Tex, to quote from this wonderful article by Eve Fairbanks in the New Republic on the Ron Paul Boys: "I get to Ron Paul's headquarters in Des Moines just as an army of student volunteers is surging out of the doors, yelling and clutching signs. 'This is the herd we can't contain!' one staffer laughs. ABC's Jake Tapper is taping a live segment in front of Mike Huckabee's neighboring headquarters, and it's time to make some mischief. The volunteers conform to a Washington reporter's expectations about Ron Paul youth--almost all boys, rowdy, eager to disrupt--until they don't.

"The ABC guys are clearly charmed by the volunteers' enthusiasm, but they're also worried the kids will mess up the sound for the shot. As soon as the thirty or so volunteers figure this out, they politely troop back across Locust Street, gather in a neat clump on the corner, and fall silent. When Paul fans driving by honk at the crowd, this doesn't elicit a single happy 'Woo!' from the now eerily well-behaved volunteers while the cameras are rolling. 'McCain wants Huckabee to beat Romney, Huckabee wants McCain to beat Romney...David?' Tapper is saying into the lens. Behind him, dozens of Ron Paul signs bob furiously and silently, giving the scene from the camera's perspective a ridiculous quality; I imagine it's something like watching a naval reporter talk about the positioning of two warships off-screen while, in the water behind him, dozens of frantic but polite shipwreck victims try to get the world's attention without shouting.

"These volunteers' whole idea is to get the world's attention without shouting. They're the closest thing this race has to the Deaniacs of '04: Hundreds of young volunteers, who have traveled to Iowa on their own dime to knock on doors and make pleading phone calls. But where the Deaniacs got a reputation for being revved-up and angry, the Paul guys are pacific. At Paul's headquarters, they hesitate to bash other candidates, even when I goad them. They are unfailingly courteous, holding doors and always referring to their candidate as 'Dr. Paul.' They pepper me with curious questions. ('Are the police in Washington D.C. under federal or local authority?') After the taping, when the ABC cameraman observes to nobody in particular that 'they remind me of Howard Dean's people,' several of the volunteers urge him, 'Don't say that!' as much to dissociate themselves from the Dean people's wildness as from Dean himself. 'I know you meant it as a compliment,' one especially young-looking volunteer in a pageboy cap reassures the cameraman, gently." Read the rest, and thanks to Lori Blanchard.