President and Michelle Obama are welcomed to the Village of East Davenport near the site where he will speak on the evening of August 15, 2012.
President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama are visiting the Village of East Davenport (in Davenport, IA) tomorrow (Aug. 15, 2012) for a speech as he swings through the state on his custom-made black bus. It is President Obama’s 13th visit to Iowa.
Those who weren’t paying close attention to the seating chart within the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver may not have realized this, but Iowa and Illinois had the 2 most prized right-down-front positions. That is because Iowa, in its first-in-the-nation primaries “gave me a chance,” as now-President Obama has put it. He has not forgotten this salient fact, and neither have I.
At the time, I was writing for Associated Content and had made it my job to go out and attend each and every campaign rally of each party. I could tell something “big” was building on the ground, just talking to the natives. I went out on a limb and predicted that Barack Obama would carry Iowa and the next thing you know, I had at least 5 or 10 people telling me how nuts I was and how they would come back AFTER the primaries to watch me eat those words.
Workers unload large vans in preparation for President Obama’s speech, which will be given outdoors in a grassy field often used for Re-enactors and/or art fairs.
I think we all know how that played out. It was not an easy victory for President Obama, running against Bill Clinton’s wife, Hillary, our former First Lady, but he pulled it out. And the prominent place given Bill Clinton at this years DNC can only mean one thing: we may not have heard the last of Hillary as a candidate. (2016, anyone?)
No matter what your feelings towards the candidates, this is a Big Deal in our neck of the woods. River Drive is totally disrupted (summer construction) keeping traffic to the Village down. The Secret Service will block access from the Locust Street side. The tickets were given out starting at noon and the line was long.
I went over to Logomarcino’s Ice Cream Shoppe today and spoke with the employees, who informed me that they would be closed for business until after the president speaks, which is scheduled to be 5:30 p.m., which means it will be closer to 6:30 or 7 p.m. Some of the Logomarcino family have already been told that they will get to meet the president.
The photographers are busy taking pictures of OTHER photographers.
The woman who made me a chocolate soda told me of the day that candidate Barack Obama visited the RME (River Music Experience) when she was working there. “I was all dirty and holding a mop..a real mess. He came in with all these Secret Service people in business suits and came right over to me and shook my hand and said, ‘How are you?’ and asked my name. He was real. He was genuine. He got my vote right there.”
Meanwhile, at the Des Moines (IA) State Fair, Paul Ryan, who would dismantle Medicare in this Land of the Old and Home of the Geriatric Generation, was booed.
I’m just wondering if the Mittster has a dog on top of the bus he and Paul Ryan will now tour the swing states in. Hopefully, they’ll let the little fellow out once in a while, if they have a mascot with them.