I'm not quite sure whether I was supposed to have taken this picture or not (actually, I think it's the latter), but nobody's on stage or anything so whatever. In any case, I was at the debate on Tuesday - and these are the things you notice when you're there but don't see on TV:
- There's a guy running the thing (always from out of view of the current live camera) who sometimes seems a lot like the guys who run bar/bat mitzvahs in the way he tries to pump up the crowd and get us to clap a lot.
- Romney and Gingrich both prayed visibly before the debate starts while the candidates were all lined up in the little area behind the CNN cubes.
- Bachmann, without fail, powerwalks onto the stage exactly five seconds before they go live at the end of a commercial break - all the other candidates have been there for a minute or so already.
- The edge of the stage has lights which point backwards at the candidates and flash various colors to tell them when their time is up.
- The debate audience was organized with Heritage/AEI people (i.e. the "intellectual conservative" establishment) sitting in the orchestra level and people affiliated with the various campaigns sitting in the balcony which extends around the hall (the candidates' spouses and close friends/advisers were in boxes at the front of the balcony). Whenever Ron Paul spoke, nobody in the orchestra seats clapped - everything came from the balcony, and most of that from those affiliated with the Paul campaign (though there was this one guy right behind me with the Huntsman campaign who clapped for Paul a few times).
- The only candidate to stay on stage for more than a minute or two after the debate was over was Ron Paul, who took a couple pictures there with, I believe, his grandchildren.
- If I'm wearing a suit and sitting in the Huntsman area, people assume I'm with the Huntsman campaign.
