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We locked up our bikes on the waterfront at about 1, I would guess. I thought at that point that we wouldn't end up getting in, just because of the massive number of people, but we had no problem at all. The organization was shockingly good, tons of volunteers. I went just for the spectacle, and I got what I was looking for. I did pump my fist in the air and scream when he dropped the line about bike lanes and funding mass transit... I hope he remembers PDX when he is sitting in the Oval Office.
I showed up with a few friends around 12:00 and got through the gates just a few minutes before he spoke. I was right up against the second divider that you can see in some of those crowd pictures. There have been some rather unfortunate remarks on blogs about how 75,000 people is our entire population, how we're the most liberal state in the nation so our opinion doesn't matter (how could we be considered a swing state in that case?). I think this really says a lot about the excitement Barack draws, and also how much Portlanders care to be involved in causes that matter to them. Now if only I could get these massive sunburns I earned in that crowd to subside.