Today was the second day of the seminar and the first day of sight visits. David O’Connor, a special agent in the Secret Service, Cal Thomas and Bob Beckel, columnists for US Today and Marc Pachter, Director Emeritus of the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery all spoke in the morning. O’Connor talked about different aspects of the secret service and what his job entailed. The US Today columnists, both of which represented different political ideologies, spoke about the importance of putting aside the ideological differences that separate the citizens of the country into political parties aside with the intent of further developing the country and the benefit of all individuals alike. Both men had very extensive political backgrounds and I took a lot of what they were saying to heart. Beckel spoke about his participation in the civil rights movement and it had an amazing affect upon the group. Pachter gave a slide-show presentation of the presidential portraits, beginning with Washington and finishing with Clinton. I thought it was considerably boring, just my opinion. Our first site visit was to the NORML office, a lobbyist group pressing for the decriminalization and future legalization of marijuana. It was interesting to say the least. We talked about how the drug has been decriminalized in certain states and the rise of medicinal marijuana in specific states as well. I can’t say it persuaded me to change my feelings on the topic but it was very informative regardless. Tomorrow C-SPAN will be televising our seminar and later on in the evening we will be going to a reception at the US Chamber of Commerce. Should be an interesting day.
Presidential portraits boring? Good thing you are a political science major and not a history major Matt