Utah Tea Party Article in the New York Times

[David Kirkham]

Originally Posted by m5extc

Great article David, thanks for sharing. I am impressed by the writer, though having differing opinions was able to report without name calling or anything else unproductive.

Andrei

Thanks for the kind words. I was very impressed with Matt Bai. We didn't agree on all things political, but we had a very long discussion on many topics. At no point did our discussion ever become disagreeable. He worked very hard emailing me back and forth to get the story fair and accurate. He did a great job.

Orrin called me after the article came out and started the conversation by saying, "David, I have been in Washington over 30 years and that is the first time I have ever seen the New York Times say something positive about a conservative. How did you do it?!"

I said, "Well, I 'bribed' them with our cars."

Meaning,

I had just come into the pits from giving some hot laps to friends when I noticed a man walking up to the car. (I was giving rides in the prototype billet chassis.) The brakes were hot, the slicks were gummy, the faint whiff of burnt oil was in the air. I pulled off my helmet and he introduced himself,

"Are you David Kirkham?"

"Yes"

"I'm Matt Bai, from the New York Times."

Looking beside me I saw one of our helmets on pit wall and grabbed it and handed it to Matt.

"Here, put this on."

While he was putting on the helmet, (and before he could object), I gently "maneuvered" him into the passenger seat and started strapping him in.

He looked a little bewildered as he fumbled with his chin strap. He tried to say something, but by then it was too late. I had already strapped him in. I jumped in, tightened up my belts, and put on my gloves. I turned to him then, flipping up my visor said,

"Ugh, you better hold on."

I slapped down my visor and lit the Kieth Craft 482. I slipped the Tremec into first gear and eased out the 7 inch twin-disc on the specially lightened Kirkham flywheel. We rumbled down pit lane, my chariot rearing to launch. We eagerly rolled up to the flagman, waiting until we got the green flag indicating the straight was clear. Feathering the gum balls at the edge of accelerative traction we catapulted into the straight. The prototype car handles like a dream. The Keith Craft 427 has an endless supply of torque. The tires hadn't had time to cool off so I knew they were still sticky. Life is good. We leaned hard into the straight before I stabbed the braking point at turn 1. As I heel and toed the down-shift, I could see him squirm as he grasped for anything to hold on to. (We all remember our first ride )

We drifted for 3 hot laps, then came the checkered flag. The session was over. 3 laps is about all a passenger can stand anyway. We idled back down pit lane and I cut the motor as we pulled into pit row. When he got out, he turned to me with an enormous smile and said, "That was incredible!"

When he wrote of that ride in the article, "We are not who you think we are. We are serious people with serious abilities," he was right. I had achieved my goal. I wanted him to understand they we (The Tea Party people) are the American Dream. I wanted him to understand there are many people across our beautiful land who can still build something with their own hands to make their own dreams come true--no matter what those dreams may be.

David