mtpolitics.net

A Great Disturbance in the Force

If you felt a great disturbance in the force, as if a million voices cried out in horror and were suddenly silenced, it’s probably because I made not only the front page at Left in the West today, but also was quoted approvingly at The Daily Kos. And pictured, pictured at both places.

The reason (in case you can’t bring yourself to go to either link) is that there are a couple of guys from dKos who are making a documentary called “Crashing the States,” and following some candidates around and interviewing bloggers.

Shane had invited them to spend a couple of nights with him so that they could attend the senatorial debate in Great Falls. He emailed me, asking if I wouldn’t mind visiting with these guys on film.

I won’t kid you — I was jest a tad leery about the whole thing. Me? With some of the Krazy Kos Kids? I figured I’d probably end up either on the cutting room floor, or crazily misquoted to make me look like an utter kook. I imagined saying something like this: “Jon Tester is a candidate for Senate. I know that he eats the food he grows and loves babies,” and finding it quoted like this:

Montana conservative Craig Sprout says, “Jon Tester . . . eats . . . babies.

Gary and Dante are very genuine guys, though, and we had a good conversation. Most of it will probably end up on the cutting room floor; more the better for you, I imagine.

We filmed at the General Mercantile downtown, and it was a hoot and a comedy of errors. Dante and Gary, along with Andy, the senior camera dude, have been on the road for quite a while, and it shows. We’d been in there for 1/2 hour or so, getting set up and all the proper permissions tracked down, and we were just getting ready to roll when one of the employees turned up the music. Well, that threw the sound out of whack, so Gary had to go ask them to turn it off. So, they turned it down, and he had to go ask again. As it turns out, you have to be very careful when filming stuff like that, as you can run into copyright trouble. Who knew? Certainly not me.

In short, it was a fun and animated conversation, and hopefully the slip-ups (Freudian and otherwise) will be kindly edited. If not, it was still fun, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat.