Ya gotta wonder

President Obama came to town yesterday to support the Democratic candidate for Governor of the State of Oregon. Like any other metropolitan area, we are strapped for cash, and the police security for this visit ran into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Traffic on a major arterial was stalled from three to seven PM. Around ten thousand people stood in line for hours for a chance to squeeze into the convention center just to get a look at the President in the flesh.

There is a - what to call it? Glamour? Fascination? Some kind of power that goes with the office, that makes people disrupt their whole day just to glimpse someone famous at a distance. Add to that, the personal charisma of the individual. I begin to understand why a visit from the President actually DOES help a candidate in an election. It's completely illogical, but then, there is little about politics that IS logical.

President Obama is the most securely guarded president in history. We'll be paying for this visit for quite a while. They ran a decoy motorcade before they let the real one go through. Which was kind of silly because the TV was broadcasting pictures of the President chatting with local dignitaries at the same time as the mock motorcade was enroute. But everyone in that motorcade probably got hazardous duty pay anyhow.

Now I understand why he actually has to be here. It's magic. He could have done a live, closed circuit broadcast from the safety of the oval office for a hell of a lot less money, but it wouldn't have had anywhere near the same effect. One woman, who had been standing on the concrete for hours already, was interviewed about an hour before AirForce One touched down. She said,"I came to see Him when He was campaigning. He touched my hand. There's no way I would miss Him today."(you could clerly hear the capital letters in her voice.)One of the high points of her life was when some guy brushed her fingertips on his way through a crowd. I'm sure she tells everyone she talks to that "President Barak Obama touched my hand." And in doing so, she borrows a shred of his magic to brighten her own life. She feels a bit more specical because he actually touched her.

I begin to appreciate the value of the live appearance. You can go to a live concert and get the magic, or you can watch a video at home, with perfect audio and exquisite close-ups and all the comforts of your own living room. If you are interested in the quality of the entertainment, the video is far superior. But the video lacks the magic.

Man, the kittens of my imagination are going to have a lot of fun unraveling this ball of thought.