LIVE from Charlotte: Washington State’s view inside Time Warner Cable Arena

Hel­lo again from Char­lotte! We are just an hour away now from being gaveled into ses­sion here at Time Warn­er Cable Arena.

To be hon­est, this are­na feels like the keep at the cen­ter of a giant urban fortress. I had to pass through sev­er­al lay­ers of secu­ri­ty to get in here, includ­ing a maget­nome­ter and sev­er­al secu­ri­ty checkpoints.

There are rings of fences and bar­ri­cades around this place, with police sen­tinels guard­ing all of the entrances. Chop­pers are always over­head, and joint federal/state/county police motor­cades go by often. No one is allowed to get close to the are­na unless they have a prop­er­ly-issued credential.

I feel sor­ry for the peo­ple of this city who want to get close to the action out of curios­i­ty, but can’t due to the extreme­ly heavy security.

But I do have a cre­den­tial… a floor cre­den­tial, because I’m a del­e­gate for Barack Oba­ma… and here’s what the view is like from Wash­ing­ton’s corner:

We have some pret­ty incred­i­ble seats. Actu­al­ly, maybe that’s an under­state­ment. Super-incred­i­ble is more like it. It feels great to be this close to the podi­um and to the stage. To be amidst so many fel­low pro­gres­sives. Every­one is hap­py and hav­ing a good time. Lots of friend­ly greetings.

I saw Saman­tha Bee of The Dai­ly Show with Jon Stew­art out in the hall inter­view­ing a del­e­gate ear­li­er. I also passed by Radio Row and did a loop around the floor past some of the broad­cast booths. Rehearsals have been going on all after­noon, as con­ven­tion staff get ready for a big evening begin­ning at 5 PM.

I’ll check back in lat­er as we get going and the evening pro­gram starts rolling. Remem­ber, your best best for watch­ing the con­ven­tion is C‑SPAN. Fail­ing that, try the livestream, or watch on PBS, which will have the best cov­er­age of all the major net­works. Stay away from CNN — they cut away too often to talk to pun­dits. And unless you feel like tor­tur­ing your­self, don’t watch Fox.