff. (I agree with the former part of that, not the latter!)

 

So we actually enjoyed ourselves! Although I did give a little chuckle at one point, and had to put my hand over my mouth! Someone asked Rove about his comment a couple of weeks ago that "McCain has mellowed." Ha ha! I couldn't help it...it just slipped out. I think I did well, and managed to not embarrass myself OR Ken. Although he might have a different take on it!

 

 

Tags: John Proos, Lake Michigan College, Mendel Center, Karl Rove, Barack Obama, John McCain, presidential election