Move Over Paris, Chicago Is The New City Of Love

At least you'll always have the Olympics...

Shypixel with the real live actual Kamala Harris and not a cardboard cutout at all

I don’t know who told everyone that Chicago is unbearably hot in August, but that dude is full of shit. It’s been in the mid 70s all week, and is perfectly lovely. Maybe a touch windy at times. There is a lot going on here, as you might have heard, but I don’t really feel like writing about that yet. I’ll tell you all about my new friend, Art, who is young, and charming, and could maybe use 50 cents (would a $20 do?), and about how he wanted to know if I thought “the lady” was going to win, and he knew that Joe Biden didn’t care about poor people, later. I might also tell you about my new friend Random Italian Man, and about how we talked about the protests, and he didn’t know who the Proud Boys were, so I told him “they are the January 6th guys,” which made him spit and curse “gangsters!” and told me that if those guys gave me any trouble, that I should come and find him, and he would take care of it. Later. Instead, let’s talk about me.

The first time I saw Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama speak at the same event was at the Mansfield/Metcalf dinner in Butte, Montana, way back in the heady days of the 2008 primaries, back when we all thought you had to actually be, y’know, qualified to become President of America. I was many things in 2008, but one thing that I was not was a Democrat. George the Lesser had taught me to not be a Republican, but I felt odd and out of place among the party faithful that populate these types of events. I had wrangled an invite from the MEA-MFT because I’d done some work for them, and had never been to a political speech of any kind. Awkward.

I had expected to sit through Clinton’s speech trying to mask the burning pain in my ear holes, but she turned out to be an eloquent speaker, as you know. Very articulate. Speaking of articulate, Obama did not disappoint. The man can do words. I listened to them both as they made their cases for the nomination, but what I heard, for the very first time in my life, were the values of the Democratic Party, unfiltered, before they got twisted by rightwing talking heads (looking at you, dead Rush Limbaugh). I got to shake their hands, and followed the locals up the hill to the Dem bar, where I got to have a beer with Jon Tester, who by the way is super charismatic and friendly, and every damn person in Montana should vote for him, right now.

This is a long way of telling you that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton made me realize that I’m a Democrat, and that’s OK. Obama also made me find a certain website that was in the tank for him, you might have heard of it, it’s called Wonkette. So I guess, in way, Barry introduced me to my wife. Thanks Bambi! You all know the rest of the story, because of how I assume that you’ve read every Wonkette article ever written and are fully aware of all internet traditions.

So I Married A Commenter

OK, NOW we can talk about Chicago in 2024 instead of going down some rabbit hole in Shy’s memory.

Hillary gave us all an amazing speech on Monday, and Barack dropped the mic as only he can last night. I didn’t watch either speech in person, because of how I was stuck in the hallway and had to watch on the TVs on Monday, and got home early to watch Obama from the comfort of Wonkette Mobile HQ. Maybe I got a little emotional while listening to him talk about the 16 years between then and now. Maybe it felt a little personal to me. Or maybe it was the booze.

The infectious feelings of hope and love are alive in Chicago this week. Democrats could not have come up with a better framing than pitting joy and love and hope against the venom and hate that Republicans offered us last month. Milwaukee felt tense, like a jack-in-the-box that is about to spring. Chicago feels like the entire city just walked out of school on the last day of classes. Not one person has rolled their eyes when they saw my press pass. They want to talk, they have questions, they don’t even know that we are the enemy of the people.

Here is what it really comes down to: I feel welcome here. Insert big tent cliche, but fuck me if it isn’t true. Democrats want me, you, and everyone, to feel welcome, to feel like they belong, not just in the party, not just in Chicago, but here, in this country. They want gay people and trans people, and black, brown, and pink people to all feel like they belong and are wanted and are valued. Hell, they even have room for middle aged cis/het white guys like me. They want Art to have access to medical care and affordable housing, they want Random Italian Man to be able to love anyone he wants.

These are my people.

These are your people.

And we are a people of love.