I didn't attend the speeches. I was more interested in walking the exhibits and talking to the folks at the booths. I was impressed with the rep from the Minutemen, as apparently they engage in humanitarian work on the border. (And for the record, I can live more easily with border watching than I can with staking out convenience stores and day laborer meeting places.) Seems some of the border crossers forget to pack a water bottle, and they've rescued several hundred of them so far. (It can happen.) I also got to talk to the young people who staffed the Brownback for President booth. I wouldn't mind supporting him, but it would help if he had a snowball's chance in hell. They can blame the mainstream media all they want, but I think a big enough "war chest" can work wonders. (Don't look at me.)
Then there was Working Families for Wal-Mart. You read right, a group that supports Wal-Mart and their contribution to the business community of small towns all over America. I saved my advocatus diaboli moment with them. I also shared with them... my dream:
Imagine, rather than taking a whole block of boarded up businesses in a town and tearing them down, leaving them up instead. You gut the interiors, turn them into a Wal-Mart, and leave the storefronts the way they are, even having some of them with separate properties, the kind this group says Wal-Mart stores have billboards for inside their own stores. The essential character of the community, the historic value of the buildings (well, more or less), all would be preserved...
Well, that was my dream. The ladies seemed mildly amused. It was a good day so far.
Like I said, I didn't attend the speeches. As a general rule, I don't care for fawning over celebrities, including standing in line with people who do. Like the ones who did it for a Kodak moment with Tom DeLay. No, I kid you not, the Tee Dee El Meister himself! Oh yeah, let's all put him on a pedestal because he got caught doing what half those guys on the Hill do and get away with. That'll show America!
I would have rather met the staff of Hot Air -- you know, Allahpundit, Bryan, Ian, See Dubya, those guys. I'm in no hurry to meet Mrs Malkin. (Sorry, hon, you're just not worth fighting the crowds over. You understand...) Of course, guess whose booth was completely deserted the whole time I was there. That's right, all that trouble and all I got was a lousy Hot Air refrigerator magnet.
Am I a "conservative?" I suppose more so than I am a liberal. I'm just not one of your button-down-golf-club-swinging-banker-lawyer-corporate-pig type conservatives. Someone once said I would have been called a "Taft conservative" back in the day. But then I read about President Taft, and now I'm not so sure. Like Pat Buchanan, I believe America is paying a dear price for trying to maintain an empire, one that we cannot maintain indefinitely. My support for the troops is not because I'm a fan of the empire. I'm a fan of the guys who leave families behind to fight on behalf of their country. In other words, I'm a fan of the Republic. It's not always the same thing. American troops, at least in modern times, have had a history of rebuilding -- schools, hospitals, providing medical care, grassroots humanitarian aid -- you can learn a lot from talking to guys who were actually there, eh? -- and a lot of other stuff you don't hear about from those hags on "The View."
I root for those guys, not the leaders who send them there while their own kids stay home and party.
But back to the Conference. I only stayed two hours, then I left. And to you guys at Hot Air, you wanna give a guy a heads-up next time? Is the Divine Mrs M too busy to have just one of her Personal Man Slaves holding down the fort? Who do you think you are, Ann Coulter???
Apparently, a stalker gets more consideration than a humble blogger like mwbh. It isn't fair! It isn't fair!!!
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