Democrats Want One Thing From Kamala: Victory

At the DNC, everyone understood the situation.

The Saturday before the Democratic Convention, I had drinks with a reporter who was in Chicago to embed with the protests. They’d spent days and weeks building relationships with the protesters and would be with them during the big event. The organizers had told the media they expected 30,000-40,000 protesters. But this reporter told me that privately, they’d been told to expect 100,000!

So, verily and merrily, on Sunday night, when the chants of protesters interrupted the audiobook I was pleasantly listening to in my hotel room, I raced down to Michigan Avenue to catch the gargantuan mass as it quivered and shook.

And yet, not so! Lo, the monster was not as promised. It was a kitty cat—a house one at that.

It was only a few hundred people. The voices had only reached me because of bullhorns. The police outnumbered them. Journalists might have outnumbered them too. I asked some of the cops, "Is this it?" And they sort of chuckled and said, "Yeah, it’s small."

As I walked back to my hotel, I saw one guy who had somehow ended up in a swarm of bicycle cops, laughing, "I’m just here for the DNC! I don’t want anything to do with these nuts!"

What was true on Michigan Avenue was true in the United Center: Democrats were not in the market for disruptions.