He was clearly the most entertaining politician on the stump. The nine candidates had already met for several televised debates, in which Sharpton's cheerful pugnacity had made him an early audience favorite. I pictured the place, months ahead, alive with the industry of democracy. He strolled noncommittally behind Watkins through a spacious second-floor location over a big Greek restaurant off Dupont Circle, listening with his head tilted and his eyes at half mast as his campaign manager described how each space might be used, where phone banks and computers might be set up, where volunteers might stuff envelopes or unpack posters and pamphlets. Sharpton had formally announced his candidacy only weeks before, and the primary season wouldn't begin until January. At that point they were just getting started. I had met Watkins and his candidate two months earlier, on a day when they were shopping for office space. It was a hot late-summer day in Washington, D.C., and steam rose from the streets as I drove south from downtown toward Fort McNair, looking for the address given me by Frank Watkins, Sharpton's campaign manager. The Democratic primary race was well under way last year when I went looking for Al Sharpton's national campaign headquarters.

Monkey wrench we need to go deeper