It’s official: Obama will give his convention speech at Invesco Field, the 76,000 seat stadium where the Denver Broncos play.
Upsides: Likely going to be stunning visuals. It’s a dramatic “change,” for a campaign running on that theme. Obama loves a big crowd, and this would be among his biggest; the crowd should go berserk for him. Easy to see a scenario where Democrats say to each other for years, “I was in the crowd the night that Obama spoke at Mile High Stadium…”
And the nomination would not be officially handed to Obama by Bernie Kosar. (Yes, I know it’s a different stadium… There just isn’t as infamous a play at the new stadium.)
Downsides: Potential for rain. Probably all kinds of logistics issues for the networks, needing two separate booths at the arena and the stadium, etc. Who gets the tickets to this? Do thousands of people just show up in Denver, trying to get tickets for the event? Can the city’s infrastructure keep up with an even greater influx of people? I’m thinking of the problems of getting around Atlanta during the 1996 Summer Olympics.
I cannot begin to imagine the security issues. Pardon my morbid thoughts, but God forbid somebody tries to fly a plane into the restricted airspace – an open-air stadium would make targeting the VIPs easier.
Does Obama’s running mate just get to speak in the arena the preceding night? And does Hillary get stuck in the arena?
In related news, the lake in Denver’s largest park has been overtaken by slime.