'MIDNIGHT CANDIDATE' WORKS THE LATE SHIFT

Zeese Tries to Woo Voters in Wee Hours

Amid the drunken revelry of a Thursday night at the entrance to
Bushwaller's Irish Pub in Frederick, a man who wants to be Maryland's
next U.S. senator introduced himself through a haze of cigarette
smoke: "I'm the Midnight Candidate," Kevin B. Zeese said.

There was no crowd to hear his stump speech and no babies to kiss.
But a young blond woman, her earrings dangling and her shoes lighting
up with each step, did stick Zeese's campaign flier down her cleavage.

Zeese impressed at least one bargoer that night, a young man who lent
some encouragement: "I'm happy that you're doing this. I'm glad that
you are," the man said. "I know it's hard."

Hard might not be the right word.

Zeese, 50, best known for his activism to end the war on drugs and as
former executive director of the National Organization for the Reform
of Marijuana Laws, is running as the nominee for the Green,
Libertarian and Populist parties.

Zeese is on a mission to rid politics of corporate interests, to pull
the troops out of Iraq, to reform the nation's drug policy and to
require a paper record for computerized voting. He also wants to
limit U.S. support of Israel and calls the attacks on Lebanon acts of
terrorism.

But for Zeese, completing this mission could prove difficult,
especially in the modern age of American politics where money and
organization equal power. There's the staff issue: He has two
campaign aides. And there's the money issue: He had about $16,000 in
the bank as of June 30, compared with the millions that Lt. Gov.
Michael S. Steele (R) and Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin (D) have amassed.

Instead, Zeese relies on old-fashioned retail politicking. And in a
move to reach late-night workers -- or, perhaps more likely, an
effort to stand out in a crowded field of 29 candidates -- Zeese has
turned to midnight campaigning.

The itinerary that night in Frederick was full: get to the hospital
by 10:50 to catch employees switching shifts at 11; then on to the
24-hour grocery stores, a Safeway and two Giants; then the bars on
Market Street; and finally a swing through 7-Eleven and FedEx Kinko's.

The night began at Zeese's arts-and-crafts style home in Takoma Park,
which doubles as his campaign headquarters.

Down an entranceway covered with overgrown plants, up a few steps and
past blue-and-white campaign yard signs piled on the porch were about
a dozen Zeese supporters. They gathered in the living room to watch a
video of a speech Zeese gave at a D.C. restaurant.

His backers, who periodically chanted "Zeese for Peace," offered
their critiques of Zeese's performance in the collective "we," as in,
"We're not running an agitator campaign. We're running a common-sense
solution campaign."

From there, the Midnight Candidate hit the road. Zeese's light blue
Honda Civic hybrid is hard to miss -- it's perhaps the only car with
Zeese bumper stickers on the back and front bumpers.

As night fell and Zeese led a two-car caravan up Interstate 270, he
detailed his path from his boyhood in Queens, N.Y., to his candidacy
in Maryland.

He was raised in a string of apartments by his parents, a surgical
nurse and a special education teacher. A product of public schools,
Zeese planned to be a criminal defense lawyer but after law school
was drawn to legal activism and later politics.

He developed a national reputation through the 1980s and '90s as an
advocate on drug policy reform. At NORML, and later as president of
Common Sense for Drug Policy, Zeese fought against the prohibition of
marijuana and called for a public-health approach to drug control. He
has appeared on network TV talk shows and written opinion columns in
national newspapers. In 2004 he served as press secretary for Ralph
Nader's presidential campaign.

The campaign for Senate is Zeese's first as a candidate. This night,
Zeese was running late, and he knew it. He was up to 70 mph, then 80.

By the time he pulled into the staff parking lot at Frederick
Memorial Hospital, it was 10:57. Wearing khakis and a blue
button-down shirt hanging loosely over his tall, stocky frame, Zeese
approached the hospital workers.

As an icebreaker, he spoke about working an 11 p.m.-to-7 a.m. shift
as an orderly at a Queens hospital during summer breaks. But after 10
minutes, the security guards told Zeese he must leave.

So the Midnight Candidate was off to the Safeway. There, as just
about everywhere on the campaign trail, Zeese turned his attention to
the Iraq war.

Zeese is an active member and leader of several antiwar groups. He
has been campaigning with Cindy Sheehan, the activist who became a
household name when she demonstrated last summer outside President
Bush's Texas ranch.

Inside the Safeway, Zeese tried to sell a cashier, Carol Hood
Baldwin, on his candidacy. It just might have worked. After he left,
Baldwin said, "I like this.

"If he's willing to listen to me, then I'm willing to listen to him,
and we'll go from there," the 55-year-old clerk said. "We need
somebody that's going to stand here and listen to you and not blow
you off when he walks through the door."

At the Giant up the road, Zeese helped load groceries into a minivan.
Then he sauntered across the parking lot to talk with Roger and
Loretta King through the window of their car. The Kings are sick of
politicians, they said, but they took a liking to Zeese. "I didn't
see any doublespeak from him," Roger King said.

Not too long ago, Zeese fit into the traditional political system. He
said he didn't start voting for third-party candidates until 1996. In
2000, he voted by absentee ballot for Nader, then went to Michigan, a
swing state, for the final days to canvass for Vice President Al Gore (D).

"We're trained to think of the two-party state, but we need to break
away from that to save democracy," said Zeese, who repeated the
message several times that night. "If people get the hope that we can
do something, it'll be like the Berlin Wall coming down."

The strangest turn in the evening came at the bars. Zeese jumped out
of his car at Bushwaller's hoping to pick up some support. But he met
a man who blew smoke in his face, an inebriated woman who flirted
with him and another man who engaged him in a heated debate over the
Patriot Act.

"I think the bars don't work," Zeese said, deciding to skip them on
his next night of midnight campaigning, in Baltimore. "There's too
much alcohol at this time of night."

After shaking some hands at 7-Eleven and FedEx Kinko's, Zeese was done.

He slid back into his hybrid, reflecting on the night behind him and
the campaign ahead. "It'd be fun if this took off," the Midnight
Candidate said. Then he headed home.