The War Room

6AM TO THE GRANITE BREWERY

My lovely wife and I got up at 6:00 am this morning to go and see Stephen Harper give a speech at the Granite Brewery on the corner of Eglinton and Mount Pleasant in Toronto.

I have never been to one of these types of events before and had no idea what to expect. In a word, what we got was...

...excitement.

People were up early to hear him speak. Stephen was very charismatic and energetic and the room was packed to the gills. Right in the heart of downtown Toronto. We had heard from another person there (but I cannot confirm) that the location had been booked a while ago and they had no idea this many people would show up. We also spoke to some very enthused Conservatives and it was a pleasure to see so many people there of every ethnicity, age and gender. It was a diverse crowd in the best sense.

It was also interesting to see all of the 'media people' in person that you usually see/read on TV/print all of the time.

Most seemed very down to earth, cordial and not terribly happy to be up this early in the morning. The only ones who seemed to have a visible 'attitude' of superiority were...

wait for it...

...CityTV's Adam Vaughn and some other reporter from the same outlet who looked like she belonged on Much Music introducing Eminem video's instead. The elitism and obvious bias from that crew just ooozesss form every pore.

At one point, Vaughn walked past a nice man who was a Harper supporter who recognized him. Vaughn just walked past him, mumbled something and rolled his eyes in obvious contempt. I guess he didn't like the fact that the 'plebes' might be getting their leader in.

Harper for his part was stellar and the excitement in the room was palpable. We also met Peter Kent, who is wonderfully articulate and our own candidate Peter Coy, who was very humble and sincere.

We wish them all the best on Monday. I encourage any of you to make the effort to go out and show these people your support.

posted by Nicol DuMoulin @ 9:27 PM