Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Can't you people find somewhere else to congregate?


It was one thing when the Republicans decided to come to St. Paul for four wretched days in September. At least they gave us a year's notice and it will bring some national publicity to St. Paul (or at least it would if people could stop saying it was in Minneapolis.)

But that just wasn't enough. In July, Ron Paul announced he would be holding a rally at the Target Center in Minneapolis from August 31-September 2. It's not a convention or a nomination announcement, since he isn't running for anything anymore, he's just going to "rally for the Republic" and "shake up the establishment" and "annoy the crap out of everyone with his zombie cult of pseudo-libertarian college kids (and Tucker Carlson.)"

But even that wasn't enough. Now seat-belt-fetishist Ralph Nader is coming to town on September 4 for a rally of his own at Orchestra Hall at Nicollet Mall. And why not? Traffic here doesn't suck enough as is, and it will be oh so fun getting around all the assorted gasbags, protesters and media.

But the question is why? Why do you all want to come to the Twin Cities? I can at least understand the Republican's rationale (they want to win a historically blue state and the local GOP spent buckets of money to get them here.) But Paul and Nader? Couldn't they have found some other city? Yes, we all get the symbolism of you rallying for your cause in the same metropolitan area (because Minneapolis and St. Paul are, once again, NOT the same city) as John McCain, but can't you be symbolic somewhere else? How about Philadelphia? They've got the Liberty Bell and Ben Franklin and whatnot. Or Phoenix? Hey, no better place to hit McCain than where he lives. Or Canada. Just throwing it out there.

Bottom line, and this goes for all three of you, there's really no reason to come here. Our summers are unbearably humid, our winters are ball-freezingly cold, our bridges are dangerously unstable and we're coming up on two decades without a professional sports championship of any kind. You shouldn't even want to come here.

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