Bill Gwatney was honored at the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday as part of a memorial tribute to prominent Democratic officials and political journalists who have died since the 2004 convention.

Gwatney’s photograph was displayed on video screens in the Pepsi Center during the five-minute tribute to about 50 people who have died. He was recognized alongside First Lady Lady Bird Johnson, Texas Gov. Ann Richards and broadcasters Peter Jennings and Tim Russert, among others.

Lights were dimmed in the convention hall and soft instrumental music played for the tribute. Convention-goers applauded when Gwatney’s image appeared on the video screen.

Before the “In Memoriam” segment honoring Gwatney and others, members of the Congressional Black Caucus eulogized the late Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, D-Ohio.

Tubbs Jones, 58, died from a brain hemorrhage on Aug. 20.

As Day 2 of the Democratic National Convention kicks off, a lingering question remains unanswered: Just where are the Sebastian County Democrats who came to Denver?

No one from the county or Fort Smith, the state’s second-largest city, is part of the official delegation to Denver. However, county party chairman Lee Webb said earlier this month that “a couple” Democrats from the region were headed to the Mile High City for the festivities.

Webb refused to say who they were. Arkansas delegates haven’t seen or heard from any Sebastian County residents.

In honor of Biff Henderson of the Late Show with David Letterman, who was spotted last night at the Pepsi Center, here are the top 10 possible places these unnamed Sebastian Countians could be:

10. Behind bandanas posing as anarchist protesters.

9. With the Oklahoma delegation, since their across-the-state-line neighbors have a Democratic congressman.

8. At Invesco Field to beat the crowd for Barack Obama’s Thursday night acceptance speech.

7. Hiking from the Arkansas delegation hotel to the Pepsi Center. If they left Monday, they should finally get to downtown Denver about noon Wednesday.

6. Crashing parties.

5. An hour ahead of everybody else, having forgot to move their watches back an hour for Mountain Daylight Time.

4. At Denver Broncos training camp.

3. Wandering aimlessly as they navigate the security fortress constructed around the Pepsi Center.

2. Boycotting the convention, since they’re big Coca-Cola fans.

1. Using a convention trip as a ruse so they can take a vacation somewhere else.

If Arkansas Democrats want a photo of Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., when she speaks tonight at the party’s convention, they will need good zoom lenses on their cameras.

The state’s delegation is seated in a corner of the Pepsi Center’s lower level, about as far away from the podium as any other state’s group. Maine and Oklahoma are the only states behind them.

Prime space on the convention floor went to Barack Obama’s home state, Illinois, vice presidential pick Joe Biden’s state, Delaware, and Colorado, the host state.

Arkansans like Berta Seitz of Fayetteville fondly remember a time when they weren’t banished practically to the rafters. In 1992 and 1996, the state’s delegation was front and center as Bill Clinton accepted the party’s nomination.

“Oh, yeah, that was great!” Seitz said Monday.

Ironically, the state’s support of another Clinton may be why the delegation is seated far away from the stage and why the Arkansas hotel is 20 miles away from the Pepsi Center. But Democratic officials said the hotel and seating assignments were made long before Hillary Clinton won the state’s primary with 70 percent of the vote.

Perhaps another explanation is that Arkansas isn’t considered a key “battleground” state in the race for the White House. Republican John McCain has a significant lead over Obama in the state in recent polls.

For the record, your lowly blogger trades off with two other Stephens Media reporters the company’s one assigned seat situated behind and to the right of the stage. General admission seating for media is high in the balcony of the Pepsi Center.

Arkansas Democratic Party officials still have no word about whether there will be some sort of recognition of the late Bill Gwatney during the national convention.

Gwatney, the party’s state chairman, was slain in Democratic headquarters in Little Rock on Aug. 13.

Without knowing what, if anything, convention leaders will do to remember him, Arkansas delegates are wearing special lapel pins commemorating Gwatney. They are the “official” pins of the delegation. His wife, Rebecca, serves in his place as a superdelegate to the convention.

And in the “say it ain’t so” department, two Arkansans said the delegation was discouraged from mentioning Gwatney at Sunday’s reception/party with two other delegations — Hawaii and Delaware — at the hotel the three groups share. Hawaii and Delaware delegations did not want to “dampen the mood,” said one observer who attended.

The first time I was in Denver — back in the 1990s — the most dramatic event of the week was when my father yelled at me for not knowing which direction he should turn on a busy city street.
Fast forward a decade to another busy city street Sunday, when I unwittingly got caught up between police in full riot gear and scores of bandana-clad “anarchists” blocking a downtown street.
This time it wasn’t my dad yelling. It was a cop with a super-sized baton and a tear gas canister strapped to his belt. And unlike 10 years ago, this time I paid attention.
“Get back on the sidewalk! Move back!” He told me and a handful of other onlookers who decided to gawk for a while. More and more tourists pressed to see the scene in downtown Denver’s main shopping district, leaving police to worry more about controlling hordes of sweaty journalists and folks in bermuda shorts than stopping the demonstrators.
Security is high here as hundreds of police officers roam the streets alongside war protesters, anti-abortion demonstrators and others. A five block area around the convention site, the Pepsi Center, is effectively locked down.
On Sunday, eventually, police — many of them on horseback — ordered the demonstrators to disband. They did without incident.
But it didn’t happen until an hour after the protest had shut down commuter rail service.
When the commuter rail started up again, a local hotel worker who sat next to me on the the train cried because she hadn’t been able to get home quickly after work.
“I just worked a double and all I want to do is get home,” she said. Then disgustedly added, “I’m voting for John McCain because of this.”

Barring more demonstrations or logistical woes, I hope to post to this blog from time to time this week at the Democratic National Convention and next week when Republicans gather in St. Paul, Minn.
I’ll attend as many Arkansas delegation events that I can so that Arkansans can find out what their neighbors and elected officials are doing at this quadrennial party.