I'm recovering from a long day in Orange County yesterday. Driving down there from Los Angeles yesterday with my friend Jennifer, we both commented on how rare we ever spend time in the "orange curtain." It takes something special to get us Angelinos to the OC, but to be honest we were also a bit skeptical about the "APIA Presidential Town Hall," by APIA Vote, because there are 2 important primary elections coming up on Tuesday making this weekend a critical GOTV weekend. So we were pretty sure that none of the candidates would make a personal appearance, but we were looking forward to seeing old friends and meeting new people. Plus, there was a "Unity" event scheduled later that evening at a local lounge, to bring together AAPI's supporting Clinton and Obama. Yes folks, we need to unify in time for the November general election... for Obama! That's right, I said it :)
The event exceeded my expectations. It was a hot day, so it was nice to finally get let into the Bren Center. In the lobby there were 3 tables. The Hillary supporters were already there with all their chum - a huge pile of signs for people to wave inside the venue, stickers, and buttons. Next to the table were 2 empty tables - the one in the middle was reserved for McCain, and the 3rd table was for Obama. No one was there set up to table! By now, Jennifer and I had reunited with grassroots campaign buddies Emily and Michelle. I called Van from the campaign to see if he was bringing stuff and to check to see where he was. He was, in true So Cal fashion, stuck in traffic, but said he only had some AAPI for Obama literature. So in the spirit of grassroots campaigning, Jennifer took charge and said, "Let's go. We're at the table!" Michelle came over and told us she still had some stuff from February in her trunk. Next thing you knew, we had some campaign signs for the front of the table, flyers, and a handful of stickers... and most importantly sign up sheets for new volunteers! Our friend Steve showed up next and had a big home made "Obama '08" banner and about 15-20 HOPE posters. Van showed up with some more AAPI for Obama flyers in different languages, and explained that everything else had been sent on to Oregon and Kentucky. In the end we looked alright, and we had tons of people come over to our table signing up to help with the general campaign! Even KABA MODERN from MTV's America's Best Dance Crew came by, and took a picture with Steve's banner...
