PHOENIX AZ: A week ago, a small group of Calgarians, including a prominent Calgary businessman and his wife, a political analyst extraordinaire with amazing contacts and yours truly, travelled to Phoenix Arizona to get a behind the scenes look at the machinations of the political campaign of Kari Lake, who is running for US Senate in the 2024 election for the Republicans. At Lake’s headquarters, we filled our SUV with road signs promoting her, as well as the Donald Trump/JD Vance presidential ticket, and travelled the length of Scottsdale AZ and other polling booths in north Phoenix, putting up our signs among many hundreds for other candidates on major thoroughfares, with the instructions from Lake’s staff (all volunteers) “put them wherever you can get the best visibility, there really are no rules.” While we calculate our group put at least two hundred signs (likely more) the highlight of our trip was attending a rally at the Scottsdale airport, featuring JD Vance, Donald Trump Jr., Kari Lake, Charlie Kirk of Turing Point USA and many local candidates. It’s here I point out this is much more than a presidential or Senate contest. There are 48 people on the ballot in Arizona including all levels of politics and bureaucracies, from the president, Arizona state governor, city councillors, sheriffs, even dog catchers. At the rally we stood in line for about half an hour to clear security and in the line behind us were two ladies from Seattle, Washington who travelled the distance to attend the rally. One lady was the mother of three, who blamed the Biden administration for severely deteriorating lifestyle conditions in Seattle, adding most of the available hotel rooms had been taken up by illegal immigrants flown to the northwest city by the Biden administration. More sadly, she said the economy was so bad and prices so high she had to forfeit her private health care, which cost US$18,000 annually, in order to feed her children and pay her rent. Once we cleared security, which was the same as you would see at any major airport, we found our seats and took in the atmosphere. On the roof of a building behind us was clearly a Secret Service agent surveying the crowd, and mingling in the crowd were very visible security agents who were very friendly, while being very attentive. The mood in the crowd was extremely upbeat and I said to my companions “we’ve gone to a rally and a family picnic has broken out.” The enthusiasm was amazing; the age groups spread across all demographics, with my political analyst friend saying he was surprised at how many young people (meaning from babes in arms to roughly 35 years old) were in attendance. “A very good sign for the Republicans,” he said. The speeches began, and while I won’t review them here, it was gratifying to finally see a group of people with conservative values and beliefs united under one cause, with none of the usual internal bickering. The general theme of the speakers was the Republicans made major mistakes in the 2022 mid-term elections when the party told its followers to not vote until election day, no doubt based on the fear of ‘ballot counting accidents (my words)’ due to advance voting. The message at the rally was 'vote soon,' even ‘vote often’, with Vance saying “go and vote 10 times, that’s you and nine friends or family members, just go vote as soon as you can.” Vance asked how many in the crowd had voted already, and political analyst, who has experience estimating crowds, said it was at least 80% who had voted. The change in tactics by the Republicans was worked well; the number of early Republican voters far out numbers early Democrat voters, another good sign for the Republicans, says my political expert. The number of polls conducted here is incredible and the results are all over the board in terms of which candidates are leading and where. The more accurate polls are those done internally by the Republicans and Democrats, the results of which are not released to the general public, but the sense is they look better for the Republicans than for the Democrats. Of course, the only poll that really matters takes place tomorrow, election day, and although the final results may not be known for a day or two, it will mark the end of the most contentious and most important election in the history of the United States and set the country in new directions, regardless of the outcome.
