The Intersection of Ron Paul and TGI Fridays

MANCHESTER, N.H., Jan. 5, 2008— -- For all the speculation this election season over exactly who Ron Paul's supporters are, for once there was no question.

At the busy intersection of Rt. 28 and the Mall of New Hampshire entrance, between roaring six-lane traffic and the glittering retail mecca, the libertarian Republican presidential candidate's eclectic ground soldiers staged a makeshift battleground, waving signs and and playing chicken with the oncoming traffic ... all in the name of the man sometimes known as Dr. No.

The effort organized by Operation Live Free or Die brought out about 40 of them in all. That number might not seem like a lot, until you consider what 40-some hand-held Ron Paul signs look like waving furiously on the snow-banked medians of a crowded intersection when all the other candidates' signs are static, planted firmly into the snow.

At first glance, it's something of a metaphor for the Texas congressman's presidential campaign, long-characterized by a frenzied political fever online that took the other candidates and the country by surprise.

As fluid as the waving movement of the signs may seem, the choice of this intersection for a show of support was a calculated decision.

"We went to city hall and and got the maps out and figured out which parts were public property," said 27-year-old Jay Nevin, who quit his job as a computer trouble-shooter in Oklahoma to come canvass for the Paul campaign in New Hampshire. "We just saw this was the highest traffic area and we could hit a lot of people in a short amount of time."

Undaunted by Paul's performance at the Iowa Republican caucuses, where the Texas congressman finished in fifth place with 10 percent, his followers have descended on New Hampshire, living in groups in rented homes across the state for weeks if not months.

"Each house has a house captain and that house captain is responsible for making sure that their people are organizing the mornings, going out and have all the materials they need," said Roxi Cullinson, an organizer from Operation Live Free or Die. She, like Nevin, left her job around Thanksgiving to join the Paul movement in New Hampshire.