This might be an appropriate moment for that four-note trombone sitcom sound-effect: wah, wah, wah, waaaah. Today's beleaguered victims are the Barack Obama supporters who thought they'd snapped up hard-to-find tickets to watch the candidate's nomination-acceptance speech later this month, which he'll deliver, unprecedently, not in the closed confines of the convention hall but to a crowd of up to around 80,000 at Denver's Invesco Field stadium on August 28. The supporters paid $15 each for tickets to something called The American Presidential Experience at Invesco Field on August 28. But it turns out there's a couple of problems. First, the American Presidential Experience is "a nonpartisan travelling exhibit of presidential memorabilia". You don't get to see Barack Obama accept his party's nomination, but you do get to engage in all sorts of nonpartisan fun: you can "have a picture taken sitting at a desk in the [fake] Oval Office" and "climb aboard [fake] Air Force One for a ride into history." Second, the hapless ticket purchasers won't even be able to attend the American Presidential Experience exhibit on that day with the tickets they've bought: it's closed, because of Obama's acceptance speech. Ticketmaster is offering refunds. We still don't know how the campaign plans to distribute real tickets for the event: they're reportedly trying to figure out a way to stop them being sold on eBay. (The Catholic Church solved this problem with the Pope's visit in April by suggesting that selling the tickets would be a sin.)
Bonus and somehow troubling piece of information: the American Presidential Experience features a "White House Touching Facade", in which you can "reach through openings and guess what the item is on the other side."
