CHOICE SEATS

Biden Gives Idaho the Boot, Right in the DNC Seat

By David Frey, 8-26-08

	Colorado delegates have front-row seats for Democratic National Convention speakers. Idaho did, too, until Deleware came along.

A lot can be said in a seat. In the case of the Democratic National Convention, how close you can sit to the candidates depends on, well, how close you already are to the delegates.

Thus, the Colorado delegation gets a front-seat view of the convention, smack up against the dais. And Idaho, once set with prime seats of its own, got the shaft. Blame Biden.

Colorado delegates are “very happy” with their seat assignments, one delegate says. “They’re being very well taken care of.”

They’re good seats, no doubt about it. But they’re not the best seats. Right in front of the speaker’s podium sits the delegation from presidential candidate Barack Obama’s home state of Illinois.

Now those are good seats, just as long as you don’t fall asleep.

Off to the speaker’s right sits the delegation from Delaware, the home state for Obama’s running mate, Joe Biden. The Delaware delegation got boosted to the front when Obama named Biden his running mate. That meant that someone had to get booted to the back. That someone, it turns out, was Idaho.

Idaho, reports the National Journal in its Convention Nightly mag, previously had prime seats because its caucus-goers gave Obama his widest margin of victory on Super Tuesday. Good thing Idahoans are used to the altitude. They’re stuck up in the nosebleeds now.

Some other Western states landed some good real estate at the convention, though. The convention floor usually goes to battleground states, and the West has a few of them. There’s Nevada, New Mexico and Montana tucked in with Florida and New Hampshire, two states that are used to getting a little more respect from politicians.

Utah seems to be as out of view on the Pepsi Center map as it is on the political map. The Utah delegation is so far around the corner and up the stairs, it’s almost backstage.

Of course, Obama could have avoided the whole seating fiasco between Delaware and Idaho if he had just chosen an Idahoan as his running mate. But then, that would have meant finding a Democrat in Idaho.

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