So, my wife and I asked around to see who wanted to go and got a friend who last December exclaimed, "Do you really think America's going to elect a black man president? Really?" She's not racist, she just thinks the rest of the country is. But she's all excited about Obama now.

We drove from Kalamazoo to Battle Creek. Got in line at 1 p.m. (News later said some arrived at 2 a.m.) It was a small crowd then at C. O. Brown Stadium, a minor league ballpark. But it grew to 16,000, with the line going way back to the street, hopefully to where the 10 twits with the McCain signs were protesting. For comparison, George W. Bush, as president running for reelection in 2004, got 10,000.

Sun, heat, body-temp bottled water, melting power bars and nuts, sweating crowds, lack of a clear view of the podium, and waiting, waiting, waiting -- I had warned that "History isn't easy," but my people grew tired of my foreboding proclamations. And I would have liked to tell the kid next to me that sweats in such an environment make you smell like a well-used dog bed.... but such negativity just wasn't appropriate.

We got in at around 5 p.m. to stand around on the field for another three and a half hours before the warm-up acts.

I kept getting this chill (the Matthews "thrill up my leg"?) as I looked around. This is history. It's freakin' amazing. There are a lot of various peoples in south Michigan, it often seems like there is too much self-segregation of races and classes, but they were all there, packed together and sweating but happy to wait for Barack Hussain Obama. (The many hardcore Republicans of the area probably weren't there, but the local news did interview a Rep. lady who decided Obama is best for the nation.) Whites, blacks, Hispanics, Asians, hippies, seniors, farmers, workers, students. Talking and joking with each other, all upbeat despite the heat and the wait.

This is what it could be, in the utopian, idealistic vision of America. I don't think that an Obama administration will magically bring it about, but I know it would take a few steps, at the least, in the right direction, instead of continuing the leisurely Bush/McCain stroll in the wrong direction.

We then got some choir singing, pledge of allegiance taking, star spangled bannering, etc. I've never been flag-wavingly patriotic, but I've been thinking how I could be, if the country got together to form a government that works for the voters' best interests instead of yanking voters' chains and working for the "free market's" best interests. As Obama said that night, letting the nation degrade is "un-American." Hell yeah.

Then came some local politicians, followed by Senator Debbie Stabinow, and the guy trying to get to Washington from Battle Creek, <a href="http://www.markschauer.com/">Mark Schauer</a>. (<a href="http://www.markschauer.com/node/1272">Here</a> he is with the special edition Frosted Flakes box with Obama and Biden, "They're Great!" There's some wordage from the media about the box on that page, as well as more info/news reaction from the event.)

Then Joe hit the podium. Biden got a rockstar treatment (if you think Obama's pick was just a boring old Washington guy, know that many just don't have your reaction). He got on the basic themes we heard from the convention. Places like Michigan got knocked down, but we gotta get back up again. But John Sidney McCain the III won't help us get back up.

Then Obama showed up, and the place went nuts. He quieted them down, and did his thing.

Like the convention speech, it wasn't the "soaring rhetoric" that all the talking heads say he's built his early campaign on. Obama told us what's wrong, why and how we need to fix it, and that McCain isn't going to do jack because "he just doesn't get it."

I tried to capture as much of it as I could on my bulky camera's movie function. Wasn't easy holding the camera above my head and looking up at the screen to keep the guy in the white shirt targeted, but that was the only way to see the next president of the United States.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZA4SZEbLEs">Here's the best clip</a>, taken as he built up to a kick-ass ending. Kick-McCain-ass, showing his skill at <i><b>barackarate!!!</b></i> "And I am going to change our foreign policy, because I am tired of listening to folks who talk tough and act dumb!"

Our state unemployment rate is 8.5 per cent, and our auto industry is status-quoing itself into failure. Note in the above clip one of Obama's strongest moments of the night, where he compares the goal of getting alternative fuel vehicles built here in Michigan with Kennedy's goal of getting to the moon.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/EdisonForChange">Here are where all the clips will be collected.</a> As soon as I get them up. Hey, it's Labor Day. Sunny. What am I doing at this computer?