Not everything on the trail is funny. Dying isn't funny. I mean, sure, "Weekend at Bernie's" is funny but more often than not the prospect of your life ending (especially at the young and surprisingly successful age of 27 -- hello ladies) is not one to chuckle at. So with apologies for a lack of comedy, enjoy part two.
I am going to cheat a bit and risk a bit of legal mumbo-jumbo. I posted the following back on 2/7 on the blog I got paid to write for on the trail (there's a part 2 to part 2 after it):
A few weeks ago, the Huckabee press corps was up in arms because the campaign discontinued the press plane in order to save money lost on empty seats. Ahead of Super Tuesday, the plane came back as Huckabee criss-crossed the south on his way to dominance there February 5th.
After a day of interviews in Little Rock, Arkansas, Huckabee took to the skies again this morning. He and his staff loaded into one Hawker 1000 jet and the seven members of the current traveling press corps loaded into another just like it. The flight plan took both planes from Little Rock to Teterboro Airport in New Jersey. Huckabee and his staff landed as scheduled, but something happened to the press plane while in the air.
About 10 minutes before landing, the plane rapidly descended. It took the dive so fast and for so long that, had we not been buckled in, we surely would have hovered an inch or two above our seats. We chalked it up to the speedy jet we were using and were reassured by the playful grin of one of our pilots; but apparently all was not well.
The next ten minutes were a series of dips and turns - one so sharp the thought of flipping upside-down flashed for an instant in my mind. At that point, I decided it best to stare down at the floor until we touched the ground. One of my colleagues from another news organization comments immediately after landing that she never wanted to watch a pilot land a plane again. She had watched the landing through the open door of the cockpit, and apparently it was something akin to seeing sausage being made.
"Where are we?" one passenger asked.
"Morristown Municipal Airport," our pilot shouted back.
I thought it odd that the same pilot told me we would be landing in Teterboro, just like the Governor. "We have a problem," the pilot told us. Apparently while in the air, all of the planes systems stopped working - most importantly, the ability for the computers to maintain the planes altitude. "It took both of us to keep it up," the pilot told us. The co-pilot immediately exited the aircraft, visibly shaken.
All aboard were on the ground and safe, albeit a bit shaken. The airport supplied a shuttle and we were able to get to New
York City where Governor Huckabee is taping interviews for talk shows today.
Yup, we risked our lives to cover the good Governor's appearance on "Tyra." The man in the Klatu Barata Nikto silver suit seemed a bit much as we exited that plane, but precaution is precaution. The bottom line was we were all safe though and the experience was much worse as it sunk in than it was as it happened.
Flash forward a mere three days. Still a bit skittish from our ordeal, we were back in the comfort of our 30 seat Dornier jet, a mainstay of the trail. Huckabee was campaigning throughout Virginia ahead of the Potomac primary two days later. It was a windy day -- so windy that Hillary Clinton canceled her appearances in Virginia because she didn't want to risk the flights. That same day in that same state the Huckabee campaign, desperate for votes decided to take our lives in their hands and fly -- twice -- in the dangerous winds. Imagine the most terrifying roller coaster you've ever been on. Now imagine the entire thing suspended 14,000 feet in the air. It's been well over a month and I'm still bitter about the whole thing. God forbid we drive the two hours (we had six hours to get to the event) and save us from at least one of the death flights. This was a theme of the campaign all too often: take the longest, most inconvenient, most circuitous route to your goal. Perhaps that's something to examine in the post-mortem.
The rest of our time on the road some of us referred to the campaign as the Buddy Holly campaign -- ironic too that back in October the Governor and his band played the Surf Ballroom in Clear lake, Iowa; site of Holly's last concert before his plane would crash early the next morning killing him, Richie Valens and the Big Bopper.
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Thursday, March 06, 2008
"The Trail" part 1
As you can well see, I have been neglecting this blog for quite some time now. Working on the road for three months tends to change your routine and being paid to know the every move a Presidential candidate means when you're not working you're sleeping, eating or drinking your face off with fellow reporters or (when you're lucky) staffers. It's the same reason, despite the urging from every friend and colleague to keep a journal, that no such document now exists.
Cut to today -- I was trying to make a dent in the mountain of expenses I have accumulated (living on an expense account is amazing, coming home and actually paying for food fucking blows) and I was reliving some moments from the trail via receipts. It's not a half bad way to rekindle the experience but it may prove more beneficial to spend the next few posts sharing anecdotes for digital prosperity.
I told a co-worker today that the experience was life altering. At first she bristled and looked at me like I was Sarah Bernhardt. But then I explained; you spend three months living in hotels and all but forsaking the life you've built. Sure, it's temporary. The best (or worst depending on your point of view) case scenario was one in which "the road" lasted about a year -- so there was always a solid "out." You can't help, however, to be changed by the experience. If nothing else I saw parts of this country I would have never had any reason to see. From bigger cities (why the hell would I ever go to Grand Rapids, Michigan?) to small towns (Garden City, Kansas anyone? -- it smells like cow shit when you get off the plane).
The days were often long and there are plenty of places I want to go back to, if only to make sure there is more to them then the inside of a Marriott Courtyard hotel room, but as Stewie says in my favorite Family Guy scene, the "main character is richer for the experience."
Enough with the preamble -- here now, part one of some undetermined number of posts on "the trail"
"You Know You're in the South When..."
My first week on the rail, way back in December, I was traveling more or less solo. The campaign was not yet providing transportation so I was flying commercial and renting cars everywhere I went. I had flown into Little Rock while the Governor took a day to do media. He had no campaign events scheduled but because the Wayne Dumondd question was coming up again I needed to be there in case there was a presser.
Thanks to a lack of knowledge of Little Rock and the asinine practices of our bean counters, I ended up way outside of town on a desolate stretch of highway in a Marriott Courtyard (number 1 of too many to count), my only friends a Best Buy and a Taco Bell I'm still regretting. But that's not the story...
As I was leaving Little Rock for some other destination (see, I should have kept a journal) I overheard two conversations that told me right where I was. I'm not trying to paint the south, or Arkansas as simple or unrefined -- it's simply an observation of cultural differences that I eventually came to truly appreciate.
First, as I was checking in at the counter, another passenger was arguing with the woman at the baggage screening machine,
Passenger: "it's not like it's loaded. What do you mean I can't bring the gun on the plane?"
TSA Agent: "you cannot bring a gun into the cabin sir and the ammo must be in a separate bag."
Passenger: "well that's silly"
No sir, it's not -- unless your job title rhymes with "poo-ess farshall" I don't want you bringing guns...AND LIVE AMMO on my plane please and thank you.
Then (story's almost done guys, hang in there) as I waited at the gate I overheard a very pleasant woman of about 50 bragging about her grand kids. It sounded like a typical doting grandma, and one with a good head on her shoulders -- the same could not be said for her daughter and son-in-law, "My daughter has 4 boys" she said, "all named Tim. She's pregnant ya know and I said to her, 'honey, please don't name this one Tim!"
Priceless
Cut to today -- I was trying to make a dent in the mountain of expenses I have accumulated (living on an expense account is amazing, coming home and actually paying for food fucking blows) and I was reliving some moments from the trail via receipts. It's not a half bad way to rekindle the experience but it may prove more beneficial to spend the next few posts sharing anecdotes for digital prosperity.
I told a co-worker today that the experience was life altering. At first she bristled and looked at me like I was Sarah Bernhardt. But then I explained; you spend three months living in hotels and all but forsaking the life you've built. Sure, it's temporary. The best (or worst depending on your point of view) case scenario was one in which "the road" lasted about a year -- so there was always a solid "out." You can't help, however, to be changed by the experience. If nothing else I saw parts of this country I would have never had any reason to see. From bigger cities (why the hell would I ever go to Grand Rapids, Michigan?) to small towns (Garden City, Kansas anyone? -- it smells like cow shit when you get off the plane).
The days were often long and there are plenty of places I want to go back to, if only to make sure there is more to them then the inside of a Marriott Courtyard hotel room, but as Stewie says in my favorite Family Guy scene, the "main character is richer for the experience."
Enough with the preamble -- here now, part one of some undetermined number of posts on "the trail"
"You Know You're in the South When..."
My first week on the rail, way back in December, I was traveling more or less solo. The campaign was not yet providing transportation so I was flying commercial and renting cars everywhere I went. I had flown into Little Rock while the Governor took a day to do media. He had no campaign events scheduled but because the Wayne Dumondd question was coming up again I needed to be there in case there was a presser.
Thanks to a lack of knowledge of Little Rock and the asinine practices of our bean counters, I ended up way outside of town on a desolate stretch of highway in a Marriott Courtyard (number 1 of too many to count), my only friends a Best Buy and a Taco Bell I'm still regretting. But that's not the story...
As I was leaving Little Rock for some other destination (see, I should have kept a journal) I overheard two conversations that told me right where I was. I'm not trying to paint the south, or Arkansas as simple or unrefined -- it's simply an observation of cultural differences that I eventually came to truly appreciate.
First, as I was checking in at the counter, another passenger was arguing with the woman at the baggage screening machine,
Passenger: "it's not like it's loaded. What do you mean I can't bring the gun on the plane?"
TSA Agent: "you cannot bring a gun into the cabin sir and the ammo must be in a separate bag."
Passenger: "well that's silly"
No sir, it's not -- unless your job title rhymes with "poo-ess farshall" I don't want you bringing guns...AND LIVE AMMO on my plane please and thank you.
Then (story's almost done guys, hang in there) as I waited at the gate I overheard a very pleasant woman of about 50 bragging about her grand kids. It sounded like a typical doting grandma, and one with a good head on her shoulders -- the same could not be said for her daughter and son-in-law, "My daughter has 4 boys" she said, "all named Tim. She's pregnant ya know and I said to her, 'honey, please don't name this one Tim!"
Priceless
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