by Ron Cassie

Listen my children and you shall hear the midnight campaign of Kevin Zeese,
On the third of August, 2006

It may not have had the romantic poetry, as described by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, of a certain midnight ride by the famous American patriot Paul Revere, 236 years past, but Kevin Zeese, third-party candidate for U.S. Senate, was nonetheless out late Thursday evening, delivering the anti-war message to Baltimore voters.

"I'm for peace and justice," said Zeese as he greeted Giant Food employee Girard Venable in the store parking lot in Waverly at 11 p.m. "We've got to stop war in Iraq. We got to end the drug war and make treatment available. And we've got to take the tax burden off those making less than $100,000." Zeese has the endorsement of the state Green, Libertarian and Populist parties.

"Why don't you run for president?," asked Venable, who also works at the Greater Baltimore Medical Center.

Zeese, the director of Democracy Rising, an anti-war organization, and the former head of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, came up with the idea of a "midnight campaign" to reach shift workers and those working two jobs as they did last-minute food shopping.

He made five "ride" stops, beginning on Thursday at 9:30 p.m. in front of the Charles Theatre and N. Charles Street Safeway, then moved to Waverly and Canton before finally leaving the Shoppers Food Warehouse on E. Fort Avenue.

"I was happy he was here," said Nimoyia Fairley, 24, of Remington, at the Charles Village Safeway as she grabbed some diapers.

"He doesn't beat around the bush on the issues. And he's right — we've got to end this war in Iraq and stop our people from getting killed over there ... I'll vote for him."

And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Baltimore village and farm,—
A cry of defiance, and not of fear,
A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door...

Aug. 5, 2006