Tales From the Trail

TW: For political junkies some of the campaign reporters relate their favorite campaign anecdotes from 2008

From Daily Beast:
"[Robert Draper GQ] I felt especially privileged to be with McCain, his son Jimmy, Mark Salter, three soon-to-depart McCain staffers, and two other reporters at a Springfield, Vermont pub one evening in July of last year, just after the candidate's campaign had effectively collapsed and the press had scribbled his political obituary. Whatever else one might say about John McCain, the man is brave, and his fortitude was on display that night as he talked about Hemingway, Faulkner, past girlfriends, Elizabeth Taylor, immigration--everything but quitting."

"[Rick Klein Time] On the day of the New Hampshire primary, Mr. and Mrs. Dennis Kucinich stole my nuts. Not my nuts exactly—ABC's mixed nut can, the food we'd stocked away in our filing location in Manchester. I was in the ABC workspace and looked up and saw them eating our food—not picking out a cashew or two, but taking big handfuls of mixed nuts. I caught Elizabeth Kucinich's eye, and she said, "So sorry, but we're absolutely starving." I reminded her that, a few days earlier, her husband had sued ABC to try to block our debate from going forward without him on stage. With that, Rep. Kucinich grabbed a mini-can of Pringles and walked away"

[Matt Bai NYT] "Bill Clinton was in South Carolina on Veteran's Day, and I think I was the only national reporter following him. The motorcade was making an "unscheduled stop." We came up on a military hospital, and I thought, "Of course, it's Veteran's Day. This will be really moving." But then the motorcade drove right past the hospital gates and pulled off instead at an African-American hair salon, so the former commander-in-chief could go bounding in for hugs and pictures. I thought, "You want to understand the problem with the boomers and their Democratic Party? Well, there you go."
TW: But then perhaps Obama would have done it differently

[Walter Shapiro Salon]"Last Thursday afternoon, I watched a line of more than 700 white social workers, gay librarians, African American grandmothers, young eyebrow-pierced beauticians and under-employed cellists snake all the way through the Veterans Memorial building in Columbus, Ohio, for early voting. The length of the line conjured up O’Hare Airport after a freak snowstorm on the day before Thanksgiving. But the mood of the heavily pro-Obama line was good-natured and buoyant—radiating a sense of awe at their own numbers—that reminded me of the Iowa caucuses."
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-11-03/the-boys-on-the-bus/