The American Spectator

Campaign Crawlers

(Page 2 of 3)

This has got to be frustrating.

"Okay, here's a tough one. Where was George Washington's temple?"

A few moments of silence. A few states are shouted out. "Nope -- next to his eyeball!" The kids offer up some pity giggles and shake their heads. The temporary tattoos remain untouched.

Again: What is wrong with these kids? CNN equals your future. The equation is on the goddamn screen.

STILL, IT WAS NOT ENOUGH. One of the most popular stands at the CNN mini-carnival was a make-your-own-button stand. Scattered on one table were several paper circles. The top halves of these were headlined with slogans-starters like Anti, Pro and I Am, while the bottom halves were blank so each could fill in their own affirmation. Then a CNN employee would clamp the paper into a button making machine to create something wearable. Ironically enough, aside from a couple overtly political buttons -- Anti-Imperialist and Anti-Fascist, for example -- most were silly (Pro-Kissing) or insulting to the host (Anti-CNN). Few related to politics.

As I duly recorded this poetry for posterity, I saw a young woman writing in "World's Best Grandpa under one of the I Am circles. She caught me looking, and smiled sheepishly as her cheeks reddened.

"It's almost Christmas," she said with an exaggerated shrug.

Students were so caught up in their button-making most failed to notice the most interactive of the attractions, a computer which when you answered a few questions about Iraq would spit out a political cartoon representing your political outlook. I pressed the buttons, duly answering queries as to whether I felt the war was winnable or not, when I wanted troops to come home and a couple others.

"You are an Elehawk!"

An Elehawk, for the uninitiated, is a hawk with an elephant head. He wears an Evel Knievel-style helmet as he dive bombs from the heavens with rockets coming out of his nose. Not exactly a flattering portrait, but, then again, not nearly as unflattering as what UNLV students have been writing about CNN, either.

As an experiment, I entered the exact opposite answers. What came back was a cartoon Dovekey, a donkey-headed dove wearing a peace sign necklace and carrying an olive branch in his mouth. Mixed answers introduced me to Donkawk, a donkey-faced hawk brandishing a knife, strapped with bullet packs an army helmet and a crazed look on his face.

A sign warned I was "consenting to CNN's use" of my image "in its programming and the promotion thereof." I didn't want my inner Elehawk to wind up on national television. (I think of the children.)

Clearly, it was time to move on.

THE "V" OF THE YOUNG man's flowing white shirt, nascent chest hair peeking out, stretched below the sandwich board draped over his shoulders. The slogans scribbled on the apparatus matched the seventies chic of his aviator sunglasses. End the War! Redistribute the Wealth! the front read, the word LOVE and some flowers drawn in each corner for good measure. I asked him whether he had chosen a candidate to support.

"In a perfect world?" he asked. "Kucinich. Realistically, Obama."

topics:
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Television, Supreme Court, Iraq, NATO