Neff: Convention Fever

by Lisa Neff

I’m a sports buff and can remember coming down with Olympics fever as early as 1972, at age 8.

This summer, however, I didn’t catch the bug. In fact, I boycotted the Olympic games in Beijing, though I don’t think the president of the People’s Republic is aware of my protest against his country’s human rights record.

I do feel a fever coming on for another event that comes around every four years — the Democratic National Convention taking place this week in Denver, where an advisory for reporters last week cautioned, “Stay hydrated: Remember, Denver is the ‘Mile High City.’”

I covered my first national convention in 1996 in my former hometown, Chicago.

Attending was like a dream come true. There was the GLBT fundraiser where I eavesdropped on U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., sharing a light-hearted conversation with Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala. There were the fiery speeches by the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Bill Clinton, who was seeking his second nomination. There were celebrities wooing politicians and politicians wooing celebrities — and everyone wooing delegates. There was the somewhat bawdy but rocking Aretha Franklin concert in Grant Park and the luxurious invitation-only bash on Navy Pier.

In 2004, I headed for Boston for the national convention — more around-the-clock parties and forums, big speeches and light moments, politicized celebrities and celebrated politicians.

This year, I’m joining the vast majority observing the convention from an armchair in my living room or desk chair in my office.

I’ll be watching and listening and reading to see how the party plans to bring home a victory in November. I didn’t see Michael Phelps swim a single race in China, but I’ll be watching Michelle Obama and Nancy Pelosi on Monday, Hillary Clinton on Tuesday, Bill Clinton and Richard Daley on Wednesday and Barack Obama on Thursday.

Gold medals aren’t at stake.

The potential prize at the finish is a Democratic president and a Democratic Congress, the team needed to lift the ban against gays serving openly in the military, promote equal benefits for same-sex couples, pass legislation banning workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity and further hate crimes laws.

I came into 2008 an ardent supporter of Hillary Clinton’s campaign for president — and I remain a supporter still saddened by her primary loss.

But I know, today, that I can’t boycott this election as I boycotted the Olympic Games in China — my vote is too valuable, the stakes are too high.

And I don’t want to skip the convention coverage of openly gay U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin speaking on Tuesday, the GLBT caucus gatherings, the Human Rights Campaign Rock to Win concert with Melissa Etheridge and Rufus Wainwright, the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund lunch, the Stonewall Democrats LGBT and Labor gathering.

For much of this long summer, party leaders have called for party unity, reminding me of something Jesse Jackson told the national convention in 1996:

“The last time we gathered in Chicago, high winds ripped our tent apart. We could not bridge the gap. We lost to Nixon by the margin of our despair.

In 1968, the tension within our party was over warfare.

In 1996, it’s welfare.

… We must find the bridge, keep our tent intact.”

Jackson will not headline at this week’s convention, but others will repeat his message. The tent is not ripped apart, yet tension exists — we are a team with like dreams and hopes, but divided allegiances and hurt hearts.

I, for one, am coming off the injured list. I’m reminded again of the words in a Jackson speech, this one delivered in Boston in 2004: “Hope cometh in the morning. In 96 days dark clouds roll away. Children can rejoice. Lady Liberty will be unmasked and unshackled.… The shackles will leave her arms. She can stretch forth in all of her splendor, free of crippling civil rights and liberties. She can proclaim again, ‘Give me your tired, give me your poor, your huddled masses who yearn to breathe free,’ come November.…Keep Hope Alive.”

(end)