Ferndale Street Festival - The Obama Effect

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Saturday was the 5th annual Ferndale Street Festival, a day when Main St. in downtown Ferndale is closed off and the city celebrates being the lovely little city that it is.

As usual, We (42nd Legislative District Democrats) had a booth at the festival. I was really impressive with how many happy Festival goers took the time to stopped for a minute or two and talk Democratic politics. It seems that Change really is in the wind.

Many folks stopped to ask, "what do you think about Obama picking Joe Biden as a running mate?" Most said they liked the idea of Biden for VP and were tickled to see we already had Obama/Biden campaign buttons (thanks to Jim the button-man).

A lot of young couples, with babies in strollers and pre-schools in tow, stopped for bumper stickers and buttons and to tell us how excited they were about the up coming election.

An interesting difference this year was the large number of average looking middle aged, middle-class white guys who paused a few feet away, looked over the booth and then gave us a nod and a thumbs up before walking on.

While taking a break from manning the booth I went to the Farmer's Market up on the River Walk. As I shot the breeze with one of the local farms, I noticed that a great many of the shoppers strolling by were wearing Obama campaign buttons. By contrast, during my time at the Farmer's Market, I saw only one person wearing a Republican campaign sticker.

The local Republicans also had a booth at the Street Festival, their emphasis seemed to be on the Governor's race. I wonder if they have any inkling how amusingly ironic it is that they have an old fossil for a Presidential candidate and a Gubernatorial candidate named Dino.

Near the end of the day - An elderly veteran told me after voting Republican for more years than he could count, he was going to vote Democrat this year. He said, "they've lost me, McCain's really terrible on veterans issue."