As I write this post I’m sitting in the Nashville airport on my way to the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. Only as a child would I have thought I would find myself attending a gather such as this since my parents were involved in Democratic Party politics during my formative years. Many of my friends and their parents found themselves in the same situation, especially if they grew up south of the Mason-Dixon line.

But I am not covering the event from a partisan perspective; instead, I will be covering it as a journalist.

Besides my parent’s political involvement, my great uncle, Jess Lanier, was the mayor of Bessemer, Alabama and also served as the chairman of his state’s delegation at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, Illinois. This is the same convention that saw multiple protests over the Vietnam War and where police roughed up a number of journalism including Dan Rather when they attempted to interview delegates who were being escorted out of the building. Hoping that doesn’t happen to me in Charlotte.

My objective will be simple:

I’ll be covering how religion and faith are presented at the convention and what themes the Democrats will highlight as they respond to last week’s Republican National Convention in Tampa. For example, some Democratic pundits accused the Republicans of a lack of diversity even through a number of the speakers were women and minorities. Admittedly, most of the delegates at the RNC gathering were white. I’m looking forward to seeing how the DNC audience looks but color aside, I bet it will be heavily weighted toward union members.

If you have any suggestions on what you would like to see covered, feel free to email me at paul.stanley@christianpost.com or follow me on Twitter @authorstanley.

The fun starts on Monday.