I admit it; I’m addicted to anecdotes like these. There are a million of ’em, but I’m collecting them all.
The Washington Post’s Richard Leiby spoke this week to John Prather, a “mild-mannered math prof” at Ohio University’s Eastern Campus, who came up with a clever idea to see which campaign better tolerates dissent.
Prather’s test was simple and perfect: He’d wear a Kerry-Edwards shirt to a Bush rally and a Bush shirt to a Kerry rally, both held on the exact same day in the same state. The result was predictable and true to form for both sides: officials at Bush’s event made Prather remove the shirt and then threw him out. Officials at Kerry’s event let Prather in and didn’t say a word.
Prather…says he carried out this one-man study a couple of weeks ago, attending both rallies in one day. “It really was to satisfy my own curiosity,” Prather, 38, told us. “It’s been my opinion that George Bush has stifled dissent . . . I think John Kerry doesn’t. In neither event was I a threat to anyone.” Yet, he says, at the Bush rally, “I was tailed the whole time.”
[…]
Prather, who lives in Wheeling, W.Va., calls himself a “moderate Democrat” who voted for Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. He had a ticket to an afternoon Bush rally July 31 in Cambridge, Ohio. At the first ring of security, Prather says he was told to turn his Kerry shirt inside out. He did. At the second ring, he was told to remove the shirt. He did, then donned a soccer T-shirt. “I was in for 10 or 15 minutes,” he recalls, when security escorted him out. It was before the president arrived. “I was so far away I couldn’t have even heckled him,” Prather notes.
Fortunately, Prather received far better treatment at the Kerry event.
A few hours later, he entered the Kerry rally, in Wheeling, wearing his Bush shirt. “Nobody said anything to me. I took the Bush shirt off after it was clear no one was watching me, and put on the Kerry shirt.”
The professor realizes that this limited sample does not provide a sturdy conclusion, and offers an assignment: “I would encourage other people to carry out the experiment.”
One person that won’t be trying this experiment anytime soon is Kathryn Mead, a 55-year-old social studies teacher who is supporting John Kerry but was nevertheless anxious to see a president of the United States in person for the first time. As Taegan Goddard noted, things didn’t go well for her.
…Bush campaign staffers tore up the 55-year-old social studies teacher’s ticket and refused her admission because she sported a small sticker on her blouse that touted the Democratic ticket of John Kerry and John Edwards.
“I had my ticket and photo identification, but they would not let me in because of this sticker,” said Mead, a teacher at Traverse City West Senior High, who said she has seen Queen Elizabeth and Pope John Paul in person.
“I have never found this kind of screening anywhere in my travels around the world. I can’t imagine being denied access to hearing the president of the United States speak.”
Several people outside the campaign event tried to console Mead, who was visibly upset.
“It really is comedic,” said a man holding a Kerry/Edwards sign. “What absolute nonsense.”
Kate Stephan, chair of the Grand Traverse Republican Party, could not be reached for comment after the rally.
No, of course not.
Mead, who has taught for two decades, instead stood on the sidewalks with other John Kerry supporters, listening to Bush from behind a fence.
“I really, truly wanted to have the experience of having seen the president and hear him speak, which is very important to me as a social studies teacher,” she said. “How can anyone in the United States deny someone entry? Isn’t this a democracy?”
Well, Kathryn, it will be in 76 days…