Behind the Press Rope

9:41 pm EST, Manchester, NH, Primary Day

We’re in Manchester NH at the JW Hill Bar and Grill – right in the heart, right on Elm St. A few hours ago, we were at Rudy Giuliani’s - I’m not sure if you could call it a “victory party.” I guess it was a speech. It was interesting. Rudy Giuliani placed in 4^th and we were there with the press and they roped us off in a special area that was just for press. And he came up and made a speech and for a second there I actually thought he was going to resign, but he said “and we’re going to keep on…go to Feb 5.” So we’ll see. But that was definitely a highlight - actually seeing the candidate up close and personal was really interesting and being with the rest of the media. It felt like you were just another reporter which was just a really cool feeling. Okay, I’m signing out.

-Will Nelligan

Watching the Returns

9:39 pm EST, Manchester, NH, Primary Day

We are listening in for the latest results. So far it looks like Hillary Clinton is ahead. And John McCain is in the lead currently. We were at Rudy Giuliani’s actual victory party. He spoke for us and something that I thought was quirky or a random selection is before he came on, they were playing Life is a hwy. I thought that was an interesting musical selection for a presidential candidate. Otherwise we’re pretty wiped from our amazing political experience. That’s pretty much it.

-Libby Donovan

Done for the Day

9:38 pm EST, Manchester, NH, Primary Day

We’re done for the day and we’re exhausted but all of us definitely had a great time. It was really eye opening. Some of us became more interested in political reporting but others of us were a little worn out by it. But it was great to see a lot of professional reporters and see what went into that, especially TV reporting. We kinda found that half of it was being a good actor and looking pretty, but it was nice to see professional radio reporters too. We saw a couple people from NPR.

Overall we’ve had a great day.

-Emily LaFond

The Final Stretch Before Polls Close

5:46 pm EST, Manchester NH, Primary Day

As we are getting closer to the polls closing, we’re seeing a lot more national coverage – a lot of famous news anchors. It’s getting even more crazy. But we actually just got to interview Dennis Kucinich which was amazing. He was great. He’s great to interview. Very nice. Very short – shorter in real life. But he talked to us a lot about his policies for youth and that was really exciting for us to get to talk to another national candidate who is so accessible.

-Emily LaFond

Hanging Out in the CBS Tent in NH

3:47 EST, Manchester, NH, Primary Day

Right now we are watching some of the international and the local broadcasts covering the election results from the CBS tent. CBS has a tent where it helps out all its affiliates cover the election. We talked with a man from Poland, from PTV, which is Poland’s public access network and right now I’m watching someone from Philadelphia covering it. So people from around the world affiliated in some way internationally or locally with CBS news are setting up.

We just went to the Clinton headquarters and we met some interesting people there, but their offices were actually closed. They have a different volunteer office in a different area. Right now, we’re waiting for a couple of newscasts to go live and then we’re going to head down to see the volunteer office for Hillary Clinton.

-Will Nelligan

Phoning for McCain

2:20 EST, Manchester, NH, Primary Day

We’re outside of the Waumbec Mill Office Building - the political campaign headquarters for Senator John McCain. We just went inside and we talked to some of the people on the phone, especially the youth. I would say there were more than a dozen very dedicated youth calling people to get them to come out and vote today.

I would say more of the room was older people but there were very dedicated youth on cell phones. That was a good image.

Now we are headed for Governor Mike Huckabee’s campaign office.

-Libby Donovan

 

Creative NH Campaigning - Dogs and All!

12:58 EST Manchester, NH Primary Day

It’s a zoo down here, but it’s good to see because there are a ton of youth out and there’s a lot creative campaigning methods. There are big dogs with signs on them…and people in cars with megaphones

It’s a lot of fun and there’s tons of energy and tons of campaign buses. Also a bunch of well known people in the political world - we just saw Pat Buchanan. We also just talked to the Ambassador to Sweden who is a personal friend of Hillary Clinton who was talking about how personable she is in real life.

-Emily LaFond

Regular NH Folks on Soapboxes

12:30 EST Manchester, NH Primary Day

The Merrimack Restaurant is a really popular, really big Hungarian restaurant and there are about 100 reporters standing outside. There aren’t actually any candidates here right now. What’s going on is the reporters are literally just interviewing regular people who happen to be standing outside of the restaurant. There’s one guy who must be about 60 years old, pretty disheveled, and he’s standing there with a big Kucinich sign and about 15 reporters are standing around him from major networks interviewing him - just a regular guy. So really, not to be cheesy but “the spirit of democracy” here just talking to regular people.

And there was one citizen being interviewed and he was standing on a soapbox. Literally a soap box. Literally and figuratively.

So interesting stuff. Next we’re trying to get to some campaign headquarters. We saw Governor Richardson who is a pretty interesting guy - a little rushed, but had some interesting things to say about service and things like that.

We saw Senator Hillary Clinton briefly but she was just leaving. She was getting into a car and lots of people were beeping and screaming - positive and negative things. We’ll see what happens…

-Will Nelligan

Joining the Media Circus in New Hampshire

12:22 EST Manchester, NH Primary Day

We’re in Manchester! We’re eating lunch right now and we’re just doing the first blog.

It’s a media circus down here. We’re down by the Merrimack Restaurant. It’s just crazy there’s just media everywhere.

We saw Governor Bill Richardson and we actually got an interview with him. We saw a star from Desperate Housewives who was campaigning for Edwards.

To get ready for this trip, I made flash cards of each presidential candidate, their status in Iowa, their party relation and their name and picture.

-Libby Donovan

 

Youth Empowered By Brower

San Francisco, Wednesday, October 24-

At the press conference for the Brower Youth Award 2007 recipients, there were only a few other people in the attendance. But right away I recognized Lesley Nagy from Your Green Life, the 90-second eco-news segment on Your TV20. That was probably the closest I’d ever been to a celebrity…that is, until I saw Q’Orianka Kilcher, the star of the movie The New World opposite big names like Colin Farrell and Christian Bale. One of the five recipients of the environmental award, she didn’t try to stand out or get special treatment. In fact, the one recipient that did stand out to me was a non-celebrity from the Bay Area. Twenty-one year old Rachel Barge, a student at University of California, Berkeley, crafted and passed The Green Initiative Fund, a fee of $5 per student per semester to go towards campus sustainability projects. What struck me about her was the simplicity and practicality of her program. As a member of the Environmental Club at my high school, I hoped that attending the press conference would inspire some ideas I could apply to my own life and school. Rachel’s ideas did just that, so when we started the personal interviews, I went right for her. After talking to her, I realized how easy she made being green sound.

Next I talked to Jon Warnow, a techie responsible for the creation of Step it Up 2007, a website that coordinated over 1,400 rallies across the country for a National Day of Climate Action. The interview was going well, until my relative newbie-ity took hold of the interview. Or, should I say, took hold of the mic. I engaged in a mic-holding war with the interviewee, as I asked my question and held the mic up to Jon, he suddenly took hold of it like a fat kid takes hold of a cupcake. In my timidity, I surrendered the mic and let him hold it through all of his responses, only to be admonished later by my nameless superiors.

Last, I interviewed Erica Fernandez, a southern Californian who stood up against a 36-inch pipeline that was to be routed through low-income neighborhoods, schools, and businesses in Oxnard and Malibu with a testimonial at the California State Lands Commission. While interviewing her, I found myself asking a lot of questions about how she dealt with adults in positions of power who were the determining factor in whether her project could move forward.

Now, when I’ve tried to call the attention of adults to issues that are important to me, even if it’s as simple as getting my parents to understand recycling and organic waste at home, I’ve encountered a lot of setbacks. Because we are the generation that has been confronted face-to-face with global warming and other environmental crises, previous generations seem lacking in their passion for conservation. Or maybe they’re not lacking, but rather, we are brimming with activism and a call for change. If I gained one thing from attending the event, it’s reassurance that there are other young people out there who are passionate about the environment.

~Caitlin Grey