Day 293: First Meeting Success!

 

October 20th, 2011My busy week continued with a long string of events today ultimately culminating in what I would say is a very successful FIRST meeting for UCSD Students for Ron Paul. Things got off to a bad start though as I woke up at 9:10 in the morning, ran to the restroom to brush my teeth and get ready, ran to the bus stop, and then ran to HSS after getting off at Mandeville. Through my powerful running abilities I was able to get to class only roughly 5 minutes late. After class, I met up with Barrett, Amy, and Chelsia in an effort to do some group work for COGN150. After skipping lunch I proceeded to work for a short amount of time, before heading over to Geetha’s place to hear her not practice her speech in front of me. I then proceeded to library walk to table with Elizabeth, Paul, her brother, Amy, and Josh. It was pretty fun as we got into some interesting conversations with strangers (Tuesdays and Thursdays are bad in terms of the sheer number of people passing by though). I would however also encounter the only white person in my Vietnamese class who joined, but sadly did not remember me from his class. OH WELL I GUESS HE’LL REMEMBER ME NEXT MONDAY!
After tabling was done I proceeded to Geisel for an immediate rest phase in the day. When the hour approached, I proceeded to Warren Lecture Hall to meet up with Elizabeth and Phil for the setting up of our meeting. We got a box out of her locker and set up the laptop as a record 20 people came to hear us preach. We talked a bit about our mission, gave out some free pizza and drinks, and then passed out posters for them to make. The results are as follows in my picture of the day: success! I especially like the “people who are bad at crafts support ron paul”. YEEEEE. I went home, quickly showered, quickly made fried rice, quickly ate it, quickly charged my phone, quickly washed the dishes, and quickly got ready to bus to AMC. I ended up walking, meeting up with Geetha and Rashika, and ultimately we decided to see the midnight premiere of Paranormal Activity 3. It was a pretty good movie as I was thoroughly entertained throughout most of it.

On October 20, 1947, the notorious Red Scare kicks into high gear in Washington, as a Congressional committee begins investigating Communist influence in one of the world’s richest and most glamorous communities: Hollywood. After World War II, the Cold War began to heat up between the world’s two superpowers—the United States and the communist-controlled Soviet Union. In Washington, conservative watchdogs worked to out communists in government before setting their sights on alleged “Reds” in the famously liberal movie industry. In an investigation that began in October 1947, the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) grilled a number of prominent witnesses, asking bluntly “Are you or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?” Whether out of patriotism or fear, some witnesses—including director Elia Kazan, actors Gary Cooper and Robert Taylor and studio honchos Walt Disney and Jack Warner—gave the committee names of colleagues they suspected of being communists. The communist threat was largely overbloated.

Classes won’t be back in session at McKinley High until November 1 (thanks a lot, baseball), but we’re already getting our first look at transfer student Rory, whom you may also know as “Glee Project” winner Damian McGinty. Hopefully he’s a likeable character…

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