I spent most of yesterday afternoon helping prepare for a rally at the hotel across the road from headquarters.

Whenever we attend an event—dinner party, play, inaugural ball, whatever—we're in awe at how everything seems to come off so well. Then we go to set up an event and feel utterly inadequate after all our plans get blown to hell at the last minute and we just have to wing it. I've started to realize that everyone is just winging it all the time. One of Senator Kennedy's staffers agrees, "especially in politics."

Look: here I am in at the service entrance to the hotel, in my thrift store sport coat with the hole in the sleeve. I'm managing to look important enough; I blend in with several people in expensive suits who get paid more than I. There is another young man, slightly older than me, in a slightly better suit, also trying to blend in with the important people. Two uniformed police officers lean against the door. We're all waiting for the call from Senator Byrd's hotel room, that he is on his way.

(The cops were important to get. Rockefeller and Byrd don't usually have police officers at a rally like this; Senator Kennedy is, understandably, a little more paranoid than the average elected representative.)

This wasn't the plan. Everyone was supposed to be here before the rally started, half an hour ago. But we've adapted quickly. When we get the call from Byrd's hotel room, this person over here will call Senator Kennedy's office and he'll be on his way. That one there will go to the green room—excuse me, holding room, as it's called in politics—and will fetch Senator Rockefeller and West Virginia Secretary of State Joe Manchin. I will continue to look important. Perhaps I will tell the sound guy we're coming. This is the new plan.

I have just taken a break to find some string cheese in the refrigerator and snack. There is a strict rule at Kerry-Edwards headquarters. If food is left in the fridge more than twenty-four hours, I eat it. That is the extent of my salary. Or it was, but the other thing I did when I got up was work out an agreement with our finance officer. After the election, I will be paid a stipend out of petty cash. Now, we have no idea how much money will be left in petty cash after the election. It could conceivably be a fair amount, enough to pay for my plane ticket home over Christmas. Or, it could be practically nothing; ten, fifteen bucks. It doesn't matter. The first question they ask when you interview for a political job is, "have you ever been paid for political work?" "How much?" is, hopefully, much farther down the list.

But we left me waiting in a parking garage. Cecil Roberts, president of the mine workers union, was filling time by giving a speech. He gives excellent speeches; they keep a crowd energized, and show how sensitive Cecil Roberts is to the needs of the working class. Someone very wise—I've forgotten who, but they're very wise—once said, "all labor leaders are sensitive to the needs of the working class. It's how they avoid belonging to it."

The new plan quickly collapsed: Senator Rockefeller and the Manchins came over early to wait in the hallway behind the stage, where the service entrance is. I went in to tell the sound guy. Joe Manchin was given the introduction by the party chairman.

Joe Manchin, soon to be elected governor of West Virginia, is a much bigger draw than the current governor, Bob Wise. Wise had given his speech very early, hopefully before anyone noticed. He cannot run again because he has chosen to emulate Bill Clinton, in both his style of governance and his personal life. Fatally, he got caught before he could rise to the ranks of Clinton or Gingrich.

I should have known this weeks ago, when I saw Wise standing at a party by himself.

Manchin is so far known as a faithful husband. His wife, Gail, is extremely popular. She remembers me each time we meet, even though it's only happened a few times, weeks apart. Neither her husband or Senator Rockefeller has managed this. Nor, I think, did the other politician I've met more than once, Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson. This the introduction the state party chairman gave Joe: "there's someone on this stage who is energetic, smart, dedicated, passionate and committed to the people of West Virginia. Unfortunately, Gail won't run. So let me introduce her better half, Joe."

And with that, Gail Manchin took the stage to give a rousing speech. Manchin gave a speech too, but he was not his wife, and so I went outside to the service entrance.

A dark SUV was parked in a shadowed corner, hideous shapes huddled around it. Senator Kennedy, of course. The cops were alert, eyes shifty. Men from the steelworkers union were lined up to shake Ted's hand. I went back inside, restless.

When I next ducked into the hallway, everyone was there: sitting in a row of chairs, two feet from me: left to right, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Senator Robert C Byrd (D-WV).



There was great confusion as well attempted to improvise an introduction for the senators, who, after a day of rallies and bus rides, were impatient to get on stage and go. I contributed to the mess, in a way I hope demonstrates my potential to someday contribute to the mess from the same high-paying, well-dressed way as the important people who had been waiting in the parking garage.

Senator Rockefeller spoke. He seems somehow to have survived twenty years in the senate without losing touch with the qualities you need to be genuinely effective in politics. I wonder how. He has also avoided becoming a distinguished speaker. A simple, solid speech that seemed to fit the solid, reliable, if not particularly interesting, impression this tall, hunched man leaves you with. I guess that's why he was trusted to be on the intelligence committee, with it's rooms where all your papers are kept in a heavy-duty safe below your desk.

Ted Kennedy spoke. I didn't really hear what he said, too busy listening for anything that sounded like "chow-dah" or "Har-vahd yahd."

Kennedy likes props.

He had a U.S. road map. "We have a president who couldn't find Osama bin Laden. He couldn't find the weapons of mass destruction. He couldn't find the flu vaccine. Well, let's make sure he can find his way back to Texas!"

He had a check. "I've been doing a little research down in Washington D.C., and it'd cost eight thousand dollars to ship the furniture from the White House to Crawford, Texas. We'll, let me just say, Mister President, this one's on me!"

He got twelve hundred people to sign "Happy Birthday to You" to Cecil Roberts.

Senator Byrd spoke. He is old; in the hallway, I saw his speech, printed in extremely large font. When he tried to highlight a section, his hand shook violently. With Strom Thurmond's not-much-lamented passing, he is now the most senior serving senator. It took him three tries to get the second word in "congressional delegation."

I said, Senator Byrd spoke. But I did not say how well he spoke. He mentioned his fifty-three years in politics; apparently all fifty-three of them have been spent honing his political skills. The crowd was on it's feet again and again. Several themes appeared, with exquisite timing and emphasis.

He talked of his wife; they have been married "sixty-seven and one half years." Standing ovation. He had told her "that he was going to be with you fine people here. She told me to tell you how wonderful you all are." Ovation. He repeatedly thanked the crowd "on behalf of my wife."

Byrd asked the crowd to elect Eric Wells, the challenger to the only incumbent Republican in West Virginia's congressional delegation. Obligatory applause. Wells' chances are, at best, iffy. He can sometimes be seen just hanging around his headquarters, or even ours. Nice enough guy.

Byrd sold him hard. Called him up for a photo-op (Wells jumped up with palpable desperation to clutch the frail old man to his chest, praying for the photos to be on the front page) and plagarized Lincoln: "Do not give us a delegation divided! Give us a delegation united!" Standing ovation.

Bryd condemned the Bush administration. "Send that dimestore cowboy back to Texas!" Standing ovation. He read a parable out of the bible. Somewhere in Corinthians. A man goes to a fig tree, and it bears no fruit. After three years, it still bears no fruit, and he chops the tree down. "Chop the tree down!" The old man is fiery as a preacher, energizing as a teamster and authoritative as a shaman. "Chop it down! Chop it down! Chop it down"

Standing ovation.

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