Here’s the view from atop the ferris wheel at the N.C. State Fair.
As we walked in to the fair (from the awful, disorganized parking, I don’t even want to start on that huge rant) I
was a little disturbed to see family after family wearing “Bush/Cheney”
stickers and even carrying B/C yard signs. Slowly a few “Kerry/Edwards”
stickers and signs appeared in the stream of fairgoers. Finally we reached some equilibruim at about 65% B/C and 35% K/E – this is out of the 10% of people at the fair who were wearing their votes on their sleeves.
Eventually we found the tables that were the source of
the propaganda. They were on opposite sides of the huge agricultural
display hall. Near the Democratic Party table there was a steady stream of people picking up materials. I slapped on a K/E sticker next to my “Stand up for Choice” stickers. There was even a state supreme court judge there who personally asked us for our votes. I will definitely vote for her if I can remember her name… In contrast, there was a serious throng over at the Republican Party table. Fortunately, none of them seemed to be at all interested in the Right to Life table across the isle.
So after ogling some of the biggest vegetables I have ever seen (including a 700-pound pumpkin) we left the ag hall and I reviewed the many reasons not to feel bad about this disparity in activity at the party tables. NC is expected to vote Republican, so of course you’d see more of that… the state fair is hardly a representative sample of voters… etc. But the real saving grace came to us in the “Village of Yesteryear,” where artisans wear faux colonial garb and display their mad skillz on the lathe (or their weapon of choice).
As I was perusing some jewelery, I thought the craftsman was joking when he asked “so do you know who you’re voting for this year or hevn’t you decided yet?” My clever, sarcastic response was lost on him as he was actually talking to the lady running the booth next to him. She was noncomittal, so he continued: “I voted for Bush last time, I never vote for Democrats, but I just can’t support him this year. Kerry’s very liberal, I wish they had picked someone less liberal.” I almost interrupted him at this point. I’m glad I didn’t. He went on: “Bush is arrogrant, and he’s being advised by arrogant people.” And then he said something about how the President in stubbornly going in the wrong direction, I can’t remember exactly.
Although I was certainly disappointed in the gentleman’s poor customer service skills, I was actually quite glad to be ignored by him and to listen to this very honest statement from a genuine conservative voter. Let’s hope more Republicans come to their senses and rediscover their consciences like he did.
Just in case you’re thinking about hitting the fair, I can tell you that even though the company running it is new this year (an interesting story in it’s own right), nothing there appears to have changed in the past 20 years. Except there are a few more vegetarian options, and fried Twinkies. (I had one. Disgusting and delicious!)