Good news for Kerry, but boy am I flabbergasted

[harper]

Just got off the phone with my mom. She and my dad went down to the train station in Warrensburg Missouri last night to see the Kerry/Edwards train. It was scheduled to go by at about 9:00 pm and they were hoping it would stop and the candidates would say a few words. Mom said it was about 11:00 pm before the train got to town.

Mom said there were 1,000 people there...and Sedalia Missouri, which is about 30 miles east of Warrensburg had 3,000 people. This is to stand and watch a train pass by at 11:00 at night. And these are not big towns. And in rural Missouri, a battleground state.

The local democratic chairman said the train did stop in Sedalia for 15 minutes or so, but it was 11:00 pm before it got to Warrensburg.

Mom said the train slowed down, but it was so late nobody was too surprised when it didn't stop.

Now I'm off the the Kerry/Edwards rally here in Kansas City. I'm anxious to see how many show up there.

Julie

[Maddy McCall]

1. Please take a photo!

I am dying for a photo of Kerry on the whistlestop train! I want to blow it up, print it out, and hang it on my office wall.

[jbm]

8. I'm not sure if this is what you're wanting..

It was posted on the John Kerry site and was taken last night in Sedalia.

[harper]

2. I see I should have posted this in the campaign forum,

Please feel free to move to the correct spot.

[hatrack]

3. No WAY - I grew up in Warrensburg!!!

It's about as fundamentally conservative and southern (despite its location) a town as you could imagine.

1,000 people at 11:00 at night in WARRENSBURG! COOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!!!!!!

[TychoBrahe]

4. Excellent news

I am in North Carolina, and so my fear level about the presidential election is naturally pretty high. Even though I know that we're within 5 points or so in every poll here, it seems like Bush-Cheney is an unbeatable force. I have to remind myself that the race is much tighter in many of the "battleground" states, and that it's a shoo-in for Kerry in most of the blue states.

So it is great to hear that the candidates are drawing well, and that the enthusiasm and support for John Kerry is so high.

[jbm]

5. I saw them in Sedalia!

If you're from around here then you know how convos go in these areas. As soon as someone had mentioned that there were people waiting in Warrensburg, every conversation that referenced the train being late included some sort of reference to Warrensburg as well. As in, "Man! that train sure is late!" and the reply would be "just think about them people in Warrensburg!"

If it makes the people in Warrensburg feel any better, those of us in Sedalia thought about them a lot!

[harper]

7. How true

The folks in Warrensberg were thinking of the crowd waiting in Lee's Summit. It must have been close to midnight when the train got here.

[DrWeird]

6. Are they following Harry Truman's old route?

During his campaign he canvassed the whole country by train, dozens of stops per day. People were turning out by the thousands in backwater little towns that nobody had ever heard of before.

[Gloria]

9. Since is the train that Truman made famous...I'm wondering if

they were more train fans/Missouri pride folks than Kerry supporters.........

[harper]

10. Don't think so

I don't think Bush is going to do as well in rural areas as he did in 2000. Folks aren't doing too well economically, plus it's their kids who are being shipped off to Iraq.