Weekend parades

It is a time to reflect. After spending the last 4 days, walking in parades and celebrating the 4th of July, I settled in last night to reflect on the long weekend's happenings. What a great time and most of the people I met were incredible.

I had the incredible experience this past weekend of walking in 4 parades. I walked for Kenosha County Sheriff Dave Beth on Saturday in Twin Lakes and rode on a float for the Sheriff on Tuesday in Somers. It was a blast passing out sheriff stickers to the kids, nail files to the adults and throwing mountains of candy. Wow- some of those kids in Somers have enough candy to last them until Halloween.

The Sheriff's opponent, Zarletti, was at both parades. Both sides were friendly to each other, which made things alot of fun. No tension whatsoever.

I also had the priviledge of walking in two parades with Congressman Paul Ryan.

On Sunday, I walked thru the streets of Kenosha. I guess it is easy to say, the crowd was not exactly lively. The parade in Kenosha has become so regulated, that it is hard to really have any fun. The "parade police" have literally removed all of the fun from a parade. Politicians are not allowed to walk in the parade. The politicians are absolutely not allowed to get anywhere near the people and they must stay in their vehicles. They are even allowed to bring their own vehicles, they are assigned a driver and a car. Next, the volunteers walking with the politicians may not pass anything out. No candy, no Packer schedules, absolutely nothing can be handed to parade goers. The parade police were buzzing up and down the parade route making sure none of us got within 5 feet of the curb. They made it very clear, we were to have no interaction with the crowd whatsoever. These politicians are the officials that the people have elected, yet Kenosha does not want them to react with the people at all.

We were riding right behind the folks from Jelly Belly. You should have seen the look of horror on their faces when they found out they were not allowed to pass out the car load of candy that they had. It was so sad walking behind them and the kids can see the candy, but they are not allowed to have any. It was pathetic and sad to watch. Little kids were tearing up watching the candy pass right in front of their faces, but they cannot have any. How pathetic of the parade police to do this to kids?

Talk about taking all of the fun out to the parade, that is exactly what Kenosha has done. I haven't been to the Kenosha parade for a lot of years. From what I remember, they used to be alot of fun. Not anymore. I understand that kids running into the middle of the street, to get candy, is very unsafe. But isn't there something we can work out? Isn't there some way that politicians can at least walk, even if they have to stay in the middle of the road? Isn't there some way to make sure the volunteers stay right next to the curb and pass out candy and such for parade goers? That would keep the kids out of the street and safe.

Kenosha has got to lighten up. Either that or they need to just cancel the parade altogether. What is the point of having the parade, if no one is allowed to have fun?

To all the parents of the kids, next year, skip the Kenosha parade and head to the Somers parade. The kids will be thrilled with all of the candy, plus there is an ice cream social at the end of every July 4th parade. Your kids will love it- free candy and free ice cream- you can't beat that deal!

The second parade I walked in for Congressman Ryan in Racine on July 4th. Now that is whole new post in itself.

Stay tuned, to be continued......