Election Day (5 of 9): Two union bartenders.

The election watch party was in an autoworkers union hall that they had let out rent-free, and 2 older (white) women who were retired autoworkers and bartended on the side were there bartending for everyone.

(The local Democratic party had bought kegs of Miller lite, but you had to get liquor and mixed drinks yourself!)

I talked with the women a bit:

1) The one with longer (dyed) blonde hair said she couldn't stand Tommy Thompson.

"There is nothing worse than an arrogant man," she was like.  "And don't get me started on Paul Ryan."

Then, she got started on Paul Ryan, and said his staff had had her arrested several times.

"How can you go and lie to someone's face?", she asked, and she said the first time he toured her auto plant, he went down the line shaking hands, and she stepped back and put up her hands to make sure it was clear that she wouldn't shake his hand.

"He was new then," she was like, "And I was weird, but they caught on fast and wouldn't let him go there anymore for a photo op."

She then said that she shows up at his constituent meetings with records of his votes that she has a notary public put an affadavit on, and whenever he lies about a vote, she stands up and says, "Lie!", and tells everyone that he just said he supported such-and-such issue, but has actually voted against programs that help autoworkers etc.

"I do that till the staff run around and take me from the room," she was like.  "One said, 'You can't say that someone lies,' and I said, 'Fine, call it an untruth, but let's talk about his record,'", she was like.  "That didn't go over well."

She then said that at some parade recently, Ryan saw her and came up to talk and was like, "Why can't we get along?"

"Because you lie," she said she said.

She also said she had a picture of him taped up in the back of her car with the word "LIAR" above it, but she took it down since she would get into nasty conversations at stoplights.

2) The other bartender, with shorter, graying brunette hair and a common sense level voice, said that she bartends at this one bar and last night she had to put up with 2 Republicans coming in.

"I said, 'Fellows, let's not talk politics, because emotions are high right now,' but wouldn't you know it, they kept talking and talking all night and needling me.  So, when the one finished his beer, he put his bottle out for a new one, and I took it away and went to the cooler, and I came back, and - "

- and at that she took an empty bottle that she had just taken away from the counter, and slammed it down in front of me again empty with one big authoritative BAM -

"and I said, 'Here you go.'  He says, 'What are you going to do with that bottle, fight me?', and I said, 'Open your mouth again and find out.'"

At that, she looked at me, and was like, "That stopped him real good."