Mitt Romney Leaves Race: The View From CPAC
February 7, 2008 | By Jack Yoest
Mitt Romney at the podium
Photo Credit: The Dude The ball room was packed to capacity at above-the-fire-marshal limits.
But the thousands of supporters in the room didn't know what was coming.
There is no wireless on the lower floors so they did not know from Drudge that Mitt was leaving.
Romney's speech started out as a barn-burning stump speech to the cheering, yelling crowd.
But his tone changed subtly speaking of the war. He turned a corner, did a simple setup, then he drop the bomb, stunned the crowd. He was leaving and said McCain was the best leader for our country in this time of war.
(His words, his cadence , his delivery was world-class. McCain or Huckabee would do well to hire his wordsmiths...)
Thank you (foot)notes:
We arrived on time but the room was full. The room was guarded by bouncers ushers at the entrances. So Your Business Blogger and Charmaine and some of the Penta-Posse and attachments were escorted 'round back through the press entrance, just like real Main Stream Media.
CPAC was treating bloggers right.
But the room was backed and no chairs were remained. The room-monitors commanded that all had to be in seats or leave. Print media had to sit on the floor.
Charmaine was in a businesses skirt and Your Business Blogger was in a bespoke suit, so sitting on the carpet was not our first option.
But the enforcers were not demanding that the visual-camera-media sit down -- they were manning the camera equipment.
So we simply whipped out our Handy Cam and cameras and starting filming and taking pictures. Print media had to sit, but visual got to stand.
Print guys could still plow their trade by listening.
Visual media got to stand. They (we) needed visual access.
The First Amendment trumps Fire Marshal Regulation.
See Dr. Crouse at TownHall with Pushy Pundits
Update: We understand that Mitt Romney wrote the speech.
