A Golden Political Opportunity

Before I get into what defines a golden political opportuinity I must point out that Pearl Jam puts on one of the most kick ass shows of all time. They are high energy, good chemistry, and well obviously have very good songs. At their August 29th performance which was a benefit for U.S. Senate candidate Jon Tester their performance kept to these standards, and the almost to capacity crowd loved it, and they also loved Jeff Ament the bass player who just happens to be a Montana kid himself. And this is just a wild guess on my part since I am not closely tied to the Tester campaign, but it looked like he raised himself quite a bit of money so it would be a safe assumption to call the benefit concert a success.

However he missed his golden opportunity. One that most politicians, especially ones from states like Montana, never seem to get. He had the Adams Center at the University of Montana filled to almost capacity, thousands of people of all backgrounds however it appeared as though the majority was comprised of young people, yet he barely mentioned his campaign when he took the stage right before Pearl Jam. Instead he said a few words about both him and Jeff Ament being from Big Sandy, and thanked them. Now I realize that everyone was amped up to see Pearl Jam, but when you have a captive audience like that you have to say something, instead he left it up to the band. Eddie Vetter later explained that those in the audience back Tester, because the band backed him which left most reasoning that if they thought Pearl Jam was cool Tester was therefore cool as well, which is not my idea of voter education.

Obviously it wouldn't have been a good idea to have Tester drone on about issues and politics right before Pearl Jam, but a quick 5 minute "this is who I am" thing would have sufficed, because the fact of the matter is that not everyone in the audience was already a Tester supporter. It was a very mixed crowd, some who were there solely for Tester, others solely for Pearl Jam, and many many others who I felt were somewhere in the middle. It is not enough to allow the "cool through association" factor to win votes, especially with young people who don't like to be tricked and have, shall I say, short attention spans.

Overall the concert was amazing, and I was happy to give $46 of my hard earned dollars to Tester's campaign. I just feel that since it was for him, he could have used the opportunity to persuade a possible voter that perhaps saw through the "well he must be cool, becuase Pearl Jam likes him, and they are cool" logic.