Posted on 09/04/2004 1:13:51 PM PDT by Hillary's Lovely Legs
Greetings from a delegate to the GOP convention in New York.
I had a busy week. And I am so glad to be home. I need the next three days to recover from the last 5.
This was an incredibly successful convention, and my hats off to the people of New York and all of their public safety workers. The police were everywhere and just terrific.
Here is my diary and observations:
I arrived at my hotel on Sunday afternoon. My hotel held the delegations of Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania and Michigan. We had to show ID to get into the hotel. Security was tight.
Sunday night I went on a cruise for my delegation on a yacht that sailed around the southern end of Manhattan, Statue of Liberty, and Staten Island. The food was great, the weather was fantastic, and everyone had a fantastic time. Some drank too much, but the booze was free.
Here is a photo of the Statue of Liberty on my cameraphone from the boat.
On Monday I had to give a speech to the Republican Women of Congress. It was there that I met Rick Lazio. I went up to him and told him what I did to Hillary last summer at her book signing. He laughed, put his arm around me and said “ You are my new best friend” and asked me to sit with him at lunch. He and I had a great time and had our picture taken together. He gave me his card and some wealthy donor contacts in Michigan, and we will be speaking on Tuesday about a campaign and fundraising strategy.
I have a great speach, I am pretty proud of it. It had the audience rolling with laughter. Too many speeches were boring and I wanted to shake things up.
After the luncheon I had my photo taken with other congresspeople, one of which was Katherine Harris.
My photos are being processed, with the holiday weekend it will be a couple of days before I am able to publish them.
After the luncheon I went to the W Stands for Woman meeting at the Waldorf.
It was another fantastic event with the twins, Barbara Bush, Doro Bush, the female cabinet members, and Angie Harmon, who is beyond gorgeous. After the speeches by the Bushes I went to a meeting of Iraqi and Afghan women who were liberated by our country. It was very moving to hear their stories. We must fight tyranny, fight terrorism, and liberate the oppressed.
I then went to a party at Mickey Mantel’s Sport’s Bar and got a baseball signed by former Tiger announcer Ernie Harwell. Then on to the convention.
Security was very tight. Protestors everywhere. All the streets were closed off for our buses. When we got close to the Garden we had to go through a checkpoint that was like going through a communist checkpoint. They looked under the buses with mirrors and we were stopped about every 100 feet.
When we got to the Garden we were in a huge crowd. It took me over an hour and a half to get to my seat. I arrived at 9:00, just as Ron Silver had entered the stage. I thought that his speech was magnificent. He was one of my top 3 speeches.
Ron Silver
I left early to go to another party, the private Travis Tritt Concert. It was sponsored by General Motors and they had all sorts of cool concept cars. They also had a 67 GTO that all the men were wild for. I even had some old guy tell me all bout the back seat. Don’t ask.
The concert started and I was eventually pushed right up against the stage. Here is a photo with my cameraphone.. I will have better photos later with my camera.
Near the end of the concert the drummers drumstick flew out of his hand and hit me in the head. I kept the drumstick and the drummer and Travis Tritt autographed it for me.
Here is the drumstick
After the party I met up with some friends who want to play cards on a boat. We were on the boat, and around 3am it started moving. I asked where we were going and they said that we were going out to watch the sunrise. No sleep for me that night.
Tuesday was another busy day of parties and convention. I think that Tuesday was Arnold Schwarzenegger’s speech. It was amazing. Another of my top 3. I was also interviewed by Japanese Television and Triumph the Insulting dog that night.
Picture of Arnold
Wednesday was shopping in Chinatown and off to see some diamond designers. Have I mentioned that I love New York.
Wednesday I missed the bus and had to take a cab with a couple other delegates. The cab had to drop us off 10 blocks from the Garden.We were told to hide our credentials so we wouldn’t be harassed on the street. I put mine under my sweater.
I was suffering from a terrible upper respiratory infection and was unable to talk or breathe. I told my other passengers that I was unable to walk quickly due to my lack of breath. They walked very quickly and left me at a stoplight. They were now a block and a half away and I had to walk by myself. I made it past several protestor but I did pretty well not getting harassed.
Then I walked past a man in a suit. He was late 20's early 30's. He saw me alone after running the gauntlet of some smelly protestors and said “ Hey, I support Bush, I am one of you”. So I said “ oh it’s so nice to see a friendly face, thank you”. He then gave me some literature that said “Support Bush”. When I started to read it I realized that it was all against Bush and I said “ Hey, this is anti-Bush. If you are going to be a protestor just be honest and tell me. I would respect you more. You didn’t have to lie to me.”
It was then that he gave me a bum rush and slammed me into a building. He then started swearing at me. That’s what the protestors do, they start swearing and calling us blank-suckers. Nice, huh?
I was unable to breathe so I just started coughing on him to try to speak. A passerby saw the situation and pulled the guy off of me and gave me a bottle of water. The cops were there in seconds and grabbed the protestor and escorted me into the Garden and to my seat.
Wednesday was the night of Zell Miller. Wow, wasn’t that amazing!!! It’s also the night that I met Don King. We had our photo taken together and he endorsed my campaign. I thought that it was pretty funny. I can’t wait to see that picture.
Tribute to Reagan
After the convention was the big party thrown by John McCain. Unfortunately our cab driver took to Times Square which was crawling with protestors and told us to walk a block west. After a couple of blocks of walking I noticed that the addresses were wrong and spoke to some cops. We were actually going the wrong way and needed to go about 9 blocks east. I wish I had that cabbie number. I would give his company a piece of my mind.
The McCain party was fabulous. Darrell Hannah and Joe Piscipo was there. I was able to meet McCain, Guilianni and Henry Kissinger. The food was the best of the convention.
Thursday morning all hell broke loose. A congressman heard about me being attacked and told my state chairman. Next thing I know the RNC Communications director is at my breakfast table and wanted to talk to me. Since I am a federal candidate and my nametag was visable, the attack on me in now a federal offence. The RNC wanted to publicize the dirty tricks that the protestors were up to and that they attacked a federal candidate and lone woman on the street.
Thursday the protestors were doing an all out attack. The buses were being stopped and the streets were lined with scumbags giving us the finger, foul signs, and screaming obscenities. It took forever to get into the Garden again.
The evening was great and the president hit it out of the park. I met Stephen Baldwin that night and had my picture taken with him. I also took photos of Carl Rove, Ken Melman, and David Gregory.
What was pretty scary was that a woman in my delegation was offered $10,000 for her credential by a man in New Jersey. The idiot was going to write her a check. The Secret Service and FBI took away my friend for questioning and she was really shaken up.
During my trip I made a point of shaking every police officer’s hand and telling them how safe I felt and how much we appreciate them. They ALL, yes ALL said that they were voting for Bush.
When I was in the diamond district I spoke to Jewish jewelers. They are ALL voting for Bush.
There is huge Bush support. We did it right, we stressed the importance of the war on terror and did not ignore that we were attacked.
9-11 should be in the front of our minds. We lost our fellow Americans. Let us never forget.
FYI
In my book, your gig there ("Who's that on the cover of the book?") ranks among the very top strata of Uber Freeps...
5.56mm
If you have a chance please PING me when you post the other pictures.
I am very PROUD to be associated with FReepers like YOU!
Great report C.
However I must say that I am gravely disappointed that you didn't mention one of the highlights of your convention was meeting Iowa Granny.
I can't see your pictures...:( ...and I don't know why not!
A page from our district was roughed up by the Aids protestors. He's the nicest kid -- sophomore at Marquette U and son of a Lutheran minister -- and doesn't desrve to be hit in the face. Luckily he's OK, but they drew blood on him. He got to sit in one of teh boxes with the dignitaries the night it happened for a little consolation.
Well, some baddies did get in. They hustled two people out of Bush's acceptance speech, and my young friend was hit in the face by the aids protesters -- that was inside, as I understand it!
Great report. How many people were at the McCain party? Did he invite the whole convention?
Congrats on a great effort - sorry to hear about your run-in with the (*%&%$#$ protester.
I'd like to know where you got that figure. Seems THAT would be a great thing to publicize.
I got it from Fox News on Friday morning before I left New York. I know I dropped over a grand and I was not going out and splurging by any means.
We attend a particular convention that lasts almost a whole week on a yearly basis and spend that much easily. Conventions are big business, but this amount of GOP spending was pretty much unreported, except for that source. I heard it nowhere else.
Thanks for the pics! They are AWESOME. But I think you should see a doctor about that black mark thing.
Nice pics, but who is the lovely lady who is trying to remain incognito? The smile is pretty.
That's ME! :P
May I borrow your gorgeous red hair?
Pretty please?
Oh my goodness...
My friend Tamsey got to be THAT CLOSE to her just
last week!!!!
Ooooo...I'm green!
I bet Lady Laura would like to borrow your luscious locks, too!
How did you get so lucky?
Hey, thanks for the ping!
I saw this thread when Hillary's Lovely Legs first posted it and never got to these the BEST PICS :-)
Heavens, she is pretty... Laura Bush, too :-)
I'm jealous of her gorgeous red hair myself - brown hair is the dullest thing on the planet and I'm too chicken to play with it LOL
I wasn't quite that close to Laura, but being just a few feet away from her and Dubya was certainly closer than I ever thought I would be... a day I'll never forget.
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